This morning I finished the largest piece of written work I have ever done. I may have once or twice written pieces of software of similar length, but this paper just kept growing. I’m not certain it’s my best piece of literary work, and I keep findingpoints where I forgot to edit, so there might be some more. Anyway, if you’re bored and feel like looking at my 24,000 word paper on the history of Jewish interpretation of Psalms 62:12, you’re welcome to. Printed it looks more like a book than an essay. I’ve decided I’ll start putting up some of my essays for university courses online in general. So feel free to check them out, even though, again, I don’t promise an exciting read.

So now I have a take-home exam to do, and a linguistics exam tomorrow… Then a whole pile of errands, and one evening I’ll suddenly find myself in an airport, leaving the city I’ve called home for eight months. Weird.

On Tuesday evening, I was expecting a phone-call from my family. My mum had called from Sydney on Saturday night to tell me that my 89-year-old grandfather (known to us all as Poppy) had been sent to hospital on Friday evening, with internal bleeding. The family said his condition wasn’t too good. So I spent the last two days of the holiday thinking and worrying on occasion.

So when the holiday ended on Tuesday night, I was possibly expecting bad news. There was a message on my phone that someone had left me voicemail around 5:30, but I was at a Mimouna and intended to enjoy myself, so I didn’t want to check it until I got home.

Then a short while later I received a call from the number of my brother, Simon. I snuck into a small room and answered the phone. Simon didn’t mention Poppy at first. Instead he told me he had asked his girlfriend to marry him.

This came as a bit of a shock. He had indicated that he thought she was something special. But I hadn’t even spoken to her, or met her… So it felt a little strange to be on this side of the world (as it did with mum’s call on Saturday).

Still, most of my trauma came because this wasn’t the news I was expecting. Poppy, it seems, was looking a little better than forecast, with the help of four doses of blood. Last I heard he is still in hospital and doing okay.

But a big mazal tov to Simon and Shimrit. I’m glad he has found his happiness. And I’m sure when I meet her in May, I’ll be thrilled to welcome her into the family.

PS: “snuck” isn’t in the spellchecker I use. Perhaps in the next edition?
PPS: I didn’t used to use a spellchecker. But this script was too attractive considering the number of errors I’ve made in previous blogs…

Suddenly in these last few days, University administration has decided the chapel in the McGill “Birks” Religious Studies building no longer exists. Signs that once indicated its presence are now gone. The room that the rest of the building is centred around no longer has any official purpose or title.

(It seems Hillel Montreal has also removed its Chapel sign. A plaque proudly reading “CHAPEL” remains lying around the room, presumably from before the recent renovations here. But its removal “chapel” was probably a rejection of terminology and not an issue of secularisation. The one currently labelling the room says “Beit Midrash” instead, which possibly implies being more Orthodox, but maybe less religious, changing focus from worship to text.)

Québec is not known for being the most tolerant place for outsiders. Its language laws have threatened the removal of historical signage, and cause it to have PFK stores while France does not dispute the name “KFC”. In our case it seems that secularism, or at least some form of xenophobia is intended to keep the Québécois with what is familiar to them.

And yet Montréal is still built around its famous cathedrals, and most of its street names that don’t begin with “Saint” begin “Sainte”. As my professor B. Barry Levy argues, if we want to make the city secular, we not only have to rename all the streets, but we have to stop celebrating Christmas and Easter as public holidays… He would rather putting the Christ back into Christmas and allowing religious expression in a more pluralist society. Despite being Dean of the aforementioned Religious Faculty, he only found out about the changes in signage after returning from two days off for Pesach, and considers it akin to Egyptian pharaohs each removing the names of their predecessors, as if they had never ruled.

Sydney had its share of the religious accommodation issue in 2003 when it was suggested that the pedestrian traffic lights be automatic (and not button-triggered) on Sabbaths, in certain areas with religious Jewish populations (Bondi Rd). Despite the fact that a lot of the world’s urban areas run on automatic pedestrian lights, for some reason a lot of the local community were offended by the thought of accommodating to the Orthodox Jewish community’s (albeit strange-seeming) needs for safety. Yes, it would cost some Council money, but they make up a significant portion of the municipal population, and it detracts for nobody as far as I can tell. It seems that last December the Council acceded to the requests (although using some motion sensors) but according to the over-100 comments on that article, it was met with largely ignorant and intolerant obstinacy—at least by online Telegraph readers. (“Once again it shows that ordinary people are left to the pandering of a minority group.” says Fred Lavender; “If certain people consider pushing a button to be work then they don’t belong in our society and I don’t see why we need to accede to these so called religious laws. It seems to be an all male agenda. Why am I not surprised.” remarks Colleen Appleton; Leigh Roberts: “What an absolute joke. Australia used to be a place where people wanted to fit in, now its just about complaining about anything and everything that dosen’t suit.” They go on and on and on.) Even if I might agree that there are better places to spend the money, our society spends similar money on erecting Christmas decorations, and certainly more on NYE fireworks.

The seventh definition of “of” given by Merriam-Webster is:

used as a function word to indicate something from which a person or thing is delivered eased of her pain or with respect to which someone or something is made destitute robbed of all their belongings“

This may help understand the outlook for “freedom of religion” in an increasingly secular world…

The splotch first appears alongside Dani

The Splotch (23 March – 5 April 2007) entered our world suddenly and mysteriously, on the way to Niagara Falls for a weekend run by Hasbara Fellowships, something I can only now identify with hindsight. In many ways, our lives were always deeply interconnected (when I set out on a journey, it would journey too; as I camped, it camped), and yet I only became aware of the Splotch’s existence in the early hours of the morning of the 25th, at the Hard Rock Cafe, Niagara.

George, Splotched

Splotch just hours before its end

It was there, always strong, courageous, defiant, in the top-right of each photo. It remained when I zoomed in, so it wasn’t on the screen. I borrowed a lens-cleaning cloth from George and gave the lens a wipe down. But the splotch remained stubborn.

The Splotch hides on a tree

It was not long after I first met the Splotch that I began to find myself in enmity towards it. I would angrily mouth off about it to friends. I had nearly stopped taking photos because it always got in the way.

Splotch and the sale of chametz

It found its way onto people or plants, books or scenery, a choir, even a sale of chametz contract. Sometimes darker, sometimes lighter, but constantly there.

Splotch and the Venice Rabbinic Bible

Because of it, I shuffled through my documents looking for a warranty and a receipt for my camera (warranty only in Australia; although I got tax back on the receipt when leaving Oz it was nowhere to be found). I considered finding a repair shop, but never got around to it.

Then this morning, when getting changed after a physio appointment (sore knee; long story), my camera fell out onto the tiled bathroom floor, spilling its battery out a few centimetres further away. This of course worried me a little. But I was not worried about the Splotch; I was worried about the camera. I picked it up, returned the battery, and switched it on. It was working just the same, but the Splotch was … still there. Only it had moved up.

Montreal scenery after the Splotch

This ignited in me a sudden murderous rage- I now knew how to rid myself of the Splotch, the bane of my photographic existence. I gave the camera a few whacks on the cushion of a chair. I checked. I looked again. I sighed a sigh of relief and laughed a laugh of victory.

The Splotch was gone. May it rest in peace.

PS (actually prescripts, being written before the post, but appended at the bottom):
1) Sorry for not writing in so long. Much has been going on. Too much, maybe.
2) Sorry for leaving such obvious chametz as the top post on my blog over pesach.
3) Chag sameach!
4) After some wonderful days of springy sunny weather complete with chirping, soaring birds and scurrying squirrels and budding trees, we’ve landed up with more snow. Heavy now for a day, in fact. The place is white again, and I have to take my scarf out. Weird.

This is not always an advantage. Such as today when I needed to go to the toilet but my reading material (which I leave beside it) had disappeared. I went to ask George about it, but he only knew of a comic book and a magazine that were there but he had moved. It seems the importants at Hillel had asked him to clean the area as we are having a few guests staying with us for the weekend.

