VANCOUVER -- The Queen has touched Canadian hearts wherever she has gone during her four-day visit to British Columbia.

But it is safe to say that no heart was touched more deeply than that of a young Korean student yesterday as the Queen passed through the lobby of the Hotel Vancouver.

Last May, Ji-Won Park suffered severe brain damage when she was savagely attacked while jogging in Stanley Park. Despite a miraculous, unexpected recovery from a coma, Ms. Park remains in a wheelchair, barely able to move, communicating only "yes" and "no" by means of a machine and her bright, expressive eyes.

For the past month, since she heard about the Queen's visit, Ms. Park had been set on meeting the monarch, her face wreathed in smiles whenever she heard the word "Queen."

So there she was in the hotel lobby, waiting for the Queen to arrive for her royal luncheon. Ms. Park wore pearls and her best outfit for the first time since the attack. Clutched tightly in her hand was a lovely white calla lily, her favourite flower. Sadly, however, distracted by well-wishers on the other side of the crowded lobby, the Queen failed to notice the disabled young Korean and her white lily as she passed by.

"Ji-Won was very, very disappointed," a friend said later.

Crestfallen, Ms. Park's mother thought about leaving. But Ji-won was determined. Happy endings take time. Her wheelchair stayed. The lily stayed.

And someone in the royal entourage had noticed her on the way through -- Aline Chrétien, the wife of Prime Minister Jean Chrétien.

Ninety minutes later, as the Queen prepared to depart the hotel, Mr. Chrétien gracefully steered her toward Ms. Park.

It was a magical moment. Ms. Park beamed a smile for the ages. She laughed. And the Queen received her lily.

"That's very kind. Thank-you," the Queen whispered. She paused longer than normal on such occasions, before heading outside to her more scripted regal duties.

Afterward, Ms. Park, who has turned 23 since she was attacked, could not stop smiling.

"I think it will be a big help to her," said her mother, Chun-Ram Lim. "Because what she hoped for and wished for has come true."

Large crowds have been turning out for every minute's visibility of the Queen in Vancouver, and the monarch skillfully pitched her own Canadian identity, linking it to the country's multicultural fabric.

The day after her celebrated puck-dropping at a Vancouver Canucks hockey game, she told 600 people at yesterday's luncheon: "It is a privilege to serve you as Queen of Canada to the best of my ability, to play my part in the Canadian identity, to uphold Canadian traditions and heritage, to recognize Canadian excellence and achievement and to seek to give a sense of continuity in these exciting, ever-changing times."

Mr. Chrétien, who acted as host at the luncheon, picked up on what is emerging as the leitmotif of this Golden Jubilee tour -- the Queen's Canadianness -- with a suggestion that she undertake a tour of all NHL cities as a model to hockey fans of dignity and decorum.

The Queen told a story of her mother visiting a soldiers hospital during her 1939 visit and being asked by two elderly men of Scots descent, veterans of the 1900 South African war, to settle a dispute about whether she was Scots or English. One veteran said he thought the late Queen Mother was a Scot because she'd been born in Scotland. The other said she was English because she'd married an Englishman.

The Queen quoted her mother as replying: "Since I have landed in Quebec, I think we can say that I am a Canadian."

The Queen added: "I know exactly how she felt."

Her audience, heavily representative of the city's large Chinese and East Indian communities, gave her a standing ovation.

In her brief speech, the Queen repeatedly touched on Canada's cultural diversity and was applauded at each reference.

"You are crafting a multicultural society that provides a model for the rest of the world," she said. "In doing so, you are constantly redefining your national identity, what it means to be Canadian -- something of particular importance to my family."