État d'Urgence, Montréal

aka State of Emergency, a five day festival for the homeless in Montreal, organized by the Action terroriste socialement acceptable, French for Socially Acceptable Terrorist Action. Artists from around the province come together and entertain the homeless people in an urban village setting near my home. During the 5 days, le sans-abri, the homeless, are fed, clothed and entertained; but more importantly the non-homeless people are given an opportunity to mingle with them in a non-zoo, non-phobic setting.


Here's a seemingly well to do girl dancing with a sans-abri; if her expression is misleading, it is the photographer's fault - she really enjoyed every moment of it, just as much as this man did, this man with traces of a good looking youth bygone.

Some photographers, keep their distance, clean shaved, lining the wall next to the stage; but yet others mingle with the people, dance and have a good time while taking pictures. I try to learn from the latter. They are also the people who'll talk to you when they see you have a SLR, and offer tips and critique your pics...

The ambiance was exhilarating and thought provoking. Homelessness, whether in Sri Lanka, US or here is sad. But they are all very different. with the tight social/familial network in SL homelesness is of a lesser degree, but if you are homeless, you are only the recipient of benevolence in a patronizing manner. The number of homeless people here is quite large; that comes with the looser social ties of the western society - but the strong middle class supports them in the form of shelters, food shelves etc. And then Montreal goes a step further with events like this.

Still these countries can do much more. Every winter a few homeless people die in the cold, outside, in parks, under bridges. And every time, the shelters talk about how many beds are vacant in a given day. But in reality when these people go to the shelters several things are checked - are they taking their medicine, are the wasted, are they stoned. So people with sizeable egos, refuse to go there... I totally understand the need for such checks at these shelters. But I also have the question - why save a grown human's life, just to crush their soul and rid their ego?

I can't be like this, Frankie. Not after what I've done. I've seen the world. People chanted my name. I got it all. Don't let 'em keep taking it away from me. Don't let me lie here 'till I can't hear those people chanting no more
- Maggie Fitzgerald in Million Dollar Baby

Soulless

I just learnt that ... means speechless; so dot dot dot.

Just a few comments over the past few weeks -

You can not buy a mac, you used to come in here and harass him for having a mac and now you buy a mac - I lost all respect for you

But I thought about it; I wanted an all in one desktop, but was refusing to buy and Apple just cos it is an Apple - doesn't that make me as crazy as an Apple cult member who buys stuff just because they are an Apple thing? I don't want to be close minded - I want to be open minded...

No Apple yet - I am trying to decide between getting a 27" and not parting with 2000 of my hard earned Canadian dollars. In reality, the 21.5" should be more than enough for me, like one of my Canadian (ahem... sorry, I meant to say Quebecois) friends pointed out... Should I, as a Sri Lankan, be ashamed that I am taking anti-supersize advice from an occidental person? How does someone who watched all of South Park, Colbert Report and dvd's on a 12" li'l laptop, not be satisfied with a 21.5"??? You'd be surprised how... But I am going to be a good girl and live within my means - I think I am settled with the 21.5"

"I do not, and I mean do not, want to turn in to an Apple crazy who stocks their house with iThis and iThat - those iPhones might be cool with their linux capability that allows remote shifts and all sorts of fun stuff, but I ain't getting one"... "Errr... give her a year, she'll come around"

I am going to go with a friend (apparently I need a lot of emotional support when I shell out all that money!!!) and we have been postponing it forever now... it's almost like I shouldn't buy a mac... :)

In the end, I did buy the smaller 21.5" (because of people who said "the 27 is nice, but the 21.5 is nice too", after wavering between the 27" (because of people who said "heck you don't need a 27") and 21.5 (because of people who said "c'mon buy the 27") - I am stubborn like that yes, cutting my nose off to spite my face is not that infrequent with me.... But still thank you everyone for your counsel!

The $500 saved will go towards a new cool camera lens and a donation to the homeless shelter; the very people who are celebrating a 5-day fest today, the very people who, as we were walking home with our expensive toy begged us for a dollar and we said "sorry we don't have any"...

