world youth day

Went for a run yesterday afternoon, and discovered that my regular route was also the route for the World Youth to get out to Exhibition Place to attend the World Youth Day ceremonies.

Just before I took off on my run, I visited Metro Square, a small park I can see from my home office window. I was curious about the stage that had been set up, and caught the end of a dance performance by some Asian girls in costume. They posed for photos after:





I watched a bit of Inuit throat-singing before setting off on my run:





Part of my running route goes around the Skydome and past the CN tower. Here's a photo of part of the massive line-up for the CN tower yesterday afternoon:





I think I must have passed at least two dozen countries on my run, each carrying their country flag. I don't think I've ever heard so many different languages over such a short time. :-) Some flags I recognized, but I admit that I had to look up most of them online using Mooney's Flag Detective or Easy Flag Identifier. The group at the top of this page is from Mexico. A lot of the young people were wearing red backpacks that had a Canada logo on them.

Here's a small group from Slovenia:





The World Youths above were opting for streetcar, but most seemed to prefer walking. The Exhibition Place streetcars that passed us were packed full of young people; I felt sorry for anyone out for a casual ride. Though you'd have to have had your head buried in the sand not to have heard the warnings trumpeted on the local media these days, warning commuters to stay away from downtown Toronto unless you want to get caught in the World Youth Day traffic chaos.

I believe that the group below is from the Shetland Islands (UK):





Because the sidewalks were so packed with people, I tended to run along the road along the curb instead, at least until I got to the Martin Goodman Trail. One lane had been closed off all along Queen's Quay Road; I had wondered about the road closure warning earlier in the month, but now I understood why.

There were a ton of police around, patrolling the route, helping to direct traffic and pedestrians at every stoplight, just generally making their presence known:





I keep forgetting to mention in past Blatherings; the green and blue stripes on the path like the one above all indicate that it's part of the Martin Goodman Trail, which is my running route.

When I got to Coronation Park, I was surprised to discover that it had been turned into part of the Worth Youth Day event. A long line of Porta-Potties had been set up along the outside perimeter:





A large video screen was set up in the middle of the park, so that everyone could watch World Youth Day events and the Pope arrive:





But most bizarre, part of the park seemed to have been turned into a mass confessional area. Purple cubicles had been set up everywhere, each with a number, sign indicating the language of that particular confessional, and a priest waiting to hear your confession:





Groups of young people were wandering around buying food at a large refreshments tent, sitting in the shade under trees, talking. From time to time I'd hear one group call out to another who was passing by on the way to the Exhibition Stadium.

e.g.

"Hey, where are you from?"

"Quebec."

"Hey, what part of Quebec? We're from Montreal!"

I briefly followed one of the groups into Exhibition Stadium, where there were massive crowds:





Headed back home after that. Since I was running against the tide of World Youth now, I stuck to the road. From time to time, some would call out greetings. I stopped to help take a group picture once with one of their cameras. :-)

One of the groups I passed was from Brazil. The guy holding the flag smiled at me, so I called out "hi!" and took the photo below:





Immediately, his companions started laughing and teasing him, and as I started running again, they called out "hi! hi!" to me. I waved back, but kept running.

Definitely one of my more interesting runs. :-)

We're going to Niagara-on-the-Lake today to see Candide at Shawfest with Ginny, back tomorrow.

pre-conchord practice

Lots of World Youths wandering about the streets of Toronto these days. You can tell they are World Youth by their fresh and shiny faces and eagerness to start fixing things that have gone wrong in the world.

Pope John Paul II arrives at the Toronto airport tomorrow afternoon, but then is apparently whisked off to Lake Simcoe (which we passed on the way back from the cottage). Despite his absence from Toronto, the archbishop is still going to perform a welcoming mass. Maybe the Pope's going to watch the ceremony on his telly from the lake, who knows.

