Yes friends: the days pass, and with them, my sanity.
Still, there is much to look forward to, and much to dwell upon, not least: what was I doing last Friday in a fur coat, "Canada 2010" woolly hat, a belt like that of the bonhomme, and a drinking stick (also featuring the head of the Bonhomme) full of Caribou?.
I will tell you what I was doing. I was embracing a French Canadian tradition of earning the beer money for my own surprise "bachelorette party" by dancing, singing Alouette, selling maple cookies for a dollar and eating le meilleur chien chaud in the world. We made $90, my friends and I, and I must salute the kindness of:
The many Canadians who gave me $5 without flinching and gave their sincere congratulations;
The man from Rhode Island who gave me $20;
The (many) people who gave me a $1 and refused to take a cookie;
The person who lent me a fur coat;
The people who lent me shin pads, a helmet, and a Canadiens jumper;
The six people who let us take their photograph;
And the dear friends I work with, who dressed me up in a Canadiens hockey outfit and made me save goals in the lift doors; who made me a sash with "Quebec Bride-to-Be"; who carried music down the street and made me dance in Phillips Square; who made an astonishing THING that I shall reveal in the coming days and who made me do things I would never have done in Blighty.
Canada is OK!!! Canadians are nice and know about irony and all that, but what is really great about them is they are not cynical the whole time like Britishers are and think it is OK to be (for e.g.) joyful and dancing on corners with your friends.
Come on England! Lay aside your cynicism. Do not sneer at people being happy in the street; smile with them and have a jig and buy them a drink! And come to French Canada, where no-one cares if you can dance or not, as long as you are amusing yourself.
Pip pip!
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7 comments:
Hmmm, you are definitely happier than in days of yore - though I miss the squirrel, the evil cat and the man upstairs - and I could not be happier for you!
And yet, not one picture? NOT ONE??
I'd forgotten about Caribou. I do hope it will have a place in the forthcoming nuptial celebrations.
Yum, maple cookies...
I bought some just the other day.
I'm glad you're having joyful fun with dancing in celebration of the 'impending nuptials'.
PICTURE!!!!!!!!!!!!
That all sounds lovely. Especially the maple cookies. Do you have a recipe ?
MWA HA HA!! You have been assimilated. Resistance, as they say, really was futile, wasn't?
Welcome home, eh?
But be careful embracing the local culture, lest you find yourself doing this. I was exposed to this kind of "entertainment" on a weekly basis as a small wrath and I blame it entirely for my current madness.
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