Montreal is a cool place

Hello Everyone, 

I've been to Montreal a lot over the years, and I was there recently for Thanksgiving, so it's a pretty familiar place. However, I've never shaken the feeling that the city, and the people in it, are just a little cooler than me. And possibly you as well. 

For instance, we went to a Japanese whiskey bar that had no sign and no advertisements. It was a 'speakeasy' kind of place, where you have to know which random unmarked door to knock on, which gets immediately opened by a woman in a tuxedo. They ask you to wait on the street for a bit so they can find room, then they come back, lead you down a hallway lined with curtains, and into a very cool, dimly lit, low-ceiling bar with amazing woodwork and expensive single malts. If a place like that existed in Ottawa, it would immediately go out of business because everyone would think it was rude to knock on some random door. 

We also went to a vintage second-hand clothing store. We have those in Ottawa as well, but Montreal has a lot of them. And ours are mostly Value Village outlets. This place had the kind of cool, fashionable items from various past decades that each individually look great, but that I would never be able to pick out from a pile of used clothing, which is how I think they get the stuff in the first place. I don't have an eye for it. Unless it was the green-blue velour jacket I saw, but who wouldn't be able to pick that bad boy out? 

We stayed in an AirBnB in Mile End, which is the kind of neighbourhood you picture when you talking about how cool Montreal is. It's densely packed with two and three storey apartment buildings that were built before a bunch of squares showed up with their "safety standards". You know what's cool? A vintage hardwood floor. You know what lame-o's worry about? Making sure your floors are flat. Boring. 

They have fancy, hipster coffee shops, but every city has those. But in Ottawa, they sell you what you want. In Montreal, they sell what they think you should have. We went to a very popular spot that had many coffee machines lining an entire wall. You know what they didn't have? A drip coffee machine. You could have one of the various kinds of expressos, but if you want a regular, no-adjective coffee, to go with your beige khakis and sensible shoes, brother you were out of luck. 

I can't say that I'm any cooler for having spent a lot of time there, any more than I can say I'm a better hockey player for going to see an NHL game, but that's not really the point. It's just fun to be around. 

Hope everyone had a great holiday.

wes

Photos 

Didn't get a chance to take many pictures. Like wearing a bike helmet, it's very uncool. But I did grab this pic of the great name tags Emilie's nieces made for us (they're francophones).