Hotdogs and History
Bonjour tout le monde!
The end of my second semester of graduate school is almost here. I've finished two of three classes, done all of my grading, and turn in my last paper on Monday, May 1. McGill Philosophy has an extension process built into the graduate system allowing for students an entire year to finish their year's worth of coursework. As a result, finishing an entire semester within that semester is essentially unheard of. Students more often take at least one extension, possibly two, in any particular semester. According to plan, on Monday I'll be officially finishing all of my winter term within the deadlines assigned for winter term. But lest the workload kill me before then, I thought I'd write an update now.
It's been a weird year. To try and cope with the stress and celebrate the fact that I finally finished a thirteen inch stack of grading for the end of the Intro to Philosophy class I TA'd, I was watching a movie this evening. During a break in the drama I looked around my apartment living room and thought how weird it is that I'm even here. It's like I can't remember the year well enough to believe I've been here eight, almost nine, months. Turns out a year of graduate school takes as long as trying to have a baby. And at the end of either a woman is both relived and surprised its actually time.
In an attempt to prove to myself that the year has really passed I thought I'd give a quick list of the major accomplishments or events that have gone by here in Montreal and at McGill:
August:
Rachel and I loaded up a U-Haul van on August 6th, 2005 in Flagstaff, Arizona and arrived here in Montreal, Quebec, Canada 5 days later having driven 2480.1 miles.
August 25 I turned 31.
August 31 Rachel started French school and then spent every morning for a month crying her way there, and every evening begging not to go back.
September:
At the beginning of September my graduate school courses began.
Due to a delay in paperwork, I went two months without getting paid any of my fellowship money from McGill, effectively without any income what so ever until October.
October:
In October we flew back to Alaska for 10 days to celebrate Rachel's sixth birthday with family and friends.
We got back and promptly got sick. But after the break Rachel stopped crying about school, started making friends, and started speaking French.
November:
A distant but dear cousin in Alaska died suddenly.
Two days later I had to teach a two-hour class on material written by one of the two professors teaching the class.
December:
At the beginning of December I completed my first class in graduate school and took an extension on the other two (they both have to be finished by August 30).
Rachel and I flew back to Alaska for the month of December.
January:
On January 2 I returned to McGill, starting classes the same day, feeling very tired but figured it was just the flight. It wasn't. It was shingles.
The shingles lasted six-weeks and for several of the weeks I could be up for no more than five hours a day. Five hours a day was just my class schedule most days.
February:
I recovered from shingles in time for our week-long winter break during which time I read at least eight hours a day trying to catch up.
Rachel got introduced to the music of Neil Young as we went to see his recent documentary.
I woke up from Neil Young with strep throat and had it for two weeks.
March:
Immediately after recovering from strep throat I taught an 80-minute class for a senior seminar on 19th century political philosophy.
The sun finally came out again.
My parents came to visit for a week and then returned to Alaska with Rachel so that I could have a chance at finishing my semester.
April:
I completed my first round of TA'ing, which included teaching a conference (in the states basically called a discussion section) twice a week. My professor observed my teaching giving me positive reviews.
Classes ended April 6.
I completed a course in Meta-Logic and a course in Marx's political philosophy.
May:
On May 1, I'll complete a course in Spinoza's political philosophy.
Then on May 10, I'll fly to Flagstaff to help my friend Christine celebrate the completion of her Master's degree in Linguistics along with our friend Melissa, who will be flying in from Georgia for a mini-reunion. Flagstaff needs to hold on to itself. All three of us will be completing a rough year of having to survive our separation from each other while living on different corners of the continent and suffering through with graduate-level academic persistence. We might get a little rackus.
May 15 I fly to Alaska.
It's been a crazy year.
Rachel is doing amazingly well. I miss her a lot and things here without her feel a lot like a crazy non-life, just living in the mind of ideas. Now that the sun seems to be staying out at least a couple days at a time I'm trying to ride my bicycle and walk outside. My grading of exams was completed in the sunshine. Yesterday Rachel read to me several books she had written herself. She's in Kindergarten but is starting to read now. She's been ready for a long time but shifting her attention to French pronunciation distracted her from it for a while. It turns out her time in English school in Alaska has been good for her. She's started reading and she's counting in 5's and 10's now too.
