slightly weird

13th July 2024

A birthday, not mine – and Beryl

Wednesday, July10, 2024

Quiet days yet busy in their own way. I have now made three different soups from my chicken stock. A laksa with chicken, a pho with chicken (photo last blog), and a Chinese soup with shrimp and tofu. Eating on the balcony is relaxing, much more so than on the coffee table.

And diet update – well, who knows. I start eating at noon and finish by 8. The mornings are the hardest. By 11am I am usually feeling quite woozy. This is expected. My other choice is to start at 11 and go till 7pm but that might be hard to do. After a week, if my blood sugar continues to not cooperate, I’ll know that’s the better plan. I’m mostly buddying with Krish as he does this, but maybe I’ll benefit.

I’ve flipped through way too much Netflix, Prime and Roki screens to find something to watch. I miss live TV but I don’t want to be one of these ‘I never watch TV’ people.

I went out briefly again yesterday to meet a friend, Esmeralda, who is visiting her old home of Toronto from Bologna. We ate in the Portuguese cafe where they served me a matcha latte, disappointedly from a sweetened (ugh) mix. This friend is one of the few I have that seems to drift through life, as I have, letting the waves carry you along while you make decisions based on the scenery and the weather. No forward plans, not really. I’m not sure this has served me.

She has talked for some years now about moving from Bologna and she’s now thinking perhaps the Azores (she’s from Macau so has a connection with Portugal) or Bolivia. I envy her the ability to even think about this. I talked to Krish about how the single woman I know are usually keen to have a relationship but, when it comes down to it, they love being able to make their own decisions, without conferring with anyone else. I’m a tolerant and cooperative person but this sounds perfect in some ways.

I went into the Dollarama to buy a paintbox and a sketchbook, partly to finish a birthday project for Krish (it’s TODAY!) and partly to have something more creative to do from the balcony than blow bubbles.

Out on the street lady yelled at me angrily when I took this photo. What was in my view was one group of homeless people on the corner. They gather here on each corner and across the road daily. I told her ‘I take photos every day.’ She raged on

The weather was very warm and stiflingly humid. In my haste to get back and cool off, I forgot I promised to get cilantro to make mango salad and cold spicy tofu today.

Last night I took hours to watch a video on how to make a ‘paper dancing man’ – I watched it over and over, stopping it and cursing the large Pause button that covered my view of the instructional video, and I made about six, all of which failed. I wondered then worried about the state of my brain or at least the wiring that made it so impossible to translate what’s in front of me to an actual creation. How can I even pretend to be an artist when this is the case? I seem to manage really, but my dolls were the first thing that I could just create without getting tangled up in directions, left or right, purl or plain, up or down, which way to turn this, how will it look when I turn it inside out? This morning I got up and pretty much breezed through my final and acceptable version. Then I wrapped the little present, started on some applique tissue design on the outside and wrote the card with more applique hearts made from Post-Its. Needs must.

Why such trouble with the dancing man? What goes on during the journey from brain to hands? I shared the video with my brother and sister, over Messenger – as a test – could they do it to see how long it would take. My sister was characteristcally quiet and my brother (who I knew would spring to the task) left the chat and came back within about five minutes with a video of his creation. Well, damn! Anyway, here’s the video that shows you how. Want to try it?

Hurricane Beryl is passing through. The intemittent rain has been heavy, the sky has been mostly leaden. There have been a couple of very windy periods with some huge rain.

The rain was a loud, heavy and furious curtain

We stayed indoors and even our plans to go out for dinner were foiled, so we will go out tomorrow instead. We planned where and when and that’s almost the entire battle around here. The plans were not foiled by the weather but rather the inability to choose where to go. This is far from new. It happens all the time.

Krish went for food and I finished up the present wrapping, and made a bunch of salads for lunch, including the mango salad now that Krish had bought the cilantro. We ate on the balcony and somehow didn’t get wet.

