rolanni | If there's no con, it must be Tuesday

Woke up early this morning, realized I didn't have to be ANYwhere by 8, 8:30 or 9 a.m. and promptly went back to sleep. After a leisurely second waking, shower and an accidental viewing of Avatar in French while Steve was searching for the local weather (calling for rain, were the Montreal weatherbeans, which it was, with a 60% change of thunderstorms). We wandered out to the Steak Frites in the rain, where I indulged myself with a warm cinnamon bun topped with apples, and a side of ham which I split with Steve, to help along his buttermilk pancakes and fresh fruit. And coffee. My, the coffee in this city is nice. Iced tea appears to be a foreign concept, but most have been willing to try.

The plans for the day, our vacation day, had been that Steve would go to the planetarium and I would go to the botanical gardens to pay my respects to the ring-tailed lemurs. Alas, I got cold feet -- the garden is some distance from the hotel. As getting lost is something of a talent of mine, I was pretty sure I could be counted on to lose the way back to the hotel, which would have been OK, had I the vocabulary to ask directions. Alas, my French consists of three phrases: "bonjour, ""merci," and "Je ne parle pas français," none particularly useful in the construction, "How do I find the Westin across from the Palais?"

By the time we'd mooched through breakfast, the rain had stopped. We wandered up behind the Palais and disconcerted some folks at an art gallery for a while, then walked a little further, up into Chinatown. The Dickinsons had told us that there was a koi pond at the Holiday Inn, so we went inside to view the koi, which was very pleasant. Outside again in the increasingly warm and sunny day, we walked west along an east-west alley, admiring the shops, restaurants and bakeries. We stopped at a kite shop and at a market, where Steve bought a jar of hoison (hoysin?) sauce, left Chinatown by the north gate, walked across to the Place Guy Fauvre (which I have no doubt Utterly Misspelled, if not Misrepresented Entirely), explored the belowstairs for a bit, toured the garden and arrived in the sweet bye-n-bye at the Maison Kam Fung.

This may have been the single strangest dining experience of my life (yes, my life has been sheltered). The place was huge, and noisy. You sit at a table. Women push carts up to the table and shout incomprehensible things at you, occasionally shoving equally incomprehensible dishes under your nose, in an attempt to tempt your palate. It was touch-and-go for a few minutes; almost, I rose and fled (I am claustrophobic to a certain degree -- noise and crowding trigger fight-or-flight). Happily, about the time I decided I needed to leave, a pushcart arrived with spring rolls on offer. I agreed to have some, and the day was saved; from that point on, it became an adventure, and much easier as it went along.

After lunch, we walked back down to the Palais, opting to cut through its climate-controlled interior rather than walk 'round the building in the humid heat. We gained our room at the Westin after a short detour for ice cream and now I am sitting in the chair by the window, watching the rain and listening to the thunder while Steve naps.

Anticipation was enjoyable, if disorganized. I got to talk to people, volunteer at the SFWA table, and view the art show. My voice didn't give out until this morning, so that worked out well.

The plan at the moment is to leave early tomorrow, release the housesitter to her life and see what two weeks' absence has brought us.

What's everybody been doing these last couple days?

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The train system in Montreal is easy as pie to use--really, I wish Boston was that organized. For $9 you can get an all-day pass and go to the Gardens and the Biodome, which you should not leave Montreal without seeing. Just take the Orange line from the Palais to Berri-Uquam, and then the Green line North to, err, I don't have the map on me, but you can ask which station is the Biodome. The cost for both is about $25, and is worth every penny.

Biodome is either Pie X or Viau, I think whichever one is farther from downtown. You could walk there from either but one is closer.

Ah ... well. The other thing is that Sharon's trick knee was threatening, meaning that while she might walk there, she might not walk *from* there, even if sure of her direction.

Alas, I can't remember the last time I took a subway in English, much less a language I can only stumblingly read, and can't speak. A study of the Metro's maps (in French) was fairly uninformative, and I didn't see anyone who looked official to ask anything.

Many folks are bolder than I am. The Biodome another time.

ah, the joys of dim sum. Yeah, it can be freak-making at first, but the food is usually more than worth it. There is a place in Boston that's excellent -- and of course I am blanking on the name, now. I can haz post-con brain?

