Foggy Night in Montréal

It has been raining every other day or so here in Montréal which, along with the colder temperatures, meant I was back in layers and rain boots. I was walking home in the evening last night after a day of rain, and the drizzle had stopped by the time I came out of metro. I live next to a beautiful park and as I was walking past the greenery I thought the effects of the fog corralled in the air made for a dreamy scenery. I do not carry fancy camera equipment so I attempted to capture the night with my iPhone. I cannot wait for sun and the summer season to start in the city.

Happy Birthday Miles Davis

Happy Birthday, Miles Davis!

The notable jazz musician died in 1991 but if he were alive today he would have turned 87 years old. The song in the video, Jeru, appears in Davis’ classic album, Birth of Cool. Birth of Cool, first issued in 1957, was one of the first jazz albums that I purchased and listened to in its entirety, introducing me beyond vocal jazz masters such as Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday, whom I already loved.

The trumpet player and composer was prolific during the fifty or so years he was active and continues to influence musicians today. Click on the above video for a mellow and easy going tune for a Sunday afternoon.

Asian Heritage Month: A Music Video That Makes Us Hungry

Did you know that May is Asian Heritage Month here in Canada?

I did, but it took forever for me to write a post about this month despite the fact that I am Canadian and Asian. But here is a music video worth sharing by a Korean rock band called Jan Kiha and the Faces for their song, That Sucks. Though I am ethnically Korean, I have never heard of the band — I do not follow any Korean musicians except for Psy, but this is not exactly extraordinary since everyone knows of Psy! Also, I cannot decipher what exactly the band is singing about, but nevermind the lyrics (though the tune is catchy). Look at the food porn!

Throwback Thursdays: One More Time by Daft Punk

Everyone is talking about Daft Punk’s newly released album, Random Access Memories, which came out just three days ago. I still have not gotten around to listening to the new album but I did read snippets of press about the band and their current initiatives, including this interesting article from The New York Times last week. (The Parisian duo own a home in California and speak accent-less English?) What was also in recent news was that the singer of the above classic, One More Time, Romanthony, who was an influential house producer and singer in his right, passed away at the young age of 45 earlier this month. I love this song and even though it is from Daft Punk’s early work, their second album in 2001, Discovery, I consider it a quintessential Daft Punk song — pounding house beats, glamorous upbeat vocals, and 80’s nostalgia. And of course, the awesome animated video makes this video worth revisiting. This will definitely tide me over until I finally get a listen to their new album.

The Montréal Bachelor(ette) Party Planning Guide: Restaurants, Part Two

Welcome to Part Two of recommended restaurants for bachelor and bachelorette party planning here in Montréal. Part One, the previous post on bachelor/bachelorette party planning in the city, recommended high-end and moderately priced restaurants, which you can access by clicking here. Today’s post lists wine bars, apportez votre vin (bring your own wine) restaurants, vegetarian-friendly establishments, and cheap alternatives for those on a budget.

This list is also applicable for both visitors and locals to the city who are planning a festive group dinner event. However, as I wrote in the previous post, the kinds of restaurants that I am recommending is really geared towards visitors to the city. I field a lot of questions from friends, family and acquaintances who are visiting Montréal about where to go and what to eat, and also about pre-wedding party planning. I often steer the visitors toward the kinds of places that are unique to Québec; that is, restaurants and foods that are hard to find in Toronto, New York City, or other places of origin.

Montréal does food very well, and in my opinion as Toronto transplant who has lived here for several years, the city excels at French, Québécois, and certain European and Arab cuisines. Also, I will emphasize this again, but Montréal is not vegetarian friendly. Most menus are in English, but download a Google Translate app into your smartphone before getting here as many specials of the day, charted on the chalkboard on the wall, may not be in English. And a final and important note: Reserve early. Especially if you are vying for the more high-end and popular restaurants, such as those posted in Part One of this restaurant guide. The restaurants I am suggesting in this series all take reservations unless otherwise stated, and hence are appropriate for booking group dinners. So in addition to the high-end and moderately-priced restaurants in Part One, here are more dinner spot recommendations for the last of this Restaurant series.

Breast Cancer, Angelina Jolie and Exploring Genetic Testing

It was around midnight when I saw The New York Times’ Twitter feed linked to an article on its opinion page about Angelina Jolie. It read: “Angelina Jolie on why she had a double mastectomy, and how it could save lives.” I clicked on the link.

Reading Jolie’s explanation of her recent decision to undergo a double mastectomy — as a preventative measure against breast cancer — was fuzzy late at night. I had been engrossed in my school work and holding late night vigils in the glow of my laptop, eyes at half mast but open from the effects of too much coffee. Jolie wrote about how, in 2007, her mother died of cancer after a ten-year battle. Jolie had then decided to become tested for the genetic mutation that substantially increases the risk of the carrier of developing breast cancer. The tests confirmed that she did indeed carry a gene mutation and in her case, she had approximately 87% chance of developing the disease. She completed her series of preventative medical procedures and surgeries in April.

Well, both myself and the rest of the world had not been privy to Jolie’s health circumstances until the publishing of her article. For a Hollywood actress and paparazzi magnet such as Jolie, her private life and medical decision had been very carefully under wraps. But she chose to write a public and very moving account of her medical counselling and surgery through her own words and terms. Her article is clear in that her motives are not to broadcast circumstances of her non-acting life to the world but to spark a discussion on women’s health, breast cancer, and cancer prevention.

Jolie’s article comes two days after Mother’s Day was celebrated here in Canada and many other nations abroad. I had sent a message to a friend now living in Hong Kong to wish her a happy first Mother’s Day, then enquired about whether Mother’s Day is actually celebrated in that part of the world. It was, in fact, and her husband took her and their infant son to Hong Kong Disneyland. I laughed at the photo she sent to me of her and her family posing with Mickey Mouse.

