Montreal 2011 - Day 4: Arts & Craft
Have you read about Day 3? http://japanesedream.livejournal.com/408882.html
I continued to slobber over architecture - & graffiti! - using halted exclamations that mainly consisted of things like, "This!" "That!" "Those!" & expressions like, "So much this!" or, "All kinds of that!" as we traipsed through the slightly weathered but nonetheless eye-catching areas of Mont-Royal & the Rue St. Denis. This was to be a day of fun & shopping in some very nifty places.
See the full set of the day's photos here: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1882332948562.2088169.1548491398&l=1903afd698&type=1
Starting with Mont-Royal: Cruella (http://www.cruella.ca/homeENG.htm) wasn't open that day (don't worry, we'll get there on Day 5), but Image In (http://www.imageinaccess.com/index.html - sorry, I can only find it in French), just down the street, was, & they have an entire wall of those stripey socks I like! Ended up with 2 pair (red/black & purple/black), & some purple fishnets. They also have a section of Venetian masks (I'm a sucker for those), & all kinds of fun, costumey things.
Then there was Diabolik (http://www.diabolikmontreal.com/indexenglish.html).
This place is insane, in the best possible way. A Goth's dream wardrobe. Lots of wonderful things. And a sale rack, too! We tried a few things on, & bought some stuff. I got a black velvet jumper (with a touch of tulle at the bottom) for around $10. Also bought this amazing corset-top (looks like a corset, but it's soft & a little stretchy, so I don't even have to play with the zipper, I can just slip it on). It's black with silver studs, a double-strap (one has a little ruffle on the edge, so I like wearing one strap up on each side, & the other hanging down off the shoulders) - & the zipper has a Fleur-de-Lis on the end. That being the symbol of Quebec, I call it my "Montreal corset". As I would find out that evening, it goes quite nicely with the skirt I bought at the Asian market.
I can't remember whether it was before or after our foray into the bookstore that we stopped to grab some lunch, so let's say before.
At Rapido, I got to sample a famous French dish, & finally have a taste of real Quebec cuisine.
Escargot for my friend, & it was tasty.
Poutine for me. A bit on the weighty side, so you won't need to eat much the rest of the day after having some, but very nice, indeed. It's basically French fries in a gravy (tomato-based, I think) with cheese curds, which are kind of the thickness of mozarella but with the texture of pecorino romano.
And I placed my own order. ^_^
After lunch, more walking, talking, & picture taking...
...until we got to the bookstore, just a little hole-in-the-wall place, but outside were boxes of sale-priced books that we couldn't pass up looking at. And I found what might be the funniest French-language book of all time.
This particular book, "Essential French Phrase Book" (AA Publishing), has very useful French phrases, but what makes it absolutely hilarious is that it also has the worst phoenetic write-ups of those sentences you could ever imagine!
Case in point: Page 45.
Mes enfants sont inscrits dans ce passeport. (My children are entered on this passport.)
I would write it something like, "Mays ahn-fahn sohnt ahn-scree dahn se pass-pohr". That might be bad, too - phoenetic writing is really hard, 'cuz there are some sounds that letters can't quite replicate. It's not really "ahn" so much as a combination of "a" & "o". There's no letter for 'somewhere in the middle'. :P
But this book!! They wrote it like this:
"May zohnfohn sawn tahnskree dohn suh pahspor."
ZOMG, LOL!!
They had some interesting books inside, tho'. I bought a small volume on Canadian French.
Next, it was Dix Mille Villages (10 Thousand Villages), aka "the Dix place" - & anyone who knows Moi dix Mois will understand how funny that is, but in a good way.
The place itself is great - a tad expensive for some items, but amazing to support. It's all fair trade stuff. Check it out here: http://www.tenthousandvillages.ca/cgi-bin/category.cgi?category=0
We looked at all the fantastic stuff, & they had samples of things like chocolate & coffee. We both ended up buying bracelets, & I bought some Earl Grey chocolate for us to share. We also got some tiny chocolate sampler squares.
