Of Montreal
I have been a fan of Canada for some time but haven’t had the opportunity to go until this past weekend. The creativity specifically through music and comedy that has come from there has been an inspiration to me. With Montreal not being all that far of a drive from Boston, my buddy Justin and I had been planning a weekend trip up there for a few months and finally made it happen. I took the bus up to Boston and we made a road trip out of it.
On the way up we realized that Justin had forgotten his passport so we weren’t sure if we’d even be able to get across the border due to increased security in the past few years. However, he had a copy of the passport in his email and we were able to make it across with an explanation and a color printout of it. Montreal was about 60 miles or so past the Canadian border.
I was playing a mix of one of my favorite Montreal bands The Besnard Lakes and some old Arcade Fire. Justin and I had been lucky enough to see Arcade Fire very early in their career in Oklahoma City about 6 years ago. It seemed appropriate that we were now visiting their home city together.
The approach into Montreal over the Saint Lawrence River was quite beautiful, brilliant shades of blue shining through the icy water. I didn’t realize until now that Montreal is the 2nd largest city in Canada and the 6th largest in all of Canada and US at around 1.6 million. Montreal is the 2nd largest French speaking city next to Paris. I had started to learn French with Rosetta Stone last summer, but got side-tracked with some projects and didn’t give it my full attention after awhile. This is definitely the place to come practice this summer. Not only do most of the people speak French here, they also mostly all speak English so its a good place to get started. We did encounter a taxi driver who didn’t speak English at all, but for the most part all were able to speak at least some English.
We were able to get a good deal on a room at the Hyatt which was sort of in the eastern/center part of the city. When we got there we started walking west on Saint Catherine which seemed to be a main street with a lot going on. We checked out a few pubs in the Western part and started talking with a bartender, asking what we should do for our short trip and first visit to Montreal. She spoke English very well, and said she was an English speaker but was also fluent in French. She said the western part of the city was more English by default, while the western and southern part near the water was more French, the older part of the city. She recommended we try to get scalped tickets for the Candien’s hockey game that night. We aren’t really big into hockey but I’ve always enjoyed it and it sounded like a good event for Montreal.
We got to the area around the same time the game was starting, thinking that would be the best time to get a good price for tickets. However, all the scalpers were quoting at least 100 for tickets, one suggested we tried the box office just as we were about to give up. They were turning the last 2 people away, but the girl at our counter said 2 tickets just became available and they happened to be only $40 so we went for it. They let us know how lucky we were to get in as it was sold out. I was rooting for Montreal to win even though they were playing New York, I have worked by MSG for the past year and hadn’t been to a Rangers game, but I was now seeing them for the first time in Montreal. We got to our seats and it was packed in, the energy was outstanding there. The fans were really into it. Montreal just kept scoring and it was an unusually lop-sided score at the end with a 6 - 0 victory for Montreal. Everyone kept referring to them as “The Habs”, I had heard it before but never knew what it meant. I thought the H on their jersey just stood for Hockey. We later learned that it stood for Les Habitants, the habitants of Canada. I just read that the Candiens are one of the most successful major sporting teams in all of North America winning 26% of the Stanley Cups. Seeing the game was definitely the highlight of the short trip and we were fortunate to be able to get in to see it.
The trip definitely inspired me to become more dedicated about my French studies this year as I want to make a trip to Paris in the next year or 2 and hope to speak French well by that time. I hope to come back to Montreal in the summer as it is a beautiful city from what I could see of it in 24 hours. Although, rather cold in the winter as one would imagine. It was about 20 F or so which they said was actually quite warm for this time of year. I've always wondered if the extended coldness can be more inspiring for creativity.