Canadian French

Yesterday the French guy in school became a citizen of Canada in a whole swearing-in ceremony. To commemorate, he put these two flags next to his bureau. I made a whole bunch of Quebec flag printouts (yes, we killed the Amazon rain forest... but it was for a good cause) and put it next to these two flags and had the other two guys, who are Quebecois, put the QC flags next to their bureaus too!! It was sort of in jest, I am very against any sort of nationalism and they all know this very well.






































So they returned the jest, by printing out a Sri Lankan flag and putting it in my bureau...

So I explained the symbolism of the SL flag to these inquisitive Quebecois/Canadians: the orange stripe for the Hindus, the green for the Muslims, the yellow for the Buddhists (and the Christians really don't matter), the Lion because the Sinhalese people come from a lion according to legend (because really, Tamil people don't matter), the sword for authority (because in ancient times everyone was up for a good fight), the 4 bo-leaves for love, compassion, sympathy and equanimity... It has been a while since I thought about my flag... and couldn't help but think of how it is yet another symbol of division; the only part that now appealed to me, the four bo-leaves.

Romantic Mist

As I was going to school today, rather early, at 9:45a (!!!!!! yes, I know... but that's pretty early for me) the whole place was covered with this beautiful mist and I thought it was pretty hauntingly romantic. And then I thought who fed that in to my head - that mist was romantic... So as I was walking with a friend, I said "look at that mist - it's so romantic" and he looked at me puzzled: "what kind of a woman are you?"... ok so at least that is not too generic, at least... kitsch, but not generic...

Armies of Students on the Escalator

Armies of students on a fine warm November morning, going up the escalator at the UdeM metro. This escalator takes people up the mountain to where most of the classes are; the days that it is broken is almost a nightmare for most people... Everyone at least sighs when they see it is broken, before embarking on the ~150 step journey... at least once I saw someone turn away and go...

How to Hold a Fork

This is actually how he holds his fork... It must be hard to be my friend, because I whip out my camera and snap everything...

I am not anal about these things, but I do notice how people hold their forks and pencils. I come from a place where these things were important social reflections, so I was this short of beaten to hold everything "properly". For my poor, teacher parents, it was important that their kids learn proper manners, they could not afford to have us grow up in to marginalized adults - at that time they didn't know their daughter will grow up to be a heathen physicist - so my parents are excused. But really people have no idea how teaching "manners" to kids makes li'l robots out of them, that grow into big robots, who then go and buy SUV's just because everyone else is, because they can not think by themselves... Ok... the SUV thing was a metaphor, but you get the idea...

I am not saying all the kids who learnt to hold the fork "properly" think inside the box or all the kids who hold the fork "improperly" think outside the box. But what really defines "proper" ways of life?

How each of us decides
I've never been sure
The part we play
The way we are
How each of us denies any other way in the world
- The Cure, in This is a Lie

Today, this guy who holds his fork like this, and I who hold my fork like that, are equally good people - but I had to work that much more to let my creativity grow, than this guy who never was suppressed... Sort of reminded me of my first days in grad school, when I looked around me and saw all my Chinese and former Soviet Union friends, who were brought up with no religion, just as good as I am; I who was brought up in a very Catholic environment... It must have helped that my parents were rebellious Catholics, at least rebellious against the church.

I've changed and the grippe

Someone's rant on Obama being Hitler like (or Charlie Chaplin like...) juxtaposed with one of the many signs of H1N1 phobia, another unjustified, baseless, over-reaction of Western society.

in the Beri Metro...

L'esco

L'escogriffe, bar spectacle, for schooner with tam, ashtray heart and david & the woods. The DJ brought his chien, a li'l italian greyhound/doberman pinscher (please don't ask how that happened... it could just be a baby doberman, given that he was trying to discipline-train him and all also...) to the bar - I tried to take a picture, just then my battery died... you will have to take my word for it...

Grand Bibliotheque

Looking out of the Grand Bibliotheque...

