some of this is true

6:39 p.m. I’m in Toronto, waiting. I’ll push the button to send this to the world later, when I get where I am going.

I’m in Toronto, for the second time in as many days. We flew here from London yesterday, and then from here to Halifax. Delays and a lack of fuel meant an hour late. More delays and a lack of taxicabs meant we didn’t get home until 4 a.m.

And now more delays and apparent problems with the plane’s nose mean I’m here, albeit a little wary about getting on that damn machine again.

I’m in Toronto. Again.

The week has been long and fun, and we did so much. I haven’t felt hungry for days, with all sorts of Chinese, Indian and Western food. We spent the weekend in London — Ontario that is — a town that, it seems, everyone living there hates. We sat around a lot, which was a welcome change from the whirlwind tour that occupied the previous days.

We flew from London to Toronto last night, where the captain announces the descent into Toronto seemingly minutes after reaching cruising altitude. Such a short flight that they don’t bother trying to get above the clouds, so you can see the ground screaming past and the lights so close you think you could hop off and plot your own landing. Little patches of city lights here and there, random, creating patterns in the void of darkness over Southern Ontario. When you fly that low it really feels like flying — instead of some impossible magic trick that can send you, somehow, floating 40,000 feet in the air — where the sound of propellers replaces jet engines, and everything shakes.

In a few hours, once — and if — they deem the plane worthy to fly, I’ll be in Calgary, which still feels like home, even though Halifax feels more and more the same way. There’s a difference, though it’s hard to pinpoint, and I wonder how long it took my parents, when they moved to Calgary from Winnipeg decades to go, to make that mental transition, from somewhere they lived to their home.

Maybe you never do completely.

When I go to Calgary, everything falls into place and it all feels like I never left, even though so many things — the city, the people, my memories and most of all me — keep changing in the months between. Maybe it’s the permanence that does it, and maybe your home is where you find that permanence. I don’t have much of that, not in my living space and not exactly in Halifax, because we will be, at the very least, changing apartments soon and, then, who knows where either of us will be in a year, in two years, in five and so on. School and work and our lives will keep us there or pluck us from the illusion of permanence to who knows where.

And in a few hours I’ll be home, in my bed and in my room, the new house we moved into when I was two, where posters of the Tragically Hip and Pink Floyd sit next to posters of Dali paintings next to a shelf with relics from my childhood, next to the bed where I had my first sleepover with a girl, closed off by the door my brother kicked in during a childhood fight, where I put up a poster of a fighter jet to hide the damage, and they all converge together and they wait for me to reclaim them.

addendum:

I made it, an hour and a half later than expected, and tired, but I’ve made it home.

We dropped a Robert Borden for dinner at the CN Tower — the world’s largest building and, apparently, Canada’s Wonder of the World. I was curious, so I looked up the term Wonder of the World. The Seven Wonders of the World refer to ancient wonders, most of which have been destroyed or have been victims of time, and the “modern” versions are more colloquial than official. For some reason I thought it was things that you can see from space — like the Great Wall. I’m not sure why I thought that.

We ate dinner, rotating at a good speed high above Toronto. We went at the perfect time, so we saw the city, as I ate my swordfish, in daylight, sunset and darkness — the whole gambit. It was like a bad Kate Hudson movie, very Hollywood-romantic, but it was actually worth the 61-second elevator ride up. Earlier, I’ve mentioned how the city just went on and on and on, and I didn’t even realize how much that was actually true, but you look out and the horizon, for damn-near 180 degrees north of Lake Ontario, is city lights. And the lines of streets and the curves of highways and the concrate — so much concrete — it just goes on.

And this is the end of our stay in Toronto.

Yesterday we were on MuchMusic again, on TV I heard, and we saw Metric. They played two songs, and they were definately on, though I felt sorry and embarassed for them and the “veejays.” The questions were from a bad teen-magazine interview — What’s your favourite movie? and What do you do in your spare time? — and the band couldn’t have seemed more bored. And I loved them for their visible disguist and I wonder if they ever thought, when they were indie and underground but still dreaming of fame, if they ever thought they were better than this, better than being reduced to a band for teens and tweens, and I wonder if the lead singer’s heart breaks whenever she’s asked if it’s difficult being a “girl” lead singer.

Body Worlds yesterday was fascinating and deserves separate relfection at a later time, when I can think about it more and at least include photos — which weren’t allowed but we have them anyway.

And we took the subway there and survived.

More bars, saw a friend, Anand, checked out the NFB twice, which was at the top of my list of favourite moments, went to the Art Gallery of Ontario, which was mostly under construction, had some more food, and here we are. We topped it off with one last drink at the Fox and Fiddle.

Tomorrow we catch a bus to London, Ont, and on Sunday we fly home.

And 14 hours later, I fly West.

first, the word(s)-at-a-time recap, for brevity’s sake:

pancakes. walking. cbc. thai food. china town (w/engrish). muchmusic. oysters. early to bed.

starting in the middle…

We went on MuchMusic yesterday, participating in the audience of MuchOnDemand, us and several dozens teenagers watching videos by rappers I’ve never heard of, and it was fun and amusing and the lights were hot. We wanted to go today, because Metric is playing live there today, but all the tickets were gone and it was sad. But we asked the producer, saying we were from the East Coast and things had not worked out for any good concerts, and would she be able, just this once, to add another name to the list.

So today (Wed), at 5 p.m. ET, we will be watching Metric play in the MuchMusic “Environment” and it will be good and maybe if you tune in you’ll see us on the small screen. Again.

