One of the things I love about living in a city is the fact that, right when you are about to resign yourself to a general feeling of apathy because you think you've explored every nook and cranny to be explored, you inevitably stumble upon a neighbourhood you never even realized existed.

This weekend, while lying in a sunny grass field off Victoria and 38th, I realized that the whole area is a bit like that new guy in class with the James Dean-style haircut and worn leather jacket -- it's scruffy, edgy and a little off-beat, just enough to stand out from the crowd (ie, the south Granvilles and Cambies, yawn.) Also, although it has some of the same interests as me (good Mexican food, Vietnamese people, weird meat shops and locals) there's just something about it that remains elusive and intimidating.

Maybe its the baffling mishmash of ethnic foods or the way the street looks like it will continue infinitely into the horizon, kind of like Queen's street in Toronto when you get close to the Eastern European area. Perhaps it lies in the fact that I have never been invited to even one house party in the area. Or perhaps it's the faded brightness of street-side buildings and the lack of condominiums or height of any kind in the surrounding market-style vicinity. Either way, upper Victoria St. continues to leave me feeling somewhat bewildered as a non-Vancouver native.

However, it's the kind of bewilderment that I know is easily solved, at least when it comes to the elusive new guy in class, by going out for a few drinks to ease the situation up a bit. So, for the Victoria-Fraserview neighborhood, I decided to initiate the virtual equivalent of those drinks -- a bit of quality old-fashioned Wikipedia e-stalking to find out exactly what this Victoria neighbourhood is really all about.

Mr Zhang Northern Chinese restaurant. Photo by Flickr user "knightbefore_99."

Besides currently having some awesome ethnic eats and flavour (with everything from the ever-popular Dona Cata on 5076 Victoria to Mr Zhang's Northern Chinese restaurant [photo above] to bakeries run by old Italian women), the area is also one of the city's oldest neighbourhoods, populated early in the city's development when the first bonnet-wearing homesteaders in wagons came down in the 1860s.

After being briefly distracted by amusing mental images of people in carriages taking over Victoria St., I also found out that the area officially became part of the City of Vancouver in 1929 and since then has been a haven for an interesting patchwork of newly-immigrated ethnic groups. It has notably been represented by an equally diverse group of MLA's, including Wally Opal, who was the province's second Indo-Canadian Attourney General and current incumbent MLA Kash Heed, who was the first Indo-Canadian police chief in all of Canada.

A district's political representation reveals a lot about which groups hold power in that area (ie, who has both the time and existing political currency to vote and get involved), so it is interesting to see that in this neighbourhood, the diversity of its residents is so well-represented.

Victoria Drive at dusk. Photo by Flickr user "noah adams."

Another strange fact about the area is that while it has very few 'heritage' style buildings, it does have the infamous Avalon Dairy, which I have not been to but which certainly makes me thirsty. This dairy, noted for being one of the only still-operated family dairies in a North American metropolitan area, was started in 1906 with six cows and continues to be successful today. Interestingly (again, perhaps because I am thirsty), this dairy also produces a special type of milk containing DHA Omega-3 called "VitalaMilk."

For some reason I find this type of unique organic-based, health conscious entrepreneurship quite unsurprising. It feels very Vancouver. Perhaps this elusive Victoria-Fraserview neighborhood isn't quite so hard-to-comprehend after all.

Do you know of sweet hard-to-find spots on Victoria Drive or did you grow up around the area? Share some of your neighbourhood wealth in the comments!

Cover photo: Fraserview Meat and Video Shop. Photo by Flickr user "knightbefore_99."