eastvanstories - Tumblr blog

[eastvanstories]

I was there when Street Soccer just started, in 2009. I was at Oppenheimer Park where they found me and they started a soccer program there. 

By 2010 there was a bunch of us going to Brazil to represent Canada in the Street Soccer league. We got to meet the president there and Neil Young. He's a great guy, we got to shoot the breeze. 

What was the best part of being in Brazil?

It was my birthday while we were there! It collided right in time. I just wanted to relax. So I ordered ice cream. Ice cream on Copacabana Beach that was awesome.

My hometown was totally psyched when they heard I was going to Brazil. Coming back from Brazil, the mayor thought, "oh cool". So he nominated me to represent Downtown Eastside and I got to carry the Olympic Torch 2010. I carried it from Richards passed Victory Square. That was the best, representing Downtown Eastside.

[eastvanstories]

How long have you been a part of Vancouver Street Soccer for?

3 months now. It’s something to keep you from other things. Keeps you motivated. You meet new friends.

Have you lived in Vancouver your whole life?

No, I just moved in February. I heard they had great jobs with carpentry and I just thought it would be a nice change.

I’ve met quite a number of people. Best way I’ve met people: 1) through my cousin Johnny, and 2) through street soccer.

What’s your best childhood memory?

My best childhood memory is of travelling. I’ve done a lot of travelling up and down the coast of BC. My favorite place would be the mountains. I love the mountains. You get out there and it's just amazing. You hear the kind of things you can't hear in the city. I enjoy what the mountains have got to give to everybody.

If you could give a piece of advice to encourage a big group of people, what would it be?

Give to others what you'd want to receive: respect. Give respect. I just want someone to know he respects me and I'll try to show it back.

Who do you have the most respect for? 

Women. They can do so much that men can't do.

[eastvanstories]

What inspired you to get into massage therapy?

Sometimes things happen in life and you need change. I was a stay at home mom and it broke apart and I needed to leave that situation. I needed to find a way to find my own living, and I didn’t have any real education beforehand. I went to a retreat and had a really good massage there. In my early twenties, I had some massage courses. I remembered that and thought: I was in this position that I really needed some sort of healing, some sort of touch, and I received that. And if I could give that to other people, that would be something that would make my life worth living. 

You said you have children? 

Yes, two kids. They’re half the time with me. Twelve and five. There’s good days and bad days. With my older son, I love it when I can give him a little more responsibility. He’s been very difficult and there have been a lot of difficult things. 

What’s a fond memory of you and your kids?

When we all play soccer together, there aren’t all the rules, we just play. Or when we create things together. My little guy really likes to draw together, but my older son is usually like, “uhh I don’t want to do that” but then when we’re in the middle of creating something and he comes and he adds his part into it. 

[eastvanstories]

Who’s the cake for?

It’s for my birthday. My daughter is throwing me a party. She’s been talking about it for a month. “I’m going to give you a big birthday party”. It mostly involves her inviting her cousins...but their parents are allowed to come. Both of my sisters live in East Van. 

If you could get something really awesome for your birthday, what would it be? 

I already have it. I’ve got her! 

What’s been one of the hard things of parenting?

It just changes your life completely...It makes you realize how your life before...what did you do with your time? For sure it’s really really hard. But it’s worth it. 

What’s the biggest struggle you’re facing right now?

It’s the life/work balance. Finding time to do family stuff. You work the whole week, you have two days off on your weekend, and then you do it all over again. 

How do you find peace or hope through this?

Well, you know, our daughter’s gone through some medical challenges. That’s taught us alot. Family. Focus on the important things. Remember what’s most important. Family. Good health. With health, everything else is gravy. Without good health, it doesn’t matter how much money or time you have; if you don’t have good health, everything else is affected. 

Is your daughter’s medical situation clearing up?

She had a heart transplant. She’s doing great now. But it’s not a cure, so she’s on medication for the rest of her life. So it’s one of the things you just live with.  At the end of the day, she’s doing really well and she’s just a normal kid. 

Having a kid is one thing, but having a kid with medical problems is a whole new ball of wax. 

[eastvanstories]

Next thing you know, there was a gun to my head while I was mopping.

Me and my friend were in charge of Metro Vancouver - Downtown Eastside housing... most of the places weren't a decent place to live in. But me and my friend took about 30-40 people and gave them homes so they have shelter. We tried to help them as much as we could, but the city would not let us take too many homeless. We took them in, started renovating to make it a place to live in.

One day, I was mopping the floors and I saw a shadow on the wall. Next thing you know, there was a gun to my head while I was mopping. And he said "give me your money", and I says "I don't have money here, I just work here, I don't carry money." And he's just pushing the gun to my head even harder. So I says, "Ok, I'll put the mop away."  So as I was putting the mop away, I swung backwards and stabbed him in the stomach (with the mop) and it took the wind out of him. He dropped the gun and ran. So I picked up the gun and it was a fake gun. How was I supposed to know?

