You win some, you lose some

 I was going to write this last night but my Photos app informed me that my macbook needed to rest and would not be uploading my photos until it was good and ready.

But you'll be happy to know I write this while eating a bacon egg and cheese sandwich and drinking coffee that got dispensed from a large vessel, into a 20 ounce paper cup, like we do in civilization. Up until now,  I've been drinking cappuccinos which has less coffee than I typically want in my coffee.

On Tuesday, I went to the Musee d'Art Contemporain, which is around the corner from where I'm staying, where it is under construction until 2028 (not the 2025 my guide book said.) They have a smaller space at the Place Ville-Marie, where they got more of this guy:

And this big-ass ring:

The collection was comprised of a lot of video format stuff, although one was of these lovely bird drawn on packing boxes, meant to depict which bird populations are endangered.

I was very proud of myself that, of all the hawk-looking birds, I was able to accurately pick out the red tail hawk,

which I'm pretty sure makes me some kind of bird genius. (Not really, they are just all over SF and the Bay Area.)

After I got out, Tim texted offering free advice from a friend of his who is familiar with Montreal. I, of course, asked about food. He gave me one place to get poutine and two for bagels. So rather than go to a park, which it turns out is just a sitting area also around the corner from my Air B&B, I walked about 45 minutes to La Banquise. All the places his friend recommended ended up being in my guide book. Who else knew about this place? All the people waiting on line:

It wasn't too bad and it gave me time to apply sunblock. Anyway, in comparison to the prior poutine of Monday, these fries were soggy and bland, but acting as a vehicle for far superior poutine components. 

The gravy had a much better flavor and the cheese curds were cheddar-er. Good stuff, and less expensive. And, as usually happens when I go to random places for random reasons, I walked through an interesting neighborhood, on Rue St. Denis, and bought some beautiful glasses from an import shop. They are wrapped up so I can't show them. 

Side note: I have yet to touch Canadian money. My credit card bill is going to be interesting.

Above is a picture of my current knitting project. Guess what it is!

Also, these are my feet, in my Fluevog sandals, which worked better than I had hoped. And by "better," I mean I have not left anymore blood stains on them. More on that later.

On to Wednesday!

I walked to Crescent Street, which is known for it's architecture and it's mural of Leonard Cohen.

I tried to go to Galeries d'Art Contemporain du Belgo, which is not exactly a museum but spaces where artists can show their work in different rooms. I got there, and I got to the third floor of this creepy building. I didn't see any art, although I was half expecting those twins from the Shining to show up and silently usher me into a back room to show me a Jackson Pollock,

I decided I was artistic enough, and walked back to my hood, where I continued to say hello to this guy.

In the mall:

In the art space:

above a restaurant:

I went home to hang out for a bit and check on the blister that I felt forming on my heel the entire day. And decided to put my sneakers back on.

I went back to Old Montreal, ate a salad because my diet has been pretty carb-heavy these days. I walked around, got caught in a thunderstorm.

Said hello to these ladies:

Then I went to Basilique Notre Dame for L'experience AURA, which I reserved tickets for ahead of time. We were not permitted to take pictures during it, but it's a light show projected onto the alter and ceiling. This is what it looked like beforehand and after.

Beautiful... very churchy. 

I walked through Chinatown after, made a mental note that I have to get dim sum at sum point (see what I did there???) I came across a group of elders dancing. 

Okay, that is the full update. Today the plan is to go to the Botanical Garden, which I will do on the metro. 

Are we just not going to talk about this?

Despite the fact that the Air Canada people made me check my bag when I am pretty sure it would have fit in those very ample overhead bins, the flight was without incident. I think it was quicker than flying to NY, which doesn't really make sense to me, not that I actually researched the milage or anything. I watched BLINDED BY THE LIGHT which is about a Pakistani teenager growing up in England and finding solace in Bruce Springsteen's music. The guy really exists; the movie ends with pictures of him and "The Boss" meeting over the years. 