Frustratingly, I still can’t find what I’d left there; which had stayed there without being disturbed for a couple of weeks. More annoyingly, it’s not something I can easily reproduce: It was a typewritten document of family history translated from a text written in German by a cousin Friederich Nothmann in the late 1930s. The family genealogist in Thornhill, Ontario, had offered to send copies to members of the family, and I received mine with $2.50 in stamps a few weeks ago. Thankfully, others have received copies in Australia, so I might be able to copy theirs when I get back.

In the meantime I’m upset about someone having decided what was mess in an apartment that wasn’t theirs. But maybe that’s what you get for having someone else clean it.

(It reminds me too of the time on Machon when the cleaners managed to send a friendly splash of bleach-based cleaner onto my t-shirt, leaving a permanent pink stain on it…)

And so, returning from a megillah reading at the Ghetto Shul (tacked on to the end of Shabbat), I arrived to a crowd of fancy-dressed people waiting for someone to read for them at Hillel. I realised that, having still not come up with a costume, I had to do something creative and quickly. So I took off my shirt and put it on back to front, and attached to it my polka-dotted blue bowtie (my always handy, most versatile fancy-dress outfit), put on my coat back-to-front, and tried walking around with my hood on… When I eventually saw how I looked, it was a pretty strange outfit, but some people appreciated it.

Within the Orthodox community there were two parties within 15 minutes walk of each other downtown: one run by the Ghetto Shul (the downtown student community), and the other by the Lighthouse/Tishters (the Montreal Cote-St-Luc student community); both promised a great time, live music and wacky costumes; the first cost $2, the other $10, so the choice was easy. And if I still felt like partying once the Ghetto Shul event had ended, I could always head to the other.

Before I got there, though, I realised that my costume would be vastly improved by having a face on the back of my head to go with the inverted shirt, but no glasses I had found would stay on. I did know, though, that there were some elastic-tied masks lying around at the Ghetto Shul, so I went there to find one, dropped in on Naomi at the library (preparing frantically for a chemistry midterm) before going up to Gerts, the on-campus bar. There, Maya took my $2 (with my back to her), and I took her photo, before going into the party.

Some of the costumes around me were neat, but little came close to Leibish and Dena’s. Both had thrown on a bit of a punk edge, Leibish covered in chains, Dena in big baggy pants. Her hair was long and streaked in copper; his was shaven to a bright blonde mohawk.

I only later got to check (by running my hand over it) that Leibish’s haircut was for real, as he was on stage with his sax when I got there. It was quite a sax-full evening: he, Jeff and Adam R each had theirs and they jammed along. At different times in the night we also had drum, bass-guitar, Blander on electric, Jordan on harmonica… And producing some great, fun music. For a short while Rabbi Eliyon Shemesh (a scarecrow for the night) visited with his guitar and a handful of Carlebach tunes.

The party was lots of fun, and there were enough people there and enough entertainment for me to not have to head for another, and so only spend $2 for entry and $3 on sharing a “pitcher” of beer. A little shmoozing, dancing, eating, drinking, photographing and the bar was ready to close up. Avraham made his way from Outremont in clown’s outfit and with unicycle under-foot soon before they did.

In the morning, there was yet another megillah reading called for 10:30 (read by Leibish) followed by brunch. In addition, I had been invited by Sigal a few weeks back to play Mordecai in a Purim spiel. She wrote a humorous script with a feminist approach that has been common recently: to make the despised queen Vashti the story’s hero, and Haman a womanising creep. And so, Vashti’s Revenge—featuring Allison as Vashti, Rebecca as Eshter, Adam as the king, Amanda as a concubine, Josh as Haman, Arié as the king’s officer—rehearsed a total of three times before showdown on Sunday. I added a couple of musical pieces to the beginning and end to put the play into the mood. (I also wanted Haman to sing Throw the Jews Down the Well but that was rejected.)

