Canuckistani in Canuckistani Land Part One - Toronto
2007-07-15

Going back to your home country as a visitor is a bizarre experience. We stopped in Toronto where we stayed with my homo friend Moser in Toronto’s gaybourhood. Being a tourist in Toronto is not a weird thing for me because it was only the second time I had ever been there (Calgary was a whole different ballgame, I’ll get to that in the next entry). We did the typical Toronto touristy stuff like Yorkville, Chinatown and Kensington Market (where Tim Roth sat down at the next table – check out sneaky vid below). Last time I was in Toronto, it was too cloudy to do the CN Tower, so we did it this time where I got my first “Have a nice day” in two years. Then I got my second, third, fourth and fifth in quick succession. Christ, have we always been that sad?

If you’ve never been up the CN Tower, it is quite an ordeal let me tell you. First you wait in line to pay for tickets, then you wait in line a second time to get your picture taken.

We watch as one-by-one people are forced to have their picture taken. "Oh, it must be a security thing", I say to Kate; Fair enough, I suppose you can't be too careful these days. As we inch closer to the camera guy, we realise it isn't a security thing at all, but a scheme to get more money out of you. Queues piss me off, Unnecessary queues make me fucking crazy.

We get to the front of the line where the cheesy cunts have the nerve to tell the family in front of us to SMILE. Yeah, they might be smiling a lot more if they weren't waiting in another line, jackass. Kate and I tell the guy we’re not interested in the photo. “But you don’t necessarily have to buy it” the kid tells us. Damn right I’m not buying it, I just paid 50 bucks to go up the bloody thing, I’m not giving them one red cent more. We walk straight around past the camera where another pimple-faced prick in a clip-on tie fucking TUTS us for not getting our picture taken. Fuck. Right. Off.

We then wait in line again to walk through the metal detector and again for the elevator. Tuts and queues, jesus am I still in England?! We finally get to the top and take a few shots (see below) and are ready to go back down when we are faced with (you guessed it) another massive queue. Not interested, so we look around for another way down and surprise surprise, we found one.
TIP: If you don’t want to wait in the massive line to go back down, there is another elevator in the restaurant entrance that is always empty. You’ll have to face another “Have a nice day” from the restaurant hostess, but it’s worth it – there’s even a bowl of free candy right at the elevator. Bonus.

Had drinks with my buddy Sush after that. He's an english dude I used to work with a the uni who does a better Canadian accent than I do. He had his own Canadian observations to share, like how easily we toss around the word "retarded". I learned the hard way how bad that word was when responding to a request from a prof, I said to my old boss at the uni, "She wants me to do what?! That's retarded. Oh well, I don't want her to spaz on me so I guess I'll do it." The looks of sheer terror/disgust from my english coworkers told me that maybe I should holster that phrase from now on.

The last day there, we went to the local pub with Moser. Drinking with the gays is always funny because you get into crazy conversations like which way is the proper way to wipe your ass (hole to balls or balls to hole). I’m not going to tell you which way I do it, but suffice it to say I was surprised to hear I am in the minority on that one.

Other than the tower, T.O. was great and oh my god was I glad we stopped there because it was really the only time we got to relax on the whole holiday. Calgary was manic. I’ll write about that more tomorrow night when I’m not so jetlagged. For those of you who are waiting for the Poland part two entry, I will get to it eventually... I PROMISE.

Video: Chillin' in Kensington Market
In the video link above, Tim Roth is the dude in the sunglasses in the back corner that goes zooming by. I was trying to make it look like I was just taking a photo of Kate and swung the camera around... it wasn't obvious at all *eyes roll back into head*. I was going to make this a sweet flash movie where it paused right on Tim Roth, but it didn't work... you're gonna just have to hit pause yourself. Found out later that Tim Roth is there filming The Incredible Hulk with Edward Norton.

The photos above were taken from the CN Tower. The smog was actually a lot worse than it looks in these photos, Photoshop levels took most of it out -- I love Photoshop. The bottom one is of that weird extension on the Ontario College of Art and Design. And yes, my camera does indeed rock, thank you for asking.

For comparison, here is the college unzoomed: