Great Canadiana Adventures #391: Ottawa

Compared to the rut of total un-noteworthiness that have characterised the week since the last entry, the previous couple of days have been very exciting indeed. They would have been exciting even if there had been excitement and wonder in the preceding days, but as there had not, they were - but even more so! [Appalling syntax intended]

We got a tour of Parliament and the Senate as M has a friend who works in the office of one of the MPs there. It was interesting as we got to see the last few minutes of the uproar that followed Harper's smear on one of the Liberal MPs. We also got to go into the members lobby and saw some very bad tempered shouting between the aides of Liberal and NDP (New Democratic Party) MPs about supposed support of Harper's comments by an NDP MP. Good to see democracy at work! (sic.)



We even got to see some of the rooms that were used by some Canada's most successful politicians. The first is Sir John A. Macdonald's actual desk and room. Flash photography is not allowed so the pictures here are a little dark (not had time to brighten them up on the PC). It was pretty amazing to see how he would have worked at the time and met with staff, colleagues, etc.





What was also pretty cool was the original cabinet room.














Whilst not strictly within the 'rules', there was a moment of power politics that came to a head: M demonstrated that it was not only Margaret Thatcher that can take on the seat of power and look intimidating. At the apex of her powers we only had to genuflect three times each and then she was deposed by a citizens revolt which cast her back among the impoverished masses. And none too soon...






The next day was spent recovering from an excellent meal cooked at M's friends house before setting out into Ottawa for the two of us to go ice skating. Now seeing as Blighty has in total about as much workable ice for skating as does a lunatic asylum for potential world leaders (hang on a minute...), I have never been skating before except for once in December 2005. So with trepidation, perspiration and not just a little fear for my fellow skaters, M and I went to get a bagel. It was great; a real bit of 'Canadiana'. A 24 hour, 365 days a year open bagel shop in darkest Ottawa that cooked them on site.

I must say that M was looking particularly fine after chomping on her bagel and I was apparently looking "cheeky". You just can't please some people...



















Anyway, after that we finally went skating! Ottawa has a canal that the City drains almost to dry but leaves about three feet of water that then freezes solid. It is this that turns it into the worlds longest skating rink. Not sure if you can read this properly, but it also boasts the fact on a large billboard. (This link is to a .PDF map so you can see where we went - we went from the top-right down to the Fifth Street cafe/seating area.)



It was an excellent time with M falling not once and me only falling three times over a period of 6.6km. That's 3.3 per cheek or once per 2.2, however you want to look at it. Skating is something that I am very much going to keep up with; for when it works, it is really good!
























At the Fifth Street rest point, we stopped for a diabetes inducing concoction called a 'beaver tail' for, as you may have already guessed, it looks kind of like a beavers tail. A malformed beaver, mind you, but the connection is there with only a little bit of imagination. As it was -9c at the time (-16c with windchill), we thought that they were justified - along with a hot coffee before we skated back to the start to hand back our rented skates.


I had an interesting moment when I was wondering what hurt more: my chin from the freezing wind or my backside from the recent fall I had just undertaken. I concluded that there was, in fact, an equal distribution of discomfort so neither end of my body could really complain (my feet were also killing me from the sudden change in weight distribution to the think sliver of skate rather than my whole sole).


The drive back that evening (Thursday) was particularly galling for me (as a Brit) but was taken with phlegmatic ease by M, who was happily chatting away about worst case scenarios that she had been through and how the snow and ice was not that bad this time... My mind was also casting itself back to thinking of how London grinds to a halt with only 2-4cm of snow and how the place would fall apart if anything remotely like Canadian snow levels would fall.

On that note, I shall have an 'Al Gore is correct' blog entry soon. His An Inconvenient Truth is really quite good and worth examining in more depth. The world would be SUCH a different place if Bush hadn't stolen the 2000 election.

Enough of all that. I shall return soon!

Exercise, anti-exercise and bottom of the pool

The gym is something that I have a love/hate relationship with. Well to be more honest, it is a tolerate/hate relationship. What is most dismaying is when you actually go backwards in ability and competency. What is even worse is when you realise that the mechanism(s) you use to get through the taught elements of a PhD are those that add inches to your gut. Beer is not the friend of an in-shape gut. M's banana bread is also sent from Lucifer himself: it tastes so good but I am sure that it is not as good for me as I would like it to be. I shall have to get into having more soup for lunch.