The rest of the day was fun, as well, and tiring. The hostel serves free pancakes every morning on styrofoam plates, each about four inches wide, piled on a plate. We met some Australians were have moved here for a year, and I wondered why someone would want to visit Canada like the way Canadians — “travellers” more specifically — visit exotic places like, for example, Australia.

The CBC museum was really cool, both levels of it, and in true Canadian form, there was a large TV set up in the Barbara Frum atrium with the Olympic hockey game on, and a crowd of people standing around it, staring, and clapping when someone made a good play. Only the CBC.

The rest of the day was spent walking around in the cold sunshine. At one point there was snow falling from the deep blue sky seemingly from nowhere. We couldn’t figure it out, though it didn’t last long. The Thai buffet was tasty but greasy. And China town was fun, with useless trinkets, neat chopsticks and plenty of things with incorrect translations, such as a greeting card that serves for the following occasions: Happy Birthday; Best Wishes; Thank You; I’m Thinking of You; and I’m Sorry. And then the card that simply said “Tinking of You.” Expect photos and scans later on.

I’ve lived on the East Coast, next to the Atlantic Ocean and all the splendours of salt-water life, for two years. And I had to come to Ontario to try oysters for the first time. They were delicious, and smothered in hot sauces and horseraddish, and the people there were cool. We said we were here from Nova Scotia, and someone down the bar, who desparately wanted to be heard after a hard day in corporate Toronto, interreupted with a “Me, too,” followed by, “Well, ancestorally,” which I think we can all agree, given the conversation, didn’t really count and wasn’t at all, no matter how much he wanted it to be, the same thing.

Then we realized how tiring it is being famous TV stars, walking around Toronto, loading up on heavy Thai food and taking in our surroundings, and got to bed at a reasoble, early hour.

Because we needed our rest for today, for Body Worlds, for Metric, for our second-to-last day here.

arrive. walking. shopping. eating. drinking. dirty bingo.

That was the first day, in six words, but some people like more than a half-dozen little words — though I suspect most people don’t event get through the title.

So we got in yesterday, arrived OK, and found the hostel. Canadiana Backpackers Inn, it’s called, and I brought a back pack, a big blue one I bought at MEC for my first year university, that in hindsight is far, far too big to justify for school or much else other than travelling, and I had this back pack so I think I fit in, though we have a private room, because while I’d want to fit in, I also like a little space.

And we arrived then walked outside, and it was cool but not too cold, sunny and not too windy — decidedly winter, but not unreasonably so. We walked up and down streets whose names we realize we should recognize. Queen. King. Yonge. We walked by stores they have everywhere and then more stores we’ve never heard of. We walked through towering skyscrapers, a concrete landscape that reminded me of Calgary, but the difference was we’d walk and walk and walk until our feet were tired and we’d still be surrounded in city. A vastness of metropolitan life.

And we had the best Chinese food I’ve eaten in months, thankfully unlike the fried, battered, largely sweet-and-sour selection that dominates in Halifax. We weren’t even in China Town yet, and it was so good.

The hostel is near a few pubs. There’s a Hooters, which we avoided. The Fox and Fiddle, which is like in a house in the way the Hop in Brew in Calgary is, though not quite as cozy but still nice. We sat at the bar and drank a few pints, chatted with the bartender and then asked the men down the bar what BARST was — a sales tax on liquor, since PST doesn’t apply.

There’s a place around the corner that boasts that it’s The Taste of Nova Scotia. Duke of Argyle, where they have boats on the walls, fake lobsters and the waitresses where kilts. Very authentic and somehow not even close to anything in Nova Scotia. But the bartender, Sonja, was nice in a way that people are in Nova Scotia, and she helped us and told us where to go, and she even gave us a shot — a buttery nipple? — to welcome us to the T-O.

Our last stop, which we read about in Dose — which we don’t have back home — was dirty bingo at a place called The Living Well on Yonge, but farther north than we’d previously been, where a crossdressing bingo caller gives away dirty prizes, and we won three times and were the envy of everyone there.

It was a good night, a great night, and the first of four until we head to London (Ontario — you need to specify, or people think you’re talking about England, which sounds more romantic, sure, but it’s a lie of omission).

Today it’s MuchMusic and the NFB and the CBC and whatever else we end up doing. And tonight, who knows. We’re on vacation.

And now we go west.

Tomorrow morning fly to Toronto, the populous black hole that of course doubles as the centre of the world, a target of scorn from anyone outside of Toronto, while also a unifying icon that can fuel alienation — from the East and West — and bring us all together. I’ve never been. I hear it’s nice.

Afternoon arrive, check into hostel. Breathe, taste the smog. Maybe eat something.

The week is wide open, with a list in our heads of things we’d like to do but few commitments. Which is nice. We’ll see Body Worlds, in its last week, and try to stomach the dead bodies which will play havoc, I’m sure, on my already depressing sense of my own mortality.

We’re also set to see MuchOnDemand, in the MuchMusic environment, which should be fun in an ironic way, and, especially, not in an ironic way. Watch the 5 p.m. ET broadcast on Tuesday and you might even see us on the television.

And then the CN Tower at some point, because we’re tourists, and then who knows. Shopping? Sightseeing? Food? Drinking? Toronto is our oyster.

And then to London, Ontario.

And then to Halifax, where I will stay for just more than 12 hours, before boarding, alone, another plane to Calgary. Home. And I hear it’s cold, so that will give us all something to talk about.