Birthday lunch – beet, squash and orange salad, baba ganouj, cold spiced tofu, mango salad and naan. We ate on the balcony and the meal was fun

I listened to more of The Giver of Stars and managed to nap. The book is good – it’s about an English woman who is living in Kentucky with a new husband who has never touched her. She gets hired into a new visiting library scheme in the Kentucky mountains and this will change her life – I’m already sure of it. Jojo Moyes manages to write love stories where the romance isn’t the only focus. Strangely, this is rare, and makes the story feel more real.

My gift was a success – as predicted, the wrapping was the biggest success. So I’m going to try to draw and paint more. Little things and maybe more paper crafts. They feel disposable, a bonus these days.

The gift-wrapped box, in which the robot toys were, and my final and only successful paper dancing man.

I think about my discarded arts and crafts supplies, though. I’m pleased I was able to pass them along to someone in Hackney, but sometimes I look over to see them here and they’re gone. I took a lot of pleasure in gathering those things – the fabrics, from donations, from remnants in the fabric store in Stoke Newington, cut from old clothes found in charity shops. Then there was the lace, the buttons, the beads and brooches, the felt, the embroidery threads, colourful and some metallic. The pipe cleaners and glue gun and fake flowers to pull apart to make skirts for the little Day of the Dead and the Christmas peg dolls. The paints and the pencils and who knows what else. It will be a challenge to collect a new box or three. Looking forward to that.

Meanwhile, it’s Toronto, it’s Parkdale, it’s Hurricane Beryl leftovers and it’s Krishna’s birthday and it’s been a pretty good day.

11th July 202411th July 2024

In which I try a new direction – back in Parkdale

Monday, 8 July, 2024

(Does that sound Dickensian? Bronteish? Not sure.)

At any rate, I went out for a short while today, just ordinary errand running, and it occurred to me that I’m waiting for something big to post here. Maybe that’s not necessary and it means weeks go by where ‘nothing big’ happens or things seem bleak and I can’t bring myself to put it into writing – it might feel too real or put people off, but it’s still my life and I can’t really imagine a day when I don’t see or do something that makes the day easier. So here we go, me deciding to blog no matter what, when I want, and…have I said this before?

Today I felt determined and made a To Do list. I had little work and a full day ahead, a day that promised to be very hot with the usual humidity so I didn’t have or want to commit to very much.

We are in a loft condo. When we took the place we saw it as a one-month stop gap. When we moved in, we were not at all happy but that balcony and shower sold me in the end and after a month our landlord gave it to us off of Airbnb – always a plus.

Our loft building on Brock Street. Our balcony is towards the back, five floors up

The electrical box in front of our building has elephants. They feel like friends but guards

There are two bedrooms – one is empty and we are storing things there. There are two bathrooms – one with a tub, which has become Krish’s and the other (en suite) is quite far the nicest walk-in shower I’ve had anywhere and that’s mine. The kitchen and living room are open-plan. The kitchen is small. but there’s an island at least or there’d be no counter space at all. The living room is narrow and is saved by French floor-to-ceiling doors leading to the balcony spanning the living room space. There are no curtains and it opens the space and the view. And I like the view – in this immediate area it’s all houses and nothing tall (except this building at seven floors) and the trees are higher than the houses, so from up here there are trees in every direction. There are birds and my birdsong app says they are mostly sparrows and cardinals. I haven’t seen the latter yet. Krish has shown me hawks (two circling each other at times) in the sky. They never land.

We are back in Parkdale again, this time a bit further east (closer to downtown by three or four streetcar stops). I like this area better than the first. We have a greengrocer, a five-minute walk away, something that other places have lacked. And Krish has easier access to all the supermarkets he likes to visit. So all in all, despite a bit of a rough landing in this place, we’ve found it works well. If only the streetcars weren’t in such a mess, but that’s another story.

A homemade quick chicken pho for lunch on the balcony

I walked along the street opposite, admiring the overgrown gardens, to the next main road. It was a hot 30-degree, 55% humidity day. First a visit to the post office where I was delighted to find no queue. Next a visit to the greengrocer – an Alphonso mango, three limes, and two Ontario pickling cucumbers for a salad. Krish and I are trying to stay within a fasting period. We’ll see how it goes.

