Author Archive

About a year ago I started a project called A Stranger A Day to overcome my shyness and talk to people. The challenge: talk to a stranger a day for a year of my life and try to convince them to let me take a picture and share a story. Since most tattoos have a story behind them, this was my conversation starter and a common thread that linked them all. Every week I have been sharing the story of the week here on Vancouver Is Awesome.

With the year now over and 365+ strangers and their stories documented (and a beautiful show where a bunch of people came to check all of the stories in one place), I’ll continue to talk to a stranger every once in a while, and post a story weekly here. The people of Vancouver, and specially my community: East Van, have been amazingly supportive with this project, and I can’t thank you enough for that. I am deeply grateful and blessed.

Before I continue  going around collecting tattoo stories, I wanted to look back and share with you where this all started. This is the first stranger story that was collected. Even the writing was different, a lot shorter than the latest posts and the quotes from the strangers hadn’t come into place yet.

Stranger #1 || Location: just outside Prado, on the Drive.

Tattoo in spanish that means “always keep learning.” She lived in Costa Rica for a while. “When you surf you not always have a good day, but like most of my friends would say, you have to always keep learning.”

She told me the tattoo was done in Vancouver; if she had it done in Costa Rica, she couldn’t go into the water, so it was worth the wait.

When I asked if I could take a picture she said she didn’t want to take her shirt off on the street. She took my phone, went to the washroom and came back with her pictures. This was my first encounter with strangerness.

Thanks stranger.

To check out the entire project and for updates on future shows and releases, go to: astrangeraday.com Thank you all!

A year ago I started a project called A Stranger A Day to overcome my shyness and talk to people. The challenge: talk to a stranger a day for a year of my life and try to convince them to let me take a picture and share a story. Since most tattoos have a story behind them, this was my conversation starter and a common thread that linked them all. Every week I have been sharing the story of the week here on Vancouver Is Awesome. This is the last story of the project as it is. :)

Stranger #365

Location: Kingsway, around Budgies

The 365th stranger! This is sort of unbelievable. When you think of it, a whole year of talking to someone completely unknown to you every single day, explaining why you are doing this and having them share something often very personal with you, is quite the journey. A daily act that started each day with a bit of nervousness; that depending how life went down every day, seemed challenging or @#$%^&*() impossible. A ‘fail’ here and there, but always, always, amazing and intriguing. I can’t think of many things that are this exciting every single day. It has been a humbling experience.

The last story was a good summary of the project: I talked to about seven people before I found one with tattoos willing to share. There was one who had a lot of tattoos but who was too busy to be the last stranger “I’m sorry. I’m cramming for a test right now, maybe some other time” , oh well. I’m glad I didn’t push, because tonight’s strangers would close circles. I was about to meet a friend for dinner, and about to leave the stranger hunt for the restaurant, when on my way there I saw a couple of individuals hanging out. I approached them and told them the usual. They both had a tattoos. The first one rolled up her sleeve and showed me something that looked very familiar. I recognized that tattoo and the story. She didn’t remember me, and I (as ashamed as I am to say) didn’t quite remember her. But it was this tattoo, stranger #40. That’s what happens when you meet strangers at the Foundation at 2am.

Her friend, however, had a tattoo I hadn’t documented before, and she was kind enough to share it. When she rolled up her sleeve, I spotted what you see above.

“My twin sister’s name is Becky, and when she was younger her email address used to be B3K1. She moved to Montreal and I got really drunk one night and decided I really missed her, so me and my best friend stick-and-poked this on.” —Then I asked about the anchor one. The classic anchor tattoo is one of my favourite tattoos, so it was a nice play of destiny to have this be on the last story. “Oh, about the anchor… my sister and I got the same anchor when we were about 18. That’s what that one is about.”

:] And that was that. I thanked them for sharing, shared the blog, told them about the show —still trying to hide my nervousness and my voice about to break (I was as nervous as the first time, maybe because it was the official last one), and went on my way.

Thanks strangers!

And thank you all. It’s been a blast. Hope to see you all at the event on Nov. 3rd (at Project space on 222 E.Georgia —at main). I don’t know how I feel now. I guess ‘Blessed’ is a good description. Thank YOU.

PS: although stranger stories won’t  be daily from now on, I will continue to collect them and post a stranger weekly here on Vancouver is Awesome.

For all the other 365 stories, click here: astrangeraday.com

I started this project called A Stranger A Day to overcome my shyness and talk to people. The challenge: talk to a stranger a day for a year of my life and try to convince them to let me take a picture and share a story. Since most tattoos have a story behind them, this will be my conversation starter and a common thread that links them all. Every week I will be sharing the story of the week here on Vancouver Is Awesome. Join me in this Stranger a Day adventure and let me know what you think!

