A return to Montréal

So here we are. I'm sitting in my temporary room at the, uh, Hotel Pierce by Simplissimo. I change rooms later on because I made a mistake because of the dates, all these time zones and things. So I, I'm in this room until eleven, and then I have to hopefully move to my new room later on. Well, that was an interesting twenty-four hours. Taxi came for me yesterday morning at eight and had a fascinating conversation with Haruman, the driver, who was originally from Pakistan. We had discussions about the current state of affairs in the world, in particular the Middle East, and the effect of a certain American president. It was fascinating, and I learned a lot about him and his life in Pakistan, in particular his live of dogs.. It was half an hour well spent. Then into the airport, the normal breakfast at Starbucks, and then hanging about, which seems to be the order of the day for most of traveling these days, hanging about for the next event. The flight to London went uneventfully. It, took off on time at about five past eleven. Got to London early, about twelve, and then, as is my wont, made my way to the Five Swans, I think it's called. Five something. It's Five Rivers. The Five Rivers at, um, Wetherspoon's at Heathrow, where I had, unusually for me, a burger and chips. I don't normally have burger, but it was probably the cheapest thing on the menu and a pint of... Now, what was it? A pint of, oh, dear me. Crikey. It was Titanic White Star. That's it, Titanic White Star. And when the guy brought it to me, he said, "That goes down well." I said, "Yes, I know." And it did. So I took as long as I, I could feasibly to actually eat my beef burger and chips. The meal was punctuated by assistants from Wetherspoon's asking how the meal was. It was fine. I then decided to explore. It's the only way to pass the time, because I couldn't sit there for six hours. So, um, I, I eventually found somewhere I could sit down, sat for a while, then moved to somewhere else I could sit down, and then moved to somewhere else where I could sit down. There was a lot of sitting down. I didn't bother going in the shops until just before leaving. I went for a bar of chocolate and some mints. And then, um, I thought, "Well, where is this flight gonna go from? From which part of the terminal will it depart?" Um, and it seemed-- the clues seemed to suggest that it was from Terminal Five C, which you reach by a shuttle tube thing. No, not the kind of shuttle tube where you get into a, a tube and into a capsule and are shot along a tube, but into a tube train. So I did that and got to Terminal C. The only thing is I still had to wait to find out which gate I had to go to. So I sat down at the one nearest to where I boarded the last time I went to Canada. I sat there for a while and then decided to move just to explore a little bit and see if there are any other clues about where the flight might depart from. Then a group of ladies, walked past me, very jolly ladies, all speaking, um, a kind of French that I recognized. They were speaking Québécois. So I followed them and ended up right back where I'd started,, in Terminals Five C. The boarding went very well. I was following behind a guy, who gave me the impression that he'd just arrived at Heathrow from somewhere slightly warmer because he was wearing shorts and had a rucksack and, um, he looked like a real traveler. And it turned out that I was actually sitting next to him on the aircraft. He was called Peter, and he had just returned from three months in India, and he was telling me that he likes to spend that amount of time in India every year. He, he was from Ottawa. We had some interesting conversations on the flight. 