(I am currently in a cafe close to my Air B&B, and in classic non-American fashion, the coffees are tiny and the breakfasts have cheese in them. I'm eating a rather complicated "grilled cheese" with my americano, because they ran out of croissants. It's got onions in it. I'm eating cooked onions before 10am, which my body thinks is 7am. Don't just me. It's yummy.) 

I can't complain; the process to get my bag was painless and even with the long wait for a taxi, I was at my Air B&B earlier than expected. And then I had trouble getting in. So I've been sleeping on the street. Just kidding.

Let's see if after five years I remember how to insert pictures. The internet agrees with me; moving these around is a pain in the ass. Anyway, this is where I'm staying:

It was advertised a one-bedroom. It's essentially a studio with a well-placed wall and a curtain, that I don't use, to separate the "bedroom." That's okay. The woman who owns it has been very responsive, she doesn't have a binder of instructions for me, it's very well located, and clean. One MAJOR problem (and I'll try to get a picture of this discretely later) is that it is on a short street between two short side streets that are both occupied by people who appear to be struggling a lot. There is a very present homeless population here (I know I'm supposed to say "unhoused" but I'm not going to do it until someone gives me a good reason to.) I can't say what the exact deal is with the people who are yelling and screaming outside my third-floor window at night, nor do I know why this particular street necessitates this behavior, but I can say it has affected my sleep and woken me up. Honestly, it's ok, I'm on vacation. But if I lived here it would be troubling. The first night the yelling was in English, I speculate because there is no good French translation for "mother fucker," but last night I was treated to bilingual vitriol. I just looked it up and "mother fucker" in French is "putain de mere," which I must admit, has a certain appeal.  But it proves a point, which I will get to later. 

My first night was pretty uneventful. I found a food court around the block and got some kind of poke-bowl-type thing and noticed this:

So this place feels pretty familiar :)

Yesterday was my first full day here. I started off at this cafe, where I got a cappuccino, roughly the size of a dixie cup, and a bagel with cream cheese. For those of you who do not know, bagels are a thing in Montreal. I don't know if this was a "good" one but it had cream cheese on it so it was good enough. I do plan to sample a purposefully-good bagel before I leave here. 

I walked to Old Montreal which is a 10 minute walk away.  Very touristy and cute, cobble stone streets, water, adorable gift shops with the work of local artisans. I did not buy anything because getting excited and dropping a bunch of money day-one is a rookie move. 

I stopped in a little store for tourist info and got some FREE maps and had a nice young man help me look up train tickets to Quebec City. I have officially decided I won't be going. It's a lovely 3-hour train ride; I had considered making it a day trip. But it's going to be over $250 Canadian which is over $200 USD. So no. 

Speaking of nice young men....

Oh another thing.... I have not used cash since I got here. I tried to use the ATM in the airport and my card got declined. Don't worry, the card is fine (some of you know I recently canceled all my cards after two went missing from my wallet at work.) Anyway, I've charged everything.

Okay, nice young whoever it is: the people here are very nice. I had heard mixed reviews about the good people of Montreal, related to their French sensibility (side note, I once spent two days in Paris and, contrary to stereotype, found the people there not-rude.) I am almost uncomfortable with how nice people here are; perhaps because I always feel a little guilty when I travel to another country and they speak better English than I do, which they are happy to do to accommodate my monoglot self. Although I'm pretty sure they are raised bilingual here. Still, everyone I have encountered has been really sweet and helpful. 

This apartment building is famous, because it's weird.

Okay, now onto the point I wanted to make. I am somewhat offended that no one talks about the fact that "poutine" sounds like a euphemism for "vulva." As far as I'm concerned this the elephant in the living room of Montreal. I ate this. I am not sure if this was good poutine. My stance on the subject has always been (and by "always" I mean the last couple of months after I booked this trip) that the gravy is the deciding factor on how the poutine would be received. Fries = good, cheese curd = good, gravy = ?. This gravy was seasoned with something (sage? rosemary? if my mother was here, she'd know) a little too strongly for me. I mean, don't get me wrong, I ate the whole thing. But I will have to sample more to see how representational this poutine is of all poutine. 

