Letters from the Front Lines: Vancouver Riot

On the subject of the true “Heroes:” from the perspective of a clean-up volunteer

*** Bear with me, it’s a long one! ***

I was watching the game at ‘ground zero’ – right on the steps of the library on the corner of Hamilton and Georgia, just as I had countless times throughout the Canucks’ magical run to the Stanley Cup Final.

I was there, like many others, because I wanted to be amongst the crowd should we had won the game and won the cup. At the same time, I wanted (albeit, to a slightly lesser extent) to be amongst the crowd even if we would’ve lost the game.

Needless to say, I got what I came for; with just under 90 seconds to go in regulation, you could tell that trouble had already begun. People started throwing objects at the screen that the city brought in for us.

[I need not describe in detail what this clip can show you]

It was like a scene out of the revolutions out of Egypt many of us had seen on the news months before; the only difference was that our mob’s anger was not directed at a political inequality, but rather, at the unfortunate outcome of a sporting event.

A surreal moment, in each drawn out second that passed that night, not only for myself, not only for those confused/worried/anxious around me, but also for the City of Vancouver and the Province of British Columbia as a whole. Chaos had overwhelmed the Georgia Street.

I took out my iPhone, being the most convenient camera I had at a moment’s notice (my Canon SD780 was somewhere in my backpack) and tried to soak in as much as I could…

I made it up on top of the parkade at the corner of Richards and Georgia. I managed to separate myself from the chaotic mess below. I stayed there for about two and a half hours, which at the time went by quicker than I imagined.

From the safety of the parkade, I saw fights break out, fires started, windows smashed, and almost every other crime that was both committed that night and reported during the news in the days following.

After the K-9 squad came and thrusted us out onto the streets, I made my way to a family friend’s apartment, where my brother had been watching the game. It was there that I watched Rob Brown’s I-hope-he-gets-an-award-for-this reporting of the events happening just a few blocks away.

When I had got home that night, I took some time to catch up on the Twitter chat and Facebook activity that had occurred while I was downtown. The last thing I saw online was an invitation to a cleanup effort that was happening the next day, starting at 7am; I decided that I HAD to be a part of that.

I didn’t wake up early enough to get downtown by 7am (hey, it’s summer!), but I did manage to get there at a reasonably early hour (10.30AM, to be more specific). By the time I got there, there was barely any garbage to pick up along Georgia street. Feeling a bit disheartened, I walked around the areas I knew were hit the most – the Sears building, Chapters, BMO, Budget Car Rental, just to name a few.

I decided to check out London Drugs, knowing they were hit pretty bad that night; it wasn’t until then that I saw a trio of girls, scrubbing away at a small stone display outside that gave me the idea to check the HBC building. Sure enough, there was still a lot of work to be done.

I had originally bought a few supplies from work (I work at Thrifty Foods) before I went downtown, expecting to deal with tons garbage – purchasing a broom, gloves and garbage bags – but I realized I was ill equipped for the task that lay before me when I arrived at the Seymour side of the building, which was covered in ash and soot.

I went back to London Drugs, and got more appropriate supplies. I spent the rest of the day (well, up to 5 o’clock) scrubbing the walls, clearing pieces of burnt debris off the ceiling, and doing my part in conjunction with the other thousand volunteers helping to literally clean up Vancouver’s image that day.

Now onto the real reason why I’m writing:

A few days after the riots and subsequent cleanup, a Facebook page called the “Heroes of British Columbia” popped online. The page’s creators encourage members to nominate individuals who “demonstrated bravery and heroism during the chaos after the 2011 Stanley Cup final.

After reading a few comments and participating in a discussion on the page, it got me thinking - “What constitutes a true hero?” Looking at Dictionary.com, a hero is a man/woman of distinguished courage or ability, admired for his brave deeds and noble qualities”

Courage and Nobility; these are qualities that are inherent within any fairytale or mythical heroes. From Robin Hood, working within his ability to ease the disparity between rich and poor, to Moses, who championed his people’s right to be free from Pharaoh’s rule, our culture is embedded with heroes who we each derive morally sound qualities that we hope to mimic in our everyday lives.

That said, I was a bit surprised to find out that the creators of the heroes page (and other pages on and off Facebook) began to include us volunteers who cleaned up Vancouver streets under the umbrella of being ‘heroes’ of the riots.

My opinion on this is that I did not stand up for the countless individuals who got ambushed by the drunken mobs, nor did I protect the livelihoods of storekeepers, nor did I emulate the actions of Bert Easterbrook. I am simply just another young adult who felt an urge to do the right thing and help out my city. In a sense, I feel that calling us heroes kinda downplays the acts of individuals like Mr. Easterbrook, who exemplified the best of ourselves, personifying the qualities of Courage and Nobility to which the definition of ‘hero’ speaks of.

I’m sure I speak for all the kindhearted volunteers that cleaned up the streets from the wee hours of June 16, right through to its end, when I say that we were just doing our civic responsibility in protecting the dignity of Vancouver. No one was thinking of fame or glory that day, and despite the thoughts I have outlined above, I am humbled to be included amongst the TRUE heroes of that day: people like Bert Easterbrook, as well as the men and women of the police, firefighters, and paramedics of the lower mainland.

— a post-riot clean-up volunteer, and a proud Vancouverite.