CATCHING UP: OTTAWA

It's been a week, so I thought I may as well catch up on this eventful week, all on separate blogs. So here we go...

FRIDAY NOVEMBER 28: Wake up at 5am to be ready to leave the house by 6am. I was told it would be an 8 hour drive to get to Ottawa, so I was well prepared with my sudoku book, recipe book (for more ideas on home made meals - more ranting on that to come!) and my goose down doona jacket to keep me warm, so I was ready for the long haul. I had fallen asleep and was surprised to be woken up 4 hours later - after 3 pitt stops - with a “We’re here” greeting. It turns out that it takes just over 4 hours, but the last time they drove to Ottawa it took 8 hours because of extensive road works. I was pissy! Lots of little miscommunications like this have been pissing me off as of late. Part of it is that miscommunication, the other part is my monthly intolerance of bullshit. So all up it was 4 hours and 15 minutes and I slept 3 hours and 45 minutes. Very surprised considering the lack of space to sleep in the car.

We got 2 rooms - 1 for Dawn and I and the other for her folks. Our room was ready first, so we proceeded to dump all of our cargo in my room. Dawn was sick with a bad cold, but being the trooper that she is, she still came to Ottawa with us and considering this fact, we let her sleep in the hotel room for most of the day for her to recover. Her folks and I went out exploring Ottawa. Being the capital of Canada, it’s a very parliamentary city and as such all of the buildings have some sort of political significance. I mainly came to Ottawa to see the changing of the guard (I thought you could see it in Toronto, but apparently it’s better in the nation’s capital). After getting there and asking at the hotel, we discovered they only do those in the Summer time - mainly so the guards don’t freeze their butts off. But they are Canadian - you’d think they would be used to this by now! It gets cold, but the show must go on for those nutty tourists who visit in a cold snowy Winter time!

I went exploring on my own and was very impressed with the old-style architecture of all the building of Parliament. There’s even a building next door that looks like you’re in that cathedral in Russia (St Peter’s? My mind has drawn a blank for the moment. I’ve seen this cathedral dozens of times, particularly here in Canada on the Food Network, where chefs design cakes based on famous global monuments and one of those was this place in Russia, but I cannot remember the name. And now I am rambling…although those of you who know me may not be surprised by that!) Anyway, Ottawa had a touch of Europe that I was not expecting. I’d say part of that was because of its proximity to the neighbouring French quarters - Quebec (or Gatineau, to be more accurate). More on that later. When I was exploring the parliamentary buildings I was very impressed by them all. The main block has 3 buildings. The one in the middle with the main clock tower overlooking the city is meant to represent a balance in the equal representation for all Canadians - because on either side of this tower you have 2 buildings: one that is the ruling party’s headquarters and directly in front of that is the HQ of the opposition. Do you want to take a guess at who has the better digs?? I will put photos up and organise them all properly once I’ve finished updating these blogs.

Amongst the exploring I found the bridge to get across to Quebec. I went there and there is nothing of interest, except for all of the street signs in French. In Ottawa the signs are bi-lingual and prepares you - or at least makes an attempt to prepare you - for the monolingual atomosphere that is Quebec. I had a fine time there - there is an expectation in Quebec that if you are Canadian, you must be able to speak French and they will only speak to you in French. However, if you are not Canadian, they will help you out in English. When I was at the information desk and made an attempt to speak French in my off Aussie accent, they knew I wasn’t a Cannuck and proceeded to help me in English, which was nice. But Ontarians don’t like going to Quebec unless they have to (now bare in mind, this is just a generalisation!)
I made my way back to the block of Parliament and went on a free tour of Parliament House from the inside. Security is as tight as the airport - I had to strip off my belt, shoes and multi layers of jackets just to take the tour. But it was well worth it. I thought I’d be bored, as me and politics don’t really mix well. The inside of Parliament is just as impressive as it is on the outside - crystal chandeliers, a stain glassed roof, beautifully detailed sculptures and portraits. You would think the portraits are of important political figures in Canada’s history, but in fact they are self portraits of the artists and sculptors themselves. How vain! I still liked them!
After the tour it was getting a bit chilly and I had been out for a few hours, so I went back to the hotel room to hang with Dawn and see how she was. The weather was entirely appropriate for bumming - and that’s just what we did. So this was the weather: it was wet, but it really wasn’t raining - just wet from the melted snow. It was cold enough for snow, but it really wasn’t snowing. There were flakes of snow falling, but they were the melting kind, so you really cannot classify them as snow (See Chris’ blog for any clarification on what is and what isn’t snow, because his analysis was spot on! And seeing as I cannot comment on MySpace anymore, I may as well do that here!) In any point, I did like this weather. Canadians don’t - for some reason!
After a while we went out for the Moonlight Madness Sale at Zellers - the post Thanksgiving sale. It’s not as mad here as it is in the States, but it was nice to get sales on. I bought myself some gym pants because I wanted to use the hotel’s gym, but I forgot to bring all of my gear. It just didn’t occur to me until it was too late.

WARNING: RANT COMING UP…..


After the sale we had dinner at Subway. Never again! Since being here nearly a month, I’ve had to have a lot of processed shit and it’s starting to get to me in a bad way. People here say they cook at home and eat healthily, but cracking open a pack of potato bake in a box and using processed potatoes instead of the real thing - which is fresher and readily available - and using salt and butter heavy seasoning on the fake potatoes…I’m sorry, that’s not home made cooking, that’s just fucked. The only way I am going to eat healthily is to make my own meals. I discovered the other reason why there is such a huge obesity problem here: people are DELUDED into thinking they are having healthy meals just because they are making them at home, but they are using packaged meals which often contain more sodium and more artificial flavourings to make sure the food is preserved for a longer period of time. Those preservatives and flavourings do not help in making the processed food any healthier just because you are making them at home. The other night I had Sloppy Joes - something I never had before as a meal. It’s basically a lasagne/Bolognese sauce. I asked “What else comes with it - how do you eat it?”, to which they replied “It’s a main meal. You put it on bread”. I cannot comprehend this. And the worst part: IT CAME FROM A CAN! If my relatives in Argentina go to the USA or North America, I think they would cry. Weeks ago people were surprised at how my macaroni and cheese bake tasted better than the processed shit they are used to having. Apologies for this rant, but I haven’t had one of my beautiful decent salads in a long time, as I have been told that I don’t need them because there will be vegies on the table. But seriously, there is only so much frozen vegetables that my body can take. Well, NO MORE!


RANT OVER….FOR NOW!


Thanks all! Back to the blog: At the hotel, I waited 2 hours after eating that crappy sub before working out at 8:30. I was going to go for a swim in the hotel’s pool, but it looked a bit rank - and so did the gym equipment (Bloody Fernwood spoilt me with clean equipment!), but I did intervals on the cross trainer for 30 minutes - at the most intensive level I’ve ever done! I was getting a headache - possible after affect of the sub and also because Dawn was sick. I didn’t want to risk getting ill, knowing I had to fly in 3 day’s time. Earlier in the day I saw a 24 hour McDonalds outlet (BTW: I am aware that I’ve spent a chunk of time bitching about fast food, but after having a crappy dinner - and after months of not having McDonalds, I caved. Dawn and I wanted to go at 3am for the novelty factor. But we were getting sleepy, so we went at midnight instead. We followed it up by going to the 24 hour Tim Hortons outlet - they make awesome hot chocolates and bagels…..mmmmmm………something! We ate like pigs, jumped on the beds, raged, watched TV and fell asleep at 3am. Just like old times!

So all of this happened on one day. I’ll separate the blogs, just coz lots of things were packed in. Look out for the next one!