Reasons To Love Vancouver #23: Our Weaknesses Are Now Strengths

For years the rub on Vancouver was that it’s a land of great beauty, populated by insular and unfriendly people. No one borrows a cup of kombucha from their neighbours. Everyone hates sharing their log at the beach. The clique culture extends weirdly beyond high school. And if you’re new in town, you can pretty much forget about hooking up in any iteration any time soon.

But then came our new commandments from Drs. Theresa Tam and Bonnie Henry: stay in your homes, no large gatherings in public places, avoid close interaction with non-family members. Suddenly our innate insularity became a 2020 superpower. And it’s no joke—even though the virus had a head start here (B.C. had its first case in late January), we’ve kept our infection rates to a level that’s the envy of the country (and the rest of the world, frankly). Here’s hoping that, when this is over, we’ll thank our unfriendliness for its service and put it on the shelf for a few years while we let our hair down.