Le Voyage Québécois: La Ville de Québec

2016 May 11

Although this was uploaded on May 19, it was written on May 11 on a train between Québec City and Montréal:

I’m writing these out of order, but I’m a fan of Quentin Tarantino so maybe I’m drawing inspiration from him. I have a couple of drafts of smaller travels to Denver, Minneapolis, and the like, but this was a big trip that simply couldn’t wait.

Au revoir, Omaha

Whenever I’m about to go on a trip, I never feel like I’m about to go on a trip until an hour before the plane leaves. It’s like my feelings are in denial, even though it’s something I’m excited about.

Very randomly, my roommate from sophomore and half of junior year (the non-Argentine half) decided he was going to Omaha. Of course he comes to Omaha on the very day I’m leaving, but we made time for breakfast anyway, in none other than Omaha’s best breakfast/post-night out food joint, Wheatfields.

The day was so nice I decided I should take a quick walk around Omaha before heading to the airport.

I picked a good day to leave since the wind was blowing in the exact right direction to bring smoke from Alberta forest fires into the Midwest (and a smaller forest fire in Minnesota). I could smell it in the air, and I thought someone was grilling nearby at first.

I made it to Chicago O’Hare for about an hour.

And once I got to my terminal I was already surrounded by French. It’s exciting to be in a foreign place for the first time in years.

My Spanish is to the point where, if I’m in the right mindset and have the right amount of energy, I can understand 99% of what is said (other factors include where the Spanish-speakers are from and if they’re using a different set of vocabulary, but my accent recognition and regional vocabularies are improving as well – for example, I have two Puerto Rican coworkers who I could understand 0% when I first met them, but my brain grew accustomed to their patterns of speech and I can have a conversation with them).

Now that my Spanish has improved enough, I feel like it’s time for a new challenge, and now that I’m in Québec I feel like it can be French… but we’ll see. Maybe something like Portuguese or Chinese would be more useful to reach out to more people, but I really like French, even if it sounds like someone has a mouthful of peanut butter when speaking.

Le Vol

Bonjour Québec

We had an uneventful landing, which is usually a good thing.

Going through customs:
Me: “Bonjour.”
Customs
officer: “Bonjour.”
Me: *Hands in passport*
CO: *Looks at passport, gets confused look*
“Parlez-vous français?”
Me: “Uuum, je parle… seulement un… petit de-”
CO: “English is good?”
Me: “Yeah that’s good.”

The cab driver was interesting. He was a chemistry teacher from Morocco who spends 4 months in Québec and 8 months in Morocco every year (the winter months, of course). He spoke Arabic and French and only a little bit of English and I speak English, Spanish, and a little bit of French. Since his French was too fast for me to process and my English was too fast for him, the conversation leaned towards him speaking broken English and me responding in broken French. It was entertaining. Beverly, knowing much less French than I do (and as I said before, I don’t know much), showed her taxi driver the address and sat in solemn silence (in a dull, dark dock…).

Between the airport and Vieux-Québec (or “Old Québec” pour les anglophones) looked exactly like Omaha. In fact, with a metropolitan area of about 895K people, Omaha is very similar to Québec City, being bigger than QC by only 90K (the official population is a little bit different story, with QC being 516K beating Omaha’s 434K). It felt like any Midwestern city of approximate size; you would probably need a car to get around to any part of town due to sprawl, the main streets were lined with chain stores for autos and Subways (the sandwich shop, not the mode of transport).

Entering Vieux-Québec was a completely different story. Where outer Québec felt like Omaha, Vieux-Québec felt like Buenos Aires (you barely have to know me to know which one I prefer). Within Vieux-Québec, everything feels like an old European city that got teleported to North America. Everything you need is in walking distance. Our Airbnb host, Alexis (pronounced Alex) has a car but feels guilty if he uses it when he can easily walk. I think that’s how cars should be; they should be nice to have but not a requirement to live. Unfortunately I can’t change the way most US cities (and cities in many other countries, but mainly the US) were planned in the post-WWII years, thinking that everyone will want a car and a big lawn and little to no contact with neighbors. While those things have their merits, this entry highlights my opinion on that.

Almost as soon as I arrived at our Airbnb (pretty late around, 10:30), Beverly and I went to Le Bureau de Poste (the Post Office). Since work frees the soul, and bureaucracy fuels the world, we thought it was a good idea. Jokes! Ha! Fooled you! Le Bureau de Poste is actually a bar/restaurant. Since alcohol frees the soul, and food fuels the world, we thought it was a good idea.

After le bar (the bar), we checked out another bar, Deux22, which means Two22 (located on 222 Rue Saint-Joseph). Being predictably tired, we decided to head home after one drink and a text from Verizon saying that my international data usage had exceeded $50 (ummm, what?).