In terms of the football we've been playing, you can see our meteoric season here. It takes some talent to be 0-0-8 (we're the Grads in Pool A). I was hoping that the Meds in Pool B would have been kind enough to do worse than us but the bastards seem to have won their last match and drawn one. Bugger. Still, it was a laugh to see six (sometimes only five) 'nearly-30' guys charging around the pitch and hoping that none of the kids that they were playing were in one of their tutorial groups. Would never had lived that one down... What is even more depressing is that the undergraduate intake this year will have been born in 1990 (Ontario takes 'em in at 17, not 18 as in the UK). Now THAT is depressing.

In terms of what is being planned for the near future, it is a reading week coming up which is good as I have about 55 exam scripts to mark on Max Weber. Seeing as the top one tries to explain the nuances of his concept of social action and verstehen ('understanding') by arguing that a diamond ring is best when the person buying it thinks 'bigger is better', I am not holding out much hope of high grades. Still, only nine more weeks and myself and the other TAs are then free.

The weather is still staying pretty cold here - last night it got down to about -25 we reckon. Even more beams in the block of flats M lives in started to contract and let off their cannon-shot booms. It was quite disconcerting to be cleaning your teeth and then have the beam above your head let off a huge booming sound. I just rest happy in the knowledge that the cold only affects in a detrimental way that have been around for ages. M's place must be at least the early 80s. Oh, hang on...

I can't wait for the end of these taught elements of the PhD so I can then get on with actually reading for the subject(s)/social theory that I am actually interested in! On that note, myself and the other new PhD students in this cohort are off 'downtown' to bond over some food and wine, so I must wrap this up and post it.

Laters, global readers...

And each one is individual... ahhh

Today has seen (for me) the heaviest snow fall in my life. Having experienced the panic that sets in on Londoners when two or three flakes fall in as many minutes, the searing stoppages of public transport and the siege hysteria that comes into effect in the national media, having to help dig your girlfriends car out of the snow at the supermarket has a somewhat surreal quality to it. In weather that would have stopped even the most determined Jehovah's Witness from knocking at your door, it was almost detached to be loading food shopping in the boot of the car whilst being swamped by large flakes of snow. And hat's off to M for driving in it, ridiculing other drivers for bad behaviour (she is nothing short of a righteous demon of law abiding when she gets behind the wheel) and making my first venture out into an Arctic wilderness (well, Loblaw's food store in Kingston) a funny and memorable event.

These little beauties were taken from M's flat balcony when it was at it's worst. By comparison, you should be able to see all the way to the water - 8-9 blocks away, but all you get here is about 2 blocks. And it was falling hard. The wind has also just ripped off the balcony divider between M's place and the students next door. At least the building is not buckling again in the cold... :-(


On another note, we have just finished watching the documentary film The Corporation. It is excellent. My brother, G, bought me a book a couple of Christmas' ago about the corporation but it was just when I was applying for Uni here in Canada so I never got round to reading it. I believe it is now back with its purchaser, happily sitting away on his shelves and making him look good when visitors come over. Anyway, back to the point in hand; The Corporation. Constituted legally as individuals in their own right, they have what can only be termed a psychopathic personality. The US has - yet again - come out to be the whore to business that we all know it to be with some absolutely crazy legal decisions. The most onerous being that US patent office (of all places!) was the final bastion against a predatory chemical company that wanted to patent an actual genetic sequence because, and only because they had mapped its DNA sequence first. The patent office was finally defeated in the US supreme court which argued the the corporation did have the right to patent it. What this means is that in the near future - read about 8-15 years - the gene for breast cancer, prostate cancer, variations of the flu virus, etc, will be the property of a company. "So what?" I hear my global readership ask: so, it means that apart from the scenario that some company could sue you for 'getting' their patented disease (hey, stranger things have happened...) it means that ANY medicine that deals with that gene sequence will have to pay a royalty to the company because it is using their 'patented product'. Imagine that: the cure for cancer would need the permission from one of big bio-techs to actually be marketed.

Grassroots action is the way to go, I am beginning to believe; grassroots action is the way to go.

On a final note, M's friend Derek has linked to my blog so I am returning the favour (I have met the guy, by the way :-) ). Despite being in the natural sciences, he and his wife Jane are incredibly nice people. You'd hardly guess they do 'proper science' at all. (I shall have to see if my link is removed after this!)

Boots and movies

I am determined this is not going to turn into an online diary, so I shall restrict comments to just talking about my new boots (which were MUCH needed) and about a film M and I saw last night.

