The Mr. Sport Hotel

My family has a long history of infamous family vacation stories. There was the "Vegas Girls" incident where my brother Bryan, who couldn't have been older than eight at the time, found a magazine full of pictures of scantily-clad hookers wedged between the seat cushions in a VW camper bus my parents rented for our vacation. Bryan, already a man wrapped in the body of a young boy, responded to Vegas Girls with wide-eyes and a loud WOO-WOO! As the bratty older sibling, I did what most big sisters would do in the same situation...I immediately ratted on him to my parents. Mom quickly confiscated the magazine, much to the dismay of my brother. For the rest of that vacation, any time my mom and I would go off to do an activity on our own, my dad would joke he and Bryan would be around checking out Vegas Girls. I think Bryan is still mad at me for telling on him.

Then there was the "Peabody" incident at a Friendly's diner in Peabody, MA. My mom was writing out a traveler's check to a cashier for our meal and happened to ask what city we were in. The "helpful" cashier responded in a language that resembled something short of Martian, saying "Peabidee." My mom, baffled, asked her to repeat what she said, and once again received a curt "Peabidee!" Mom asked the cashier if she could spell out the town, which came out P-E-A-B-O-D-Y. My mom, relieved she wasn't losing her mind or her grasp of the English language, replied saying, "Oh, you mean PEA-BODY?" The cashier, obviously irked with my mother now, looked at her like she was some sort of idiot, and replied with a snort saying, "THAT'S WHAT I SAID! PEABIDEE!"

Clearly.

What brings up these incidents of the past is my current business trip to Vancouver, B.C. I arrived here yesterday for a work event and my company put us up at a fabulous hotel in the Yaletown District, called the Opus Hotel. By some accident, I was put up in an executive suite. The room is very modern, and has a living room area with the most comfortable couch, two plasma televisions, surround sound, a huge bathroom, iPod docking station, down comforter, heated bathroom floors, and a big, cozy terry-cloth robe. The room is loft-like with large windows that look out towards the water on one side, and out towards brick and glass buildings on the other side. Add a kitchen to this place, and I could call it home.

This is my third trip to Vancouver. I was here for a day last May when I left for Alaska on a cruise, but it is my first trip here, at the tender age of 16 that truly stands out to me. It is also the trip that introduced the Mr. Sport Hotel into my life and Khorge family vacation infamy. As I look at the luxury of this room, and compare it to the room we stayed in at the Mr. Sport, I knew I had to write about it.

The summer of 1990 was a big one in my life. This was the summer before my senior year in high school. It was also time to begin considering what college I would attend the following year. I didn't have a tragic high school experience, but I did know I wanted to get out of my hometown. When a brochure from University of Puget Sound arrived at my house, I was confident I had found my school of choice. It was small, brick and ivy, and it had a physical therapy program, which at the time, was what I thought I wanted to go into.

My parents decided we would travel to Tacoma, WA to check out the college. They mapped out a route that would take us to Eureka, CA to visit my aunt and uncle for a few days, and then continue up the coast of Oregon, into Washington to check out the campus, visit family who lived in Seattle, and eventually, our final destination would be Vancouver, B.C.

My uncle in Seattle had given my parents some ill-advice by telling them they need not worry about hotel reservations on this trip. My parents liked the idea - it allowed for some flexibility and freedom on the trip. Unfortunately, we were not the only family on this journey that summer, and every night became a terrible struggle of driving from town-to-town looking for a place to spend the night. I remember passing by what looked like happy families at Shiloh Inns, Red Lion Inns, Holiday Inns...swimming in heated pools and enjoying free HBO. In comparison, we were playing Bates Motel roulette nightly, staying a string of dumps. Only in Seattle, did we move on up to a deluxe accommodation, when we stayed at the downtown Westin and enjoyed panoramic views of the city to Mt. Rainer.

By the time we rolled into Vancouver, the northwest was experiencing an unusual heat wave. It was sweltering and after hearing nothing but whining from my brother and me, my parents were just trying to find a hotel with a swimming pool. We must have passed 100 NO VACANCY signs until we arrived at the Mr. Sport Hotel, which advertised air conditioning and a heated pool. Good enough! We pulled into the parking lot.

Note to self: if the hotel you are staying at markets itself to truckers with a "stay nine times and get the tenth visit free," immediately exit the premises. (We didn't of course). Mr. Sport spared no expense on decorating the lobby - it was just worn and tired with its olive hues and dark wood trim. A restaurant off the lobby offered stale pastry and sour orange juice served in red plastic cups as our daily free continental breakfast. The place smelled of stale cigarette smoke and Pine Sol. And the heated pool was a mere hole in the ground, surrounded by tall walls of the building that blocked the sun.

The rooms lacked character too. It looked like an episode of Miami Vice had thrown up with pale pastel walls, pastel comforters, and white lacquer furniture. I can't remember what was wrong with the air conditioning unit, but seem to recall it either not working or about to fall out the window.

Perhaps the finest feature of the Mr. Sport Hotel was proudly advertised in the elevator. On the weekends, the bar/lounge up front became a topless lounge. Imagine standing in an elevator as an overdeveloped in the chest 16-year-old girl, with a bunch of truckers, looking at XXX-lounge advertisements together.

Awkward.

The Mr. Sport has provided years of entertainment to my family. We still talk about it and laugh. I stole stationary from there and even send my brother a letter on it from time-to-time.

I looked online to see if the Mr. Sport still exists today, but I couldn't find a trace of it. Perhaps it has come and gone, but it will always live vividly in my mind.