I think it was on or going toward St. Denis that we saw things like the cupcake shop, the old church undergoing construction (I think they're turning it into apartments - they were selling pews/benches for, like, $100 or something), & the little shop where teacup_sky got a beaded choker that was on sale, & where I got to hear what a French-language "standard" (in the vein of Sinatra & that lot) sounds like. ^_^
Fido - cell phone co.:
Structube - awesome modern interior shop (furniture) - http://www.structube.com/en/our-stores/15
Down to St. Louis Square, with its pretty fountain & nifty little Gothic gate beside the flower garden, surrounded by more amazing architecture. The apartments are like Goth meets castle!
Stopped to sit & chat across the street from this awesome building, resting on a low wall.
After a while, however, thunder! It was going to rain, seemingly big-time. We'd been planning on some ice cream (or creme-glacee, in French), & it just so happened that Coco MaBoule was only a hop, skip, & a jump away.
I had some scrummy green tea ice cream in a cone that had the top dipped in chocolate. Very tasty, & nice & light, given that I wasn't incredibly hungry after that poutine. A storm did come, & when we left Coco MaBoule, we caught the tail end of it (thankfully, I had my umbrella with me).
Walked down to a couple of other fantastic shops, X20 (http://www.x20.com/indexa.htm) & Obscure (http://modeobscure.com/). X20 had cute dresses, cool shoes, & groovy accessories. In Obscure, we marvelled over the wearable works of art made by the shop-girl's friend (she didn't even technically work there, just helped out from time to time, in exchange for maybe a piece of clothing or whatever). She talked to us a LOT about the clothes & jewelry & shoes & those leather pieces. There were some great clothes in there, some of which teacup_sky said resembled brand pieces. Wish I had enough money & suitcase space to have bought everything I saw in all those places!
Made our way back through part of the Latin Quarter, VERY artsy-seeming area, kind of New Orleans-ish.
At the house, we reveled in our purchases & had way too much fun with a Moi dix Mois triple-feature - teacup_sky's got ALL 3 concert videos. (I only have the last one.) It was awesome being able to watch them all on the big-screen tv in the basement. Inspired, I changed into my Montreal corset & the skirt I'd bought at the Asian market.
Going to bed before the last day made my heart sink a little. But I would be sent off with a bang.
Next: Day 5 - http://japanesedream.livejournal.com/409395.html
I continued to slobber over architecture - & graffiti! - using halted exclamations that mainly consisted of things like, "This!" "That!" "Those!" & expressions like, "So much this!" or, "All kinds of that!" as we traipsed through the slightly weathered but nonetheless eye-catching areas of Mont-Royal & the Rue St. Denis. This was to be a day of fun & shopping in some very nifty places.
See the full set of the day's photos here: http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1882332948562.2088169.1548491398&l=1903afd698&type=1
Starting with Mont-Royal: Cruella (http://www.cruella.ca/homeENG.htm) wasn't open that day (don't worry, we'll get there on Day 5), but Image In (http://www.imageinaccess.com/index.html - sorry, I can only find it in French), just down the street, was, & they have an entire wall of those stripey socks I like! Ended up with 2 pair (red/black & purple/black), & some purple fishnets. They also have a section of Venetian masks (I'm a sucker for those), & all kinds of fun, costumey things.
Then there was Diabolik (http://www.diabolikmontreal.com/indexenglish.html).
This place is insane, in the best possible way. A Goth's dream wardrobe. Lots of wonderful things. And a sale rack, too! We tried a few things on, & bought some stuff. I got a black velvet jumper (with a touch of tulle at the bottom) for around $10. Also bought this amazing corset-top (looks like a corset, but it's soft & a little stretchy, so I don't even have to play with the zipper, I can just slip it on). It's black with silver studs, a double-strap (one has a little ruffle on the edge, so I like wearing one strap up on each side, & the other hanging down off the shoulders) - & the zipper has a Fleur-de-Lis on the end. That being the symbol of Quebec, I call it my "Montreal corset". As I would find out that evening, it goes quite nicely with the skirt I bought at the Asian market.
I can't remember whether it was before or after our foray into the bookstore that we stopped to grab some lunch, so let's say before.
At Rapido, I got to sample a famous French dish, & finally have a taste of real Quebec cuisine.
Escargot for my friend, & it was tasty.