When the pilot spoke to us, he said that it would be a, a swift flight. It would be round about six hours as opposed to the six and a half, seven that one can expect. We must have had a tailwind, I believe. And then, we took off, and after a while, we were given some wine to drink, and the attendant, flight attendant said, "I'll just leave two with you rather than just the one little bottle. You can have some more if you want later." I also had an orange juice.Um, and what it was, they gave us something else to eat and I forgot what it was now. Some snack affair. And then, uh, it was, "What do we do next?" Uh, well, the screen was in front of me. What shall I watch? I looked at the films and I thought, "Well, hmm," I wasn't sure. And there was one which I, I hesitate to say out loud. It was called Fackham Hall, um, which was clearly going to be a comedy. I decided I would watch that, but first I listened to some music. I put on an hour of blues, classic blues music, which passed some of the time very well. And it was strange because I was snoozing off, trying to at least. I always find it very difficult to get any, any kind of sleep on an aircraft. And we, we took off to the east and wheeled round and headed for South Wales, and then Southern Ireland, and then across the Atlantic. So I, I was half listening to music and half snoozing. When, uh, I opened my eyes and everything was dark, the lights were off in the aircraft, and I thought, "Well, that's, that's really strange." Because normally you tend to be able to watch the sunset as you're going across the Atlantic. Um, but it just got dark very quickly. I found it very puzzling. I took a couple of quite attractive photographs - this is going to sound absolutely stupid when I tell you what it was later. Um, but the, the wing and the engine, I was sitting right next to the, the wing and large engine there, and it was bathed in a purple light, and I couldn't understand it. It was beautiful, but never mind. Took a couple of photos. And then I, I turned to Fackham Hall, and itt was difficult not to laugh out loud, I have to say. It was real kind of British, coarse, crude humor. Um, lots of double entendre, lots of absolutely silly, almost slapstick comedy. Uh, I can't really tell you who, who, who played the parts, but if you ever get the chance to watch it, I... And you, you like a laugh, a sort of schoolboy laugh, then that's the one for you. And then I was still puzzled by this purple light that seemed to be glowing outside. And I couldn't work out whether this purple light was a fixture on the aircraft. Um, it seemed... It was difficult to, to tell. It was... We were flying almost directly at it. Um, never mind. I sort of ignored it for a little while. And then we were given our, our meal, a three-course meal, uh, served on a tray which was probably about, oh, what, fifteen inches by ten. So there's not a lot of space for your main course, your starter salad and a dessert, and all the cutlery and a serviette and a glass for your wine, of course. I'd consumed, uh, almost half of one of the small bottles, and, um, I decided to leave the last one. I've still got it. It's here in the room, so I might consume that at some point. Um, but we did get another drink of orange juice or whatever. It was good. The food was fine. I had a butter chicken, which came highly recommended by the flight attendant who seemed to be pushing that one above all else. I, I guess that one was the one they had the most of. Um, so finished that, uh, then had a cup of coffee, which I left for so long because it was so hot. Then I glanced across the other side of the aircraft because there seemed to be a light on over there. Uh, whereas everything else seemed to be in reasonable darkness. There were people working on laptops. There were people sort of snoozing. But there was this one window which was really bright. You could actually see out of it. You couldn't see anything because we were flying about forty-three thousand feet or something crazy. Um, but it was bright. And I thought, "Well, this is bizarre." And it turned out it was a fixture new technology which I hadn't realized, which controls the amount of light that comes through the window. And I thought, "Oh, maybe that's the moon then. Maybe I'm looking at the moon, and this kind of purple haze," to kind of phrase, "is, is, is causing the moon to actually look purple." But then I thought, "Well, it's the wrong shape for the time of month," because we... it was a new moon when I set off, or the night before at least. And here it was, a full kind of shape, and, and it... right ahead of us. And it wasn't till later, I was talking to Peter next door when we were almost approaching the coast of Labrador and, and Newfoundland, when it suddenly dawned on me, and to both of us really, that this wasn't the moon, it was the sun. And that window on the other side revealed that it was still daylight outside, and that's what I expected. I, I expected to, to actually land in daylight.Um, and so this magnificent technology allows the, the crew to dim the windows so people don't put the, pull the blinds down. No blinds to pull down. It does it by some means of physics. And I, I asked the flight attendant when she was giving us our last snack of the day or the flight about it. I said, "What? So you can actually alter this yourself, this one?" 

She says, "Yes, but they're locked, so you can't." "All right." I said, "But what about that one over there where the, the light is coming in?.." 

"Oh, that one's broken. It doesn't work." 