Allison and Jodi came downtown last night for a UT practice. The next time the three of us meet will be next Thursday, at the hotel in Van Nuys just before Conchord! Here's our tentative concert playlist, though it will probably be tweaked more before the actual performance (hey, or maybe even during the concert):

California Dreamin'
Twinkle In His Eye
Waiting For Frodo
May It Be
Another Story
Homecoming
If Everyone Ate Some Chocolate
(with participants from our songwriting workshop!)
It Said What?
Amanda
Star Sisters
Friendship Song
The Lady
Hockey Monkey Song

We ran through other stuff as well, including finetuning some aspects of "Library Boy", which has been fun to work on. I think that my main challenge during that song will be to focus on my guitar playing and NOT to watch what the others are doing on stage. Especially Jodi.
>:-)

After Allison & Jodi left, Jeff and I went out to a nearby coffeeshop with Parki. A wandering gang of World Youths passed the shop as we sipped our Fruizzis and coffee, looking intent and eager. They did not come in.





The Monkees might be resurrected as a tv series, according to this Reuters story. Scary.

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Today's Blatherpics:

	Sara and Kaarel at Kaarel's birthday party on Sunday.
	The birthday cupcakes made and decorated by Sara and Annie.

my neighbourhood

The Dandelion Report's Filk Journal directory has been updated. Also, don't forget to check out the Filk Community Message boards. Topics include: Guitar Xanadu (guitar/instrument-related discussion, moderated by Scott Snyder), Filk Forte (Allison Durno), Another Quarternote Heard From (Bill Sutton), The Supporting Note (Andrea Dale), Crafty Filkers (Lady Lavender), OVFF message board (OVFF concom). And feel free to post news about upcoming gigs, projects, housefilks, etc. in the filk community news message boards. All links from the main Dandelion Report page.

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Today's Blathering is part of a WordGoddess collaboration project. The assignment: to post photos from around our neighbourhoods. As those of you who regularly read my journal know, I've already posted a lot of pictures of my neighbourhood in past entries. Here are some more, all taken of locations within walking or running distance of our apartment. I took the photo above during a recent morning run.





I love Toronto. I used to live out in the country, grew herbs and wildflowers in my rock garden, woke to the sound of birdsong instead of fire engines and honking traffic. A pastoral setting, I know, but I started getting cabin fever by the time we decided to make our move to the city.

Weird, I know, especially just after waxing eloquent about how much I love the cottage. I do love the cottage, and I love the outdoors with a passion that rivals my adoration of all things chocolate...but at heart, I'm a city girl. I love the bustle and action of downtown Toronto, the easy access to bookstores and coffeeshops and theatres, the underground subway and network of shops, the hum and rattle of streetcars along King Street.





Our condo straddles the entertainment and financial districts in downtown Toronto. On one side is Roy Thompson Hall, home of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra, as well as the Princess Of Wales Theatre and the Royal Alexandra Theatre. From my home office window, I can also see a plethora of nightclubs, the neon-lit Rubiks cube of the Paramount Theatre and Chapters complex a few blocks away, MuchMusic television station headquarters.

If I step out the front door of my building, I can see the CN tower and the Skydome, both minutes away by foot. Streets in my neighbourhood tend to become gridlocked with taxicabs just before and after games and theatre performances. Finding parking can be an (expensive) nightmare. I never drive in Toronto; I walk, run, or take the subway or bus system most of the time. Some opt for four-legged locomotion:





When the World Science Fiction Convention rolls into Toronto next year, I suspect that I'll be the closest resident, with the Metro Convention Centre being a 3-minute walk away. (To those thinking of asking: sorry, crash space has already been spoken for :-)).

I love standing at the base of the CN Tower on a sunny day and staring up all the way up the tower to the top, shading my eyes and gawking like a tourist. I think the Skydome's pretty cool even though I've only seen one Jays game (they lost). I hate the bizarre sculpture of sports fans, which, to the appropriate eerie soundtrack, would make a great thematic focus in a horror movie:





On the other side of our neighbourhood is the financial district, with its towering office buildings and sea of suits and cellphones during rush hour. Weird to think that I used to be part of this surging throng when I worked as a programmer/analyst for TD Bank's head office about fifteen years ago, working in one of the black monolith towers designed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

I love the hodgepodge of architectural styles (anywhere from very cool to downright ugly), the juxtaposition of old and new. I really like the Royal Bank Plaza building, whose mirror-glass facades contain real gold and are gorgeous in the sunlight. You can see it in the second photo on this page, the building second from the right.

The interior of BCE Place is another of my neighbourhood favourites (see photo below), which houses Toronto's oldest surviving stone building and oldest intact streetscape.





