Parallel Lines Project Episode 2 - Tunnels

Parallel Lines Project - Mark Moldowan Social Communications

INTRO

Welcome back to the Parallel Lines Project - the podcast where we separate fact from fiction. Now by we, I mean the royal we; I’m your host Mark Moldowan.

Que theme music.

On this week’s podcast - tunnels. Yeah, seriously. Tunnels. I’m not talking about your regular old transportation network type tunnels, I’m talking about basement gambling dens, opium tunnels, underground cities and of course drug trafficking.

After that, the recipe this week - vegetarian stir fried quinoa. Trust me - this shit is delicious, easy to make and will satisfy even the most fickle of meat eaters.

But first -

ACT 1 - CORRECTIONS, OMISSIONS AND SHOOTING THE SHIT

So first off I want to apologize for some of the weird audio bugs last week. I’ll chalk it up to first cast jitters. I also want to point out that while I definitely wrote “Jennie” in the script, for some reason I decided the proper pronunciation of J-E-N-N-I-E was Jeanie. I may or may not have had MJ on the mind or something I don’t know.

Don’t worry, my Jewish guilt is in full force and I will say ten hail Harry’s for redemption. Oh Harold Ramis - you may be gone but you will forever be remembered in our hearts and on basic cable every Groundhog Day. I got you babe.

Oh and before I forget - if you have a topic you would like me to investigate for the show let me know! I have some stuff in the hopper, but I always love to tackle new ideas. While I’ve been keeping it local so far, it can really be anything. I want to make sure I get my money’s worth out of my Journalism degree. You can go to my website www.markmoldowan.com and comment of this episode or drop me a line at [e-mail].

I’d love to hear from you.

Now - on to the show.

ACT 2 - TUNNELS

If you live on the west coast this may be oddly familiar to you.

Turn of the Century Vancouver. Location, Chinatown.

Sitting on the edge of the Commonwealth, the new model colonial city of Vancouver was a jewel in the crown of British colonialism. While small, the city had a reputation for the cutting edge. The completion of the Canadian National Railway connected the far flung colony to the rest of the dominion and newer and grander construction projects were well on their way. The Dominion building on the edge of Gastown was set to be the tallest building in the British Empire. An electric trolley system began to connect the settlements that would become Greater Vancouver, and Lord Stanley’s Park was beginning to take shape as the modern greenspace in the heart of the city it is today.

But the city had its darker side.

On the eastern edge of town, the growing settlement of Chinese workers was seen as a dangerous, seedy element on the edge of a modern, technologically advanced city. Chinese immigration was not new to the city - many came to help build the railroads, others came with the promise of riches in the interior during the gold rush. Most had settled in Vancouver.

These strange foreigners with odd customs were looked down upon by the rest of the city. The Asian community was an underclass, subject to constant scrutiny and sometimes violence from the rest of the population. Ghettoized and stigmatized.

Now, I’m not saying that Chinatown was a nice, happy crime-free place. Far from it. As we all know, poverty breeds crime and one of the biggest criminal activities in early Vancouver was the opium trade from China.

Now I know this is a sensitive topic, so I’m going to make this clear - I am not saying the Chinese immigrant population was responsible for the opium trade or even its only victim. Laudanum - an opium based medicine - was widespread among the English population in the Empire.

In fact, opium use among the Chinese is most definitely tied to British actions before the Opium Wars and ran rampant due to their interventions in China. However, the Chinese opium trade was a part of our city’s history and needs to be acknowledged as such. Even Prime Minister Mackenzie King addressed the issue, saying “almost as much opium was sold to white people as to Chinese” and that “the habit of opium smoking was making headway, not only among white men and boys, but also among women and girls.”

Now in 1907 a white supremacist society whipped up a big enough anti-opium fury in the city to spark a massive riot that utterly destroyed both Chinatown and Japantown in Vancouver. They blamed the Chinese community for corrupting the good white people of Vancouver.

I sure am glad we live in modern times where we don’t just blame a race for the ills facing our city.

Anyways, I wanted to give some background before I got into the topic today.

The tunnels. Of all the famous tunnels under our city, the opium tunnels are by far the most prevalent. I’ve heard everything - that the tunnels ran from the waterfront to select Chinese businesses that housed opium dens to smuggle the drug literally under the noses of Vancouver’s boys in blue. I’ve heard the network of tunnels extended from store to store creating something of a giant, literally underground den of illicit opium smokers. Kind of like the malls under Montreal but with less chain stores and slightly more drug smoking.

Even more confusing, there are actually a shit tonne of hidden tunnels that run all over the city as well. There’s a tunnel from Waterfront to the Canada Post headquarters that was used for mail service during the war. There’s a massive collection of steam tunnels under UBC. There’s train tunnels near waterfront, security tunnels under old banks - just a crazy underground city just beyond our reach. On top of this, the opium tunnel urban legend is totally pervasive across the North American west coast. LA, San Francisco, Seattle - even Victoria - all have legends of Chinese opium tunnels. It’s crazy.

And to complicate this even more, according to the Vancouver Police Museum, there are plenty of hidden rooms and compartments all over China Town. It wasn’t just opium dens either - gambling was big business in early Vancouver and was kept out of sight and out of mind via hidden walls and passageways.