I folded clothes, filed papers, worked an hour, sent in my timesheet to be paid in a couple of weeks, and listened to the final 90 minutes of my audiobook House by Christina Lauren. A very odd book – boy meets girl, boy lives in a house that’s ‘alive’ – it takes care of him and always has, until he meets girl and jealousy takes over and tries to entrap him and kill her. Yes, that’s odd but interesting. All done. And now I start Giver of Stars by Jojo Moyes, my new favourite author.

I’m always looking for the overgrown wild gardens

31st July 20233rd August 2023

Toronto Old Town

Saturday, 29 July, 2023

It’s nice when there’s a not-so-hot day in Toronto during the summer. Krish was off for his phototherapy and we said we would meet afterwards. This takes some discussion about where we will go, but we settled on King Street East without much of a plan other than Krish mentioning the amazing almond croissants that we’d had some years ago (it was closed that day – a Wednesday) a possible pizza place and perhaps go into Toronto’s First Post Office.

I started my journey and changed to the College streetcar. This is now familiar to me. I love the Alice mural and I had a bit of a wait – also becoming too familiar. There was a lovely smell of baking nearby and I wandered over to a small bakery – Janelle’s and Southern Accent. The latter has meaning to me. The restaurant Southern Accent was undoubtedly my very favourite in town. It was Cajun and Creole and the owner prided himself on having taken the staff down to New Orleans every year to make sure they knew what the food was supposed to taste like. Later in New Orleans myself I didn’t have any food like it, but then I couldn’t get Cajun food so I won’t know how alike they might have been. Southern Accent had a lovely vibe – dark with coloured lights over the bar, cosy with two floors and some nice private alcoves with curtains to draw, with a Zydeco backing track. The server would come and explain the dishes, help you choose, and then bring them to you, always smiling. And it was delicious. Like most places, it fell on harder times, the menu shifted a bit and then the street was redeveloped. They moved, but never made a real success in their new spot. Portions had become smaller, more expensive, and the vibe just wasn’t there – none of it.

However, Janelle was pleased I was buying the spices. I asked her why Southern Accent. She said that they had been her neighbours, hadn’t survived the pandemic, but had befriended her. Good thing too. Janelle was also pleased to hear me ask about her still-warm scones. ‘I’m known for my scones,’ she told me with that broad Toronto accent where the ‘o’ sounds are different. I vowed to go back, ate the scone at the streetcar stop until my ride showed up.

Each time I come to College and Ossington I see the Alice mural. It remains the best street art in the city for me. I want more like this

Scone and some blackening spice from Janelle’s

After meeting we started off at Queen Street. I wanted to take a look at the construction for the Ontario Line there. Things are fenced off and there are ‘guards’ around but no work was going on. This is going to take a long, long time to complete – estimate is 4.5 years but no one expects this to stick. It’s the latest transport controversy for Toronto, and there are many of them.

We also took a little detour into the Eaton Centre. Those flying geese overhead looked lovely but my photos just won’t capture the detail no matter how much I play with editing. It feels like this flock of sixty has been flying up there to who knows where for a very long time. Flightstop was installed in 1979 and was crafted by Canadian artist Michael Snow.

We don’t walk east that often. Yonge Street is the major divide in Toronto. Streets that run off from there are numbered at zero and there’s East and West. Like most cities there are people who love one side of town and those who love the other. I’m a West person in Toronto (East in London, but you knew that). But this time we headed east to see what we could see.

Love a ghost sign. I looked it up and Loew’s was a theatre chain back in the early 1900s. This sign at Queen and Victoria, on the Elgin Theatre, had deteriorated but in 2022 it was restored to its original appearance

I was struck by the two spires so close together. At the front is the Metropolitan United Church (The Met, founded in 1818 as a small wooden chapel and now relocated here to open in 1872. It has a special recognition for its acceptance of all genders) and at the back St Michael’s Cathedral Basilica

Not sure how clear this is but the gate of the church is in the form of two stone churches

A close up example of facadism in the making. The piece of building at the front is the old Richard Bigley building staying up at what will be Richard Bigley Lofts. I wonder what Richard, who sold the Happy Thought line of stoves (“‘Grate’ Happiness at Home” promised an 1885 ad in the Globe newspaper)