Was lovely to see you both. Hope you return to cooler temps than I did. *melts*

China Pearl is probably what you're thinking about. It has an upstairs, and upstairs-to-upstairs. Very good. If you're lucky, the wait person speaks some English (or perhaps French if you're in Montreal), and gives you the main ingredient of the food in the wrapper.

Dim Sum can be intimidating for a first-time-go-er; best to go with a friend who is familiar with the system and the food. Dim Sum is best in medium-to-large parties anyway, so you can get lots of stuff & try them out.

Yanno, I've eaten dim sum -- they're like stuffed dumplings. It never once occurred to me that they had to be consumed in a madhouse.

I was glad to see you. Alas, the temps were fingering into the mid-eighties by the time we got home, and worse called for later in the week. *pouts*

Um? Aren't you going to DragonCon this year? Atlanta in September is hot.

[annoying foodie lesson} Dim sum is the term for all the food (small plate items, including dumplings, noodle rolls, chicken feet [personally, ugh], porridge, egg tarts... you get the idea) served that way. The entire experience is Yum Cha (drinking of tea).
[/annoying foodie lesson]

And yeah, I know all about Atlanta. I am going under protest, and with the promise of non-stop a/c.

and I see you already got the lesson. Ne'er mind... *grin*

Anticipation was enjoyable, if disorganized.

I apologize that Canadian customs and UPS-Canada conspired to keep the Fledgling ARCs and other goodies that we shipped up from actually, you know, arriving...

No problems. We have witnessed the Customs-UPS Follies previously. The box actually did arrive on Monday and were a hit at the Deceased Canine Party.

I had that experience - where neither I nor my husband could understand what the push cart lady was offering - at a dim sum restaurant in Toronto. At one point we ended up with a plate of whole baby squid that were bright yellow. It was quite an adventure.

- CJ

Hoisin Sauce - smear it over salmon filets/slices, sprinkle thickly with sesame seeds and run under the broiler for 5-7 min. Not authentic anything, but very tasty and quick, especially when the salmon's on sale.

That tops me. More than 40 years ago I had high school french for two years.
The only phrase that stuck besides Merci and bon jour is parle vous francais. That doesn't help a bit since it means "do you speak french."

The phrase you're looking for is "parlez vous anglais?" (pronounced without any of those silly ending consonants, of course)

Here in the land down-under, it's called "Yum Cha", which I believe translates as "Drink Tea" (please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) & it's lots of fun, but definitely more so with large groups - you can eat well for around $15/head, and a highlight is seeing if you can convince an unsuspecting member of the group to eat cold chicken's feet (the hot kind are, even for me, fairly unappealing), or tripe. It seems to have taken root in most cities with a substantial Chinese population, but I've had it in Hawaii, so there you go (although the American kind was a fair bit more tame than the kind we get here. It's a blast, and definitely worth persevering with. Next time you come to Sydney (soon, please!) I'd be happy to treat you & Steve to the best Yum Cha you can find outside China!

Continental drift being what it is, I suspect it is best you not hold you're breath for our visit...

Roll on the intercontinental stargate, I say. I'm sure the trolleys will still be rolling when the continents do collide...

And for those who are interested in learning about dim sum, a friend does a food review blog and her dim sum posts have pictures.

http://lansingfoodnews.blogspot.com/2007/10/dim-sum-primer-part-1.html

OR

http://dimsumprimer.com/ (which is under construction)

I live in a small midwestern city that has three places to get dim sum on the weekends. We have also driven all over LA (on numerous occasions) for good dim sum. Cart lady etiquette is also a useful learned behavior. Pre-dim sum in Lansing we used to drive to Windsor ONT for our dim sum fix.

My favorite dish at the moment is Water Chestnut Cake (mǎtí gāo) which is sort of a pan fried "jello". Weird but we took the recommendation of a cart lady and she was not wrong. The cakes resemble jello but the taste is a very floral vanilla (steamed gelatin with chunks of water chestnut & caramelized on the outside).

If there's no con, it must be Tuesday

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Dim Sum in Boston

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Dim Sum

Hoisin Sauce

"Je ne parle pas français"

Re: "Je ne parle pas français"

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