So, after everyone had grabbed their bagels, and fruit, and juice, and hamentaschen, we had everyone settle down in their megillah-listening seats, and took our positions backstage. Allison entered and introduced Megillat Vashti, before the whole cast came on to do the can-can while singing Liza Minelli’s Shushan, Shushan. My character was meant to be an absent-minded, hunch-backed, rabbinic-looking Jew who was always too busy having talmudic arguments with himself to notice anything much else around him, and whose arthritis wouldn’t permit him to bow down to Haman. Vashti spends most of the play pretending to be a man and secretly ruling the empire through Esther; Haman, the kingdom’s head sleaze, tries to come onto Esther when Achashverosh enters and spills the drinks on him. At the end, it is victory for Vashti and Esther, and so we end the play with a song. It even seems people in the audience could understand the words we were singing; this was evident from the reaction on Becca’s face when we sang the second line of the chorus (to Lifehouse’s Hanging by a Moment):

They tried to take all Persia from the crown
But now they’re strangled purple, green and brown.
They’re flailing here until we take them down,
They’re hanging by a rope here with you.

I had been afraid the play wasn’t going to turn out, but I think in the end we carried it off well, and gave the audience a great time. It was good fun to play in, too.

Even after everyone had had their fill, the leftovers were still numerous. I shlepped piles of bagels up to our kitchen, along with some bottles of juice. It seems I missed out on bringing up hamentaschen or cake, and there wouldn’t be enough people at home to get cut fruit. But there was plenty for the taking.

By the time I had gathered all that, and we had done mincha, it was almost time to do my only non-Purim thing for the day: New Earth Voices (a choir I’m in) was having an extraordinary rehearsal at 2pm. The Ghetto Shul’s Purim Extravaganza was announced for 3pm, with a megillah reading then, and I would only be stopping my singing at 4:30. Still, when I got there, the seudah (meal) hadn’t started, and people were waiting outside while the tables were being set up.

When I eventually made it inside, the whole room was decorated very colourfully and very sweetly. The tables (even the walls and ceilings) were covered with all kinds of sweet things: chocolate coins, jelly-beans, lollipops turned into crepe-paper flowers, candy-canes, shot glasses waiting for vodka… The colourful and sweet theme continued into the meal, where the corn salad was sickly sweet, and the humus had been dyed pink. I have to say I don’t find these colourings particularly appealing. I never got used to the green, yellow or purple tomato sauce I met in Israel. While others were purple and pink, my table’s bottle of water was coloured yellow and looked like oil, so most people instinctively kept away from it.

We heard a saxaphone duet—Leibish on alto and Adam R on soprano—and Leibish led an entertaining Purim quiz whose answerers were awarded shots of an expensive bottle of donated whisky. Two more prizes in large bags were available, and I answered the question just a moment after Rachel got in. But she didn’t want the prize, so she eventually managed to push it onto me and I walked away with a Smores kit.

By dessert, for whatever reason, most people had left. Dessert, though, didn’t really have a different sugar content to the rest of the meal, only in different forms: M&Ms, ice-cream and the like. A few of us left, now on a Purim/sugar high, realised we still needed to bentch (say grace after the meal), and so searched for a fun tune to shir hamaalot. We sang it to Yellow Submarine, and then had a very long and elaborate and hugely enjoyable rendition of the prayer.

Once again, I was one of the last left around, and so had pillaging rights, and liberated a bag of M&Ms, as well as all the things I had been given as mishloach manot, the Smores kit, and a few things off the tables and walls. I felt it ironic that the Megillah feels the need to specify that although the king granted the Jews to take the spoils of their attack (8:11), it also insists that when the event came, they did not (9:10, 16). Well, I did. Yum.

They are finally predicting highs of 9 degrees by the end of the week…

Update: they bureau changed its mind: the best we’ve got now till Sunday is 1 degree.

This was redeemed only a little by McGill’s library going back to their Wednesday night practice of leaving recycling bins full of books outside in the cool air, waiting for people to come and rifle through them for anything of use.

Little pamphlets only eighty pages long, paperbacks, hardcovers thin and thick. Most are in English; some in French; others on occasion in assorted languages, such as Hebrew: This evening, David Zvi came and offered me a book of Genesis in Hebrew with some commentaries. He told me the bins have been back out there for two weeks.