As cold weather goes, whilst the most invasive coldness was actually in Kent over my brief sojourn back to Blighty over Christmas, the weather in Kingston is pretty chilly too. Of course, I am always testing out exactly how cold it is by standing on M's 9th floor balcony for at least a few seconds each time the weather report says it has got a bit colder. I've found out through using this advanced form of empirical research that -20C with a winchill taking it down to about -29C really is bloody cold. I managed about 15 seconds before deciding that I really did like my ears, fingers, toes and nose attached to my body so went back inside. I've also had the daily experience of, when walking into the wind, having the sensation that my teeth are about to crack if I smile at my walking companion. Most upsetting as it restricts my jovial nature somewhat. ;-)

The boots (finally getting to the point here) are proper Canadian hiking boots that also serve as very good urban wear. If you will excuse the utter mundanity of this, I will try and insert a picture of them:


Ah ha! Success! Right, them little lovlies have three brilliant qualities: (1) They do not have a crack running right across the middle of the front of the soles like my previous pair (led to very wet feet after tramping to Uni in the snow); (2) they're from Montrail who get a good (verbal) write up from the Canadians I've spoken to; and (3) they don't squeak on the highly waxed corridors of the Uni! I am well pleased. Although I imagine you are incredibly bored by now, so on to other more interesting things.


Pan's Labyrinth is a very strange but very good film. It combines bloody aspects of cruelty and blind devotion to a cause (Franco's fascist Spain) alongside the desperation of the little girl to escape from her situation. The film is one of those where you're still thinking about 'what that bit meant' a long time afterwards.

The actions of the town Doctor are especially like this and you wish (hope?) that you are a human being of similar qualities. It is also difficult to repress the feeling that if you had the chance, you would quite happily cave in the skull of the Captain and make the world a slightly better place. But then, what would that make you? - plus that is exactly what he thinks about doing to the Republican guerrillas...

Plus this film aptly reminds you: never piss off a woman with a knife.

Right, I have work to do that involves reading some of Empire (if you're really interested in it, you can download the entire book - for free - from here), so I shall depart and then start after making myself a bagel and getting a very nice coffee from the shop just around the block. (And yes, yes, I realise I just used a 'Canadianism', it's just that, well, things here ARE built in a block format - oh how I miss the winding, but reasonably quick, roads of the UK!)

Warm, frozen, boiling, then chilled

Nope, it's not a recipie it is my experience of heat today. The flat was very warm most of the day but then it was another -15C windchill day so then you go to freezing cold. The boiling was me overheating (as I tend to do) during an indoor football match (9-0!!!... to them) and then being more nicely heated after a shower and in writing this.

It's been a good weekend so far, with the Reel Out festival going well and then with M having friends over from Ottawa. Two very nice guys who made the time fly by. And jeez did we eat! I am on steak/red meat overload and am expecting to either grow muscles like Schwarzenegger or add another two inches to my unhappily expanding girth (but if I am honest, that is mostly down to escaping the workload with beer on Tuesdays and Thursdays). And with both of them also being gay, this makes the weekend the most Queer-intensive experience so far.

Right, I have get on with my reading for this coming week (a book by a couple of chaps who want to be the 21st Century's version of Marx; a historian of science and technology; and the big-beard Marx himself) and I want to get in a few minutes of R&R on the couch with a cold drink beforehand.

Until sometime soon...

Ok then, now for some news

I spent the time yesterday evening finishing up at the Uni and then getting back in time to go and see the first of the Reel Out film festival that just started in the town. It focuses in gay, lesbian and Queer issues in general but through the form of film.

Last night at the cinema was spent watching a short(ish) film about lesbian gymnasts. Sounds strange, I must admit, but it was entertaining and I had never been with quite so many lesbians all in one place to watch a film before... The evening was then a move to the Grad Club which is quite a cool place where (you guessed it) only Graduate Students can drink at. It can also serve as a general function venue which was what happened last night. They also had my favourite Canadian brew on the current selection of beers on tap (Upper Canada Red for those of you who are interested) and so that went down quite well. Several times in fact.

Today is being spent getting ready for M's friends arriving from Ottawa for the night, so it is cleaning (or the avoidance of cleaning in my particular case) that is the order of the day. Which is good, as it is about -13C outside and with windchill taking it down to -20C, so indoor things are much the order of the day.

Right, must get on with the aforementioned skiving.

Toodle-pip chaps.

Dear all...

Well, this seems the best way to reach everyone quickly and simply. I would suggest that in moments of boredom and the like, you take a moment or two to check in here to see what has been happening in this land of the Great Frozen North. And I really do mean frozen...

Right. Lets see if this has worked properly! :-)