Nelson House Heritage Garden

A gardener must be an optimist - always planting for the future with the eye of one's imagination. As often happens in life, the future might not work out as planned or, let's face it, we just might not be around to see it happen.

One of the delights of a mature garden is the chance to see those loving plans come to beautiful fruition. Nelson House B & B, a century-old house, has such a garden. It is small - a city garden only - but it has been planted with excellent "bones" and tended with love for generations. A visit to our little urban oasis is a step back in time. Several of our trees, shrubs and roses are truly heritage specimens, planted when the House was young, circa 1905-10.

The photo above shows the "bones" of an astonishing pieris japonica - described by garden sources as growing slowly with an elegant, upright and layered habit. What is astonishing is that this very slow-growing shrub, a native of rainy, shaded mountainsides in Japan and China, is expected to reach no more than nine to twelve feet - ours is fifteen to twenty! Even in Vancouver's well-watered, shady environment, this specimen is undoubtedly one of the oldest on the West Coast.

Blooming through much of March and April in Vancouver, the pieris japonica graceful, dangling bell-like flowers are matched in their day-time charm by the old-fashioned lily of the valley perfume - especially on a mild spring night.

What does "people-friendly" mean?

 

Back in 2010, I commented on the meaning of the term "gay-friendly" in the hospitality industry. Although the majority of folks will never encounter it in their own lives and therefore not give it much thought, discrimination against the GLBT community is still with us!

I recounted the news story of a B.C. bed and breakfast that refused to accommodate a gay couple and were taken to the BC Human Rights Tribunal on grounds of discrimination under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms(a crucial part of Canada's Constititution). It promised to be an interesting case as the B & B owners defended their action on the basis of their Christian beliefs.

At last, the decision came down today and as reported on CBC and Huffington Post, the B & B owners were found to have illegally discriminated against the gay couple. They were fined $4400 for the "indignity and humiliation" suffered by their prospective customers. In the judgement, it is clear that even though the B & B owners were free to hold certain religious-based beliefs in their own home, the fact that they opened their home as a public business required them to comply with laws that prohibit discrimination based on sexual orientation. I have read elsewhere that they decided to close their business soon after the discrimination suit was filed.

I say hooray! Yes, this case was a sad, drawn-out legal mess that neither party probably wanted in their lives. However, if hospitality businesses want to live up to the very definition of "hospitality", they cannot discriminate against anyone just for who they are!

We have always described Nelson House B & B as "people-friendly". We think it meets the dictionary definition and underlines the kind of religious beliefs that we share: practice "kindness in welcoming strangers or guests".

Boating in Vancouver

One of my favourite recommendations to our guests is to see Vancouver from the water. First-time visitors quickly discover that Vancouver's downtown is an arrowhead-shaped peninsula with water on three sides!

To get out on a boat and look back at the city's face gives one a whole new perspective. This is true on any of Canada's waterways but in Vancouver, BC, it is especially easy and especially pleasurable. Why drive to Granville Island Market when the colourful Aquabus will deliver you to it's dockside for as little as $3.25?

If you want to check out North Shore attractions like Capilano Canyon's suspension bridge or nearby Grouse Mountain, the scenic route is not by car but by taking public transit's SeaBus across Burrard Inlet. When looking back on downtown Vancouver from the SeaBus terminal or taking a tourist cruise on the paddle-wheeler Constitution, you might think that you were gazing at the Manhattan skyline.


If being Captain of your own "ship" is more your style, Vancouver offers easy rentals of anything from kayaks to sail and motorcraft of every description. Be responsible, obtain a boat licence. It's easy and it's the law.

Home Sweet Home...

I am back in Vancouver just in time for Valentine's Day. I am wondering if the B & B still has rooms for the big weekend.

Arriving at the airport at midnight, o-so-relaxed from a month in the Mexican sun, I meet the slap in the face culture shock of returning home. Canada Customs puts their most surly(I hate my job) agent out to welcome me back. She never meets my eye, no smile, but she is full of mumbly irrelevant questions like "Did I travel to Puerto Vallarta to meet anyone?" This girl has just too much imagination and too little sense to be wearing a badge.

Waiting at the luggage carousel, I look up at TV carrying the late night local sports. This is strange because the local TV Sports Guy was actually on the flight from Phoenix with me. Of course, the big-screen is filled with a slam-bang hockey fist-fight, where nobody can land a punch as they grip each other's sweaters and swing around in circles on the ice. A real Canadian Waltz.

Someone just hardly bumps me with their luggage cart and I hear my first Canadian "Sorry!" Regrettably, we seem to use this word as much as Mexicans say "Hola!" Minus the smiles and eye contact.

I make it out to the Airport's Meet & Greet area. I told my husband to go to bed as he had work early the next day. Just warm up the sheets for me, please. I glance around not really expecting to see my Valentine. And no, he is not there. Instead, I meet the eye of BC.'s Premier Gordon Campbell, standing alone, very much by himself in the busy crowd. Like most locals, when he sees me looking, he suddenly has to check his Blackberry. Most of the world doesn't even know Blackberry is Canadian.

I am home.

Springtime

On days like this, it's good to be alive in Vancouver, BC.

What does being "gay friendly" mean?

Recently, two news reports of gay travellers being refused accommodation by bed and breakfast owners, got me thinking about the subject of gay friendliness in the hospitality industry.