Rachel and I expect to stay in Anchorage for the summer. In July we'll be taking care of my dear niece Mari for a couple of weeks while the rest of my family returns to Bristol Bay for their annual commercial fishing season. Anchorage is full of family and long term family friends. The mountains have a reliable way of hugging the city and hushing things down to a space of quiet. The sky is full of big birds--ravens and bald eagles. And the flats in front of my parents house are home to nesting herons, moose, and the occasional brown bear or coyote, all right on the edge of the city. I expect we'll be eating a lot of salmon. And I'll return to making bread and pie and remembering I like cooking things like dinner and lunch. Several friends of mine are pregnant or just had babies. It's fun to see these little families starting as I return to being there with mine.
To give you a few unique Montreal tidbits, here are some things I found out recently.
Montreal has no coin operated newspaper dispensers. To purchase a paper you have to go into a store and pay the cashier. Street vendors selling food are illegal here and have been for around 60 years. In the entire city of Montreal there is only one food cart salesman. He's a steamed nut vendor that sets up regularly in front of the enormous department store Le Baie in downtown Montreal. The city tried to shut him down but he had identified a hole in the legal system pointing out that the law only actually made the selling of MEATS from carts illegal. In 2002 the people of Montreal tried to have the law overturned and many were heard walking around the city yelling, "We need hotdogs! We need hotdogs!" But the cautious local city officials refused to budge. Apparently Montreal had a long history of horse-drawn cart vendors starting as far back as the 1890's selling milk, bread, ice and, ever popular with Montrealers, fries. But hotdogs got singled out as a serious health code concern in 1947 when a Dr. Hood submitted an official report to a hygiene commission subcommittee arguing that the hotdog vendors were unsanitary, a cog in the traffic wheel, and too much competition for local restaurants. Jean Drapeau, a Canadian lawyer who became Montreal mayor first in the 50's and then again from the 60's to the late-80's (that's right, for over 30-years total), succeeded in constructing the Montreal Metro (subway) system, bringing the '67 World Expo and then the '76 Summer Olympics to the area and also in outlawing any and all sidewalk vendors and food carts. As a result, no hotdogs are sold on the streets of Montreal (you have to go inside and order them as a side to go with your Poutine as any good Quebecois person would) and there are no coin operated newspaper machines on the sidewalks either.
Enjoy your hotdogs you free living Americans!
All the best and lots of love,
Elaine
The end of my second semester of graduate school is almost here. I've finished two of three classes, done all of my grading, and turn in my last paper on Monday, May 1. McGill Philosophy has an extension process built into the graduate system allowing for students an entire year to finish their year's worth of coursework. As a result, finishing an entire semester within that semester is essentially unheard of. Students more often take at least one extension, possibly two, in any particular semester. According to plan, on Monday I'll be officially finishing all of my winter term within the deadlines assigned for winter term. But lest the workload kill me before then, I thought I'd write an update now.
It's been a weird year. To try and cope with the stress and celebrate the fact that I finally finished a thirteen inch stack of grading for the end of the Intro to Philosophy class I TA'd, I was watching a movie this evening. During a break in the drama I looked around my apartment living room and thought how weird it is that I'm even here. It's like I can't remember the year well enough to believe I've been here eight, almost nine, months. Turns out a year of graduate school takes as long as trying to have a baby. And at the end of either a woman is both relived and surprised its actually time.
In an attempt to prove to myself that the year has really passed I thought I'd give a quick list of the major accomplishments or events that have gone by here in Montreal and at McGill:
August:
Rachel and I loaded up a U-Haul van on August 6th, 2005 in Flagstaff, Arizona and arrived here in Montreal, Quebec, Canada 5 days later having driven 2480.1 miles.
August 25 I turned 31.
August 31 Rachel started French school and then spent every morning for a month crying her way there, and every evening begging not to go back.
September:
At the beginning of September my graduate school courses began.
Due to a delay in paperwork, I went two months without getting paid any of my fellowship money from McGill, effectively without any income what so ever until October.
October:
In October we flew back to Alaska for 10 days to celebrate Rachel's sixth birthday with family and friends.
We got back and promptly got sick. But after the break Rachel stopped crying about school, started making friends, and started speaking French.
November:
A distant but dear cousin in Alaska died suddenly.
Two days later I had to teach a two-hour class on material written by one of the two professors teaching the class.
December:
At the beginning of December I completed my first class in graduate school and took an extension on the other two (they both have to be finished by August 30).
Rachel and I flew back to Alaska for the month of December.
January:
On January 2 I returned to McGill, starting classes the same day, feeling very tired but figured it was just the flight. It wasn't. It was shingles.