I am still trying to negotiate the whole eating thing. Yesterday I went to the grocery store and bought three large bottles of water, five nectarines. I have four mini clif bars from home. The food here is not that cheap. Last year Nicole and I went to Berlin and we got huge wraps for six euros. That is not the case here, although the exchange rate to USD does help. Good thing I'm not taking that trip to Quebec City. But it does mean I have to go out to eat. I also have this habit of thinking it's complicated to find food, when the block behind my Air B&B is a long strip of businesses, including restaurants. Still, yesterday I went to a pizza place in my guide book and then ate ice cream, mostly for the extra calories to get me through the night. The pizza was better then it looked.

Also, these pink guys are all over that street. 

Last night I finished a book. I have three other novels with me; they're short but it's safe to say I am not going to get to all of them. I have also been knitting a gift for my trainer while I listen to podcasts. 

Right now, I'm drinking my second coffee (this time a cappuccino) in this cafe, before I return my laptop to my Air B&B and go back out to a modern art museum and some park-type-place nearby. I'm staying in the downtown area and I don't know if I'll attempt the public transit system, or just do everything on foot. I won't have to figure that out today. 

Oh, and I'm also near Chinatown. 

Reaching the end :(

I am writing this post rather than work on submissions because I find submitting unpleasant. I am aware that this just means I'll be doing it later, likely tomorrow, after I return home, and am sleep deprived.
After breakfast, after it stopped pouring, I went to one of the Eslite book stores.

This one is a few floors, although the main bookstore is on the second floor and is open 24hours. The other floors contain other merchants, but also a stationery section with tons of journals, pens and... stationery. I immediately picked out two more journals, which is why I went. I waited until 11am to see what they had downstairs, but everything either did not meet my journal requirements or was expensive. So the two Eslite 30th Anniversary journals it is.
Their cafe was also very expensive so I went to the Starbucks downstairs and wrote for a while.
As planned, I went back to Herban Kitchen and Bar for lunch/brunch and was pleased when I realized it was two blocks away from the store. The restaurant is very cute. I ordered Moussaka. It was yummy.

For whatever reason, I got a stomach ache almost immediately. But I planned to return to the Ximen area (where my first hotel was) to get another pair of those earring and some kind of food item to bring to work on Monday. The stomach ache was off and one and I was determined to get the remainder of my shopping done.
After that, I came back to this neighborhood, grabbed one last souvenir and walked back here to my hotel. By this time, I was pretty uncomfortable.
So here I am. I have been in my hotel room for about three hours now, checking my Duotrope email for presses to submit to, listening to my friend Jason's podcast, knitting and periodically checking the movie channels to see if they put on anything good. (They have not.)

I am going to venture out in the rain now to get more take out from Ooh Cha Cha, and return and remain in my room doing much of the same. I have faith I'll fit everything I bought in my luggage; maybe my coworkers will be eating squashed mochi on Monday. My alarm goes off at 5:30am.
It's been a good trip. I'm glad I got a couple of day trips in and that I got to feel grounded in Taipei.
Thanks for reading. I'll see you soon, on the other hemisphere.

My last day of purpose

Usually when I travel, I would have seen everything I'd planned to by now. But I did go out of town two days. So on Wednesday I covered the last few places I'd prioritized.
The rain was supposed to come by 9am, and then it was 2pm, so I got more time dry than I had expected.
My first stop was the Confucius Temple.

This temple, like others I have seen, have a main building in the middle, but also halls and structures (gates) surrounding it. At the front gate, inside, there were men singing. One asked if I was American. I said yes. He proceeded to hum (not really humming, more like da-da-dumming) 'You Are My Sunshine.' I thanked him (what else does one say?) and went to check out what was beyond the front gate.

