Making our way East...ish

It's been a few days since I've written anything because the last few days have been spent either in transit or working/meditating with a little bit of sightseeing mixed in. Any downtime was spent eating and sleeping. Usually one before the other.

Toronto/Mississauga

Here are some pictures I wanted to show you from our day trip to Mississauga on our last day in Toronto. We tried to go to Niagara falls, but because it was the long weekend, the traffic was CRAZY. We saw some more tall buildings, since we only a few in Winnipeg, these always amaze me.

While we were there we spent most of the time checking out the mall. Sean needed to satiate his need for shopping for really expensive well fitted clothing to see what he was missing living in Winnipeg. Big cities and name brands tend to go hand in hand. Like this, look at the Power Rangers gear you can buy in Mississauga, there`s nothing of the sort in Winnipeg!

On the Road again!

In this post you'll find less pictures. Being in tourist mode all the time is tiring and it also helps to convince the Quebecois people that you can speak French if you try and look like you belong there. But fear not! I took some pictures for you visual pleasure.

Story first:
After Toronto, Sean and I made our way to Montreal. Thanks to Alex we didn't have to wake up too early, because he generously gave us a ride to the bus station. We set the alarm for 7:20am(Keep in mind 6:20am Winnipeg time), slept another 20 minutes, then rushed to get out of the apartment to catch our bus at 9am. After a gruelling 6 hour bus ride with one stop in Kingston, ON, we made it to Montreal. While passing our time on the bus, Sean, as always, did some stretching. And I found a cool feature on my camera to make slow motion videos. We spent some time making faces at the camera in super slow motion!

Montreal

Thanks to Kirsten's friend Kylie, we had a place to stay for one night in Montreal before I headed off to the Vipassana meditation retreat and Sean went to Stephane's, another couch surfer that we met through Alex. Kylie's place is a quaint little one bedroom apartment in an old building that's in a quiet area, but right near the heart of downtown. It's only a 20 minute walk to Mcgill University. The night we stayed there we went to check out the town and we got to see the World Film Festival in progress. The streets were closed off for a everyone to watch a different award winning film every night of the week. By the festival there was a girl playing with the water in a street level fountain. There were so many kids playing. It looked awesome with all the lights on the water. They kept changing from white to red/ on and off making it look like a dance.

It seems like hauling around our lugage is getting easier and easier, but, I think we're just getting lucky! In Toronto, we had to haul all our stuff a few kilometers, this time in Montreal, Kylie's house happened to be a ten minute walk from the bus station. That's nothing! It's been worse for Sean because he has with him a 50lb suite case with squeaky wheels that has a non extending handle and is very top heavy. Along with this goes his 2 black grocery bags and a large backpack with an extra attached bag that swings around every which way. I walk around with my small suite case, a backpack and my pillow in hand. 

Montreal to Montebello

So, I thought 7:20 in Toronto was early... I had to wake up at 5:45am in Montreal to take the metro to the bus station. I took a bus to Montebello(which happens to be 150km back towards Toronto) that morning to volunteer at the meditation retreat. I got on a very empty bus. It was me, one girl sleeping WAY at the back and a very engaging and excited bus driver. 

Just before the bus left, an older gentleman got on. He was headed to le Château Montebello where many politians were gathering that week. He happened to be a local writer for the Montebello paper who currently lives in Montreal. He takes the bus up there once a month to do interviews for whatever article he is writing. At first the bus seemed very quiete, but it turned out to be quite entertaining. This gentleman told so many stories in his radio host style voice, that I didn't get a chance to sleep. He talked about everything! The bus driver never had a chance to get one word in. He talked about travel, his life and the history of Quebec. I even found out a little more about the meditation centre. 

He said that the meditation centre once was a very expensive private boarding school and that it was loosing students in it's last few years. As a last minute effort to get better attendance, they built a brand new gymnasium which is now the meditation hall.

One of the stories that I liked most even had a show and tell portion! He started telling a story about taking a train from Winnipeg up to Churchill about two weeks ago. He said that the train stopped at one point beside a tee-pee, then a native man got on the train. The gentleman immediately went to talk to the native man and found out that he lived off of the landing hunting and gathering. To pass his time, he made hand drums with traditional techniques passed to him by his father. He had a hand drum with him on the bus and the gentleman thought it was very unique and had to buy it! He then offered the native man $80 for the drum and another $20 for the drumstick. He thought that he was giving the native main a good deal, but, he soon found out that this man is one of the best drum makers in North America. He was fairly well off for living off of the land from a tee-pee and had his own blackberry and laptop.

For those of you that thought I was sleeping in a cave with absolutely no "creature comforts", I managed to take one picture at the retreat. Here is my humble abode.

Being at the retreat was very difficult. It's hard to meditate in the midst of working hard in the kitchen preparing food for 150 people. It was very good experience to help one incorporate the practice of meditation into any type hectic lifestyle. Needless to say, I learned a lot in my short stay there and can't wait to go back when time permits.

Right now I'm in Montréal with Sean. We are staying with Stephane. We met him through Alex, our host in Toronto. Québec is an awesome place to practice my French before we head to France. At the meditation retreat all the other volunteers found out that I am learning French and going to France soon. After that they made an effort to speak only French to me. I learned so much in the 3 days I was there. This will continue through our trip in the rest of Québec. For example in Montréal Sean and I spent the whole day speaking only French to each other. It's good because we're both around the same level. Our host, Stephane is from France which also allows us to practice even more! I'll be fluent en français avant je fini cette phrase.

I must take rest, it's been a tiring week. I miss everyone, but to be fair, I miss Kirsten the most. Can't wait to see you when you visit me in France. I know you're counting the days too :)  I'll make sure to take more pictures for next time. I will be seeing more of Montréal in the next couple of days then we're off to Quebec city later in the week.

À bientôt,

See you soon,

Stephen