I tried to write a few blog entries while I was there without much success. I just couldn't seem to find the time or the inspiration...too busy with the business at hand I guess: learning how to run a pub.
I did get out a couple of times during my tenure there, two Sundays to be exact. The first Sunday it was partly cloudy, windy, and cold with an occasional snow flurry dampening my spirits and my camera. The second Sunday it was just plain snowy, cold, and wet...not the typical photo day this California kid relishes. Riding the "Rocket" (Toronto's subway system) up, down, around, and under Yonge Street for a few hours, I managed to get a few shots of the city near each station.
It was a busy day in downtown Toronto on that Sunday. Being three weeks before Christmas, it was probably a busier than normal. Their version of "Times Square" is bit more compact than New York's. It's called Eaton Centre. There is a large mall with all the usual shops and fast food places we have here. Outside, the large stage and cement gathering area was mostly empty of people save for a local radio station's promotional pick up truck blaring it's speakers and displaying it's banners. It was snowing quite heavily at the time. That nearby stage offers local, live entertainment when the weather cooperates. Old style trolley cars clank to and fro, ferrying Torontoans East and West...the subway runs mostly North and South.
It all seems to work very efficiently.
I was flying solo in a strange city, so the whole experience was a little tentative. Standing and staring at the cityscape at the entrance to each subway station then scurrying back down into the subway was about all I could muster. I wondered on more than one occasion what the heck I was doing in Canada in the dead of winter. Some of the locals expressed to me the very same thoughts. Winter is winter no matter where you live. And with that brings the usual challenges, adjustments, and longings for more temperate climes. Strange...many Canadians vacation in Cuba during the winter months. They, unlike their American counterparts, are allowed to travel readily to that Carribbean island. After all...they are Canadians! Even though they look, act, and talk similar to us...it is another country entirely. The 49th parallel is still only a line drawn in the dirt across the prairie hundreds of years ago, eh?
Even in the cold, dark of winter, Canadians drink more beer than we do. One of them commented to me in the pub one day, "Can you believe that we still love our ice cold Butler's or Keith's when the snow is coming down outside? That's crazy, isn't it?" I told him, "Not so much crazy as it is simply different". One other big difference in pub libation there: No blended drinks, even in Summer. Canada just ain't Margaritaville! Or Daquiriville, or Pina Coladaville for that matter. They don't even have blenders in most of the pubs, let alone a machine for making slurpy-like blended drinks. It's just not their thing. They love their beer...and are proud of it!The food in Canada is much like in the states. Pub fare does consist of a few things not normally found at an Applebees or Chili's. Besides the familiar bar and grill type menu, pub fare items like Shepherd's Pie, Steak and Guinness Pie, and Fish and Chips are standard. Many places you can still find Steak and Kidney Pie, Chicken Curry, and Bangers and Mash (grilled sausages and mashed potatoes). Generally speaking, it's all good comfort food...but a tad on the bland side. Canadians don't embrace the wildly spicy, exotic Southwest and Asian offerings that we have come to demand. At least that is the way it is in publand. They do have their fair share of Asian restaurants (and a huge contingent of Asian citizens). Sri Lankans are very abundant in Toronto as well and comprise most of the kitchen staffs. Ask a Sri Lankan cook to make you Chicken Curry like they have it and you'll experience spicy food!
That's me standing at the bar in the pub where I trained. I stopped in there for breakfast before heading out on my subway jaunt. The pubs are very cozy and very friendly (for the most part). The alcohol is much more expensive in Canada, hence the price of beer and cocktails reflects that added expense. For instance, a single shot of whiskey (they call it rye) goes for about $6.50 for call brands. And that's a real "single" shot, ie, 1 ounce! We've come to expect, and enjoy, those 1 1/2 or 2 ounce pours here in California. Premium, import draughts like Guinness run about $7.25 for a "pint". By the way, the most popular beers in Canada...are you ready for this...are Coors Light and Bud Light. Go figure! Again, no blended drinks. Only the youngest pub dwellers go for the "shots" of Patron or Jaegermeister. And, the drinking age in Canada is 19. I didn't ever see an I.D. checked while I was there, although the liquor board does its share of I.D. sting operations just like here in the states. I figure that most of the kids trying to pass false I.D.s at bars here are in the 19 to not-quite-21 age bracket anyway. Hence...underage drinking in Canadian bars is not as much of a problem.
That's a shot of the converted Victorian/rooming house in which I stayed in Toronto. It's located on a side street, just a few blocks off the main drag (Yonge), two blocks from a subway station, and smack dab in the middle of Toronto's "Gay Town". It was no big deal. That area is very quiet and no one bothers you save for a bum or two once in a while. I didn't go out bar hopping while I was there...it was a bit creepy enough just looking in the windows of some of them late at night. Just not my cup of tea...not that there's anything wrong with that mind you! Although I did have the opportunity to meet and chat with a "lovely" trans-gender person named Anita (was Jeff) at my work pub the last night I was there. We didn't converse about her transformation. She was very sweet. We talked about Toronto and photography (she is also a photographer). It was only slightly surreal...I'd had a couple pints of Guinness by then. All in all, it was an interesting hour of pub chat for me. We exchanged website addresses and I headed out for the subway "home". My last night in Toronto.
At the subway station, I had a much stranger encounter. As I stepped onto the platform at the bottom of the stairs to wait for the next train, there it was. A very large, mature raccoon. It was slowly ambling its way around the small area between the subway wall and the edge of the platform, sampling bits of whatever trash had been left on the cement from inconsiderate riders. It didn't seem to notice or care that I was there, just a few feet from it. A few other people farther away were staring, a couple of young women were giggling, trying to get their cell phone cameras going. The raccoon continued its fruitless search for something. The subway train began to pull into the station, moving much slower than usual. The operator had noticed the animal and decided to slow down. He reached out the window of his car and tossed a bit of food in the raccoon's direction as the subway rolled by. It didn't seem to see what had been thrown. It appeared to be blind or sick or both. As the subway train came to a stop, the animal meandered back toward it, as if wanting to go back down to the track level and return to its den under the structure (that is where many of them reside). It bumped into the closed door of the train. If the door had been open, it would have wandered right into the train itself. The operator waited to open the doors until the raccoon turned and walked back toward the wall. I got on. The doors closed. And my last subway ride in Toronto began, slowly at first, then faster as it cleared the station and the raccoon that continued its search of the subway platform.
I had heard from the locals that downtown Toronto is literally infested with raccoons. Upon hearing that, I raised my eyebrows in disbelief, "Really?", I said with a slight smirk on my face, "Raccoons? Where do they live?" I was informed that they live everywhere...in trees, under houses and apartments and other buildings, and under the subways. And after Googling "Toronto raccoons", I also discovered that it is quite a problem now. The humane society discourages any control or eradication efforts. So, they just coexist with them for now.
My time in Canada was rather short by most standards (three weeks). Too short to offer any kind of accurate description of the city of Toronto or Canada in general. I worked most of the time. Someday, I would like to go back when the weather is nicer and I have more time to explore. It's an interesting city at the very least. The people are friendly and enjoy talking to you about the differences between themselves and the Americans. Those differences are mostly political. The look, talk, and live their lives just like us. They do have socialized medicine, though they criticize it openly because of some of the shortcomings, ie, paying for prescriptions and the exorbitant taxes imposed on alcohol, liquor, and gasoline. Everything's a tradeout. There are no free lunches anywhere...even in the Great White North, eh?
Cheers to my new-found friends in Toronto. Thanks for your hospitality. More photos of what I was able to see in Toronto here.