On Sunday I was and still am away from my family in Toronto, and spent the day here in Montréal with my head in my books. But I thought about my mother who passed away when I was twenty years old after battling cancer for eleven years. It also happened that I saw a breast cancer surgeon a few days earlier because, as I explained to my boyfriend, it was time again to have old doctor hands feel my boobs in ways no one else has ever felt my boobs.

Spring in the Plateau, Montréal

Flowers in the city on rue Christophe-Colombe.

Throwback Thursdays: Sabotage by The Beastie Boys

Was anyone else really sad when Adam Yauch died just over a year today in May 2012? I love The Beastie Boys and Adam Yauch (MCA) was my favourite as he was what I considered the most talented of the trio. Just last week, however, they renamed a park in Brooklyn, New York as Adam Yauch Park, located in the borough where Yauch grew up. To commemorate, here is the group’s 1994 video for Sabotage, directed by none other than the venerable director Spike Jonze. Sabotage is very much worth revisiting as it remains a classic music video and one I still love watching today. Plus, they all wear awesome moustaches.

COSMARXPOLITAN

This great Tumblr brings politics, fashion and humour together in one big Lenin sandwich. “Fun, fearless freedom from the oppression of capitalism:” www.cosmarxpolitan.tumblr.com

The Montréal Bachelor(ette) Party Planning Guide: Restaurants, Part One

Well hello there, welcome back! This is the second of the multi-post series on bachelor and bachelorette party planning in this lovely city of Montréal. The first post provided some tips on lodging options, and this second post will go over restaurants suitable for a group dinner in establishments that are better than a run to McDonald’s. That is, these are restaurants I recommend for a nice sit-down dinner with your party group.

This particular series on bachelor/bachelorette party restaurant recommendations is divided into two parts. Part one of this restaurant series, below, explains the Montréal restaurant scene, basic tips, and high- and moderately-priced restaurant recommendations. Part two, in the next post of this series, will cover wine bars, Bring Your Own Wine (BYOW or “apportez votre vin”) restaurants, vegetarian selections, and frugal offerings. I will also be posting other tips and recommendations for bachelor and bachelorette party planning in this city on the topics of bars, events, and other related items. The first and previous post of this party planning series covered the general party environment in Montréal and hotel recommendations.

First thing about the Montréal dining scene: It is amazing. There are more restaurants per capita (744 according to a 2006 figure) than anywhere else in Canada. Plus, the Québécois do not accept crappy food. You will find there are many excellent restaurants in this city and pretty much all of them serve the most excellent bread. (Which is obviously not the center piece of your meal but a really nice extra touch and a personal obsession of mine.)

We also have apportez votre vin (“bring your own wine”/BYOW) restaurants, which allow you and your guests to bring a reasonable number of bottles of wine (or beer) to a restaurant to have with your meal. I have yet to encounter a restaurant here in Montréal that charges a corkage fee so all you have to do is bring your bottles and they will serve it with your meal. Keep in mind that these restaurants do not have a liquor license so they cannot refrigerate your bottles for you; they will instead bring a bucket with ice for your table, so keep this in mind if you are bringing a few white or dessert wines. Most of these BYOW restaurants are situated in the Plateau neighbourhood, home of many excellent restaurants in the city, and advertise their service as “apportez votre vin” on their websites and menus. I do have some favourite BYOW restaurants that I love, which I will mention in part two of this restaurants post.

Another point that is worth mentioning is that Montréal is not a vegetarian-friendly town. Depending on where you are coming from — especially a sizeable city like Toronto, Vancouver, or New York — you may be used to going to any restaurant in your home town and finding vegetarian options for your veggie friends. Montréal is not like one of those cities. The culture here is that of joie de vivre where French Canadians love their cheese, bread, wine, smoking, foie gras, and a pretty liberal sexual culture (that is why you are here, right?). Vegetarianism is seen as a form of asceticism not welcome by the Québécois still recovering from the fall out with the Catholic church in the late 1960’s, which ruled the province through its law and culture. Only 6% of the Québécois attend church weekly, the lowest in any western society. (Interestingly, most Québécois consider themselves Catholic.) Therefore, if you have vegetarian friends in your party you should double check the restaurant menus before committing. And do expect to get the “We have vegetarian — fish and lamb!” kind of responses as I have personally experienced.

I would say though that my biggest tip regarding restaurants in Montréal is to go for the kinds of restaurants that the city excels at. This means that, in comparison to other cities such as Vancouver, Toronto, and New York City, we suck at Asian cuisine. I am not trying to say that all Asian restaurants in this city stink — certainly not true as there are a few that I absolutely love. However, if you are from a big city with a sizeable Asian population, why come to Montréal to eat good quality sushi at an inflated price when you can get it at home for way cheaper and even higher quality? If you come visit this city in the lovely francophone province of Québec, steer towards the kinds of cuisines and restaurants where that you probably cannot get at home and that exemplify the best of the city. In my point of view, the best restaurants here are usually French, Québécois, central and mediterranean European, and Arab cuisines.

Additionally, you will want to try to find a restaurant that is large enough to accomodate your group and takes reservations. My restaurant suggestions below fit both these standards, but I should point out that if you are looking to book at some of the more popular restaurants you may need to call them months in advance. That is right, you are not going to get a table for six at Au Pied de Cochon in two weeks time, so forget about it. So this is my second biggest tip: book early. But keep in mind that if you do not score a reservation at your favourite restaurant of choice, there are many, many great restaurants in the city so planning a great meal for your friend will be done. And last but not least, I have included some alternative, frugal choices for the economical amongst us which you will find in part two. Below are some of my choices for high- and moderately-priced restaurants.