Christopher Cheung's 'Very Vancouver' digs past the skyline for working-class stories

Vancouver journalist Christopher Cheung has written a book about the city that sidesteps the million-dollar view. Very Vancouver: Uncovering the Soul of a West Coast City, just released on ECW Press, weaves autobiographical snippets with 15 reported stories drawn from years of local reporting—moving past downtown and Kitsilano to capture residents who have quietly made the city their home.

The book opens with Cheung's own childhood on Ontario Street, where the West Side's aspirational glow gave way to stigma attached to everything east. That collision of competing identities became his entry point. "Once in a while there is a book that comes out about Vancouver, but I will flip through it and it just talks about downtown, Kits, and Chinatown," Cheung said in an interview. "I wanted to write something that's hyper local, where people could really get a feel of what it's like to live here and start a life here."

The book's subjects include binners who gather refundable cans and bottles, an exiled Syrian politician selling baklava downtown, and the family behind a hundred-year-old Italian corner store in Strathcona. Rather than a sightseeing roundup or restaurant guide, Cheung positions Very Vancouver as an "anti-guidebook." He answers questions no guidebook would ask: Why is there somebody in my alley collecting cans? Why is there so much of this specific kind of house? Who are all these people who are growing vegetables in their backyards?

One chapter follows Ms. Liang, an independent Chinese woman in her 70s, on her binning route. Media coverage often celebrates elderly grannies' contribution to green efforts without questioning minimal pay and poor working conditions. Cheung sought to answer different questions: Why does this person do this work? Do they have a family? Where do they go home at night? Another chapter opens with a reunion of the Yip family, one of Vancouver's oldest Chinese Canadian families spanning seven generations. During a time of rampant racism, their ancestor Yip Sang established himself as a successful businessman and community leader. Among 400 Yips gathered at the Chinese Cultural Centre, Cheung was one of two journalists invited to the celebration.