I am in Toronto and it is the G20

I am only just in Toronto, though, because I am at the airport on the edge of the lake. It is a magical place that you travel to by ferry; from it, you leave Toronto on a tiny aeroplane with propellers drinking wine given out by ladies in 1950s air hostess outfits. I am going home to Montreal after a week that was long and strange, spent mainly, as it was, in a room on the 41st floor in an hotel, wondering why people leave their office lights on when they go home at night.

Toronto is empty at the moment, like the City of London at 4am on a Sunday morning, because the G20 is in town (or about to be) and everyone is working from home for fear of being jumped on by the ragged protesting hordes, despite the fact that the protests aren't due to happen until tomorrow.  There are policemen everywhere moving around in great clumps, ambling through the streets in knock-off RayBans eating sandwiches and sipping from paper Tim Horton's cups, ready to protect and serve and save us from people with beavers on strings. 

But not all the policemen drink Tim Horton's coffee. Some of them are in Starbucks, particularly the one on the corner of Yonge and King.  Regular readers will be aware of my views about coffee  (broadly the same, even after all this time), but Starbucks to me is the worst of all,  because it talks in the language of coffee but makes a drink that smells of despair and things in tins.

I am in Starbuck's because there is nowhere else to get coffee-approximate substances and food, and it is early and I must eat and drink.  I have ordered something called a "triple no-fat Venti latte", aka a large cup of lukewarm skimmed milk with coffee-scented devil jizz in it, and am clutching a sandwich of inderminate content and provenance, waiting for my 'coffee' behind five policemen in matching outfits of soft above-the-knee shorts, baseball caps, Nike ankle socks and Asics trainers.  

"Triple grande no-fat vanilla iced coffee?" "Yes!", says Policeman 1, who is approximately 6ft 2 and wearing a perky cap. "Grande caramel Frappuccino?". "Yes!", says Policeman 2, who is like Policeman 1 but a bit shorter. "Venti no-fat mocha?". "Yes!", squeaks Policeman 3, who would probably not be tall enough to be a policeman in Holland. "Venti soya cappuccino, extra froth?" It is now the turn of Policeman 4, who is a lady who I think likes Policeman 1 (a man).  "Iced dark cherry mocha?". "Me!", shouts Policeman 5, who is halfway through an enormous pink cupcake. 

"What is Canada like?", asks an Englishman later that day. He is thinking of moving here with his children. It is a big question, but all I can manage is: "Nice. The policemen wear shorts and drink Frappuccinos". 

A day after I wrote this post: there's rioting on Yonge today, just where the policemen in shorts were drinking iced cherry mochas, and it's not looking good.  The policemen (and women) in shorts are probably in riot gear today. I hope everyone in Toronto is safe.