I had a fit of morbid laughter when I saw this redevelopment banner today. The graffiti could be its Greek chorus. Do you think the condo developer actually bothered to read The Iliad before naming a building after it? Or even bothered to Google it? But then why not style a condo as the location of ten years of vicious warfare, flaming arrows streaming past the gates, grieving women tearing their hair in anguish, the dead lying unburied, horrifying and inglorious trips to the underworld, juvenile and narcissistic gods, the death of heroes, and then ultimately the destruction and fall of Troy. Everyone loves a condo building named after a gruesome cautionary tale about fallen cities. Think of the decor potential – let alone the potential for irony! Someone should advise the strata owners that if Greeks/a large wooden horse ever knock, don’t open the door. And the graffiti – do you think they mean Troy? Or Vancouver? Or the 2010 Olympics VANOC committee? Or all three? My mother looked up at this banner darkly, after I pointed it out, and said “The Iliad… well, they’ve never read it!” Then, more hopefully: “Do you think they were being ironic?” You’d think a developer could at least have seen the Brad Pitt movie. Nearly everyone dies, I seem to remember. “Liveability!” Capricious gods! Bloody battlefields! Boutiques!
P.S. The boutique Iliad building is not being built on this spot. It already exists a few blocks away from this site. It’s on Homer Street, of course, but that street was not named after the blind poet. It was named after an early Vancouver lumber magnate, which makes it similar to most of our downtown streets. But let’s pretend it’s Greek, why not? I wonder what war story the condo developer will borrow for the new building to be built on this spot? The Das Boot, maybe? The boutique Deer Hunter? And I guess this means goodbye to the William Davis Centre for Actors Study. It was housed in this building – you can see the sign at the end of the block. Davis is the Canadian actor who played The Cigarette Smoking Man on The X-Files. The character was a jerk but I bet he could tell you the plot of The Iliad. Lastly: if you live in the Iliad building, you need this painting for your decor! It’s at the Hastings Street Value Village right now.
Above, the Trojan horse from the film “Troy,” starring Brad Pitt as Achilles.
I used to think such accidents only happen over here. But they happen even in France. Remember the perfume “Samsara” by Guerlain. Sounds oriental and sensual. But “Samsara” means the world of six realms of suffering in Hindu and Buddhist terminology, the opposite of Nirvana. The human world is part of it. True insofar.
I love Samsara. Didn’t know that was the meaning. Smells like Nirvana to me.
We seriously need a new Vancouver condo development called the Samsara. That would absolutely be the icing on the cake. And perfume, what a great new diversification project for condo developers! Smells like money!
There’s already a Samsara resort in Jamaica. Don’t order the shellfish.
Oh the brilliance…
LOVE IT:-)
I like the Iliad building James built. I definitely am amused that it’s on Homer St, and it is one of the cooler looking loft style developments in the city.