It was almost five years ago that 3/4 of the Woodwards Department Store lot was demolished in a huge, orchestrated series of explosions.

Bill, his son, and I came downtown at 4:30 am on the morning of the implosion, and went to “work” at our office in the Dominion Building — the first year of our tenancy as top-floor occupants. In reality, we were there to record the closest building demolition we would probably ever witness.

Bill set up his camera on a tripod outside on the fire escape, and his son and I positioned ourselves by the window. And we waited.

And waited.

It was mind-numbingly boring, and all of us were getting hungry, antsy and impatient.

Eventually, however the countdown began — if you hear the video, it sounds like “Three, Two, One, Boom” — and two rounds of big blasts occurred, the first, I think to weaken the primary load-bearing columns, and the second to finish it off, followed by the perfect collapse of several buildings that Bill and I had been in myriad times during our entire childhoods and into the beginnings of Mint. Then the dust came, and covered everything.

We were lucky: none of our windows broke, unlike all the other buildings around the Woodwards site. It sure was shocking though, to feel the series of thuds and concussions, and fear that yes hmmm maybe the windows might break….

Anyways, Bill recorded his experience, and it’s been up on YouTube ever since.

I remember going into Frannie’s at the end of February, for my semi-usual early-morning breakfast fix, along with two or three other regulars, plus a steady stream of construction workers (yes, they were still around, building the new buildings in the neighbourhood) coming and going. When I went up to order, Helen said in a quiet tone and with tears in her eyes, “We’re closing.” They were going to leaving within a month, maybe sooner but definitely not later.

And for the next four weeks, as often as I could, I went down there to the little space above where Scratch Records used to be, to order breakfast, or lunch, or cookies and banana bread. I wanted to make sure the gustatory memory was firmly embedded — and I was also kind of guilty because for a period of time, six to eighth months perhaps, I had not visited Frannie’s because I was concerned with so many hearty breakfasts and what it might mean to my innards. But that feeling disappeared soon enough, and I truly missed going there.

One morning, during the final weeks, I asked Helen what that amazing smell was. “It’s Japchae, want some?” She was cooking it at work to take home for dinner. “Come by at 1:00 and I will have it here ready for you.” And she did, and it was amazing. At one point, Frannie’s had served Japchae, a Korean dish of stirfried cellophane noodles, veggies, meat, and soy sauce, but no longer had; it was one of the only things I remember disappearing from the menu.

Anyways, throughout those final weeks, Helen and Kee were greeted over and over again by old customers, some folks who had made special long treks to return. And on the final day — yes, I went there for breakfast — they warned everyone that they will only last as long as there was bread. I even ordered Bill his regular sandwich to go, and had it taken straight to where he was that day, kilometres away from the corner of Cambie and Hastings.

Right around 2:00 or so, after the big rushes — and there was a steady stream of wellwishers ordering turkey or chicken clubhouses, toasted veggie and cheese sandwiches, chicken noodle soup, roast beef sandwiches, and on and on — Kee announced, “We’re out of bread! We are done.” And with that, food creation stopped, and the remaining folks slowly made their good-byes and left.

I frequently saw Kee sweeping and vacuuming the floor of Frannie’s around 3:00 or so when the rush had long since passed, and I thought of Helen and Kee on that final afternoon in early spring, when they put the broom away and locked the door for the very last time.

You can read elsewhere about the reincarnation of this Dominion Building basement spot, from the total redo of the interior to reflect its Middle Eastern vibe, to the saving of the (I believe) Davide Pan-created security bars on the windows put up for a previous tenant, to the little garden out on the sidewalk tended to by Nuba staff, but the thing for me is the food.

There was a time when two or three times a week we would order lunch from Nuba, and it was usually the same thing: Najib’s Special and the lentil soup. Najib’s special is something that I have not seen anywhere else: it is deep-fried cauliflower. Sometimes a bit crunchy, but by the time we got it, it was a bit steamed, the deep-fried cauliflower is a little bit greasy (olive oil!) mouthful of that white vegetable that I remember eating raw as a child with French onion dip. It  comes with a unique (for me) green hot sauce, and starch and veggie and salad, and lots of olive oil. It is crazy good.

Other things that are memorable include the roasted potatoes (yup, and with the hot sauce added — I see them making the huge trays of roasted potatoes when I come into work every now and again), the wonderfully crispy falafel balls, the Mjadra (mmm, the crispy onions on top), and the chicken and hummus. Basically, really, the whole menu is amazing.

They tried to serve breakfast for a month, but that didn’t last long. And they have since expanded to three locations now — the most recent opening being closeish to Casa Del Artista and the Narrow — but the spot in the basement of the Dominion Building is the one for me. Oh, and there is also a bit of a “cushion room” too.

Next door to the Dominion Building, on the ground floor, facing Cambie Street, upstairs from where an early version of Scratch Records lived — where, according to legend, Nardwuar worked way back when — is Frannie’s, a venerable old sandwich spot that has not changed, we think, since forever almost. Run by a friendly duo, Frannie’s opens at the seemingly ungodly time of 6:30 every weekday morning, and closes at 4:30 in the afternoon.

The regulars are all there on their menu — the various customary sandwich concoctions and baked goods and soups and all that — and they also have curried beef and teriyaki chicken with rice. But the big thing for me is their breakfast.

When you order their bacon or sausage with eggs, hashbrowns, toast, and sliced tomatoes, Helen hauls out a hot plate and proceeds to cook your breakfast to order on a small skillet which, I don’t know about you, but to me is fascinating. Is it good? Yup. Everything is good at Frannie’s. No, really, and I’ve eaten almost everything there.

During all the big Woodwards construction, which is still going on but to a lesser degree, Frannie’s was overflowing with hardhat-wearing construction workers who would appear for breakfast, morning break time, lunch, and afternoon break time. And when the Ms. T’s building was burning down up on Pender by Homer, Frannie’s was overwhelmed with sandwich orders for the firefighters. With the neighbourhood “changing” and with more eating places popping up and around Frannie’s, I’d like to think that there is a healthy future for a small sandwich shop that is built on simplicity and sincerity, and has been around forever.