So I went down on my way from the library and took my turn at them. Five large bins of books. Many are cheap novels; some are classics that everyone already has; others are large textbooks and pamphlets on various topics; household encyclopedias; childrens’ colouring books and stories; a lot of books on economics (and how to succeed) from various ages; psychology is always popular, maybe because anything ten years old is outdated; others on sex and anything taboo.

And occasionally there’s something worth taking, or just amusing.

The other guy searching with me at first (before others joined) managed to find a free Agatha Christie novel, and soon a great Christmas/birthday present: “How to manage a urinary tract infection.”

I’m not sure how useful my takings are, but there’s no harm in having them, and no guilt in later throwing them away. My first find (and a good one) was a Pocket Books French/English dictionary, which may come in handy alongside the French text book I picked up from a second-hand shop in Boston, in these last few weeks of chance to learn the language. My second was a small pamphlet on “The Christian Mysteries: Prayer and Sacrement,” which might come in handy when I finish using my family’s history as toilet reading material. Then there was “How to Satisfy a Man Every Time and have him beg for more!” which falls under the same category as managing urinary tract infections (good for giving). As I was leaving, a fellow digger called out for anyone interested in learning Ancient Greek and so I picked up an introductory text. And when I came back later, I acquired Strunk and White’s style guide to American English (3rd ed., 1979).

All this begs to ask where all these hundreds upon hundreds of books come from. Well, they appear weekly outside the main library, which suggests that they were once inside. But they bear no mark of cataloguing. So the library was given them but didn’t want them in their collection. Which is fair enough: few of the books would fit well in a research library; those that do might be obsolete, others already in the collection. Most of the books seem to have come from household libraries, but wouldn’t most households try profiting by selling to a second-hand bookshop? Maybe these are even the books the bookshops rejected! But most people don’t ask. Gleefully, they just reach in and take.

And so it is on Wednesday nights that those who know, or those who are curious enough to approach, take no caution in throwing their arms into big blue bins, upturning the piles of books and scrap paper and magazines. Pulling them out, checking their spines, throwing them back. Believing that somewhere in there will be a shining gem. No one asks with any care where they came from, or who is throwing all these out, they just come with the faith that maybe this week, just maybe, the bins will contain the book for them.

These might not amount to Simon’s finds from the Fisher Undergratuate Library. But at least, when it’s warm enough, they’re back every week!

Naomi and I had planned for a while to make it there for their Carnaval de Québec, taking place from the 26th of January through to 11 February. (Over this same period, Montreal too had a Fête des Neiges (snow festival), although only on the weekends and not as big a deal as the Quebec event, and although I attempted to make it there it never quite happened.) The first couple of weekends were eliminated, so we planned to find a way up for the weekend of the 11th. We would find a hostel and stay for the weekend.

But when we attempted to find a hostel room a couple of weeks before departure, all were booked up. We were left with a few options: call Chabad and see what they could organise, go up during the week, or just take the trip on Sunday. (No, sleeping outside wasn’t an option.)

As the idea developed, a daytrip in a rented car became appealing, even exciting. We would get a minivan of friends together, and start early in the morning, return in the night (three hour voyages each way), maybe even giving people some time to study for exams. Once we had got 6 people confirmed, we looked more closely at the rental prices and discovered that it would be more expensive than planned, because on top of the $67 for the rental would be $27 for being under 25-years-old, as well as a tank of petrol. And no one under 21 was allowed to drive, which meant I was doing it, and that was a bit scary, having only driven twice on short trips on the right side of the road. Still, even then, divided by six the price easily beat the Orleans Express‘s offering of a two-way bus ride for $64 at student rates.

But the costs came out even lower in the end: we found a seventh person (who also happened to be over 25 and like driving), and had a cancellation from two, leaving us (after a small balagan of actually trying to get the car first on Saturday night and then on Sunday morning) with only a carload of 5, with rental at $34 for the day (plus gas).