Note: yep, this project will have more than 52 weeks, as trips to other countries didn’t work too well with the challenge :( Almost done!

Stranger #356 || Location: Museum of Vancouver, during an intermission at ‘Interesting Vancouver’

How this story came to me and my presence at this event was mere luck in action. See, I wanted to go to that event, but it was sold out by the time I could buy a ticket. I was bummed I couldn’t go, looked for tickets, tweeted about those two reactions and waited. Waited. And waited. Then, out of the blue, one of the organizers tweeted me back. It so happened that he had seen my tweets (that sounds so wrong), and he knew someone who had cancelled, so I could perhaps take her spot. I was in. I rushed to the MOV and just made it.

Super cool talks made the time go by and soon it was time for an intermission. After a talk about tattoos had just finished, it seemed like the right time to approach some strangers. Then luck struck again:  I was explaining the project to a stranger, when the same person who made it possible for me to be there came by and listened to my pitch. He immediately asked me if he could introduce me to someone. Now, I am already regretting the “no faces, no names” policy of this blog.

He introduced me to this special individual you may be familiar with. I told her about the project and she immediately agreed to tell me the story:

“I’m going to tell you about the one on my back. It is the Taj Mahal.  I’m a breast cancer survivor. Around the time I got it, I was fascinated by this book about Russian tattoos. I think it’s called the ‘Russian Criminal Tattoos’. It is a set of two books. I was fascinated with every single thing having a meaning or representing something else. For example, the towers or the domes on a church tattoo would represent the times they’ve been in jail, or a set amount of years. All of those images, being representative of something else and telling a tale about their lives stuck with me.

Most breast cancer survivors get a pink ribbon after they overcome cancer, but I already had ‘survivor’ tattooed on me, even before the cancer, so being such a romantic, I think the only thing that could symbolize that conquering and that time was getting the Taj Mahal between my shoulder blades. That’s what it represents. When you stand in front of the Taj Mahal you get that unforgettable feeling of beauty and greatness; and me being originally from India also makes that connection with it.”

When I asked her for the picture she immediately looked at me and said: “are you crazy?! I’ll have to take my top off!” I blushed and asked if there was even a small possibility to get at least a tiny part of the piece for the picture. I was nervous. She then said: “yeah maybe you’ll be able to see it if you pull down the neck of the top a bit”. “For a picture?”—I asked. “Yes!” 

We went to a less busy space, and after taking a picture of her with a friend of hers, she let me take the tattoo shot. “Oh! You got the lotus, that’s the latest part of it. It is above the Taj.”

I thanked her again for taking the time to be part of the project. Shortly after, the intermission was over and it was time for everyone to go back inside. I had to leave due to an emergency, but I was still in awe. The speakers, the people, the coincidences… I’m so lucky. What a day.  :)

Thank you all, and thanks stranger!

For the daily strangers click here: astrangeraday.com

I started this project called A Stranger A Day to overcome my shyness and talk to people. The challenge: talk to a stranger a day for a year of my life and try to convince them to let me take a picture and share a story. Since most tattoos have a story behind them, this will be my conversation starter and a common thread that links them all. Every week I will be sharing the story of the week here on Vancouver Is Awesome. Join me in this Stranger a Day adventure and let me know what you think!

Note: yep, this project will have more than 52 weeks, as trips to other countries didn’t work too well with the challenge :( Almost done!

Stranger #350 || Location: the Anza (Main and Ontario), after the glorious Spit party.

Good times, awesome times! It is good to go out for a change. Once the party was over, I helped around with clearing the space. Since the music was out, all the lights were on, and quite a few people were still around, this gave me the chance to collect a tattoo story. I spotted some traditional-looking tattoos on his arm, and decided to approach him. He was immediately into it and we sat down in a booth and told me the story not behind those on his arm, but about this one on his chest (the one that reads ‘Pas de chance’, which also made for a really cool picture.

“The story behind that one… it is an old French story, I think it is originally by Jean Cocteau, he was an artist and a writer in the early 1900s in France. He tells the story of how he has ‘PAS DE CHANCE’ tattooed over his heart, it means ‘Out of luck’. He meets this French sailor in a bar, and this guy has just gotten out of prison —he was on a ship that did mutiny, so the entire crew had gone to prison, even though he hadn’t really participated. He ends up taking this sailor back up to his room, and they spend an amazing night, telling each other all kinds of things, and the next morning he wakes up really early and for some reason he’s like ‘meh, you know what, I just got to get out of here’. Without waking the sailor up he gets up and sneaks out, and once he’s on the street he realizes he has left his gloves behind. They were expensive, so he goes back up, and he hears a sound. He sees through the keyhole and finds the sailor had already woken up, and he was sitting on the bed, holding the gloves, sobbing. So he just backs away quietly and leaves.”

