Crystal Mall is a Crystal Ball for lovers of ethnic foods
After a lifetime of exploring Vancouver, from its streets to neighbourhoods to parks and picnic sites, to tourist destinations and secret “under the radar” attractions that only locals know, I thought I had “seen everything,” as the old expression goes. But there is always room for more secrets, and the shopping mall/farmers market known as The Crystal certainly takes the cake, so to speak.
Kingsway is one of Vancouver’s most historic streets. Originally an Indigenous foot path between Burrard Inlet and what is known today as New Westminster, the path became a road and then a highway and today remains a busy street lined with a bizarre assortment of tiny shops and restaurants, autobody shops, mini-malls, and the huge new residential neighbourhood of glass high rises centred around what is now known as Metrotown in the suburb of Burnaby.
Should you have the time and interest to search for them, Kingsway boasts many small family-run Asian restaurants, mostly Vietnamese or Chinese, with Burmese cuisine, Malaysian, Thai, Indian, and Filipino foods also in the mix. The only way to discover if these tiny restaurants have great food is through experimentation. Don’t let the fact that the restaurant or grocery store is located on a parking lot in an obscure mini-mall dissuade you from sticking your nose in; just like the “Golden Triangle” in suburban Richmond, there are riches behind the glass windows and cheap brick walls to be found.
Having explored Kingsway endlessly and with more trips yet to come, I have passed by The Crystal Mall many times without ever noticing it. The Mall stands at the gateway to Metrotown, on the southeast corner of Willingdon and Kingsway, one of many such towers in Metrotown. Looking closely, you might notice the development is circular and the tower stands on a large pedestal. There is a sign in front but if you are driving a car chances are you won’t notice it, and until the other day I never did.
Evidently there are four floors of underground parking, but a little advance glance at reviews will inform you that the parking lot is a crowded catastrophe with tiny stalls and giant cars and only one way in and out, so don’t go there. Simple research on Google Maps will reveal a public parking lot just west of Willingdon and even some street parking, and it’s only a two-minute walk to the front entrance of the Mall. There are stairs leading to the second floor and a central courtyard with multiple entrances leading to the interior. Pick either entrance; it makes no difference because the moment you enter you will be sucked into an entirely different world and be entirely and happily lost within two minutes.
Metrotown Mall just further east on Kingsway is a huge development with hundreds of stores and a giant food court, but the shops are famous brand name outlets found in all modern malls. Funky Crystal Mall feels like a mix between Hong Kong and Mexico, blending hundreds of small shops and food stalls with a farmer’s market and myriad tiny alleys going all directions. This may be the result of building a circular tower. On the day we were there, the “alleys” were jampacked, with the bottom level of the mall featuring a market selling fruits, vegetables and meats, all with long lines of shoppers drawn by low prices and foods you won’t find anywhere else. Even the barber shop had a long line of customers waiting for a discount haircut. Travel agencies and assorted retail outlets add to the cacophony. We felt like we were in Kowloon or Oaxaca, swept along by the crowds.
The giant food court was like no other I have ever seen, with not a single corporate KFC or Burger King outlet in the mix. There were little noodle shops featuring snails, others offering body parts you will never see in a Safeway. If you like to explore new food options, this is the food court for you. We have grown past pho (Vietnamese beef soup) and are currently experimenting with varieties of laksa (Malaysian cocoanut curry soup) a tasty broth that will certainly clear your throat or sinuses if you have a head cold, and we shared a table with a single Chinese man because finding any seating was difficult. The food court was the largest I have ever seen, and the Mall itself was 99.9 percent Chinese speaking many different languages, with many ages and groups, although the tables were generally full of families and friends. Our new friend described his own soup as “spicy,” and we could see smoke emanating from it and were expecting it to burst into flames at any moment. We couldn’t agree what the soup was called, or what spices were in it, but it certainly brought a flush to his cheeks.
The hour or two we were there was only enough time to partially browse the shops and various floors and to be swept along by the crowds swarming what I termed “alleyways” going all directions. We’ll certainly be going back for more explorations of the most unique shopping mall in Vancouver, but next time we won’t do it on a busy Saturday afternoon and (forewarned is forearmed) we most certainly won’t attempt to park underground. Perhaps we might even summon the courage to try the snail noodles, whatever they are, although we may have to work our way slowly up to the more peculiar cuisine offerings at the many little family-run stalls at a later date. No need to fly to Hong Kong while there is a secret foreign world hidden right underneath your nose, and in Burnaby of all places, if you know where to find it, and now you do.
