Quick-Facts!
* Banking hours vary
according to the institution you are doing business with. Basically
you can find a bank open Monday to Saturday anywhere from 8am-8pm
and automatic teller machines (ATM's) are everywhere in malls,
corner stores and you can also access the ATM from most banks from
the street after hours.
* Our currency is the
Canadian Dollar. Sometime it's made fun of and called monopoly money
because the paper bills fives, tens, twenties, fifties and hundred
are each a different color. Our coins are one cent (penny), five
cent, ten cent, twenty-five cent. Our dollar is a coin called a "loonie"
and there's also a two dollar coin which is called a "toonie". We
also take American dollars but if you need to change your money you
can go to a bank or a currency exchange place.
* One thing you will notice about Vancouver is the number of
coffee shops. With your own
laptop you're pretty much set as many coffee shops provide
internet access. Otherwise
one place you can go is the downtown at Vancouver Public Library and
get on a computer there.
* We speak English here.
All federal government buildings also communicate in
French You will also find
many other institutions like banks and travel agencies will serve
you in other languages and if you go to certain parts of the city
you will here many other languages such as Cantonese, Mandarin,
Farsi and Italian being spoken.
* There's shopping, shopping and
more shopping about Vancouver. The only time that there
is really a lot of shops closed is Christmas and some also at
Easter. Otherwise shopping is available seven days a week. You can
shop at the big malls like Pacific Center Mall in downtown Vancouver
or in neighborhood shopping districts such as Robson Street,
Chinatown, Commercial Drive and Little India. Make a phone call
before you go because shopping hours vary.
* We use the metric system
so distance is in centimeters, meters and kilometers and the
temperature is in Celsius.
* To make a local call
in Vancouver you have to dial 10-digits. This includes the 3-digit
area code and then the seven-digit number.
* There's the Vancouver Police
Force who drive around in black vehicles as well as ride
around on bicycles and motorbikes and the Royal Canadian Mounted
Police (RCMP) who are contracted to many of the other municipalities
and implement their own programs.
* Speed Limit:
On the highway it goes between 80 - 100 kilometers per hour
(km/h) or we say clicks and in the city it's 50 clicks. Watch out
for school zones and play grounds where the speed goes down to
30kmh. (Basically, 100 km/h = 60 MPH, 80 km/h = 50 MPH, 50 km/h = 30
MPH) If you rent a car while you're here, a friendly note of warning
the police like to hide in plain sight to pull over speeders and
give out fines that start at $100.00 and just go up and up!
