'It's tough to see it go': Business residents of Kirkwood Block trying to move on following fire

Businesses located inside the Kirkwood Block building are trying to figure out the next steps after the historic building was destroyed in a massive fire on Feb. 2.

Businesses located inside the Kirkwood Block building are trying to figure out the next steps after the historic building was destroyed in a massive fire on Feb. 2.

The building was home to a number of businesses including Eben Convenience Store, a Korean-Canadian owned shop.

Son of the owners, Paul Lee said he got a call from his brother Wednesday telling him his family’s store was on fire.

“(My parents) were okay, but I also heard that they had left with just the clothes on their back,” said Lee. “They left everything in the store, as well as the unit adjacent to the store that they were staying in.”

Lee said his family immigrated to Canada from South Korea in 1997, and they opened the convenience store on Feb. 2, 1998. The fire happened 24 years to the day of them opening their business.

He said some of his earliest childhood memories are being inside Eben Convenience Store, and losing the business and his parents home to fire is devastating.

“It was just such an important part of our family’s history so it’s tough to see it go.”