Planes, Trains and Automobiles: The learning process

After a month in Montreal I still can't seem to remember when it is actually useful that the French word for stamp (in the postal sense) is not stampe with a long "a". Despite being so embarrassed when I made that mistake four weeks ago that I practiced the line "Je voudrais dix timbres, s'il vous plait," over and over as I waited to be served, what did I say instead? "Je voudrais dix staa...timbres, s'il vous plait."

The sound of my hand slapping my forehead was audible for miles. At least this time I realized it immediately. Last time I was out the door and half way down the street before I realized why the clerk gave me such a funny look.

One of the students in my class is a new teacher from Nova Scotia and a couple of her friends from University are visiting her on their way to teach English in Korea. I hung out with the three of them the last couple days. One of them is basically me but from Nova Scotia which is simultaneously weird and awesome.

I spent 24 hours in Quebec City Friday evening and Saturday morning/afternoon. The train ride was the best I've yet experienced- it left on time and arrived on time and moved at fairly rapid pace both there and back. Doesn't seem like much but in North America that is pretty much the most you can ever expect from a train. Quebec City was absolutely spectacular. It is astoundingly well preserved. Friday night I stayed at L'Auberge Internationale de Quebec, a member of Hosteling International. It was only $30 for a bunk in an 8 bed dorm right in the upper-town of Old Quebec inside the walls. It was a pretty nice place- clean, bright, recently renovated and spacious.

That night I went on a pub crawl with some other people at the hostel, though it was more like a pub stop, cause we only went to one pub, albeit a really good one with few tourists other than our group, live music and lots of local and regional beers to sample. I met a young Englishman on his way to Alberta to work in the oil sands, a young Irish lad who certainly lived up to his national drinking related stereotype, a manic couple from New Zealand, a Mexican engineering student with a passion for Canada, a German woman who had just driven from Vancouver to Quebec as part of a World tour, an unrelated German pothead in his early 20's, and a young French Swiss girl from Lausanne who had been studying English in BC but was now visiting the country. I talked Canadian and British politics with the gentleman on his way to Alberta, Quebec-Canada relations with the Mexican engineering student and the tribulations of studying a language with the Swiss girl as the German woman was swung around the dance floor by a Japanese man, the couple from New Zealand harassed the locals and the guys from Germany and Ireland drank themselves silly.

At about 3am I was feeling a little ill and decided to head to back. I had a nice chat in French about Montreal with the local girl who worked nights at the front desk before going upstairs to climb into my top bunk. Three hours later people started getting up and milling about in the room. After another three hours of mostly useless attempts at sleeping I got up and had a chat with the other two guys still in the room. They were both in their twenties. The really tall one was from Holland and the human sized one was German Swiss. Both were separately on their way to Montreal and then Toronto so they were naturally full of questions for me. After an hour or so of answering questions about the differences between Toronto and Montreal, Toronto cultural institutions and every detail I know about the Toronto Transit Corporation they were on their respective ways and I was on my own to discover the city.

I wandered most of the day, which was actually very pleasurable and then I found myself at the Citadel where I somehow managed to get myself on a French-language tour of the local residence of the Governor General of Canada. I understood most of it and was left with just enough time to catch the end of a street performer's routine in front of Chateau Frontenac and the subsequent horde of children that descended upon him with five-dollar bills in hand (that guy must have taken in $400-$500 in that one performance) buy some post cards and walk the long way round to the train station.

It was a great experience, I only wish that I had had more time and a good friend with me as a travel partner. The locals even turned out to be way more friendly than I had expected and actually more tolerant of my broken French than the people in Montreal. I hope to go back next summer.

Keep on Tranglin,
Anthony