I asked Krish if he thought there was more construction going on in London or here in Toronto. He thought Toronto probably had. Anyone know? We were looking at a pizza place but it wasn’t open yet, the sun was shining down at full force now and we just moved along.
Continue reading “Toronto Old Town”

19th July 2023

Toronto Necropolis

Tuesday, 18 July, 2023

Some years ago I went on a Toronto cemetery tour to visit during Black History Month. It sounded interesting because we would be visiting the graves of prominent black Canadians and abolitionists. I learned a lot and I liked how the areas where most of these graves were had a casual feel, like a local village graveyard. It was on my list to visit again and, since my brother and his wife were in town, it seemed a good place for a touring suggestion.

I think his photos are better than mine, but I haven’t stolen them. I have instead stolen some history for my captions – begging forgiveness for that theft. Think of it as flattery. My brother, John, is my loyal reader and editor and today he’s my unknowing co-blogger.

I wish I had a better memory or had done more research before going this time. I couldn’t find a single grave from that BHM tour. Many of these graves are just markers, as you’ll see.

The cemetery is the Toronto Necropolis. From John’s notes: “The Toronto Necropolis opened in 1850 to replace the Potter’s Field (the Strangers’ Burying Ground) which had been since 1825 the first non-sectarian burying ground in the town. The chapel, lodge, and lych-gate were built in 1872. The crematorium here opened in 1933 as the first in Ontario — 32 years after Canada’s first cremation, in Montreal.” Interesting that it really wasn’t that long ago and this puts some perspective on how very recently the immigration from the south by the underground railroad actually was.

Toronto may pride itself on its multiculturalism and ability to live alongside many cultures, but racism is real here. Some of the stories, while stirring, were stories of immense courage amidst prejudice. I probably shouldn’t talk too much about something I can’t even show here, but despite not finding the graves, I felt their presence during my walk.

It was a very hot day and the cemetery is a good walk from the bus, but we made it, passing through Cabbagetown with its many beautiful houses. Around the cemetery they seem particularly picturesque and for some reason I don’t seem to have taken many photos. Was it the heat? My phone battery? Did they not ‘click’?

1866 Gothic Revival house on Sumach Street. The exterior has been made ‘quieter’ since several years ago when it had 18 different trim colours. Gothic Revival is a very popular style in Cabbagetown

Park Cafe on Sumach Street. I was tempted by ice cream but avoided the calories This doesn’t look like a city cafe at all

John and I were amused by these two signs so close together. It felt like we’d walked for a while and there was another long hot road to get along now

This is the very lovely chapel at the entrance. It was built in 1872 in the Gothic Revival style popular throughout this area.

Looking east from the chapel and just past the lych-gate is the caretaker’s cottage, which I somehow missed photographing

Enter through the lych-gate, where the coffins would be set and later brought through for the burial. Lych is an old word for a dead body

More than 50,000 people are buried here. The graves are somewhat haphazardly placed, which adds to the atmosphere of this cemetery, one of Toronto’s oldest. There are some notable people in this place, although most are known only to Canadians: Anderson Ruffin Abbott, the first Black surgeon born in Canada, honoured to be part of the medical team that tended the fatally wounded American president Abraham Lincoln on the night of April 14–15, 1865 – his house was on the street where we lived in Parkdale; and Peter Matthews and Samuel Lount, the rebels hanged for their part in the Mackenzie rebellion of 1837. You’ll also find George Brown (one of the Fathers of Confederation and founder of what is now The Globe and Mail, and whose name graces one of Toronto’s best known colleges) and Joseph Bloore (a fierce looking man, who founded Yorkville Village. One of Toronto’s main streets, Bloor Street, is named for him.) The first person to be buried here was Andrew Porteous. The cemetery’s registry says that his body was stored in the “Dead House” until it was buried on May 22, 1850. He had been Toronto’s first postmaster. You won’t find his grave easily. It’s been eroded over time so that only the base remains.