From a conversation that seems from so long ago:

today I am so excited because I am a new and proud ;-) member of La Grande Bibliothèque. I took more comics books home than I was able to carry around and a movie and a series and everything is free.
If i loose my job I will just sit there and spent all my days with reading until I have to leave Quebec again

I love bibliotheques in general... Yeah me too - if I lose my job... and you know what? There's a park close by where a lot of homeless people stay... and then every evening near the metro Berri there's a van giving out food to the homeless... so there, both lodging and food needs are taken care of... We'll have to find a place to shower... worst comes to worst, there's the (somewhat dirty) St Lawrance!!!

Stephen Colbert

These two girls in the metro, it seemed too young to get the sarcasm of the mostly American political commentary, too hippie to care, too French to be able to get it, were reading I am America and So Can You by Stephen Colbert... In my stereotype hyped head I was thinking, these girls have been speaking French with not one word of English, how can they possibly understand this book? But I think they did understand, maybe not all, but more than my stereotypes would allow...

"do not jiggle jello?"

one girl read out loud...

Hurley's

Hurley's Irish Pub, must be my single most frequented pub in Montreal. More than a year ago, October 16th, 2008 to be precise, I came here for the first time; there's a blog entry, but not a word about how pissed I was at this one guy, and how very mean I was to him; we really did not talk to each other almost at all the next day onward... many months of just un-tellable irritability followed... culminating in him breaking my detector... ok 2 days later I bumped into him in the grocery store and acted like sensible grown-ups and I even gave him a ride home - he apologized for breaking my detector, but I am not sure if this was before or after I offered him a ride... and we still kept our distance afterward... and quite a few of my friends, near and far, know about him, let's just say...

but that was then...

Today, I went to Hurley's with him and someone else, after ditching our checkout-Apple-store plans for free-sushi and then more sushi at a restaurant and now since the Apple store was closed we headed to Hurley's... Sitting besides him that night, I could not help but think of him as my most trusted work place confidante now, almost on par with my own brother, my best friend... Life and its ironies... I don't know if I have changed or if he has changed - I suspect it is a mixing of both, with a mixing angle of 45 degrees... I coined the term him-2008 and me-2008 for this... He has since exhibited extreme tolerance and open-mindedness - either he cultivated these over the last year or just never showed me this side of him back then.

And then exactly a week from now, I will be at Hurley's again, not only not uncomfortable, but also actually enjoying his presence... We've tested each other through so many social, political headlocks (yes he is a separatist...), I have felt very comfortable telling him about my heathen way of life, that I have the feeling that we will remain friends for life - I really hope we will.

And then I got teased by the Dave Gossage group that was playing, to the amusement of the whole bar... I seldom blush, but this day I did feel my ears warm with the gush of blood...

Hurley's, hardly my favorite bar in Montreal, hardly my fav beer, hardly my fav music, hardly my fav ambiance; but surely my favorite kaleidoscope bar. Ironically Dave, of the band, was a "witness" to the making of this kaleidoscope all 3 occasions...

That gets me thinking - I make best friends at work, just because if I hate them, I am still forced to stay with them and then with time if and when I like them, I will like them that much more, our relationship is that much more complete... A lesson to be learned... something about giving it a chance... giving myself a chance...

everything passes, everything changes
just do what you think you should do
and someday maybe
who knows baby
I'll come and be crying to you
- Bob Dylan in Ramona

Pablo Picasso

So I had planned on having my group, PICASSO, over for dinner... The number of PICASSOans and ex-PICASSOans are growing, so I decided to do a tapas thing...

The next day my professor reminds me the 25th of October is Pablo Picasso's birthday...

Is it eerily co-incidental that I had a get together and served nothing but tapas for the PICASSO people on the Spanish painter Pablo Picasso's birthday? I, nor anyone else, had not the slightest idea that it was his birthday...

Skiing in Fall!!!

Officially it is still Fall, so we go to take some Fall pictures. It is cold and I am miserable, but... Not these Quebecois - they artificially snowed Mt St Sauveur, the largest Night Ski Resort in North America and started skiing already....

