- Restaurants |
- Nightlife |
- Shopping |
- Coffee & Tea |
- All
Carnegie Centre
Category: Public Services & Government Public Services & Government [Edit]
401 Main StVancouver, BC V6A 2T7
Neighbourhood: Downtown Eastside
(604) 665-2220
8 reviews for Carnegie Centre
8 reviews in English
-
Review from Mathieu Y.
Vancouver, BC
Updated - 3/30/2010 2 Check-ins Here
I just wanted to update my review since I purchased a membership here 3 weeks ago. A membership ($1/year) gets you free computer/internet/printer usage, free, nicely dressed, billiards tables, community expeditions, and concerts, jam nights, poetry readings, etc. Theres a lot going on here any day of the week!
Also, I should respecify that a meal cost under $3.50 for the most part, and its some of the healthiest food you can order for that price. Delicious stroganoff, teriyaki chicken, or perhaps some lasagna await your plate, decorated with rice and salad with basil dressing? Score! I notice a lot of young people who work at the newer businesses showing up here more often around noon.
Other services they offer include a post board with the option of leaving a private message for someone, chess, a smoking lounge, dining service, ESL and computer lessons, newspapers, and of course the library. Worth going to, even if you are hung up about poor people.Listed in: Dive Eats
1 Previous Review: Show all »
-
10/8/2009
When you approach the carnegie center at Main and Hastings you'll notice two things, the homeless… Read more »
-
-
Review from pete d.
Vancouver, BC
3/8/2012
Come for the cheap food, stay for the bedbugs..
Neither are an exaggeration, and I've experienced both here. The Carnegie aka "The Downtown Eastside's Living Room" is a gorgeous turn-of-the-century building busting with history and and passion. The stained glass stairwell alone is worth the visit.
Despite the dire warning of bed bugs, the place is clean and pretty well run (although bed-bug caveat for anything borrowed from the library branch here). The Carnegie hosts a wealth of services for the DTES locals...
HOWEVER.. this is a facility for low-income *locals*, particularly marginal people. A hotbed of poverty activism and anti-gentrification militance, there is an ever-present spectre of class-warfare hanging in the air. The Carnegie is not the place for adventurous gastro-toursim in search of cheap eats, in fact there is a growing palpable resentment of outsiders (including the students and starving artists) who are taking advantage of valuable resources that include cheap food.
I'd caution Yelpers from just 'dressing-down' to take advantage of the inexpensive albeit mediocre food and rubbing elbows with society's less fortunate.. Unless you really can talk the talk and walk the walk, or you're down there to contribute: you risk the very really possibility of being outed and chastized in a very uncomfortable and public manner - and yes, I've seen this happen to a very nice clean looking unassuming tourist couple, and it was pretty intimidating for them.
Caveat Emptor all the way here - if you're looking for cheap eats in a gritty part of town, I'd suggest the new Save On Meats cafe two blocks west. If you're looking to give back to society's less fortunate - then come on down. -
Review from Larry L.
3/12/2011
Where would you go if you had the perfect date?
Where would you go to make it an adventure with said perfect date?
What would you eat with said perfection?
You would take her to the Carnegie Centre. A place full of nostalgia and mystery and childhood dream history.
A place that is now a community centre for the neighbourhood. Rough around the edges yes, but lots of charm hidden away. You just need to know where to look and how to find it. It is indeed still there after all those years. I remember stories my father used to tell us kids. About the Egyptian Mummy in the tower and how they'd try to sneak a peak at it by sneaking in, not to get caught and then run out to tell their friends that they did it! After that it'd be a 5 cent movie to watch some cartoons at the theatre down the street. That was back in the day. back in the 40's. Life was quite different then.
If you come down here, you might meet some people who remember those days from the 40's and 50's. You can strike up great conversations with the locals over a game of chess. You may just end up losing a game or two there as well.
Take notice there is also a library and community services and so on.
But I was here to take my perfect date for the perfect meal in a perfect locale.
We made our way into the building, through a maze of walls and construction and awkward scent left behind that permeated the walls. Up to the second floor and there we were. The cafeteria.
Unfortunately we didn't make it in time for the Seafood dinner and ended up just having soup. Lentil soup, which was quite good actually.
So in the end, we decided we would have to come earlier the next time to have that meal. She took the raincheck for another day. I couldn't have had a better and more gracious friend to dine with. I was just so enamoured by the experience, the giddiness was barely containable underneath my boring exterior of a face. And so we scampered off to another destination to have our meal down another street in the midst of Chinatown.
It's not for everyone. You have to come prepared and leave your bourgeois mentality at home. If you come here, you come humble and appreciative and with an open mind.
So how was it that we decided to come here?
It just happened that on one rainy Sunday earlier this year, a friend told us about this place. A gem in Chinatown, where you can come and volunteer your time to help those in need. It just so happens that this place has a very good cafeteria too!
Not fancy, but good and healthy. Wholesome solid food for the masses.
Now if you happen to be here, you can dine and get fed for very little. Check their site for the menu options for that day. And if you have time just drop in for a coffee and mingle. Get to know some people and hear some great stories.