I was impressed by the story. You must have guessed by now that I hadn’t heard of it or read the book before. Then I started to wonder if  the ‘Pas de Chance’ tied in with more elements of it, so I asked.

“Oh, yeah… so ‘Pas de chance’ or ‘Out of luck’. Well, he had this tattooed over his heart and in the course of the night, while he is making love to this sailor, the sailor takes a pen and crosses ‘out of luck’ out and draws some good luck symbol. Trying to tell him that his luck has changed. And even though they shared this amazing moment, he still gets up and leaves the next morning.”

I was speechless. He then told me more about this story, it was a very very cinematic narration, that I sure will read. It is called ‘The White Book’ by Jean Cocteau. This was amazing, just when I thought the night couldn’t get any better, I found this story. :)

Thanks stranger!

For the daily strangers click here: astrangeraday.com

I started this project called A Stranger A Day to overcome my shyness and talk to people. The challenge: talk to a stranger a day for a year of my life and try to convince them to let me take a picture and share a story. Since most tattoos have a story behind them, this will be my conversation starter and a common thread that links them all. Every week I will be sharing the story of the week here on Vancouver Is Awesome. Join me in this Stranger a Day adventure and let me know what you think!

Stranger #338 || Location: Commercial and Grant

A bike tattoo! After talking to a couple of strangers without tattoos today, I found the most perfect one to end the day. I was wandering around when I saw him waiting for something/someone on his bike and decided to tell him about the project. He told me about the stick and poke you see above:

“I basically bike everywhere. I biked to Mexico from here with a bunch of friends. It took us about two months. I had a great time, so this is what it represents. The guy who did it is also a close friend, so that’s cool too. It was his third stick-and-poke.”

It was a very neat small tattoo. I thanked him for sharing and then I kept walking.

Thanks stranger!

For the daily strangers click here: astrangeraday.com

I started this project called A Stranger A Day to overcome my shyness and talk to people. The challenge: talk to a stranger a day for a year of my life and try to convince them to let me take a picture and share a story. Since most tattoos have a story behind them, this will be my conversation starter and a common thread that links them all. Every week I will be sharing the story of the week here on Vancouver Is Awesome. Join me in this Stranger a Day adventure and let me know what you think!

Stranger #336 | Location: Commercial Drive, around Falconetti’s? or was it the Libra room?

This story was found Wednesday night, when I HAD TO go out for a walk to clear my head from all the coding I had been doing all evening. It was about 11pm already and it was starting to rain, so I didn’t know if the project was going to be done. I said to myself that I was going to go from my house to the closest open coffee shop, and if it happened, it happened. And it did. He was walking out of one of those restaurants to have a smoke when I took the opportunity to tell him about this. He was super cool with it and told me the story behind this tattoo:

“When I was younger I joined a circus here in Vancouver, actually it was just a few blocks down from here. I spent about 4 years of my life with them and this was their symbol. They were called ‘Ailanthus’. Ailanthus is a weed that grows about anywhere and once you get it is extremely hard to get rid of. But the story is a bit more interesting than that since this symbol has always been popping up randomly in my life.

I did a busking tour across Canada, 10 different cities. It was the most successful money-making venture I’ve ever been in. I made probably about 7 grand in under two months just playing my drum. It’s a lot of money for playing drums. So I kept seeing this symbol everywhere. It just kept popping up in different places. Finally when I was in Quebec city I said ‘alright! I’m gonna get it tattooed’. And I got it tattooed by a Mexican in a really old shop in an old part of Quebec. He had brought in a fake tattoo portfolio, and I was his first tattoo on anybody other than himself. It got super infected. I was so pissed, I wanted to get my money back, but of course they didn’t give it back. The dude got fired shortly after tho, so that was ok. Then I waited for about two years to get it touched-up here at The Fall.

Also, my dad chose this symbol as his company’s logo without even knowing that I had it tattooed on me. It is the Celtic trinity knot and for me it represents that all points in the universe are interconnected. Just keep walking the path and you’ll meet yourself everywhere.”

That was an impressive story. It is quite fascinating when people seem to have a symbol that follows them around. There have been a couple of stories with this similar coincidence before in the project, but I think no story has had this level of coincidence. Very neat.

Thanks stranger!

For the daily strangers click here: astrangeraday.com