The cemetery seems orderly compared to the last one I saw in London (Abney Park), but it has an intimate feel

I’m going to guess these are cremated remains. This marker looks very different to the others in here, almost like a catalogue

It really was a hot day. I hadn’t brought any water. I had wandered over to the back of the cemetery to see if there was any sign of the graves from my last visit and I looked to see houses I’d remembered from that time too. Only they weren’t there. My memory must be faulty, or I was too hot and tired to wander to another corner to discover them. Walking back towards the entrance, there was a tap. A man in a wheelchair was filling up his water bottle and I remarked that he knew all the good places. He winked and said he did, and this was his favourite filling station. I managed to get a nice, cold drink before we walked on.

Can’t finish this without talking about how much I love the old, rough grave markers. I hope I’m not alone in that. Most of the graves have become anonymous, the engraved letters long since worn down. There’s a sadness but also serenity in that.

The way in is also the way out, so I had to stop cursing about retracing my steps and get on with it. Across the road is the Riverdale Farm, with its animals. There were some cute pigs. A child asked an attendant what sort of pigs they were. ‘Tamworth,’ she answered. Without even thinking, I remembered a lovely meal at the Smoking Goat in Shoreditch and said that ‘their meat was delicious.’ I don’t think John will ever quite forgive me for uttering such blasphemy ‘in front of a child no less.’

Suitably told off, I walked with him back to the main road, passing many houses that will fall under the ‘things I didn’t photograph’ category. Each garden was green and full of colourful, often wild, flowers. At the main road, Parliament, we chose our route home and had to wait some time for a bus to arrive. I took the opportunity to buy a cold drink and linger much longer than was polite in the air conditioned shop. A scorcher in Toronto and our tour was done.

5th July 20235th July 2023

The Danforth – Greektown, Toronto

Monday, 3 July, 2023

Many years ago I crossed the bridge over the Don Valley Parkway to see what was there. Bloor Street becomes Danforth Avenue here and everyone calls it The Danforth. At the very start of Danforth Avenue I saw a Greek restaurant and in I went. What I remember was that I was the only woman in there. There were groups of men sitting with coffees and smoking (that’s how long ago it was, smoking…). I hadn’t much of a clue about Greek food so I asked the server what I should order. He led me into a small kitchen and started to tell me what was simmering in each pot. I loved this experience and didn’t have it again until I went to Porto a dozen years ago or so. It was just as thrilling then.

I remember I chose a lamb stew with artichokes and lemon. I also ordered a Greek salad (sounds like a lot of food now, but I was keen to try things) which arrived as juicy red tomatoes, red onion, cucumber, black olives, and topped with fresh feta cheese and an oregano dressing. No Greek meal I’ve had since then has measured up or even pleased me, although years later I found a place near College and Yonge Street who grilled calamari perfectly. So yes, this blog starts and ends with food.

I don’t really remember walking along the Danforth much after that. It got the name Greektown for the people who lived there. This was once the biggest Greektown in North America, and although the Greek population and Greek-run business have declined, people of Greek descent are still the largest ethnic group here. The Greater Toronto Area (GTA) boasts about 2% of its total population are Greek, the highest concentration in Canada. If you’ve seen the original My Big Fat Greek Wedding, you’ll have seen the neighbourhood masquerading as Chicago’s Greektown.

What I remember for the most part about the area is the Playter Estate where my sister shared a tiny apartment while still in art college (grand houses), a lovely fancy grocery store that I couldn’t find on this new visit, and a very popular little mall with a good health food store called Carrot Common that I didn’t visit this time either. I’ve been along this street a bit, but it’s never been an area that I was desperate to visit. Here it was 2023 and it felt like it was time to go back and see what changes there were.

I didn’t see any reference to why Danforth Avenue is known as The Danforth, so fill me in if you know. I did find out that it’s named after Asa Danforth Jr., who was originally commissioned to build a route that headed east from Scarborough towards Trenton in the 1850s. At first it was known as Danforth’s Road and was well used until nearby Kingston Road became the more popular passage between Toronto and destinations to the east.

We got out at Chester Station and walked over to the main street. It’s an easy journey just one train all the way from the bottom of our city block right across Bloor Street until it becomes the Danforth. The subway line is called the Bloor-Danforth Line and stretches from west to east right across metro Toronto.