But in reality, according to both the Vancouver Police Museum and the Vancouver Historical society no opium tunnels exist.

But the final nail in the coffin for the opium tunnels in Vancouver is the geography. To my Vancouver listeners - have you ever noticed the lack of underground structures in China Town? Most historic buildings there don’t have basements. Why? China Town was built on a floodplain. A lot of buildings were constructed on stilts buried deep in the ground.

So opium tunnels? Total horseshit. But underground tunnels?

Vancouver is filled with them. Well, was.

The Canada Post tunnel mentioned earlier has been filled in due to safety concerns. The Canadian Pacific Railroad tunnels were converted for skytrain use. Even the famed UBC steam tunnels are under very strict lock and key.

And for good reason. The UBC tunnels have very poor ventilation and it is absolutely a concern for any would-be urban explorers that want to go check them out. Oxygen levels fluctuate wildly and the carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide poisoning is totally a legit problem. On top of that, the insulation on the pipes down there is old as all hell and is literally crumbling off. These pipes get freaking hot. You could easily burn yourself pretty severely if you tried to venture down there as well. On top of all of that, UBC has been cracking down on spelunkers, arresting and fining them to keep the tunnels off limits.

There’s also a tunnel under West HAstings that was used by the Bank of Canada to transfer cash and prevent robberies - though again the tunnel is tightly closed and impossible to enter.

There is one last tunnel in Greater Vancouver that I feel I need to point out. Again, this one is sealed, but it remains unfilled.

I’m going to take you back to the year 2005. Canada was in a boom time. Podcasting was a new phenomenon that exploded on to the scene after being popularized by a soon-to-be pop culture icon and everyone was rocking out to the hit single “Shake it Off.”

No seriously. I’m not talking Serial and T-Swift. I’m talking Ricky Gervais and Mariah Carey. Fucking weird dude.

Anyways.

Deep in the bowels of Surrey, three dudes thought they were the smartest fucking people on the planet. Under a massive hanger on a non-descript plot of land by the border, they began to build one of the most elaborate drug smuggling tunnels ever built between the US and Canada. In fact, I think it’s the only one.

Sitting three meters deep, one meter tall, one meter wide and 90 meters long, the tunnel was pretty impressive. RCMP and US officials were tipped off early in its construction. Probably because building a massive and structurally sound tunnel like that is pretty ballsy.

It wasn’t even open and in full use for a day when cops swarmed in on both sides of the border sealing it shut.

So I guess Vancouver is no fun city when it comes to tunnels.

.”Mark” you say, “all you do is take away all of our fun - I want to go to an underground city. Possibly with Morlocks. Or CHUDs.”

My simple answer is “okay. Drive about three hours south of here.”

Seattle my friends, has a massive underground city built beneath it. Being perched on a pretty solid hill, Seattle is the perfect place for a network of tunnels. Not only that, but the historic Seattle city centre is now literally underground. That’s right, the modern city was built on top of the old one.

Pretty crazy if you ask me.

Now I’ve never toured the underground city, but I know people who have and they say it’s a pretty amazing sight to behold. Looking at my old friend Tripadvisor - fuck, that’s two episodes in a row I’ve used them, they should be paying me for this - the tours seem to be very well reviewed and relatively inexpensive.

So do underground tunnels exist in Vancouver? Yes. But the only ones that are used for drug smuggling are in Surrey. Suprise!

ACT 3

Now for our recipe today I wanted to do something with a bit of an Asian flavour to go along with all our talk of China Town. I also wanted to do something a bit healthier than those cabbage rolls.

Today I’m going to tell you how to make Asian style Quinoa “fired rice.”

Here’s what you need:

1 Package of Extra Firm or pressed tofu (or 28oz)

2 cups quinoa

12oz of Guy Lan

2 Carrots

4 scallions

4 cloves of garlic, chopped

1 small piece of ginger, grated

½ cup soy sauce

2 tbsp rice vinegar

1 tbsp rice wine vinegar

2 tbsp sesame oil

Cook the quinoa. Rinse all vegetables and tofu and pat dry. Cover the tofu in paper towel and press it between two heavy plates for about 10 minutes - even if you are using pressed tofu. Chop the carrot, scallion, garlic and Guy Lan. It’s important to chop the whole Guy Lan - flower, stems, leaves and all.

In a large wok or pan, heat up a small amount of oil on a medium to high heat and fry the tofu until golden. Set aside. Add a bit more oil and fry the white parts of the scallions, the ginger and the garlic until fragrant - about a minute. Then add the Guy Lan and Carrot. Stir fry until softened. Add the quinoa, tofu and sauces. Stir until heated all the way through and make sure there is no excess liquid.

Pretty easy huh?

Well, that’s it for episode two of the Parallel Line Project. Hope you enjoyed it. If you liked it please leave your comments and rate it on iTunes. You can also see the transcript and show notes at markmoldowan.com/podcast . All music on this podcast is under the creative commons license and was found at the Free Music Archive. Our theme song is Against the Wall by Boxcat Games, other music included in this podcast is credited to their respected artists in the show notes.

Have a great week everyone, and keep it weird.