[eastvanstories]

I used to like going to the park, but if I go there right now, and go to the monkey bars, I’ll just hang there. I’m not as energetic as I used to be when I was a kid.

What’s the biggest struggle you’ve faced in life?

Maintaining friends.

One thing I’ve learned in University is that friends come and go.

In highschool I thought everyone was my friend, but when everybody leaves...

No one has time to call anymore. oh my friend has something important to tell me, but she can’t tell me now, she has to tell me later because she’s busy.

What is being a good friend, to you?

Someone who is loyal, honest with you.

Can you think of when someone has been honest and encouraging with you?

It was, like, Yesterday! I was feeling really overwhelmed with homework, falling behind in this assignment and my boyfriend told me, “you’re you, you don’t give up”

What drives you to not give up?

I feel that if I don’t do it, I won’t accomplish anything.

Does anything inspire you to never give up?

“I don’t really have any inspiration, if ever I do, I forget about it.”

...

For a girl who might feel like she’s hanging on the monkey-bars of life’s playground, suspended without enough energy, I believe that she can find the inspiration of life, the perfectly honest and loyal Friend.

[eastvanstories]

“I’m yelling and screaming at kids...breaking them down and building them up.” *jokingly*

“what’s the best thing about kids?”

“I think... their child-like heart...child-like heart. Just don’t ask me what is a child-like heart.”

“What has been one of the funniest things that your kids have said?”

“Instead of belly-button, she used to call it a butt-belly.”

“What’s the best part of being a dad?”

“Just having no time to do anything. Losing my independence.” *laughs*

“When it’s going so tough with the kids, they’re tearing the house apart, how do you find peace and hope?”

“I think I just have to try to not lose my temper, I need to remove myself for some time, think about life, and then come back to Jesus and his future grace. It can be rough sometimes. It’s like climbing a mountain, different stages are tough, but you have a goal in mind and when you reach the top it’s awesome.”

“What’s easier, managing kids or criminals?”

“Easier? Criminals I think. But if they’re your kids...your kids are criminals. The most noble form of policing is being a dad.”

[eastvanstories]

“I like to take all of the pictures from all of the cameras and devices, put them together, then organize it all. I used to get really intricate details with categorizing who was in each picture. But now I’m behind since last summer. So it’s not quite a year behind, but it’s getting close.”

“So how many photos do you think you need to categorize?”

“A few thousand, perhaps, that I have to go through and organize.”

“And you’re wife takes a whole bunch of photos?”

“She takes a lot of pictures. She takes the same picture all the time, I swear, over and over. And she won’t clean ANY of them out. And I have to go through and pick the good ones out of it. The worst thing was when she discovered she could hold down the button on her camera. Like, *D-R-R-R-R* rapid-fire pictures.”

[eastvanstories]

...sometimes you turn a valve and you hear fffsssshhh and you sketch-out because it’s so in-your-head that something’s gonna, like, blow.

“The most common problem with a drain is that people think that they can just throw anything into their garborator... This one time I found 7 chopsticks down the drain...It’s a funny thing, plumbers hate water.”

“Plumbers hate water?”

“Plumbers hate water. They don’t like it. Nobody likes working with water, we’re the ones dumb enough to play with it. You hear a little bit of water go off - sometimes you turn a valve and you hear fffsssshhh and you sketch-out because it’s so in-your-head that something’s gonna, like, blow. Or spray something. Flood something. Thing one time...we had a hose and drew it into a toilet...but what happened is that the hose shot out of the toilet, because there was so much pressure, it spraying all over the person’s bathroom! So we had to run in there...the hose is going everywhere, down the hallway.”

“If you could give a piece of advice to a large group of people, what would it be?”

“Don’t flush paper towel down the toilet. And forget your garborator. Just forget about it. Don’t use it.”

[eastvanstories]

“it was just one of those experiences where God just said, "This is your nice life in East Van, but there are millions and millions of people who are suffering in the world." 

"There's a refugee family at West Coast Christian Fellowship and they lived with another refugee family in Turkey for two years. They're missing them desperately and so they started an initiative at West Coast to sponsor the refugee family that's still in Turkey."

"How did you get involved with the sponsorship, what inspired you?"

"Well I met K**** and M**** and I thought they were so delightful and just hearing about what it's like to live as Christians in Afghanistan and Turkey and it was just one of those experiences where God just said, "This is your nice life in East Van, but there are millions and millions of people who are suffering in the world." And although I may not be able to do something for all of them, I could be involved in a process that could indeed help five of them."

