This is the second story in a three-part sequence a couple of man who has lived in Vancouver’s Stanley Park for the final three a long time. Read the primary half right here.
Christenson Bailey began tenting in Stanley Park in 1990. And he nonetheless lives there in the present day.
He’d moved right into a tiny campsite hidden deep within the forest to make artwork for the final three a long time, and he has lived on subsequent to nothing.
In the start, Bailey survived on simply $300 a yr by placing his artwork abilities to make use of, doing sign-writing jobs across the metropolis for money.
“By just doing this sporadically, coming in and out of the forest, no one ever questioned me,” Bailey tells Global News. “I just walked down the street, knocked on doors. I asked, ‘Would you like this?’ and showed them a presentation. People paid me a good fee.”
For the primary 17 years, he lived solely by candlelight. He made no bother and stored in contact with park rangers. For meals, he taught himself catch wild geese and geese.
“It was easy to do,” he remembers. “Get some grain, go down to the water, throw the grain in the water, they show up, you bag one, pluck it, and you go down to the beach, build a fire and roast it.”
With a smile, he remembers the remoteness of that point, seeing just about nobody on Third Beach from sundown till early morning.
“The patterns of living and subsiding were basically what I was able to think up,” he says. “One of the happiest periods of my life was that period.”
This was how Bailey favored it.
He may go weeks with out talking to a different particular person. He spent his time meditating, learning the forest, and making artwork.
When later years introduced new expertise, Bailey would experience his bike to UBC and spend as much as 20 hours per week within the laptop library constructing web sites.
He went all over the place on his bike. He’d method rental and restore retailers to ask for outdated inside tubes from bike tires, which he’d found have been good for tying baggage to the back and front so he may carry issues.
Sgt. Susan Sharp with the Vancouver Police Department’s Mounted Unit, whose stables are in Stanley Park, says Bailey was decided to be self-sufficient.
“He’s had numerous offers of clothing or food vouchers,” she says. “He never took anything from us. At one point, I got him a pair of shoes because his were so wet. He was very grateful.”
In a manner, Bailey used the quiet forest to reset his life. It allowed him to take away all exterior duties and commitments so he may stay a humble existence.
In one interview, he proudly states, “I have no time schedule, usually — except my own.”
He would spend hours or days at a time within the forest learning crops and animals. Walking alongside a path with Global News, he factors out a selected tree that forks at its midpoint.
“I think that’s an incredible tree, look at it,” he says. “The light that comes through, the feeling of peace and this presence, has so much quiet strength that it just resonates.”
This is the place Bailey drew inspiration for making artwork, taking his sketchbook across the forest to see what he may create.
“You’re in this place … you’re not studying a book that says do this for tone and shade, or any teacher, instructor,” he says. “It’s between you and the natural world.”
For greater than 25 years, Bailey sustained this way of life.
In 2017, issues began to alter.
Bailey would bathe repeatedly in a stream close to his campsite. He believes the water was contaminated as a result of he developed a pores and skin situation and needed to search remedy from a clinic.
Given that he had no identification, he was referred to the Canadian Mental Health Association to be paired with a case employee — a routine course of for somebody thought of to be residing exterior.
“From the outset, (the case worker) arranged for legal forms for me to sign, which swore that I was the person that I said I was.”
Caseworker Geoff Bodnerak had labored in numerous sides of outreach and psychological well being for 10 years when he met Bailey. They labored collectively for 2.
“I run into a lot of individuals who aren’t afraid to be themselves,” Bodnerak says in an interview. “I enjoyed talking to (Bailey) and listening to his stories and how he grew up. I remember him bringing out his sketchbook and being very proud of his sketchbook.”
Through his connections, he secured Bailey a checking account, even with out authorities identification, and initiated the method for a pension.
Within a couple of months, Bailey went from incomes $300 a yr to $600 a month.
He says he was “flabbergasted.”
He was capable of purchase groceries, higher outside clothes, and a telephone so he may begin an Instagram account for his artwork.
Bodnerak says their relationship was all the time based mostly on belief, and he by no means tried to persuade Bailey to go away the park.
“That’s not what he wanted, he liked living there.”
At one level, Bailey ended up within the hospital for minor surgical procedure after medical doctors discovered a benign tumour throughout an earlier evaluation.
After the process, there was confusion round fee of the $1,000 invoice.
“When it was apparent that it might not be covered, (Bodnerak) said he would pay for it,” Bailey remembers, with tears welling in his eyes. “You know, he was that kind of guy. He was great.”
By this level, Bailey had spent 27 years residing in isolation in Stanley Park. No electrical energy, no heating, no creature comforts. Just himself and the pure world, with a go to to town from time to time.
Bodnerak knew Bailey may stay this fashion for a few years to return, however steps wanted to be taken for when, or if, he modified his thoughts. That began with getting a passport.
“(There was a) lot of investigative digging and it was just about where would they have medical records,” he says. Then they began border-crossing information as a result of his household had moved to Canada from the U.S. when he was a youngster.
“We started going through point of entry (records), and then I could prove he’s been in Canada this long.”
The course of was lengthy and gradual. Bailey was considered one of about 100 shoppers Bodnerak had on the time.
Despite greatest efforts, the duty was by no means accomplished. In 2019, Bodnerak left his job for private causes, handing over Bailey’s file to a different employee.
Then the pandemic hit and Bailey’s case was not a precedence.
So he waited.
Stay tuned for the ultimate story on this three-part sequence.
https://globalnews.ca/news/10430020/stanley-park-longest-resident-survival/
