On Floods and Resilience
The lower mainland of British Columbia is infamous for its temperamental weather in the winter. One moment, the sun is radiating through the clouds, reminding residents of how fortunate they are to call this geographical space home and the next moment, clouds clad the skies like a wet blanket, a persistent but sometimes endearing irritant. Occasionally, the rains come with an unprovoked fury, lasting for days with no end in sight.
In December of 2025, we found ourselves on the receiving end of one of its moody bouts. As a Vancouver resident, I didn’t think too much of it until reports of the floods in the Southern Fraser Valley, east of Vancouver, started flooding in. Inexplicably, I was drawn to photograph this latest episode and its impact on the people who called it home. On my first trip out, the weather greeted me with a typical experience. As I headed out of Vancouver, the sun beamed through the skies, as if to assure me of its blessings on my quest, but the further east I got, the more the demeanour of the sun retreated. The clouds thickened and descended upon their own weight, severely hindering visibility and conferring a certain eeriness on the valley. Roads appeared to disappear into the fog and incoming motorists seemed to appear from thin air. If clear skies and a beaming sun were to be interpreted as blessings from the elements for my quest, I shuddered to think what this unprovoked change in weather indicated.
The Southern Fraser Valley contrasts with Vancouver. Its characteristic feature is farmland with residences few and far between. There is a certain tranquillity there and a sharp awareness of the value of privacy that residents have. As I traversed the valley, I found myself terrified, but not because of the waters. I had a profound sense of my status as an outsider, and was immediately reminded of news headlines from across the border reporting the ill-fate of people that look like me in spaces where they were perceived as outsiders, and with that came fear. As I stopped to take photographs of ravaged farmlands, I desired for my demeanour to show the nonexistent watchguards of this community that I meant no disrespectful incursions. Despite a torturous inclination to retreat from this unfamiliar space, I continued on for reasons unclear to me. Every shutter press felt like stubborn resistance against my oppressor and a deliberate choice to coexist in discomfort. When I exhausted the film rolls I had, I eventually returned to the familiar, but I was incredibly dissatisfied with the shooting experience. I set out once more, this time with the primary goal of simply enjoying the shooting experience. This time, my fears were assuaged, and I found a peace that shaped my decisiveness. On this second trip, the watchguards had given way from my subconscious to the emergence of curious residents.
In the aftermath of the rains, I observed that though the persisting evidence flooded farmlands, it was not in despair. One passerby tells me that the floods in 2021 were worse, and they survived just fine. The repeated climate bouts have built a stubborn resilience like calluses on a fighter’s hand. I couldn’t help but wonder about the economic impact of this latest episode. In our ever-unpredictable climate, how much longer could these communities continue their act of resistance? How much longer could they continue to defy the inclination to retreat? How much longer could they continue to choose to coexist in discomfort? Only time can tell, but for now, they remain tethered to the land as victors to their spoils.