Saying "Goodbye" to Canada....part 2

Did I mention that, as we were about to drive onto the ferry, Fania asked "Alex, where are your glasses?"  The moment she posed the question, I remembered seeing them on the counter in the bathroom and thinking to myself, "Oh... there are Alex's brand-new glasses... I should hand those to him in case he forgets to pick them up"   sigh.   ah well...  There is always the mail....

And so, short one pair of spectacles, we arrived at the Vancouver airport, checked in our luggage, and headed off to say hello-and-goodby to my very favourite sculpture, Bill Reid's "Spirit of the Haida Gwaii" (yes... the one that appears on the $20 bill!).  Jim Tully writes about the sculpture in his book "Strange Multiplicity" as a way of thinking about Canadian constitutionalism, and relations between first nation and settler peoples. I love the book, and love the sculpture!  You can read more about the sculpture on the Bill Reid Foundation's site.

I have my favourite parts of the sculpture.  I really love the back end, where you see mouse woman hiding beneath raven's wings.  According to the plaque positioned beside the sculpture, mouse woman "is the grandmother of Raven, and the perpetrator of many tricks for which her wily grandson is blamed."  Sounds a bit like my own mother!  :-) [or, more honestly, maybe a bit like the kind of grandmother I eventually hope to become!]

I am also fond of Frog, who is managing to lick Duncan's face in this shot!

Frog, licking Duncan!

Who could ask for a better farewell than that? 

And so, off through security, into our seats, settled in for a 9 hour flight.  Yikes.  That was a lot of in-flight movies to watch!  on the happiness front, I was expecting to take the tube from the airport to our place, but Steve showed up with a rental car (yea!)  and so... off to 11 Woodside Lane.  More adventures to follow!