 "Ah, right. Okay." So I, I learned something new, and by that time they'd started to reduce the dimming quotia, quo... What, what? Dimming quotient. Would that be the right term? The dimming quotient. And they-- we began a kind of slow descent as we came over the St. Lawrence up by Gaspesie and then we gradually lost height into the clouds and then below the clouds, and we could see the sun then, as it was truly revealed as its self. We landed, I think it was, uh, about half past seven, which was actually about an hour early. And, um, that was quite good actually, because there I had this vague thought in my mind that when I arrived at my accommodation, if it wasn't too late, I might try to make it to the open mic at Benelux Verdun, where I've been before, uh, not to perform, just to go and watch and try and book a slot for next Wednesday. So it was good that we arrived early because, first of all, there was the journey from the aircraft to the airport terminal. No, there wasn't. I'm making that up. Uh, we just, we had a long walk up from the aircraft up to the terminal building through a tunnel, and then we had to go through the passport control, which I guess is very similar to the one which is now being introduced into Europe. They last time I was there last year, they had this system where you scan your passport, you have your photograph taken, and it remembers you from the last time you were there providing your e-visa thing is still valid. And then another long queue to go through the actual immigration control, where people check the little chitty that you've been given by the machine, and if you qualify, you, they let you straight through. If not, then you have to go and speak to an immigration officer. So then it's down to the baggage retrieval area. It wasn't too long, and I have to say I'm very pleased that I had placed identifying marks on my two items of checked luggage. On my small little cabin case that I normally carry in the cabin, I had put a nice orange fluorescent strip on this one side, and then a yellow fluorescent strip on the bottom, so I can recognize it. And on my suitcase I have the resplendent sticker representing the Groyne, uh, the Sandancer sticker, So after a, a ten-minute, fifteen-minute wait, retrieved the bags and then out through a perfunctory glance at this little document that you were given by the machine, handing it to the guy at the exit. Now you go, and then for a taxi. I tried to do some research whilst I was still on the flight about comparison in price between Uber and the normal regular airport taxis, and it turned out in actual fact that the Uber was probably going to be about twenty dollars more expensive. So I joined the queue for the Bonjour taxis, which are a fixed rate into the city, and it was quite a queue. I think it must have been all told about a hundred meters long 'cause it snaked backwards and forwards. It took about half an hour to get through that area. And the taxi ride was, uh, perfect, uneventful. We arrived at my hotel and the taxi driver kindly helped me across the road with one suitcase, the big one. I had codes to enter on the outdoor entrance door. Another code entry to get through the inner door. Go to the lift. Another code. Same code, I have to say. Another code entry to go up in the lift to the second floor, or we would call the first floor. Um, and then another code to get into my room. By that time, I think it was quarter past nine here.So that means it was quarter past two. Is that right? Five, yeah. Quarter past two back in England. And I had a decision to make. Should I crash out? Because I felt like crashing straight on the bed. Or should I make the effort to go to Benelux Verdun? I decided on the latter, so I went to the nearest metro station, which is Guy Concordia, which is just 50 metres down the street. Sorted a 10-journey ticket, and then travelled three or four stops along the green line to D'Eglise, around the corner into Wellington Street and thence to Benelux. Music was in full flow. A guy singing, playing guitar and singing. I recognised the guy who organises the open mic stuff. He was standing outside having a smoke. I went straight in, went to the bar and looked at the list of beers on the wall. There were quite a few familiar names, some not so familiar. But I decided to opt for probably one of the less strong beers. They are, to use the phrase, craft ales. It's not draft real ale, it's draft keg. But I really couldn't care less in those situations. So I opted for an interesting beer at about 4.2%. And it is, and I'm not sure how letterly it's going to actually cope with this, this beer. It is called "Ouate de Phoque". Now, those Francophiles, those French speakers amongst you will know that a 'phoque' is a seal. So a clever and slightly naughty play on words, Ouate de Phoque.. So I ordered one of those. It always takes me by surprise when I get the price. I think it was just over $10, which works out to something around about £6, I guess, in English money. But I shouldn't really be surprised. That's the kind of price you pay in large cities. And it's very nice. So I sat down at the tables and consumed some Ouate de Phoque, watched the music. And then the first guy finished. Another duo got up. And that was interesting. They did two or three songs with a kind of a Spanish flavour, almost flamenco flavour. One guy playing the kind of guitar, the fiddly bits. And the other one playing guitar and singing. They were good. And then Steph got up and said, right, this is the next. We've got the last act for the evening. It was all in French, but I could understand him. And so one of the co-hosts for the evening, I've forgotten his name now, he got up and did two or three songs. And he was good too.. Very professional. And then he said, right, that's it. Good night, everyone. Have a great time. And everybody clapped. Clapped the bar staff, clapped the performers, clapped Steph. Everybody got the clap. I mean, everybody clapped. And so I thought, right, now's the time to approach him and try and book a slot for next Wednesday. He recognized me from last year and said, oh, how nice it was to see me back again. I asked about a slot for next week'And he said, "Oh no!"  

"Ouate de Phoque? ' I thought.

He told me that next week's session has been cancelled because of a hockey match. I'm saying hockey match because you wouldn't dare put the word ice in front of it in Quebec because everybody knows exactly what you mean if you say hockey. It's got nothing to do with running around on the field with a ball and hockey sticks. It's all to do with ice hockey and the team in Montreal, the Montreal Canadiens . They are in what we would call, I guess, the playoffs for the final rounds of games. And they're contesting this playoff series with the Tampa Bay Lightning. And there is a match scheduled for next Wednesday. I I think it's in Tampa Bay. It's not in Montreal. And so everybody will want to watch this game on TV. And everybody will be wanting to watch this game somewhere where they can drink beer and watch TV. So they're either going to celebrate or drown their sorrows. We know the feeling in the northeast of England.

 I was devastated. I thought, oh, dear me. Here am I. I've come all this way to play in an open mic on Wednesday the 29th of April. And it's been cancelled. And Steph was so apologetic., "If I'd known you were coming, I would have kept the slot for you, and you could have come on, uh, at the end."

Never mind . So I finished my, "Ouate de Phoque?" And it seemed pretty appropriate at this time. Then made my way back on the Metro again, um, to Guy- Concordia, and then from thence to the hotel. It's a very pleasant kind of room I'm in temporarily. It's actually got a sort of separate bedroom and, and whatnot. I could actually live in it probably. I did get permission to stay here till my other room's ready 'cause normally I would have to check out at eleven and check in again at three. So it's gonna be interesting to see what happens. Um, but at this moment, having just had a cup of coffee and a bit of chocolate, i have to decide what to do next. I may go out and look for some food, or I may not go out and look for some food. I might just stay here and eat more chocolate and perhaps have another cup of coffee. Um, I have to say, this is the first time I've actually dictated a blog into my phone using the Letterly app. So I'm fascinated to see if it's worked. If it hasn't, I'll be absolutely devastated 'cause I, I can't imagine having to say this all over again or writing it all over again. Anyway, I shall attempt to translate this into a blog, blog and post it, and I hope someone reads it. I might actually add some photographs to it as well. Okay. Farewell for now. Au revoir.