Petit-Dejeuner du Jour 1

The next day started well, as the Verizon thing got sorted out by Mom (Happy American Mother’s Day) and we decided to get some breakfast. Le Cercle (located on Rue Saint-Joseph as well) was great.

Apparently this is annual Grilled Cheese Week for the city, meaning the restaurants are making their best gourmet grilled cheese and at the end of the week citizens can vote “On Internet” as the waitress said. It was so good I ate it before taking a picture.

<food picture not found>

Musée de la Place Royale et la Pluie

Of course, when you travel you have to go to whatever museum is good in the area and the best one that was open on Sunday for us was the Musée de la Place Royale (The Royal Plaza Museum). It was rainy (Il y a beaucoup de pluie).

Btw, do you guys like these gifs?

After seeing some exhibits and a weird movie about commissioning the painting of Samuel de Champlain (the founder of the original Québec settlement), we got a tour from this guy.

Here we are near the mouth of the river near where old fortifications would have been. He did a good job staying happy and entertaining in the cold rain.

Nuit de jour 1

Later that night, we went to a pretty cool restaurant in the sky!

Yeah I know it’s not that amazing but still pretty cool (and expensive). Luckily, the USD to CAD exchange rate has been pretty good for US tourists lately. Most prices appear to be similar to what they would be in the US, but the exchange rate means that whatever has $10 CAD on its price tag costs around $7.50 USD.

After dinner, we went to a bar on the suggestion of our waitress which was the wrong choice. I call it Le Nebraska even though its name was actually something else, since they blasted country music, and the only people there were 50+ y/o men (and one 50+ y/o woman).

After they left, Beverly and I were the only ones at the bar and the bartender came over and we tried to have a conversation, but he had limited English and we have limited French, so after about a minute he stood there right next to us, not leaving while he has the entire bar to wait around in, staring… So Beverly and I had a competition to see who could finish their beer the fastest and promptly left.

We found the right bar later just a block away. I ordered a drink called “Bonne Fête Kevin Continue Com’ Ça!” which translates to “Good Party Kevin Let’s Keep It Going” and was pretty good. It tasted like an alcoholic health drink which maybe I should starting getting into instead of beer and rum and Coke (pop has so many calories in it). The bartender explained the origin of the “Bonne Fête Kevin” which was a “viral” video where, for all I can tell, is a bunch of people repeating the phrase, “Bonne Fête Kevin Continue Com’ Ça”. Beverly nor I really understood the appeal of the video but it totally reminds me of “Damn Daniel, back at it again with the white Vans”. People are easily entertained everywhere.

We also encountered a hockey team from a nearby small town with members from the US and Canada. Their coach was an asshole though, and I don’t say that about a lot of people, especially those from Canada. I won’t go into details, but he asked where Beverly and I were from and immediately responded by calling us a word that was supposed to be stopped from widespread usage not too long ago. Sometimes people use the word without legitimately knowing how hurtful it can people to certain people and just need to be updated on what is and is not offensive – after all, appropriate word usage changes like the weather and if you’re not plugged into the popular media, it’s easy to fall behind. This was not one of those people. His players didn’t stand up to him because he was their coach, and apparently a pretty good coach, but Beverly had no problem debating with him. Once she saw that he was just trying to piss her off, she decided to stop wasting her time.

The hockey team left (the players apologized for their coach’s behaviour right after he left) and the bartender immediately came over to us to bond over how much of an asshole the guy was. The friendly bartender was the opposite of the coach. He told us some interesting stories about his travels. He lived in Northern Canada to do some work for a while (I forgot what for – must’ve been logging, right?) and spent a lot of time in Inuktitut-speaking populations. I’ve always been interested in the Nunavut area and Inuit culture since doing a territory report on it in 6th grade geography class. Maybe I should extend this trip to take a detour into Nunavut for a week or so… But it’s probably still kind of cold… and I suppose I have work.

Jour 2

We were in for another cold day, this time with a little bit of snow in the morning. I decided to go on a run anyway.

It cleared up and got a little warmer, but was still a little rainy and cold. Nonetheless, we trekked onward to a crêpe café, which was all Beverly was hoping for.

Since no museums were open on Monday, we went to Le Château Frontenac, or Frontenac Castle. It’s the only castle of its kind in North America. Inside there were plenty of old paintings and I found the perfect new hobby, pictured below.

Afterwards we went on the obligatory tour bus. We stopped in the Plains de Abraham. If you’re wondering the history of the Plains de Abraham, these are plains where Abraham was.

After the tour we ate at the most awkward restaurant where Beverly and I were the only clients among about 10 waitstaff. To add to the awkwardness, they asked if we were on our honeymoon. I was wondering when that was going to happen and of course it happened there.

We didn’t do anything Monday night since we had a long, sunny day planned ahead of us. Anything except catch up on Game of Thrones, of course.

Jour 3, le dernier avec Beverly 🙁

And then it was Tuesday. It was a balmy 65 or so degrees and sunny.