One and half years later, these people still surprise me!!!

Borderless Europe

It really is very exhilarating to cross country borders in the EU, without any stopping or check point or whatever. Even though Switzerland is not part of the EU, their borders with France were wide open like this... Old check points standing as ghostly reminders only, of an era bygone, of a time when people were not as smart as they are today...

My Money and Theirs

My Swiss Francs and Euros... The first time I exchanged money, it was in Milan - so I gave them 100 of my Canadian dollars and they gave me like 50 of their Euros... Agggg... I gave 100 of mine, and I want 100 of yours!!!!!

Home Sick!!!

this is My Home, people of Geneva!

Saint-Genis-Pouilly

This window pattern was common in may homes in Saint-Genis-Pouilly. I have seen this pattern in some houses in Minneapolis too.

Depanneaur with super helpful owner... France, at least Saint-Genis-Pouilly, dies on Monday... everything, well almost everything was closed on Monday. Espèces de paresseux!!

Geneva, Switzerland

Geneva, I was really surprised at how big this city is; ok, not nearly as big as Montreal, but I somehow thought it was smaller than it actually was. With all its watchmakers and bankers Geneva is really a pretentious town, but if you take the time to find your way through, you can find nice little nooks and corners...
Jet d eau, in Lake Geneva, situated where Lake Geneva empties in to the Rhone river.





The United Nations office in Europe.




























My lonely planet guide book mentioned Switzerland railways are famous for their graffiti stations. I am not entirely sure why this sets apart Switzerland from any other station anywhere in the world, which in general is also graffiti-fied.

Sinhalese in Italy

So there is the Lord's Prayer in about 20 diffrent languages in this little town of Como's Duomo (Cathedral). So I am seeing Ukrainian, Russian, German and then, guess what, I saw the Sinhalese one too... whoa!!!!

Beautiful Alps

The Alps were amazing... I got a ride from Como to Geneva from this professor; the trip that was to take 4-5 hours took like 8-9 hours. The Scottish professor got lost in the Alps - all to my amusement. I was already enjoying the magnificent views as he was trying to figure out the way and fight his embarrassment - he need not have been embarrassed, I really was happy that we got lost. During the journey, we traversed an altitude of 2100m - probably the highest I have ever been to!!

I crossed the Swiss-Italian border with this professor - we were stopped at the border like everyone else was they asked him if he was French (he was driving a French car) he said no, he was Canadian (he holds dual citizenship), and they just sent us away - I was pretty sure they were gonna check my documents, but they just took one look at me and let me go... I love this lax attitude...

The professor by himself was a wonder - other than being a great physicist, he was also very fluent in Japanese I am being told. And everywhere we stopped he switched with ease between French, Italian and German all the while talking to me in English. He claims his French, Italian and German are not the best - he just knows enough to get by... but that's still very cool... And then he was telling me stories of his younger days as a postdoc at Fermilab, sabbatical in Germany, etc etc... sort of reminded me of Keith, ok not as cool as Keith... But when the border patrol asked him and he replied Je suis Canadien, he "put the icing on the cake"... I asked him "what made you say Canadian and not British - we are after all closer to Britain", he said "oh well, it's because my Canadian passport is in my pocket and my British one is in the bag"... Talk about a cosmopolitan person... Cool cool cool...

Confession

The blessed sacrament of confession...

When we were little we had to go for confession every month - normal adult humans do not sin all that much, so what's to be said about a kid? I remember being dreadful about confession because I was so afraid one day the priest is gonna see through my making up of sins and throw a public fit and denounce me - everyone would point their fingers at me and say "she made up sins", because this is what I did - I'd say "I probably lied to my parents, so I'll say so", "I probably fought with my siblings, so I'll say so"... What kind of crazy people make little kids confess every once a month?

Disdainful as I am sights like these, still give me a sense of nostalgia about a past that I was very much like them...

Lago di Como

The rich touristy village, Como, we had our conference. See those cool hydro planes?



Funicular to the Village of Brunate.













View of Como from Brunate.













