In March, I squeezed past a squadron of Mexican police officers, navigated a metal queue, plopped money down at grated narrow window, made my way into the Arena Coliseo de Guadalajara, and was immediately confronted by the sight of a masked man being hurled out of a wrestling ring.
I was here with two friends, one of them locally raised and guiding us through the chaos, to take in a lucha libre, the famously Mexican style of professional wrestling. A mix of curious tourists and passionate locals had crammed into the small, aging arena to watch the spectacle.
Although we came with little active interest in professional wrestling, we were excited by lucha libre’s promise of spectacle, in all its fun and over-the-top glory. We found three hours of excitement, hilarity, athletic prowess, drama and drunken fan excess unlike anything available in Canada these days.
But to two guys raised playing hockey in B.C.’s interior, there was something familiar about the Coliseo and its occupants. Crammed in a dense industrial neighourhood in the centre of Mexico’s second-largest city, my friend and I had found a building we knew well from our youths.
In all its nostalgic, flawed, and scarred glory, we had found an old barn.
Spectators at a lucha libre wrestling match in the Arena Coliseo Guadalajara, Mexico.
Photo for The Tyee by Darren McDonald.
The old barn: a place that was ours
Even today, I can close my eyes and whisk myself to the innards of the Civic Arena, an aging, faintly yellow concrete building that sat for decades in the centre of Vernon, my hometown.
The Civic Arena was an old cinderblock and wood barn of the sort you could once find in every town and city in British Columbia. It was a utilitarian, rectangular ice rink built in 1937 and in accordance with the unique demands, skillset, resources and limits of locals.
Its small ice sheet was surrounded by stepped terraces that rose up a half-dozen levels. Painted blue, they functioned as seats, insofar as they were the only place to sit and watch whatever was happening on the ice.
At the top of the seating, behind a waist-high railing, a narrow corridor ran around the entire upper perimeter of the building. It was just wide enough for two people to walk by one another. Beneath the stands were another set of hallways that provided access to dressing rooms and other mysterious doorways.
And as a child in the early ‘90s, all of this was my kingdom to explore.
Although my family never had much money, my parents always slotted enough away to allow me and my brother to play hockey. Fiercely (overly?) competitive, I loved everything about the sport. It was fast, technical and exciting. I was good at it, and I liked being part of a team. As I grew older and struggled with school’s social elements, hockey gave me a couple days a week in which I could lose myself on the ice. Or off the ice.
My brother was two years younger. When he played, I’d inevitably find myself dragged along to his games. Sometimes we’d be at the Priest Valley Arena, a newer, more utilitarian ice sheet at a local rec centre. But I liked the days at the Civic Arena the best.
For hours, sometimes alone, sometimes accompanied by other hockey siblings, I’d roam the arena, racing down the narrow concourse, checking which doors had been left unlocked, and inventing ball games anywhere possible — i.e. everywhere.
A handful of times each year, we would visit the rink in the evening and find it transformed for a junior hockey game. Children became legion. Men stood along the concourse railing jawing at one another. The big concession — the one with hot dogs and French fries — was opened. And the weirdly passionate fans above the penalty box would boisterously yell at cocky teenage hockey players.
Over the years, my skepticism of all of it would grow. But the rink, the building and the arena remained unsullied and, indeed, would be elevated by the passage of years and the influence of nostalgia.
The old barn was a piece of my childhood, a piece of Vernon’s history, and a place that was ours.
In 2018, shortly before it was demolished, Vernon residents packed the Civic Arena to celebrate the arena’s 80th anniversary.
Photo by Roger Knox.
They’re functional, but not exactly beautiful
Old barns are defined less by their age than who built them. In Lillooet, B.C., where I live, the local rink dates back to the ‘80s. As in Chilliwack and countless other places in B.C., the arena was a community endeavour. Community organizations raised money, local companies donated supplies and handy residents pitched in their expertise.
The result was a rink that was and is eminently functional, if not exactly beautiful.
On a recent sunny Friday afternoon, I met my friend Gavin Smith at the Lillooet Recreation Centre.
Smith is a rink rat in every sense of the word. He drives the Zamboni, sweeps the floors, keeps the dressing rooms in tip-top shape and helps out with hockey practices. This spring, the local…
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