I could write far too much more about my neighbourhood, so perhaps I'd better stop here. Besides, I've already Blathered and posted photos about my visit to Kensington Market and Chinatown, local grocery stores, people-watching along the harbourfront, and too many photos I've taken on various neighbourhood runs.


And hey, even the Pope's coming to visit my neighbourhood this week. :-)

otters and sunrises

I woke at about 5:30 a.m. because of something moving in the forest. Something big. The wisest thing to do would have been to go back to sleep, but we're going home today, and I knew it was probably my last chance to see a cottage sunrise for a while.

Before checking out the sunrise, I wanted to investigate the forest noise. There was definitely still something back there, moving around, snapping big branches underfoot. I was tempted to wander into the forest a bit to check it out, but decided not to. Chances were good that it was a moose, but there was also a small but nonzero chance it could be a bear, in which case it was probably not a good idea for me to try sneaking up on it, especially since everyone was still sleeping and wouldn't know where I was going.

The sky near the horizon was just turning a pale rose when I got to the boathouse, so I knew I still had a few minutes. I made myself a bacon (Canadian back bacon, eh?) and tomato sandwich and ate my breakfast out on the dock while the sun rose.

It's been a good visit, and I actually feel like I've had a vacation at the same time as being happy with the amount of writing I've done on my novel.

My favourite moment during the visit was yesterday morning around 6 a.m. I was first up (as usual) and was on my way across the deck to the boathouse to do some writing when my still-sleep-fuddled brain noticed how utterly beautiful the lake was. The sun was just peeking up over Lewis's Island, and the sky was a brilliant blue. Mist was dancing across the entire surface of the lake; vague wispy tendrils floating like white fire, drifting.

A lone canoeist was paddling his way along the distant shore; I could only see his silhouette. The light was amazing, golden and warm. I snapped a few photos but gave up after a few minutes; I realized that there was no way my camera could accurately capture the breathtaking beauty of the scene, the birdsong in the forest, the trilling of a loon pair far out on the lake. I sat on the dock for an hour, watching the morning sun slowly burn the mist off the water.





Lots of wildlife around. An extremely cute chipmunk has been busying about, ecstatic over my gifts of peanuts. Four ducklings paddled by the boathouse as I was writing yesterday. The mother was nowhere to be seen, and JBR says there used to be five ducklings. :-( Two of the ducklings clambered awkwardly up on the shore to peck at the grass, then slipped back into the water, peeping until the other two peeped back, obviously letting them know where they were. I hope the remaining four make it through the summer okay.

Less than an hour later, an otter splashed around in the lake just off our dock. He frolicked around a bit, staring at us from time to time, then swam off. We see a family of otters playing in the water around here occasionally, always fun to watch.

visitor centre

Happy birthday to my brother-in-law, Kaarel!

Today's Blatherpics are from our visit to the Algonquin Park Visitor's Centre yesterday afternoon. Jeff and I tend to visit the Centre at least once a year, usually with our visitors. In addition to housing some interesting science/biology and historical exhibits, the building is air-conditioned with a decent bookstore and a cafeteria. It's a great place to take children on a rainy day, or just to browse for a change of pace during a long visit.





Jeff's family contributed towards one of the exhibits in the Centre, commissioning a sculptress friend to create a bust of Tom Thomson, a famous Canadian painter and member of the Group of Seven, whose mysterious death has evoked much controversy and speculative books over the years:





It was interesting to examine the reproduction of the Tom Thomson cairn after seeing the real cairn on a lake tour boat trip only a couple days before:





And each time that Jeff and I go to the Visitor Centre, I always visit the Wolf Howl exhibit. When the Centre was first being built, people had the opportunity to donate in someone's name to sponsor exhibits. Jeff and I donated in the names of my brother and his wife. A plaque with all donor names is displayed beside each exhibit. Jim and Diane both loved Algonquin:





Unbelieveably, I'm still on track re: my novel writing. My goal by the end of this month is to have written about 37,000 words. Next month: finish the first draft (I'm aiming for a total of approximately 50,000 words total for a middle reader novel), revise/edit.

This coming week will be pretty busy since I have a column due for Writing World in addition to two sets of biweekly updates for the site (since I'll be away in California during one of my deadlines) and a Muse's Muse column, in addition to my daily Market Watch and novel writing goals.

Hey, and I've even started writing a new song while I'm at the cottage! :-)