& a blog

Canada is like a popular American movie remade by amateurs with French subtitles.

You recognize certain scenes, and the plot feels familiar, but somehow the whole thing is off.

Not that this is bad thing.

Indeed, I rather like it.

Valentine’s Day Trip

A recent jaunt up to Montreal for a weekend both confirmed everything I had ever remembered liking about the place, and introduced wholly new things to enjoy.
Back in the day, I had remember being kinda turned on by the whole speaking-French thing. It was like there was this truly foreign country right above Vermont that I’d never been to. It was like another dimension. And I really mean a dimension distinctly different than the rest of Canada where English is the primary language. For all intensive purposes, Toronto is an American city. Montreal on the other hand is the second largest French-speaking city in the world. After Paris.

Just above New England, it seems, there is the ancient, forgotten kingdom of Noveau France.

The Quebecoise (or Quebecers, as I saw them identified in some Anglophile magazine) love two things: hockey and beer. They also have a penchant for friend foods, winter sports, and sparsely-clad women, which seems all the more erotic to the Quebecoise men given the temperature. Sacrifice, as always, is the root of sexiness.

Hockey

In order to get the real Quebec experience, my girlfriend and I snuck out of the downtown hotel-bar-nightclub area of the city to attend a Junior League Hockey match. Junior League Hockey is something of a cross between Minor League Baseball and Division I sports. The athletes are young, and in development, but they are also professional athletes, aspiring to the great NHL. Even though the NHL has only 6 of 36 teams located in Canada, Canadian players outnumber Americans in the league. Which can probably tell you something about the quality of Junior League Hockey on a Friday night just outside of Montreal proper.

We sat in the bleachers, high above the main action, because it was cheaper. But that didn’t mean that suggestively-dressed “beer bimbos” (my sexist term) weren’t cycling around with cups of beer for $4.50. I had two, one for each of the first two periods, and then tracked down some nachos. The scored was tied at 0-0 through the end of two periods, because the goaltending was outstanding. Only late (5:30 left) in the third period, did the visiting Quebec (City) Remparts get on the board with a top shelf flick in goal.
When the Montreal Juniors pulled the keeper a few minutes later, Quebec put the game out of reach when a bad pass was converted to a long-range empty-netter.

And that was how it ended.

Hockey Culture

Perhaps more interesting than the game itself was observing the Canadian culture surrounding the game. Alongside the “beer bimbos” a host of other erotically charged young girls did everything from monitor the VIP Section (Salon de VIP) to shoveling the snow off of the ice during media timeouts. These girls, the much-beloved “Cintron Girls” wore the most interesting outfits of any of the women, and were met with standing ovations every time they got on the ice. The man in front of me, at the game with his wife, was reprimanded silently by his spouse after whistling enthusiastically when the “Cintron Girls” arrived on the ice.

Next door to the main rink was a second, smaller rink for local play. Though it was 11:00 on a Friday night, some local game was in full force, with teenage boys eagerly passing across the ice and taking crack shots on goal.

When we finally got back to the hotel, we were greeted by further hockey. The Canadiens (the single most beloved thing in Montreal) were tied with the Colorado Avalanche until a breakaway goal gave Montreal the win.

Brutalism

Brutalism is the dominant mise-en-scene of Montreal. Which compliments the icebound feeling of the city quite well. Because of the way the city expanded, with its major construction projects happening in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, there was really no way for the Quebecoise to dodge the architectural cast-concrete bullet that is brutalism. Everywhere you go, from the metro system, to the Olympic Stadium, to the highways and national theater is brutalist beyond belief. No windows. Lots of rough, corrugated cement. Stiff corners and rigid angles.

The only redeeming thing about this widespread use of brutalism is that it manages to give the city an amazingly aesthetic cohesion. The kind of cohesion that most American cities can only have in their historic sections, which are harmonized by colonial and federal stylings. That this cohesion happens through brutalism however, does give some cause for fear and dystopian aesthetic nightmares. The whole time I wandered through the underground city (tunnels connecting corporate buildings and metro stations) I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was in the setting for some awesome cyberpunk movie I’d yet to write. It was also a little bit like being in the contemporary mines of Moria, as vaulted ceremonial halls opened 100 feet underground from thin, cold tunnels. What a strange, advanced Northern civilization Montreal manifests. It is like visiting a city of great industrial strength that is constantly at war with the natural climate it is entirely dependent upon.