Years ago, a new B & B owner in Vancouver contacted me in order to introduce herself and her business and ask me for some tips on successful innkeeping. Over coffee and reciprocal visits to each other's guesthouses, she told me that she did not understand why I mentioned the word "gay" in describing Nelson House B & B. She said that Canadian society was moving beyond such labels. Surely no one had to worry over outright prejudice and wasn't one's sexual orientation just a private thing?

I hesitated as I didn't know her very well but I figured an honest question deserved an honest answer. First, I said that like most people(meaning the majority of heterosexuals) in the world, I would prefer that my sexual orientation remained a private and personal matter. However, now that I had opened my home to the public as a hospitality and accommodation business, I saw the need to flag sexual orientation to potential customers who might, for their own reasons, prefer to stay elsewhere. And also, I wanted to indicate to gay(and read lesbian too) travellers that no one at Nelson House B & B would blink an eye at an adult, same-sex couple wishing to share a bed.

My new innkeeper friend was too new in the business then to realize that gays form a loyal and highly desirable portion of the travel industry's client base. Even though she was a Jewish woman and probably knew something about prejudice and discrimination, she still found it very difficult to put herself in the shoes of someone suffering discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation.

All of this came to mind this week when the UK press gave national prominence on the BBC, newspapers and the internet to the denial of accommodation to a gay male couple once the innkeeper realized that the guests were actually a same sex couple. Simultaneously, here in Canada, an almost identical denial of service occurred in Kelowna, BC. The difference in the Canadian case is that the innkeepers defended their actions based on their evangelical Christian beliefs. In both England and Canada(and 50 other countries), national laws are in place to protect all citizens against discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. Incidentally, the United States is NOT one of those countries. Police in England decided not to press criminal charges and it is up to the English gay couple to pursue possible civil damages. According to media reports of the Canadian case, the couple chose to file a complaint to the BC Human Rights Tribunal. This interesting clash of rights will be decided by early next month.

Now lawsuits and heavily reported civil rights cases are not the reason anyone goes into the bed and breakfast business. In the ten years since I advised my new innkeeper friend, much of the mainstream hotel industry has discovered the reportedly lucrative "pink dollar" and most now trumpet their gay friendliness. Tourism Vancouver and many other cities, states and provinces now dedicate portions of their websites and other marketing campaigns to bragging on their non-discriminatory practices. A go-getter, gay-owned marketing company out of San Francisco has made a bundle by certifying the gay friendliness of corporate hotel chains with little icons of gay approval in the form of luggage tags. Many other PR executives have cleverly inserted a rainbow flag somewhere on their website to reassure and attract gay customers.

I now look back on twenty years of successful innkeeping and look forward to many more ahead. To me, even though times have changed, I know not everyone has changed with the times. As the gay owner of Nelson House B & B, of course I understand and genuinely welcome gay and lesbian travellers. As a man who believes in treating everyone with dignity, fairness and respect, I have long since dubbed our brand of hospitality as people-friendly!

Vancouver dreamin'

Vancouver used to always be followed by "B.C." You know - British Columbia. It was because of the other Vancouver, in the state of Washington. I have noticed that the BC suffix has now been dropped. B.C. now designates a whole other subject, like British California or Bring Cash. The city has achieved standalone status.

Vancouver has grown up. She is young(c.1880s) by world standards but the world has begun to take notice. For a longtime, she was a provincial place, a rather rough town that grew into Terminal City. Terminal in the sense of the end of the road(as viewed from back East), as in a major rail, freight and port facility. Vancouver's reputation has suffered the envy of some other cities that have more history but less geography. For too long, Vancouver was all about setting - a city that leaned against a wall of mountains as she splashed her feet in the vast, mild Pacific. A surreal green rainforest with mist dripping from every limb. A westcoast experience derided as the Wet Coast. It was only with Expo'86, that the world was compelled to note the chutzpah of a gawky teenage city bold enough to invite everyone to come and see.

And they have come and seen. And many have bought a piece of paradise, a room with a view. Beauty, beauty everywhere. For some, that beauty has been reason enough to lay back and roll another one. For others, it has been a magnet that uprooted and drew them from half a world away. The world's languages fill the streets. Smart young people in sandals design the computer games that the world will play next year. They social network avidly, climb a mountain competitively and are as apt to take the bike to work as the BMW. Their world is plugged in, 24 hours and global.

Vancouver is now as fresh and dewy as this year’s Hollywood starlet. The city has great bones - the Coast Mountains soar over a glassy new skyline. The makeup is minimal and immaculate - the Pacific Ocean washes miles of chilled but sandy beach. Most attractive - for Vancouver’s turn in the spotlight (and to the delight of visitors) – this city is a friendly tease. She has become open-minded, hip, cosmopolitan and maybe a teensy bit pretentious.

Vancouver offers both sexy and becalming lifestyles. Canadians elsewhere trade down from high-powered careers and trade up to more expensive housing, just to be here, to go play outdoors, and yes, to smell the roses. Non-Canadians have ceased comparing the city to the mountains of Zurich, the bayside zaniness of San Francisco, the Pacific ports of Hong Kong and Sydney. Vancouver is unique. She is no longer just a pretty young thing. No where else do you hear people talking endlessly about "quality of life". Ultimately, this city knows that her inner beauty will define her and that remains a work in progress, a work of maturation. In 2010, she knows that the world will see an Olympic Vancouver with panhandlers outside the ice arena, homeless outside the many fine restaurants, the poor and deranged, the rich and deluded, side by side in "lotusland". Still, the city beckons - come and see!

Youtube videos courtesy of paulngstewart