The first thing we did was go to the farmer’s market. It was inside, because snow is a thing there.

We got lunch (outside) near the Place Royale then took a two minute walk to cruise the St Lawrence.

Beverly wanted a new profile picture. It was a challenge to get one she liked but I think she was eventually satisfied.

These waterfalls are actually taller than Niagara Falls, but not as wide or powerful.

We then hung out a bit more in La Place Royale and it was an entirely different environment without the rain. Beverly went to the bathroom at one point and I sat on the bench next to the bust of Samuel de Champlain and practiced my French on DuoLingo.

An older man approached me and asked how I was doing. I was a little leery of him at first, but he seemed nice and didn’t speak any English, so it was the perfect opportunity to practice French. He asked why I was in Québec and I told him I was on vacation with my sister. He later gave me a business card for “general events” services… weird. He didn’t stick around too long though, which was good because I could then keep practicing French for a couple minutes more…

But less than 2 minutes later he was back. He then talked about his house which was a couple blocks from the plaza and tried to lead me over to see it. I declined, of course, but he insisted that I send him an email later that night. “Oui, je t’envoy un message cette nuit,” I lied. He then creepily shook my hand and left again. After leaving to then find Beverly, I promptly threw the business card in the trash.

The whole experience, although uncomfortable, was kind of funny. I was in an open area with lots of people so at least I never felt unsafe (plus he was older and overweight, so I could’ve easily fought or fled if I needed). And it’s cause for an interesting story. In any other setting I would’ve probably ignored him from the start. And say what you will about Argentina, but that never happened to me in Buenos Aires. It goes to show that creepy encounters of the third kind can happen anywhere, even in Canada, so don’t be afraid to travel! (I don’t think a lot of people would reinforce their love of travel after that, but I can spin any argument in my favor if I want.)

I bought a couple postcards to send to relatives (actually we sent Beverly’s but I bought some too). The person I bought from could tell I didn’t speak much French but she didn’t speak much English either. It turned out she was from Colombia and we ended up doing the transaction and talking a little bit in Spanish. Hurray!

Beverly and I walked up and down Petit-Champlain (a old-style market street near the river). We went back to St Roch where our host lived and got some Canadian poutine, restoring all the calories from the 6 or so miles we walked that day.

And last night we were so tired we just watched some Brooklyn Nine-Nine and went to bed in our respective rooms (her in a bed and me on a couch – don’t feel bad for me, I can sleep anywhere).

Jour 4, Jour sans Beverly, Voyage à Montréal

This morning’s schedule was relatively blank. I sent the postcards, got breakfast and coffee at a café on Rue St Joseph (near Ubisoft, the video game company that consumed my middle-school years by developing Splinter Cell and Assassin’s Creed) where I read some news in French, then took an Uber to the train station, Gare du Palais, for Montréal.

Dans le train

This train ride is great. Getting on was a breeze and I have plenty of space to myself (I don’t think a ton of people go from Québec to Montréal on a Wednesday). It only takes 3 hours to get from Québec to Montréal by train since the cities are so close. The train resembles the one I took between Omaha and Denver. It doesn’t look or feel particularly sleek like the ones in Europe, so it must be a North American thing. The countryside resembles Nebraska and Colorado with way more of the good parts. There’s plenty of farmland, but more hills and rivers. I swear we cross a river every 10 minutes and they all look amazing.

Fun fact: When I planned ahead I accidentally bought a $30 ticket for Wednesday, May 4. On Thursday, May 5, I found out and had to buy another ticket costing $90. Always double check your dates, kids.

Now I’m about 1 hour from Montréal and will have plenty more to write about at the end of the week. Before I sign off, here’s some quick thoughts and observations.

Alex l’hôte (Alex the Host)

Our host was great. He’s a professional skydiving coach and had many interesting stories to tell. He spoke English with almost no Quebecois accent at all but was willing to speak French with me whenever I spoke a bit in the language. He spoke Spanish too after spending a lot of time in South America. Congrats Alex, you get 5 stars.

L’attitude quebecois au les anglophones (Quebecois Attitude Toward English-Speakers)

It’s a little different than Argentina, and a little the same. The rate of English-speaking encounters was definitely higher, but Beverly and I speak very little French as mentioned before, so we didn’t have much choice. One major difference is that, here, I’m not a visible minority, so people don’t assume that they should speak English with me based on visual assumption, just audio assumptions. That’s one thing that bothered me in Argentina. Some people insisted on speaking English to me no matter how much I spoke Spanish to them (and most of the time my Spanish was better than their English, and I understood them in Spanish better than when they spoke English). Not being a visible minority definitely has its advantages. I think it’s important to give people respect and assume they speak the main language of the area until they show you otherwise (or better yet, ask – you usually can’t go wrong if you just ask first). Maybe that’s just me though.

Au revoir par alors.

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