Apparently these huuuuuuuge keys are commonplace in hotels in Europe - the first time I saw them... You have to give them to the front desk when you leave, so when you come back you have to actually go to the desk and get your key. One night when I returned, I could not help but feel shameful - sort of reminded me of my time at the Convent - what was I going to tell the Mother Superior about being drunk and this guy?




View from the window of my hotel - yes I know... but let's just call it quaint, shall we?

























Lake Como and the town of Como...

Eating in Italy

Does it get any fancier than this? Probably yes... but this itself made me break a bank... And we didn't even order wine from that shelf...

Como, Italy, where I met some really nice people (ahem...) from ATLAS... and so I was not eating alone the rest of the conference... :)

Physicist Shoes

Can you tell which one is the physicist's shoe? And they walk those cobble-stone streets without batting an eyelid!!

These nice people I met while I was having my dinner alone in Como on the first day of arrival - they were super friendly... they invited me to go bar hopping with them and I had such great fun. They were a little frustrated that I didn't speak Italian or Spanish... Mmmmhhh... I speak Sinahlases, English and some French, should I be frustrated they don't speak none of those? One of the girls understood some French, albeit very little, so we did communicate... Anyway through the night other friends joined them and we were able to communicate a little better...

As a photographer I have learned that women really do hold up half the sky; that languge isn’t always necessary, but touch usually is; that all people are not alike, but they do mostly have the same hopes and fears; that judging others does great harm but listening to them enriches; that it is impossible to hate a group of people once you get to know one of them as an individual.
- Annie Griffiths Belt, photographer National Geographic

Milano

So I went to Europe thinking "hey how bad is it going to be... I survived China where no one spoke my languages and I didn't theirs", so I didn't take a phrase book with me... Man was I wrong... While it was not as bad as I have made it to sound, the discomfort was still non-zero... Between the language and the system, I did not know how to find my seat in the train - the ticket are not in English and the seat numbers are not that straight forward... Does North America do things in a more intuitive manner or am I just used to the North American system?? Hey but the seat numbers in Sri Lankan trains are pretty straight forward too... Despite their many shortcomings, train seat numbering is not one of them in SL...

Paying Toilets

These paying toilets from none other than the Geneva airport... I'd think with the price of the airline they could easily allow their customers to go for free...!!! And am I not told over and over again how rich the Swiss are!!?

But people won't allow this scam... People coming out of the toilet will hold the door open for the next one so they don't have to pay to go... I don't know how long this had been going on, by the time I walked in... but I am guessing the Geneva airport lost a million amazing Swiss Frank because of the kind tourists!!! heh heh... take that Geneva!

Redneck Bar

This was the most red-neckest bar I have ever seen in Montreal... Some place east of St Denis on Mont Royal...

Sheesha

Sheesha time... this Sheesha, unlike most others on St Denis bars, was a no-tobacco one... not that I have a problem with some tobacco in an occasional sheesha..

Fairmont Bagel

Fairmont Bagel shop - best bagels made in the Jewish tradition. If you don't like bagels, that's no reason not to try these - I used to not like them too before... Yummm yummm....

Harmony

Mont Royal's cross as seen from Rue Duluth and Blvd St Laurent.

Montreal, the city dubbed La ville aux cent clochers, the city of 100 bell towers in its many churches, the city with a prominent gay community complete with their sometimes not-very-conservative gay parade, the city that is proud of a Christian cross overlooking them, the city where pro-choice is practiced in many clinics... the city of tolerance, the city of harmony...

PR in Canada and marching pre-schoolers

Today I applied for PR in Canada - despite/or because of (a phrase I learned from a cool friend) my love hate relationship with these people. And when I could have easily applied in the rest of Canada, I instead chose to apply in Quebec, knowing fully well that the French will be held against me - well, that's me... And mind you, I am doing this by myself for $400/- as opposed to $3000/- of lawyers fees...

forgive me pretty baby, but I'll always take the long way home
- Tom Waits

I must say, I was surprised that I had all the documents in order; it was surprising because I had to navigate through the French/English websites and most people who went before me, who seemed to speak perfect French, did not seem to know what they were doing... The Indian guy who went before me had all his documents in order - must be the genes of the sub-continent!!! heh heh... Let me put myself in a tiny box here... so I would separate myself from the other human beings...