Poutine for me. A bit on the weighty side, so you won't need to eat much the rest of the day after having some, but very nice, indeed. It's basically French fries in a gravy (tomato-based, I think) with cheese curds, which are kind of the thickness of mozarella but with the texture of pecorino romano.
And I placed my own order. ^_^
After lunch, more walking, talking, & picture taking...
...until we got to the bookstore, just a little hole-in-the-wall place, but outside were boxes of sale-priced books that we couldn't pass up looking at. And I found what might be the funniest French-language book of all time.
This particular book, "Essential French Phrase Book" (AA Publishing), has very useful French phrases, but what makes it absolutely hilarious is that it also has the worst phoenetic write-ups of those sentences you could ever imagine!
Case in point: Page 45.
Mes enfants sont inscrits dans ce passeport. (My children are entered on this passport.)
I would write it something like, "Mays ahn-fahn sohnt ahn-scree dahn se pass-pohr". That might be bad, too - phoenetic writing is really hard, 'cuz there are some sounds that letters can't quite replicate. It's not really "ahn" so much as a combination of "a" & "o". There's no letter for 'somewhere in the middle'. :P
But this book!! They wrote it like this:
"May zohnfohn sawn tahnskree dohn suh pahspor."
ZOMG, LOL!!
They had some interesting books inside, tho'. I bought a small volume on Canadian French.
Next, it was Dix Mille Villages (10 Thousand Villages), aka "the Dix place" - & anyone who knows Moi dix Mois will understand how funny that is, but in a good way.
The place itself is great - a tad expensive for some items, but amazing to support. It's all fair trade stuff. Check it out here: http://www.tenthousandvillages.ca/cgi-bin/category.cgi?category=0
We looked at all the fantastic stuff, & they had samples of things like chocolate & coffee. We both ended up buying bracelets, & I bought some Earl Grey chocolate for us to share. We also got some tiny chocolate sampler squares.
I think it was on or going toward St. Denis that we saw things like the cupcake shop, the old church undergoing construction (I think they're turning it into apartments - they were selling pews/benches for, like, $100 or something), & the little shop where teacup_sky got a beaded choker that was on sale, & where I got to hear what a French-language "standard" (in the vein of Sinatra & that lot) sounds like. ^_^
Fido - cell phone co.:
Structube - awesome modern interior shop (furniture) - http://www.structube.com/en/our-stores/15
Down to St. Louis Square, with its pretty fountain & nifty little Gothic gate beside the flower garden, surrounded by more amazing architecture. The apartments are like Goth meets castle!
Stopped to sit & chat across the street from this awesome building, resting on a low wall.
After a while, however, thunder! It was going to rain, seemingly big-time. We'd been planning on some ice cream (or creme-glacee, in French), & it just so happened that Coco MaBoule was only a hop, skip, & a jump away.
I had some scrummy green tea ice cream in a cone that had the top dipped in chocolate. Very tasty, & nice & light, given that I wasn't incredibly hungry after that poutine. A storm did come, & when we left Coco MaBoule, we caught the tail end of it (thankfully, I had my umbrella with me).
Walked down to a couple of other fantastic shops, X20 (http://www.x20.com/indexa.htm) & Obscure (http://modeobscure.com/). X20 had cute dresses, cool shoes, & groovy accessories. In Obscure, we marvelled over the wearable works of art made by the shop-girl's friend (she didn't even technically work there, just helped out from time to time, in exchange for maybe a piece of clothing or whatever). She talked to us a LOT about the clothes & jewelry & shoes & those leather pieces. There were some great clothes in there, some of which teacup_sky said resembled brand pieces. Wish I had enough money & suitcase space to have bought everything I saw in all those places!
Made our way back through part of the Latin Quarter, VERY artsy-seeming area, kind of New Orleans-ish.
At the house, we reveled in our purchases & had way too much fun with a Moi dix Mois triple-feature - teacup_sky's got ALL 3 concert videos. (I only have the last one.) It was awesome being able to watch them all on the big-screen tv in the basement. Inspired, I changed into my Montreal corset & the skirt I'd bought at the Asian market.
Going to bed before the last day made my heart sink a little. But I would be sent off with a bang.
Next: Day 5 - http://japanesedream.livejournal.com/409395.html