So around 8:30 on Sunday morning, piles of food (some taken from an enormous Ghetto Shul surplus on Saturday), Naomi, her friends Chloe and Andy, me in the passenger seat and Avraham at the wheel, all climbed into our rented Ford Taurus, fussed about what music might play on the way, and set off north-east to the capital. Along the way we got to know each other a little better, eating carrots and grapes (well, those of us that touch fruit/vegetables at least); most of us got some sleep- thankfully not the driver; and despite the number of books and maps and printouts on board, failed to actually plan what we would do once we got there.

After spending some time deciding where to park, we eventually found somewhere that would cost $7 for the day, took our lunch and walked up into the centre of the Old City in search of a carnival (to aid us, Naomi had visited for last year’s carnival and could find her way around a little). Before long, and after Chloe finding something for lunch, we stopped opposite the Quebec Parliament Building for a lunch. Naomi and I had packed smoked salmon bagels and a large Chinese cabbage salad which we shared with the others, although only Andy took. We ate while our bodies began to freeze, and a woman took photos of us (which don’t seem to have appeared in the carnival’s photo gallery).

Behind us, as we ate, was a collection of snow sculptures (student-made as we soon found out), and to our left a castle of ice which seemed to be making a lot of noise, particularly from the mouth of a woman speaking excited French in a very Quebecois accent. Having the motivation of isolation from the motherland and the need to create an identity in a world dominated by English, Quebecois French probably maintains many more old features than are currently popular in France. Nonetheless, having trained myself to French French speakers, it sounds very yokel, very country; it is a slow, melodic French. And it is somewhat more distinct outside of metropolitan Montreal, which was the novelty of hearing the accent in Québec City.

So we walked around looking at the snow sculptures, but Naomi promised that there would be more and better, so we didn’t need to take our time so much on those (and she was right). We took a walk through the ice palace where children were being entertained by silly performers on an ice stage, and I discovered that you can take neat photos of people’s faces distorted through bricks of ice. I suggested we take a group photo through the ice, but the idea didn’t take, which is a pity because we didn’t end up with a single photo of all five of us.

Some of the events were “free” with a $10 “effigy” that would last you the whole carnival. But it was the last day and we were only there for a few hours, so it wasn’t worth getting one. I was a little confused by the name “effigy” too, which to me usually represents something people set alight in the likeness of a detested fellow human being. In this case it must have just meant mascot, as people had these little cutely-smiling plastic snowmen hanging from the zippers of their jackets. One man I saw had a collection of Carnaval de Québec mascots—in the form of badges, sew-on patches, hanging effigies—dating back over 50 years, all attached to the breasts his jacket, as if from an extraordinary and overly perilous military service.

Relatively the day we had chosen was not so cold, and was nice and sunny. Nonetheless there were regularly complains of how cold it was (of us, only Avraham is a Canadian) and we had to make stops inside. To this end, we found ourselves inside a souveneir shop (where Avraham bought a plastic horn for Purim), inside the Kraft/M.Christie tent (where we played a game of “which heater gives off the most heat?”, and wondering how to turn upside-down to warm our toes on the hanging radiators), and eventually for an extended break at the Metro tent.

Yes, nearly everything there had a big corporate sponsor’s name plastered all over it. In particular, the Kraft tent—apart from being warm—was essentially a place with large games for children, and snacks for both them and adults, that would indoctrinate towards eating Kraft products. It, for instance, involved children putting together giant plastic sandwiches containing giant plastic Kraft Singles (they seemed plastic anyway) into a less-giant but still plastic oven, or making a giant plastic Oreo (owned by Kraft in Canada), before being given rewards by young staff in bright uniforms.

Many of the events of the carnival were kids-focussed. They involved stages where clowns or dancers would perform bright happy tunes in big, puffy, warm suits. A few of the others were a little more adult, such as the outdoor bar run by SAQ (the only business that sells bottled liquour in Quebec), and the in-betweens like some of the rides, like a zip-wire / flying-fox from one hill to another, or rubber rafts down bumpy inclines, or a little bit of downhill skiing. There were also things like the human foosball (table soccer) game, or horse-drawn sleigh rides. The smaller kids had a ride the whole time, as their parents pulled them along on sleds! We went for the raft, despite Naomi complaining that it wasn’t her sort of thing and she felt sick. After the awesome rush of tubing a few of weeks before, the 15 second ride in a slow, 12-person raft over a few bumps was not really that much of a thrill. And then there are those times when adults to kids’ stuff too, like with big fluffy bears.

