Hello BOB blog readers!

Here is a letter from the Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Gardens.  Let’s help make them one of the “Great Public Spaces” in Canada!  The real competition is a few places in Toronto..  Now we love Toronto..  But we love Vancouver more!  And we want to show off one of our gems.  So vote away!

Lovin’ our city,

The BOB Team

Dear wonderful folks at BOB,

We’ve been nominated as one of the The Great Places in Canada in the “Great Public Spaces” category!

There are first, second and third place winers based on votes, we believe….we need your help to be number 1!!  The three categories are “Great Streets,” “Great Neighbourhoods,” and “Great Public Spaces.” We’re in Great Public Spaces.

http://www.cip-icu.ca/greatplaces/en/place.asp?id=5930

You can only vote once each time you go on the site AND have to wait a while between visits. Please pass this to all your network and ask for their support for us. The voting goes on until the end of February; this is going to be a long campaign

Kathy

Executive Director

Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden

www.vancouverchinesegarden.com

The long awaited Scent of a Sandwich is now open! They do eat in, take out, and catering of – you guessed it – sandwiches!

In particular, they make hot sandwiches stuffed to the gills with gourmet meats, cheeses and veggies. They also have a nutella and bananna option for a sophisticated alternative to the old favorite PB&J. Their catering menu is more extensive, offering breakfast pastries, fruit platters, cheese platters, dips and more. They also offer free consultations if you want do do an extra special lunch presentation for your office, so don’t hesitate to get in touch with Thomas and let him know exactly what you need!

What we really admire about Scent of a Sandwich is that they’re on board with the idea of inclusive revitalization, where economic development that takes place in historically under-served communities like the DTES is intentionally inclusive of existing residents in businesses. Scent of a Sandwich has demonstrated their commitment to inclusive revitalization by partnering with local employment agencies like BOB and Pathways, hiring locally through the Pathways 100 Hired Challenge, and improving their formerly vacant storefront on Main Street between Pender and Abbot (in partnership with BOB and the City of Vancouver’s Facade Program). BOB also put on a BusinessLinks session with them to do a culinary & catering staff skills training event.

Furthermore, they’re also interested in being sustainable, and are doing all their deliveries by tricycle! Looks like they’re using disposable plates at the moment, though…surely that will change soon once they get more established.

You can check them out in their new location at 418 Main St. Welcome to the neighborhood from the whole team here at BOB!

Pandas are famous the world over for being an exotic animal that eats chutes and leaves

A crowd gathered at the corner of Pender and Columbia as leaders from The City, the Chinatown Merchant’s Association and the Chinese Freemasons Society unveiled Arthur Cheng’s beautiful three panel mural to drums, dancing lions and a crowd of cheering locals. Vancouver proudly celebrates Chinatown’s 125 birthday this year and during this weekend (August 14th and 15th) Chinatown will be THE place to be.

As part of the celebrations Chinatown has a new mascot, Muse! Seen above to the left Muse is a a mystical creature imbued with good luck and good fortune, creative and full of vivacity!

Below are some photos of City Councilor Raymond Louie and local business leader Gilbert Tan (Chinese Freemasons) with artist Arthur Cheng and some of the festivities during the official unveiling. Members of the BOB team were  some the lucky ones that the lion tossed some salad greens right at. It’s going to be an extra lucky fiscal quarter for sure now!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHINATOWN!!

HERE’S TO ANOTHER 125 YEARS OF HEALTH AND SUCCESS

AND TO THE INTEGRAL ROLE THAT YOU PLAY IN THIS CITY (AND LIVES OF THE PEOPLE WHO ARE PROUD TO CALL IT HOME)

From the team at Building Opportunities with Business

BOB was happy to be invited to the official lighting ceremony of the new Chinatown Neon sign which hangs off the city owned parkade at the corner of Keefer and Columbia. Present were the mayor, the three Chinese city councilors (George Chow, Kerry Jang, and Raymond Louie), numerous Chinatown business leaders (Jordan Eng, Albert Fok, etc.), and various friends of Chinatown. Also present was every media outlet in town, so many that all the mics had trouble all fitting on the podium.

Several BOB staffers attended and I snapped a few pictures which I uploaded to Flickr, they’ve already been ‘borrowed‘ and appear elsewhere online.

Coverage Elsewhere

• City of Vancouver info page
• Local historian John Atkin

Based in Vancouver B.C., Building Opportunities with Business (BOB) is a non-profit organization that is championing an inclusive revitalization process for the inner-city that values existing businesses and residents. BOB is a connector, a resource and a facilitator working to: strengthen the inner-city’s community capacity; identify and build on untapped business opportunities; improve employment opportunities and retention; and increase investment in Vancouver’s inner-city.

On the main floor of 163 East Pender in Vancouver’s historic Chinatown, we have a large room which is available for rent for meetings and events, it is also available as coworking space Monday to Friday from 9 until late. In addition to desks, chairs, tables, couches, we installed several lockable lighted display cabinets. This floor is retail grade, on Pender right across the street from Vancity. As a service to local residents and businesses, we are displaying wares, art, product, crafts, business cards, and marketing material free in these display cases. As you can see their are several empty shelves. Each shelf is over one cubic foot and can hold about 5kg of stuff.

We need your stuff to display. You can display whatever you want, for as long as you want, any sales or leads you may generate you are free to pursue to the fullness of your ability. BOB charges zero dollars for this and many other services. Space is available first come, first served, write coworking@bobics.org or contact a staff member.