Well, that was amazing
The lantern festival, I mean. It was great. We took the GO train to Exhibition at about 6:30, and walked down through the Ex, which had just started yesterday. It was just Amelia and me; the others were coming later. Luckily we had borrowed an old umbrella stroller from Jackie, as the walk was quite long and Amelia is tired at that time of night.
The 'lanterns' weren't really lanterns - they were almost life-size reproductions of scenes from Chinese history and culture, made of transparent fabric and lit from within when it got dark. Some of them moved and had fountains, etc. It was very impressive. They also had a show that included a lion dance, maritial arts and acrobatics. Unforuntately the 'lions' came down among the spectators and scared Amelia out of her wits and she started screaming.
Thursday we drove down to Queen St. West and Chinatown. The cluster of shiny condo buildings continues to grow along the lake, which I find quite sad. They cut the lake off from the city like a big glass wall. But Queen St. is much the same. I love it there - it's like my spiritual home. The fact that it's mostly quirky clothes shops probably says something about me. But I feel quite at home there. And it's one of the few places you can go to at 10:30 am and it feels early morning - everything is just waking up. Plus it's still quite gritty in parts - there's a Money Mart, a rundown neighbourhood laundry, and the former mental hospital that I think is still used as a day centre by people with mental illnesses. I like a bit of grit.
We walked down to Spadina/Chinatown, had a look around, and then took the streetcar back to where we'd parked. A strange thing happened. We got on and I told the driver we needed to go a few blocks west of Bathurst. He said, 'OK'. I said, 'So, how much is that?' He said, 'Oh, don't worry about it - it's only a few stops. Next time.' I was gobsmacked, as they say. That's never happened before. I'm used to cranky transit drivers.