This photo, taken on Sep. 1, showing white vinyl stickers covering up Ivanhoe Cambridge's logo on COVID-19 signage was the first tangible clue Woodgrove Centre had changed ownership. (Alex Rawnsley/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By Alex Rawnsley

2020 in review

Our Favourite Stories of 2020: Endless leads, rumours & sketchy translations

Dec 26, 2020 | 7:15 AM

NANAIMO — My favourite story to cover through 2020 was an extensive, multi-lingual quest.

In August, NanaimoNewsNOW received multiple tips about the sale of Woodgrove Centre, the largest mall on Vancouver Island and, if true, one of the largest commercial real estate purchases in recent memory.

Tracking the story down began with reaching out to the mall itself, followed by Ivanhoe Cambridge who owned the property at the time. Both inquiries resulted in responses of ‘no comment’.

The newsroom and I hit further dead-ends through old real estate contacts, contractors, development companies and the provincial government.

Information we had uncovered led me to believe the purchaser was a Chinese investor who moved to the Island through a government program. He’d purchased a restaurant in the Comox Valley then reportedly bought stake in Arbutus Ridge golf course.

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The big break in the story came Sep. 9 when I eventually received information suggesting Weihong Liu, a Chinese businesswoman was the purchaser of the mall and managed to receive her phone number from a contact.

The problem was she did not speak English and I do not speak Mandarin.

My initial text to Weihong, originally written in English before being translated to Mandarin and eventually back to English to ensure no incorrect translations.

What followed was two days of awkward texting back and forth, with each text meticulously written, translated and reverse translated through Google Translate. I wanted to ensure my messages were clear and conveying in Mandarin what I was trying to say in English.

I eventually arranged an interview with Weihong after she connected me with the head of her transition team at Woodgrove Centre. We spoke for nearly 30 minutes, an extended interview to allow her translator to relay my questions and Weihong’s answers to me.

NanaimoNewsNOW broke news of the sale late in the afternoon on Friday, Sep. 11. Response on social media to the purchase was overwhelmingly positive with hundreds of people weighing in with their hopes for a revamped Woodgrove Centre.

Weihong also invited NanaimoNewsNOW to the mall in late-September for an in-person sit down to delve more into her specific visions for the mall and projected timelines.

The Woodgrove sale was not only one of the biggest stories of the year for NanaimoNewsNOW, it was also one of the more complex to piece together.

It was incredibly rewarding to see such a successful piece emerge from weeks of work and dozens of phone calls and dead ends.

The experience of communicating intricate information in two languages through a less-than-perfect online translator will forever stick with me as a key memory from a rollercoaster year.

alex.rawnsley@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @alexrawnsley