(Message sent Mon, 16 Jun 2008 17:02:54 -0700)
Holy cow they like things big here. I feel like the provincial hick come to town, forever bumping into lamp-posts for looking up at the buildings. Quite the most soaringest, gleamingest, toweringest skyscrapers I ever did see.
I get a kick out of how we pile qualifiers on top of superlatives in order to let things be he biggest, or deepest, or (in this case) tallest even thought they're not. The CN Tower used to be the tallest structure on Earth. Now it's (get this) the world's tallest completed free-standing structure on land.
Such quibbles aside, it's an astonishing thing. Standing at the base (N 43 38.531 W 079 23.256) looking up gave me a sense of awe over what we are capable of when we set our minds to it. The view from the top was just stunning - south out over the Toronto Islands to Lake Ontario, north out over the downtown area - but the crowds were so awful that it was only just barely worth it. I had to wait 50 minutes in the queue to go up the elevators, trapped between Mr Stinky in front of me and Mr Everyone Needs To Know My Business behind me, then once at the top the only way to get to a window was to elbow little old ladies out of the way, and then there was another 50 minute wait for the privilege of being allowed down in the elevators.
The weather has been peculiar. While in Winnipeg it was fine and rainy by the day, here it has changed by the hour. It was fine and hot for most of today, but I got caught in two sudden downpours, and right now I'm writing this in my 17th-floor hotel room, looking out at a thunderstorm over Lake Ontario that every few minutes lights up the sky, silhouetting the mighty skyscrapers that stop me seeing the lake itself.
Sam (the woman I met on the train through the Rockies and bumped into again in Winnipeg) ended her two-week trip in Toronto, and her time here overlapped mine by a day or so. I got a hilarious late-night phone call from her. She was so utterly exhausted after two weeks of being driven from pillar to post by well-meaning minders who crammed activities into every minute of her every day that she was punch-drunk, almost manic. The next day I had lunch with her and two of her friends - a lovely local couple who very kindly gave me their contact details, should I get into trouble or otherwise require assistance while in Canada.
I visited the Royal Ontario Museum, an amazing collection housed in a most peculiar building. At some point they took an old stately stone building and grafted this... thing onto it. They call it the Crystal, but to me it looks like an errant hyper-dimensional craft that has materialized in the wrong place, slicing through the building. It's wild, and I loved it. You go into the Crystal and into the main atrium where you find yourself looking at what I take to be the original facade.
At first I found the museum bewildering - huge and hard to navigate. I found I wasn't really in the mood, and very nearly left without seeing anything. But then I thought, "I know how to beat the museum blues - dinosaurs!" So I found the dinosaur display and my mood lifted in a second - it was the best and best-presented collection of fossils I've ever seen.
After the dinosaurs I went to the Ancient Egypt section. It was pretty good, but I found myself thinking, "Hmmm... a model of the Saqqara Step-Pyramid. Doesn't do the real thing justice," and "Oh look - a reproduction of Hatshepsut's carving celebrating her trade mission to Punt. The real thing looks much better under the harsh Egyptian sun." Ah the joys of insufferable smugness.
This issue of the homeless living on the streets of Canada's super-rich streets continues to fascinate and disturb me. There aren't as many in Toronto as there were in Vancouver, but you still hear, "Can you spare some change sir?" several times a day.
One day a man approached me just as I was leaving the hotel. He asked for a minute of my time, and when I stopped to listen (even though I knew where the conversation would go) he thanked me for not walking on by. Then he launched into his life story, delivered with scarcely a drawn breath in a very quiet monotone that I found hard to follow. The gist of it was that he had been in prison since 1997, and had only just been released that morning into a Toronto he no longer recognized. He had been a boxer, and had once been offered a briefcase containing $250,000 if he would do something (I didn't catch what). He had trained as a plumber and was now trying to go straight, but he couldn't do it alone. Would I help him out?
He didn't stink, and his breath didn't smell of alcohol, but his eyes were wild and haunted and widened and narrowed randomly in a most disturbing fashion. On balance I considered that at least part of his tale was true. I gave him $10. He immediately asked for more.
So, did I help out a guy who was genuinely trying to lift himself out of the gutter, or did I help a junkie get his next fix? Who knows? I do hope Mr Crazy-Eyes makes it, but I don't suppose he actually will.
One day while wandering about I came across an art installation inside a public arcade. According to the sign the installation "... works in mysterious ways to challenge the distinctions between between art's physical manifestation and its conceptual footprint." Despite this I went in to see it. It consisted of a series of large panels, each painted with a star field in pastel colours. Superimposed over each star field was an image to do with space - a satellite here, a constellation symbol there. Each panel also had a set of cross-hairs with a bunch of numbers beside the intersection. It took me a while to work out that these numbers where latitude and longitude co-ordinates. Once I had realized this I chose one of the panels at random and typed the co-ordinates into my little yellow friend. "At last!" I cried, "Art work for geeks!"
I asked my little yellow friend to take me to the spot, and followed its bee-line through 4kms of city streets, getting caught in another Torontial downpour along the way. A last I arrived at the spot, footsore and a little grumpy. I walked about a bit to be sure, but there was no doubt about it - the point in question was inside an arts supply store. Plucking up my courage I went inside and said to the woman behind the counter, "This might sound like crazy talk, but did you know that an artwork in town is pointing at this shop with GPS co-ordinates?"
It turned out that she did know all about it, and I was the first person to track the location down. The artist had in fact left a little prize for the first person to navigate their way to the shop - but had given up on the project and withdrawn the prizes just a few days before! I was robbed I tell you, robbed!
I took a ferry ride out to the delightful Toronto Islands (N 43 37.304 W 079 22.691) on the lake. This is an archipelago of a dozen or so small islands, all connected together by bridges. The islands are dotted here-and-there with boat sheds, marinas, houseboats, and cafes, and there are lots of baches (=cottages for you NorAms) set among the trees. Most of the baches are modest, quaint, and quirky. Some are rather more grand, and some are so poorly maintained that they are in danger of being reclaimed by the bush.
On the north side of the island group you are looking across a couple of kms of water to the skyscrapers of downtown, while on the south side you are looking across the wide, wide waters of Lake Ontario, with no hint of the other side. The waters are blue and sparkling, with the odd swan or Canada goose bobbing about.
From just about everywhere on the islands you can see the CN Tower if you look north. It's a good demonstration of just how big this thing is, as none of the other skyscrapers are half so present.
It was a wonderful, green, peaceful place. I rented a push-bike and spent a happy day just pootling about.
Bye for now. Love Joff.
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