There was a pond with turtles, including these, hanging out. I don't want to anthropomorphize too much, but a couple of the big ones appeared to be looking at me rather judgmentally. Maybe it's because I'm an agnostic running around Taipei taking pictures of temples. Speaking of which:

These ceilings are amazing!!! I didn't go back inside because I felt weird being sung to. But in general, this temple had fewer people praying so I felt more comfortable being all touristy.
The Bao'an Temple was a couple of blocks away. It was more active here so I was less blatant about my picture-taking.

According to Lonely Planet, this temple got a Unesco Asia-Pacific Heritage award for its restoration and revival of temple rites and festivities. In case you were wondering, because I was, Unesco is the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. According to Wikipedia, "Its declared purpose is to contribute to peace and security by promoting international collaboration in education, sciences, and culture in order to increase universal respect for justice, the rule of law and human rights along with fundamental freedom proclaimed in the United Nations Charter." It occurs to me, I could spend an hour on one temple. These structures are quite complex and there are pamphlets that describe all the elements. I did not spend a lot of time here. I don't know how much of that is because it's a place of worship and I'm not worshipping. It is likely because I was overwhelmed with all the things to see.

 But again, look at the detailing on the roof:

That should conclude my mishandling of religious sites of worship.

My last museum was the Fine Arts Museum, which I found was in the Expo Park. I didn't spend time in the park but there was a lot of food and teenagers practicing a dance routine. Wikipedia says it's "multifunctional.' The museum is next to Taipei House, which I considered visiting to learn about Taipei history. This is the museum:

Again, there was an exhibit based on sound. There were a lot of dark spaces and headphones.

I have to say, I liked a lot of the exhibits. But at this point, I was a little museum'ed out. This morning I threw away all the booklets and pamphlets about the exhibits because they will take up too much room in my scrapbook. But here is a bit of what I saw.

I was there for close to two hours. It had started to rain. And rather than run around, all hungry and cranky, looking for a special restaurant, I ate at the museum cafe, which was perfectly fine. I did not go to Taipei House.

After lunch I headed to the Taipei Main Station because there are two malls attached to it and I was sure I could find Taipei (not Taiwan) souvenirs. I was wrong. Or I decided, after one mall, Taiwan will have to do.

Lonely Planet recommended Cafe Macho, which it turns out is around the corner from the vegan restaurant I've been frequenting. 

I got lemon cake and coffee with Bailey's in it. I did some writing, which has not been going well for months now. 

After an hour or so I returned to my hotel room to blog. I stopped in the middle determined to find this Thai restaurant by the Red House I had not been able to find last week. I found it! Actually I had to get help. This restaurant is just one business among all the bars behind the Red House, so I understand how I didn't realize it was there.

The food was yummy. The rain stopped. 

I returned to my room to complete my blog post. On the way back, I encountered a snail, which is the biggest I have ever seen. I stopped a guy, who was looking at his phone, from stepping on it (in his flip-flops.)

You can't tell how big is is from the picture but the shell was probably 3-4 inches long.  

Speaking of phones, people are on their phones A LOT here. Maybe I notice it more because I am more watchful of my surroundings, but it looks like almost everyone is on their phone.

Right now it's Thursday morning. I think I have correctly checked in for my flight tomorrow. It's raining. Actually, right now it looks like it let up. During breakfast it was pouring. 

I have little planned for my day. I hope to get a couple of good meals in. The type of shoes I'm wearing get soggy in the rain, which is unpleasant. There is a chain of book store called Eslite; they are all over the place. But some are special. I plan to go to the one that's open 24hours. I hope it has a cafe. And journals. 

I'll write my final post later. I wake up early tomorrow to take the MRT to the airport. I hope it's not pouring when I do.