Chloe (having on principle refused any fruit and vegetables in the car and at lunch) had been holding out for some sweet fried dough, which she shared with Andy, and later some icy maple syrup from the sugar shack. By the time she had this in her hands (and dragging from her lips) we decided we’d had enough Carnaval and wanted so see the Québec part of it. So we headed back to the city, surrounded by the music of a procession that began the carnival’s closing ceremony.

As well as just wandering the streets of the quaint-by-fame Old City (vieux-Québec), among the places we had to visit—mostly for Chloe again—was a chocolate shop/museum. And once we were in there, it took quite some time to get out. Although the patches of information on chocolate history were in French and so inaccssible to most of us, it was still interesting to see their collection of chocolate artworks, materials used in chocolate production, and so on. They also brought us samples every now and then, but most fun was just to stand and stare as new batches chocolate were created before our eyes: fill, scrape, cool, fill, scrape, cool. Scraps and blocks of chocolate were all thrown into a big sink full of remelting chocolate. The woman doing the work soon got a little self-conscious about the peanut gallery, but with a few laughs kept going. Eventually we succeeded in pulling Chloe away, and returned to the street.

We walked further up, and found ourselves in another store, selling ceramics, candles, and other household things with a good discount. Naomi acquired a few candles to replace hers which are on their way out. We continued up a hill to find a more trendy scene with plenty of outdoor ice pubs, but people were anxious to get back so we didn’t stop in them. And although Avraham had been hoping to do so all day, we weren’t quite sure whether we had found the route along the city walls we had hoped to walk, and it was getting a bit too dark to safely walk it. So instead we found our way back to the Town Hall parking lot, took turns in the bathroom, warmed up the car and headed out of the city.

Naomi drove most of the way this time (just don’t tell the rental place), while the rest of us slept for patches of the three-hour ride. Otherwise, there was some good snacking and some good conversation before we finally got back to Montreal, dropped home Andy and Chloe, then Naomi, then back to Hillel after filling the petrol tank, from which Avrumi would drive the car back to National down the road before finding his own way back home.

All in all, it was a nice day. If nothing else, having a road trip was fun, and at $18 a head + food it was the cheapest travel I can count in my time in North America. Québec was maybe not as quaint as advertised, but we chose to go in busy season; and on that matter, the Carnaval was a whole lot more commercial than I might have hoped. Still, I had a fun time, saw some fun things, and met some fun people. And that, so they say, is what counts.

So while I had nearly forgotten to pack my passport, what I had really forgotten was that I didn’t have it at all: I had sent it to the Canadian Embassy in NYC a couple of weeks ago with my Study Permit application (I didn’t need one for a single semester here, but I did for two).

As a result, I proceeded to spend a while stressing, talking to Naomi who looked for embassy and border phone numbers, but because I was only packing at the last minute as I tend to do, most hotlines weren’t open late enough. I called one that was, for Canadian citizens in emergencies abroad, and thankfully they didn’t throw me off the line for (1) not being Canadian (2) not being abroad (3) having a loose definition of emergency. But most of what they told me involved recommending against trying to cross the border without my passport/visa… I had thought it might be more stressful than worthwhile anyway.

It’s not quite in my mentality yet that I need a passport to get to somewhere that I can reach by a 6 hour bus ride. You simply can’t do that in Australia. Anywhere in Australia. So it completely slipped my mind.

Well Boston’s off the books then. It had sounded like a nice trip (and great value: CA$100 with travel and entertainment included), with a great bunch of people.

So while I considered paying my $100 elsewhere for a ride to Toronto and back (it’s our mid-semester break), a main motivation of going that way would be to see Niagara, in which case I might want to plan ahead to make sure I have a friend to come with me.

So I guess it’s another shabbat in Montreal. I don’t think it’ll be so bad. =) I think I’ve found somewhere interesting for dinner…