Tyler Baba grew up working with his hands, many mentors teaching him along the way.
His dad Mick Baba had an autobody shop and then Mickey’s Paints in town for many years, and gave him a grounding in bodywork. His friend Dave Butler’s dad taught the two young men mechanical skills. Another friend of the family taught him woodworking.
In Grade 5, he gave his teacher the first rocking horse he ever made as a gift when she left on maternity leave.
His mom, Marilyn Baba, taught him the skill of sewing, which he used to make custom hats he sold at Red Shred’s Bike and Board Shed for extra money in high school, buying secondhand clothes and reusing the material.
“Mom and dad were good about showing us skills,” recalled Baba of his childhood.
Also during high school, Baba gravitated towards the Youth Train in Trades (YTT) program, hoping for a job which would allow him the freedom to travel, with his main goal to get out and have adventures in the world.
Through the YTT program, Baba learned welding under Bruce Jenkins, who was the welding instructor at the time.
Baba decided to focus on welding because he liked the opportunities it would afford him to make enough money to take time off for travel.
There were a lot of good welding jobs at the time and he wouldn’t have to earn a four-year degree to land one.
So he did the training and worked a variety of jobs, including working in remote locations like diamond mines and isolated Indigenous communities.
He said at one community, as they worked in the Arctic darkness, they had to have a local community member keep bear watch over them to prevent any curious and predatory polar bears from endangering them as they worked.
The jobs were varied and so were the communities he was based in, with some people even openly unwelcoming to outsiders. But there were always good people and he had a chance to see a lot of places he otherwise wouldn’t have. Baba said he enjoyed the remote coastal communities the most, on the shores of the Arctic Ocean where traditions were still in practice.
“It was just neat to see their communities and the way they set things up,” he said of the outposts.
Meanwhile, with his gaze firmly fixed on the goal of travel, Baba managed to complete an epic motorcycle journey over the span of two years, done in three sections. The journey took him from Vancouver to the tip of South America: Ushuaia, Argentina.
“I left the bike in whatever county I ran out of money in, I’d come home and work for a while and fly back down,” explained Baba of the multi-year journey.
Friends of his did the trip in three months, but Baba took his time, enjoying different things along the way and never travelling in a straight line.
The trips slowed down after he was married and had kids. He lived in the Edmonton, Alta. area for seven years with his family, where he was able to stay closer to home with local jobs.
When the relationship ended, it was a natural move to return to Williams Lake where they both had family. Baba said he knew if he ever ended up back in his hometown, he hoped he would be able to do the job Jenkins had done teaching him, years earlier, and the timing worked out he could fulfill this ambition.
Baba is now enjoying life as an assistant teaching professor at Thompson Rivers University in Williams Lake as the welding instructor.
He said he really likes the mountain biking community here in Williams Lake, the trails, music in the park and the outdoor opportunities he and his family are able to enjoy so close at hand.
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ruth.lloyd@wltribune.com
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