[eastvanstories]

"I grew up a missionary-kid. So I've traveled to South Sudan, hitting every country in southern Africa with my parents, I've lived in London, Minneapolis, now Canada for the last 6." 

"What's been your most memorable experience of sharing the love of Jesus with others?"

"On outreach in South Africa, we were just walking down the street and these four guys came up to us and they were like, "Are you guys Christian?", and we were like "Uhhh yes?!", and they just fell at our feet and started crying...it was unreal...and they said, "We can see Jesus with you guys and the light around you is just incredible. Can you pray for us?", and then they said, "Wait! Wait! We need to bring a friend". And they brought this guy in a wheelchair who had had a stroke and he couldn't move the left side of his body. So they said, "Can you pray for him? Because Jesus is with you." And so we said, "Yeah, sure." And so we're praying for this guy, and he looks up at us. We see him start to move his left hand a little bit. And then he stands up out of his wheelchair and starts running around the streets saying, "Jesus healed me! Jesus healed me! Jesus is with these guys!" And all five of them became Christian that day. It was crazy. God constantly reminds me of that as I go through struggles."

[eastvanstories]

“I'm working on a website for Jamaican dominos. Apparently playing dominos is very popular in Jamaica.” “What's the worst part of the job?”

“I think I'm going to get fat.”

“What are the perks of the job?”

“I get to work wherever. My friend has this little mouldy room in Harlem so I'm going to go live there for a while.”

[eastvanstories]

#Throwback from June 4th

“Dance for me is the best way how I can express my happiness, it is my freedom, it is different world - my world.I will never have enough. I dance even on bus stop and when I am in the bus I dance in my mind. Through dancing I have met so many amazing people and made so many friendships. Dance is the biggest part of ME, it is my life. Even when I started teach more recently, I want keep dance as my hobby and not as my job, so I will never loose passion for it.”

[eastvanstories]

“What’s one thing you like about your character?”

“I actually like that he’s canonically gay so he’s a representation in the media which is pretty cool.”

“If you could combat something, or save East Van from something, what would it be?”

“I’m going to say Godzilla, because it’s a classic! That would be pretty cool!”

“What common problems do you see in East Van?”

“I see a lot of homelessness...I really want to help the city with that issue...I don’t know many homeless people, but I see them on the streets and whenever I can, I try to help them.”

“If you had a large captive audience who’s discouraged from, say, homelessness, what would you say to give them hope?”

“I’d say: ‘we can work together and rely on each other, someone’s always gonna be there for you, no matter what happens there’s always good people out there, and someone’s going to want to help you.’”

“Have you ever had a moment when you were discouraged and someone helped you out?”

“Ugh, yeah, actually, I’ve been kicked out of my house before, and I had nowhere to go, and a friend of mine offered me to stay with them, and I really needed that. ‘Basically saved me from spending the night on the street...I’m transgender, so I identify as male, and so my parents aren’t very accepting of that sometimes so it gets really hard at home. We had a little bit of a fight. I got kicked out. And then my friends are really supportive and great.”

[eastvanstories]

“I’ve been doing this every saturday, volunteering with the Community Police Centre because I want to join the police force. 

"Was there a moment when you were like, “Ah, I want to do that!”?

“I don’t know. I just really really want it. But I don’t really know why. It’s been a very gradual thing. From high school I started looking at all the careers in Canada and then I looked into law enforcement and checked out their website...and it just got more and more...and every time you see a cop car, it’s just like, “Ah, maybe it is a good idea!”

“So we’re cleaning up the streets right now. Where’s the worst place for garbage.”

“If you want to find garbage, you go to the back alley of the Waldorf Hotel.”

“What’s the worst piece of garbage you’ve seen or had to pick up?”

“One time, I found two Starbucks cups and it had some drinks in it, and so I poured it out, and a whole bunch of maggots fell out! It was kind of scary. I’d rather pick up a snake than maggots.” 

With hastingssunrisecpc.com and wccf.ca

[eastvanstories]

“We play World of Warcraft as our bonding time together. Since 2009.”

“I found out there’s a new level 100 skill” “Oh ya!” 

“What’s been your favorite adventure?”

“He takes me through the dungeons. He’s a tank. My tank! heheh... I’m the hunter. He takes the damage and I do the range damage.” 

[eastvanstories]

"Congrats on your new baby [6 days old], what’s her name?”

“Izabel-Azul Hurricane Campbell”

“Why Hurricane?”

“It has to do with the women in our family, we’re all a little crazy. If she’s like any one of us, she’ll be a natural disaster. [laughs]”

“When you all get together, do you get along well, or is it like a perfect storm?”

“Most of the time, perfect storm, we’re all so very stubborn”

“How do you find peace in the storm?”

“Food! As soon as food’s at the dinner table, everybody’s quiet.”

@ http://www.pomegranate-midwives.com/