After packing our things very slowly over the last day (Saturday) we have left for the airport FMO very early this morning. My back was still killing me - it had started hurting for 3 days in a way that all of my upper back muscles were so tight that even slicking hard food was painful on every bite. I have no idea what this was or where it came from but in no way did I want to let it get in the way of our Canada trip. If you hurt then consequently you need to yoga more and that's what I am doing. So far we had an agreeable flight in a small Lufthansa machine to Frankfurt. My God, how long it has been since my last Lufthansa flight. The flight attendant was twittering away into her microphone, I was wondering if in an emergency she would twitter as happily: Ladies and gentleman, unfortunately we will be crashing shortly. Thanks for flying Lufthansa today. I wish you all a veeery happy day!
Still I liked to be back. And somehow my trust into the Lufthansa captain was a lot bigger that on any Ryanair flight. Interesting...
After landing in Frankfurt a tank vehicle approached our plane and a cool guy with a rubber duck (dressed as a pilot) on his cap emerged from the car and starting to install the kerosine hose.
Then we taxied over the entire airport which made it possible to get a good look at all these large aircrafts everywhere around.
4 hours later we started our flight towards Toronto.
The flight went by without any incidences, but we needed to wait one hour before taking off which made it a total of 9 hours in our cramped seats in economy class.
When we arrived it was already around 11 pm at home while in Toronto the sun was shining (it was 6 hours earlier).
At the baggage claim we ran into a German professor on behalf of whom Rene would participate at his conference at Toronto in the first place.
So we headed towards the city train together.
After about half an hour traveling by train and a good old fashioned street car, we finally arrived at our motel studios in the vicinity of Chinatown. The neighborhood looked a little rundown. The shops on Dundas West where the street car had been taking us all along were all quite small and dingy but I liked them a lot. No shiny fronts, no expensive stuff, just regular colourful neighborhood shops. Cool.
As it was now way after midnight at home, Rene was feeling very tired. Mysteriously I was not. We went out for shopping (nothing there) and then went to a Vietnamese joint to have traditional pho soup and my beloved ca phe sua da (coffee). Delicious!
The next morning I was awake veeeery early, at 4 am Toronto time, and tried to sleep again. Not possible though. Rene slept through until I woke him up with a coffee. That was all we had and what the hotel provided. I had had time enough of course to go looking for supermarkets and breakfast joints nearby on google maps. I proposed a café on Queen Street West, the Early Bird. It is quite stylish and as we were soon to find out: the coffee and falafel/hummus sandwich were simply delicious!
I am actually sitting here now writing about our first day at Toronto.
The cafe was very silent though. Literally everyone was staring at his or her laptop and taking a sip of coffee every now and then.
Opposite the cafe was a post office where we bought stamps. I was handed a few stamps with an undefined animal on it that reminded me of an ugly goat. As I was recalling my trip to New Zealand and its sheep I asked the man behind the counter: Is that a goat or what is it? He answered that it must b a moose and suddenly I saw it. It was a female moose with a goatee. I laughed and said: Oh and I was wondering since when Canada is famous for its goats... A moose makes much more sense!
Just around the corner from where we just were was the famous graffiti alley (Rush Lane). It looked exactly like that kind of backstreet lane where you get yourself murdered at night in a movie but since there were a few tourists present I felt alright getting my camera out and exploring. There were a lot of word graffitis but a few cool images as well.
After coming out at the other end on Spadina Ave we asked somebody for a mall that should have been nearby. We were told that there was the Eaton Center Mall, just a fifteen minute walk away. A classical wrong, once again. I can't tell how many people I have met asking for directions who had no idea that the way they described as a short walk was actually quite a long distance. As was the case here.
We walked and walked and walked, it was hot, until we decided to take a street car...for just 2 more stops. The Eaton Center is gigantic and so we limited ourselves to getting Canadian SIM cards and taking a look at an HMV music/film store and 1 or 2 other shops.
When we tried to leave the Eaton Center we ended up in Saks Fifth Avenue. Th 2 malls were connected in the basement level. There was so much glitter, gold and Versace I felt totally misplaced and glad when we found the exit.
We took a street car back towards the direction of our hotel, found a super market and stopped at another cafe where I had a Cold Brewed coffee. That's the latest coffee trend in Northern America, which has already reached Europe this summer. I can recommend it with Tonic water.
After returning to the hotel and chilling for a bit we left again to get to Rene's conference meet and greet, where we enjoyed some light conversation with a colleague of him and some snacks before heading all over campus to take a bus towards the water front. We had a look at the water towards the islands where I am intending to go to one of these days at Toronto. Beautiful clouds passed by and we watched several ferry boats coming and going.
Keine Kommentare:
Kommentar veröffentlichen