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Canadian Couple Claims Record $50-million Lottery Win

VANCOUVER -- When Claude and Kurt Blanchette-Ebert started planning for their 30th anniversary next month, they considered buying themselves a second-hand car to celebrate.

But after winning $50 million in the Lotto Max jackpot Friday, the couple can get themselves something much grander. A house is on the list, they said, and perhaps a vacation to someplace like Monaco.

“We still don’t believe it,” Claude, 52, said. “It’s surreal.”

The couple was facing tough financial times when Kurt bought a Quick Pick ticket last Thursday from the Mac’s convenience store at Hemlock and Broadway in Vancouver.

When he returned on Saturday to check the numbers at the store’s machine, he was flabbergasted. He rubbed his eyes and looked again: he had matched all seven winning numbers and won $50 million, the biggest lottery jackpot in B.C.’s history.

“The first thing I said was ‘holy sh--,’” Kurt, 63, said as he and Claude accepted their winning cheque from the B.C. Lottery Corp. on Tuesday.

He still didn’t believe it and had the ticket verified by Mac’s clerk Sunil Arora. When he got home, he was “beet red,” said Claude. “I thought he was going to have a stroke.”

The pair stashed the ticket away in a safe place and broke into hysterical laughter.
But it would be days before they claimed their winnings. On Sunday, Kurt returned to the convenience store, sneaking through the slew of reporters, to buy a firelog.

The next day, he quit his job as a pastry chef for a small bakery. When he told his boss, he said, the man “just fell on the ground and rolled around laughing. It was very entertaining.”

Claude also quit his job as a furniture upholsterer.

But what’s next for the newly retired couple remains a mystery. Kurt said while he has often daydreamed about becoming a millionaire, it’s different when you really have the money. As a result, the couple has no immediate plans to spend it.

“It still hasn’t sunk in,” Claude added. “We’re trying to absorb it and get it to the bank as quickly as possible.”

The pair, who don’t play the lotto regularly, said they hope to buy a house and live off the interest on their winnings.

They say they'll also go on a shopping spree, and perhaps take a holiday since they’ve never had one together. Kurt said he would like to visit someplace like Cote d’Azur on the French Riviera.

Up until now, he said, he has been happy vacationing on the beaches in Vancouver and the mountains in Whistler.

“If you think you might get rich with lottery tickets, think again. It’s luck and good karma,” he said.

The couple met nearly 30 years ago in Edmonton — Claude’s hometown — when Kurt, who hails from Germany, was working as a chef at one of the city’s hotels. They moved to Vancouver in 1986.

Although the Blanchette-Eberts said the money will change things, Kurt noted: “we’re still the same people.”

Neither one of them had told their families about the win before it was announced at the B.C. Lottery Corp. “They’ll find out now,” Claude said..

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It seems that its true, sometimes good things do come to those who wait... Cheers Kurt and Claude!



H/T: The Great White North