Ice

After a stunning breakfast, made virtually free by travel vouchers for a Chef’s Special at La Belle Province (later described by locals as the McDonald’s of Montreal) the girlfriend and I wandered over to the Vieux Port, which was said to be picturesque and historic. What that meant, was that it was the only section of the city that wasn’t explicitly postmodern or brutalist. In the place of those revered local styles, everything from traditional French limestone housing to Belle Epoque apartments could be found jumbled together.

This was disappointing.

The Quays of the Old Port, on the other hand, were not disappointing. Most unfortunately, we managed to find ourselves between two winter festivals, and as such the Quays were largely empty. I say largely because there was of course, a ton of ice. Also to be found were large coal ships and container vessels which appear to have been intentionally left icebound for the winter.

All around them, as endless as the horizon, was ice.

Between two wharves, a large section of ice had been marked off as a skating area. After getting a good look at it during the day, Colleen and I returned after dinner for a wonderful late evening skate. Rentals were $7. Tickets to Skate were $5. It was a wonderful way to spend evening, particularly as we had busted out our snowpants, just in case it got a little cold.

Which of course, it did, but we didn’t care. We were wearing fucking snow pants.

Real ice, frozen as this was from the surface of the Saint Laurence River, is much rougher than rink ice. Not that we cared. In fact, we were more than disappointed that the staff wouldn’t let us skate around the large track outside of the designated skating area, that had benches and other fun things to explore, and certainly stretched about a half mile in total.

Still, skating seemed a perfect compliment to the hockey of the night before, and though we didn’t actually take advantage of it, there was a “winter bar” that was accessible from the skating area, just in case.

Beer

Beer was the only more ubiquitous in Quebec than Brutalism. Everywhere you turn, every restaurant you go into, every pharmacy or bodega you shop at, is selling beer, and not just the Canadian standards of “Molson’s” “LaBatt’s” and “Moosehead.”

No, the Quebecoise have discriminating tastes, and as such have developed a rich microbrewery tradition. All around the city, “Trois Brasseurs” can be found selling the microbrewery experience as a eatery/bar. This was the first place we ate in Montreal, and the food was excellent, as was the beer (Which was apparently made right next to the bath room, which seems gross, but only encouraged me to drink more everytime I had to go to the bathroom).

The “Trois Brasseur” people make a deadly compliment to their beer. It is called “Flamm” and it is a bizarrely wonderful thin-crust pizza that is built on salt cream and goat cheese, and includes options for pesto, chicken, tomatoes, and bacon. It is absolutely delicious, but is entirely too little to sastify any appetite. Which is why we had two.

The next night, we hit the other Quebecoise chain, “St. Hubert.” Though they didn’t offer any in house beers, they did make a great sandwich, and complimented it with a local microbrew called “Keith Alexander.”

Which was middling.

By far, the best microbrew had to be “Blanche de Chambly,” a Hefeweizen-like wheat beer with a floral tang. And despite being good, it was also damn cheap, especially when purchased at the incomparably-budget “Peel Pub.” Though we didn’t spend nearly enough time at that particular bar, it was certainly a wonderful place to drink.

Blanche de Chambly proved so good, we bought a bottle to take home. We also brought back some Boreale, which my brother (having himself visited Montreal recently) told me was top stuff.

I would have to disagree, but his point was good. Beer in Montreal was damn good, and don’t those frozen Canadians deserve it.

Bottom Line

I can’t wait to get back up to Montreal. It was the most fun I’ve had in a long time, and being a college student, that means something. Just cause it’s cold up there now (and is definitely COLD) doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go up. In fact, it’s all the more reason to go, because this is when you see how Canadiens really live (hockey+beer+ice+brutalism) and why they haven’t moved to Miami.

yet.