This picture, of pre-school kids marching in line, taken on my way back from the Immigration office, has no relevance to me applying for PR other than this was taken a few blocks from the office of Immigration.

I have often watched in amusement, these kids, I imagine from day care's, chained together (ok, they are not chained... their hands are just roped together) so the caregivers don't lose them, and they don't get one of those crazy ideas and dash across into the traffic, and all sorts of safety reasons like that. Coming from a culture that clearly distinguishes between kids and animals, at first it was hard for me to wrap my head around kids being roped together like that, much like sled-dogs. But over the years I have grown to see this act in a positive way - it is what's best for them and who doesn't think a pack of sled-dog-like kids are cute? C'mon dogs are cute and so are kids... I think we've got a win-win here. Some of these caregivers are pretty enthusiastic - they sing cute little nursery rhymes and have the kids join them in a choral while marching... It pumps up my day to watch a shameless fully grown adult lead a group of sled-dog-like kids in a nursery rhyme choral; the kids with their ADD, their heads bobbing, turning to look at everything and anything, dreamily joining in their peers in the choral... Human beings learn this act of following their peers without giving much thought to it, at a pretty early age...

Festival des Films du Monde

It is the Montreal Film Fest; yes those

"black and white hippie movies, they're always about gay cowboys eating pudding"
- Eric Cartman

so of course I went... ;) I am not done yet... but I did catch a nice World War I documentary to go with me reading...

This week also marks the beginning of the school year for universities around town... so an excess of giddy college freshmen, loud, drunk... it is very fun to watch them actually...

Bonding Under the Stars in Sudbury

I will spare the details of how much I love these guys – I think I addressed this issue in a previous post. :) But I will say I feel very fortunate to have them as my friends. In reality I am killing my career being here, as it is hard on me when the physics conversation goes in French. So I am torn between this great social life and this sub optimal career life. Ah well as we say in SL you can not have both your porridge and your beard.

We watched the stars: the Andromeda, Jupiter, and the milky way.

On a totally unrelated note, I was told long ago, by a person who told me worldly truths, might I add, that you can only get wasted, if you are relaxed with the company you have. And I think it is true…

“Look it is the milky way” they said, "are we in Sri Lanka” I asked, “it is only visible from there…”… ah that’s when you know you’ve hit rock bottom.

I must mention this new guy in our group, who I really got to know better during this trip, a person with so many conflicting sides to his personality. At once a smarty and a musician, at once childishly cute but able to have a political discussion, upto date on current global events, a socially conscious and open minded person … I am always awed by such self contradiction.

Then back in Montréal on Saturday I will be told that to have such an orderly apartment is something that was never expected from me, from knowing me before, from the way I talk!!!! On my way back I thought, "well how boring can a person be if they only give out what is expected of themselves"...

I guess I am what I am awed about… :)

Something about Fearing Cheese...

So one of my friends is in a band - they list themselves as thrash (yes, I know, but that's how they wrote it), country and garage... The dynamics of the group was really interesting... The last time one of my friends shocked me with his band performance, he didn't even come close this shock I got this day... Also because in a non-show setting, this my friend gets all motherly and treats me like a 18yr old kid or whatever... (which I don't mind, in fact I find it mildly amusing... I guess because I don't see her all that often).

A good 45min-1hr of pure screaming, and even to my uncultured ear, bad music, but what had me was their dress(es)... specially the lead singer. The 25year old girl, with not the awesomest body (she was not fat, but...), dressed in a one size larger, not so flattering swimming suit... Wow... And here I think I don't care about what other people think... One can not help but look up to them for such a carefree attitude...

Most people shock the hell out of me, to borrow from Pretty Woman, in a good way, most of the time... yes I know I said this before...

The very 90's bar? Bistro de Paris.