And to Pops. Thanks for all those stories you told us about this place, about the neighbourhood and the days of what it must've been like to be a part of the "Lil Rascals" era. The memories continue and the history is preserved. We just need to open our minds and eyes and hearts to see it unfold in this place called Carnegie Centre. -
Review from Simon R.
BC
12/9/2008 1 photo
Somewhat beyond unpretentious, this local community center on the corner of Main and Hastings has it's own charm and personality, with exceptionally nice staff and people who have dedicated their lives to helping the less fortunate.
With its historical architecture and spiral staircase, the space is archaic and beautiful, with plenty of character and room for a library, gym, and cafeteria. The food upstairs is amazingly good and healthy, with three course dishes for less than four dollars, but remember that the food is mostly intended to feed the local starving homeless people.
The area is pretty sketchy, dirty and daunting with clustered packs of crack addicts loitering around the entrance. Just remember that these are people suffering from addiction, and if you are capable of saying "no" every time you're offered crack (usually 2-5 times), you're probably not in any real physical danger. -
Review from Jenni B.
3/28/2010
***Review # 400***
But wait... I have walked by this building countless times, but I have never been in. So why the review? Because #400 has to be a statement, and this building and this street corner are a statement of the darker side of our city.
This gorgeous historic building is perched on the corner of Main and Hastings, which is indeed the most impoverish zip code in North America. Carnegie is the heart of the downtown eastside.
Walking by on a daily basis at abotu 8:30 at one point, each day I noticed the local residences cleaning the area. Getting rid of rubbish, hosing the side walk. Kitty corner to the main VPD detatchment, it seems an odd area for drug trafficking. It is well policed. Again having walked right by countless times I have never felt unsafe (although I have had offers to buy crack a few times). Heavily policed, this area is not for the faint at heart, but it is a very real part of our city, even if we aren't all that proud of it.
Carnegie itself services this population. According to http://vancouver.ca it is "meant to serve people at the very margins of the community and to help them obtain real options for moving out of often destructive life styles."
Main and Hastings is my favorite place to bring out of town tourists... typically at night, and always in a car. While some people may turn their noses to this population, I find this area to one where one can learn humility. Speaking with the residents, they will tell you their stories. And if you are keen you will learn that the difference between you and them is you probably had a few luckier breaks in life. These people aren't terrible; what is terrible is how they can be treated like human waste.
A five minute conversation with a local resident will change you mind, your perspective, maybe your life. In fact, anytime I hear something cold or calluous muttered about our homeless population I tell the utter-er to go to Carnegie and talk to some people.
So thank you Carnegie Hall for providing this community a living room, and thank you to residents of the immediate area who have shared their stories with me. -
Review from Rudolf P.
Vancouver, BC
6/19/2009
At this joint you can volunteer your life away and never have a chance at a job. A lot of free fieldtrips, classes, games, billiards, weight room, sports gym (floor hockey, basketball), free dance lessons and yoga at times, music, tv, cheap kitchen. Join & drop out. Free dances in the 3rd or 4th Friday of the month by house bands assembled from weekly music jams which occur on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Nice free evening music cabaret Tuesdays, 7-10pm. Karaoke, poetry readings 1st Saturday of the month in the evening. Smoking lounge on outdoor patio. Hobnob with locals. Alternative documentaries and new feature films shown, Sunday, Thursday and Saturday. Nearly everything is free once you've paid your $1 annual membership.
Food: 50¢ coffee, milk, juice. Cookies about the same. Soup 80¢ or so, $1.75 for complete lunch, usually with salad, dinner: $3. Snacks 80¢-1.00. Best "homemade granola" in town: $1 (if it's not sold out or burnt, or served with warmer than usual milk.) Sandwiches, muffins and nut bars often available as well as fresh (green) fruit. Open 7 days a week. Odd hours. Often closed. I got sick a few times after eating. But others swear by it.
Serious security staff. Won't put up with no nonsense, from anybody, including you. Don't have a beer before you go. They can smell it apparently.
Vancouver Public Library branch in building.
Newsletter, free around the 15th and 1st of each month, or read it online, complete with back issues: http://carnegie.vcn.bc...
Recommended: dress down to visit. Avoid photographing in the building. -
Review from Victoria R.
BC
1/6/2009
Well, let's see. It's in the middle of one of the worst areas in the city. Besides that the HIV, meth and other epidemics that rule this neighbourhood,also, sadly govern the people in these parts of the town. So, you will see the worst of the worst, but it can make you appreciate what you have and how lucky we are, maybe even inspire you to act, to help and to do something. Oh, the building is amazing. The history, architecture, staircase and library is something to see. Eyes and hearts wide open.
-
Review from Luke L.
3/2/2011 17 Check-ins Here
seriously a fantastic resource. you can get three fresh, hot, nutritious meals there for $6 total! for real! you could live on three squares for arond two grand a year~ whoa. caters to a lot of low income people who might not otherwise be able to get their needs met. i love this place and everything it stands for.
Listed in: food