I had two goals – to find the grocery store and to find some grilled calamari that was as good as that College Street version. Food! Greektown is about food, it’s true for most people. As usual, I set my goal low knowing that it would be warm and it would be more walking than I could easily manage. I hoped there were benches.

We arrived at Chester Station, ready to explore

The Danforth looked bright and clean. It felt like a bit of a treat to be walking along this obviously more well-heeled area

Although I didn’t find my fancy grocery store, I did find Rowe Farms so we browsed and came out with nothing

These butchery displays always remind me of Spain. In Rowe Farms

Does the area look Greek? Well, some of it does, I suppose. But then I’ve never been to Greece. A Greek friend who saw the street sign photo was very puzzled. ‘Why,’ she said, ‘it says Logan Avenue in Greek. Why? Where is this?’ So I needed to explain that this was common in Toronto – for street signs in ethnic areas to be displayed in both languages.

My first glimpse of anything European didn’t look Greek at all but this Italianate bell tower a short distance away. It surprised me

The area on and around Logan Avenue has luxurious views. At the Danforth it starts at Alexander the Great Parkette with its ATG statue and fountain, columns and flowers. Built in 1994 it’s considered to epitomise ‘the local flavour’. The streets then branch northwards into the Playter Estates, an area to consider for a cooler day’s stroll.

This vista was somewhat breathtaking to me, really. I wished I had the leg power to walk down the entire street. Green, sumptuous and I suppose wealthy

Another view of the same street. The first one must be very small in your view

We kept walking along the street and met some construction. Roadworks are plaguing Toronto and creating many transit diversions, but the Danforth has a subway and no bus so it’s a bit less of a bother. We got closer to the Italianate church and visited the faithful Dollarama, window shopping along the way. We were finally getting hungry, but hadn’t seen anything that beckoned us in.

Sign across the road right where the construction was. The street hosts the Taste of the Danforth each year in mid August. Traffic will be halted and the street will be full of Greek food and celebration

The most impressive building is definitely the church whose bell tower I had spotted earlier. It’s a Catholic church called Holy Name, established on September 11, 1913. In August 1914, construction of a proper church began only to be interrupted when, that same month, World War I was declared. They could do no more than lay the great cornerstone on November 14. Services were held in the basement, the only completed part of the building, until in 1921 a hall was built, then in March 1926 the main church was finally finished and opened. Today the church conducts services for the African Catholic community along with its other services.

A bit annoyed that I didn’t take more photos Holy Name church (the one with the bell tower). It was quite majestic.

Billboards along the street

I’d done some research into where you could get good grilled calamari and nothing had looked like it could promise more. So we retraced our steps when the way ahead seemed to thin out from interesting shops and sights. At first we went into a place just to see what they might offer but it felt too formal and fancy, so we went to the place I’d read about. No room on the patio so we went inside. If a place can be judged by how busy it was, this would be OK or better.

The busy patio where we ate lunch. It was more casual here

Dips as a starter. Taramasalata, hummus, tzatziki, baba ganouj

Grilled calamari with onions and a lemon wedge

OK. So the review. The dips were OK, and the pita was pita. Compared to our dips at the Paramount, the dish fell short. As soon as the calamari arrived, I knew I’d be disappointed. There was no charring. This looked bland and tasted that way too. It seems fresh onions or leeks were normal with this dish. We ate it because it was in front of us. No more than that. My favourite lamb chop recipe is a Greek Canadian one from Toronto chef Christine Cushing. I’d replicated it in the land of cheaper Lamb (UK) and it was always perfect – thanks, Christine for the video lesson. This chop wasn’t as good as the one I’ve made myself, so although it was nice to have it, I always prefer when I buy something better than I can do myself at home. So this meal gets a 4/10. Sorry! (Yeah, I’m a harsh critic but it’s my money after all.)

We walked a little bit after our meal, over to Broadview Avenue at the beginning of the Danforth. We considered ice cream, rejected it, admired Danforth Church from afar, and were ready to go. My legs were done, and so was our visit to the Danforth.