The shingles lasted six-weeks and for several of the weeks I could be up for no more than five hours a day. Five hours a day was just my class schedule most days.
February:
I recovered from shingles in time for our week-long winter break during which time I read at least eight hours a day trying to catch up.
Rachel got introduced to the music of Neil Young as we went to see his recent documentary.
I woke up from Neil Young with strep throat and had it for two weeks.
March:
Immediately after recovering from strep throat I taught an 80-minute class for a senior seminar on 19th century political philosophy.
The sun finally came out again.
My parents came to visit for a week and then returned to Alaska with Rachel so that I could have a chance at finishing my semester.
April:
I completed my first round of TA'ing, which included teaching a conference (in the states basically called a discussion section) twice a week. My professor observed my teaching giving me positive reviews.
Classes ended April 6.
I completed a course in Meta-Logic and a course in Marx's political philosophy.
May:
On May 1, I'll complete a course in Spinoza's political philosophy.
Then on May 10, I'll fly to Flagstaff to help my friend Christine celebrate the completion of her Master's degree in Linguistics along with our friend Melissa, who will be flying in from Georgia for a mini-reunion. Flagstaff needs to hold on to itself. All three of us will be completing a rough year of having to survive our separation from each other while living on different corners of the continent and suffering through with graduate-level academic persistence. We might get a little rackus.
May 15 I fly to Alaska.
It's been a crazy year.
Rachel is doing amazingly well. I miss her a lot and things here without her feel a lot like a crazy non-life, just living in the mind of ideas. Now that the sun seems to be staying out at least a couple days at a time I'm trying to ride my bicycle and walk outside. My grading of exams was completed in the sunshine. Yesterday Rachel read to me several books she had written herself. She's in Kindergarten but is starting to read now. She's been ready for a long time but shifting her attention to French pronunciation distracted her from it for a while. It turns out her time in English school in Alaska has been good for her. She's started reading and she's counting in 5's and 10's now too.
Rachel and I expect to stay in Anchorage for the summer. In July we'll be taking care of my dear niece Mari for a couple of weeks while the rest of my family returns to Bristol Bay for their annual commercial fishing season. Anchorage is full of family and long term family friends. The mountains have a reliable way of hugging the city and hushing things down to a space of quiet. The sky is full of big birds--ravens and bald eagles. And the flats in front of my parents house are home to nesting herons, moose, and the occasional brown bear or coyote, all right on the edge of the city. I expect we'll be eating a lot of salmon. And I'll return to making bread and pie and remembering I like cooking things like dinner and lunch. Several friends of mine are pregnant or just had babies. It's fun to see these little families starting as I return to being there with mine.
To give you a few unique Montreal tidbits, here are some things I found out recently.
Montreal has no coin operated newspaper dispensers. To purchase a paper you have to go into a store and pay the cashier. Street vendors selling food are illegal here and have been for around 60 years. In the entire city of Montreal there is only one food cart salesman. He's a steamed nut vendor that sets up regularly in front of the enormous department store Le Baie in downtown Montreal. The city tried to shut him down but he had identified a hole in the legal system pointing out that the law only actually made the selling of MEATS from carts illegal. In 2002 the people of Montreal tried to have the law overturned and many were heard walking around the city yelling, "We need hotdogs! We need hotdogs!" But the cautious local city officials refused to budge. Apparently Montreal had a long history of horse-drawn cart vendors starting as far back as the 1890's selling milk, bread, ice and, ever popular with Montrealers, fries. But hotdogs got singled out as a serious health code concern in 1947 when a Dr. Hood submitted an official report to a hygiene commission subcommittee arguing that the hotdog vendors were unsanitary, a cog in the traffic wheel, and too much competition for local restaurants. Jean Drapeau, a Canadian lawyer who became Montreal mayor first in the 50's and then again from the 60's to the late-80's (that's right, for over 30-years total), succeeded in constructing the Montreal Metro (subway) system, bringing the '67 World Expo and then the '76 Summer Olympics to the area and also in outlawing any and all sidewalk vendors and food carts. As a result, no hotdogs are sold on the streets of Montreal (you have to go inside and order them as a side to go with your Poutine as any good Quebecois person would) and there are no coin operated newspaper machines on the sidewalks either.
Enjoy your hotdogs you free living Americans!
All the best and lots of love,
Elaine
posted by hawkbrwn at 2:25 p.m.
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