Chapter 7: Midway Point

Mini Journal

I haven’t written a mini journal in a little while. To review, I write these ‘Mini Journals’ when I have little tidbits of information to share but couldn’t fit them into the main ‘chapter’.

Last week we got a tour of the EA Games and Bioware headquarters here in Montreal. It was very interesting and even a little bit fun, but I can’t tell you what I saw in there! The reasoning behind the secrecy is basically that these companies exert a lot of time and money into their ideas, so a very idea becomes a commodity, and if a competing company learns about their inner workings, all sorts of copyright infringement battles could go down and it wouldn’t be pretty. So, I can’t say what games I saw in progress, but I can say we were assured that the game industry in Montreal is doing well right now.

Also, last night I went to “Sunday Night Improv” (free for the Champlain group) and enjoyed an evening of hilarious made-up stuff! I also learned that any one can join their practices, for free, and partake in their improve workshops every Sunday night. Why did no one tell me this earlier? I love improv! I want to go now… In other words, if you’re interested in Theatre, here’s a spot for you!

Chapter 7

Midterms

I can’t believe we’re already at midterms! This always seems to happen; school starts and then the next day you’re taking your first midterm!

Actually, midterms haven’t quite begun yet. We’re just starting to study and/or prepare for them in my Earth Sci and Canadian Culture classes, and we don’t exactly have an actual ‘midterm’ in the 3D Animation class. In Concept Painting, we’ve been working on our midterm since last week- it’s one finished illustration of a scene of our choosing.

Then again, I shouldn’t be too surprised by the arrival of midterms. I am on blog number 7 after all, and if there are 15 weeks in the semester then as a matter of math we are almost halfway through the Fall. We’ve had a lot of work so far, but we’ve had a lot of fun, too.

In fact, just this weekend, we went to the botanical gardens for the Chinese lantern festival. We went at night so it was a tad nippy but the garden was all lit up with colorful lanterns shaped like zodiac creatures or dancing people. The insectarium was open, too, but I didn’t go in there.

Spiders and I… we don’t get along. I did hear exciting stories about said spiders, however, from my friend Dan (who often donates his photos to this blog). Apparently, one of displays had ‘these GIANT tarantulas’ in it which were up against the glass, and as people leaned down to look at nearby Black Widows, they didn’t even notice the tarantulas! He said they also had a display with those spiders that wait under ‘trap doors’ for prey to wander by, and the class bisected the spider’s den so you could see it waiting for a nearby cricket. Actually, I’m sorta glad I didn’t go…

Anyway, there were a lot of people at the garden that night, but I guess the lantern display was coming to an end soon, so the last-minute folks were coming to see it. There’s a pumpkin carving show or display of some kind coming up, too, on account of Halloween, which might be fun to go see, too.

Speaking of Halloween, the UQAM res hall is officially decked out as of last night. They put up paper skeletons and everything orange, black, and cob-webby all over the lobby, so it feels much more festive around here these days. I have my costume all ready, personally, and several of my friends are getting theirs together. I’m really looking forward to Halloween up here, so I hope it’s fun!

Then again, so far pretty much everything we’ve done up here has been fun, so I think I needn’t worry much. I guess I’m taking this blog to reflect on the past seven weeks (which have FLOWN by like a jet) as is often customary of events with both a midpoint and narrator. I’m looking forward to the remainder of my stay here, but I don’t want to even think about the end of it yet. Our next big excursion is the Ottawa City trip, so I’ll certainly have a lot to write then. For now, the leaves are changing and the weather’s getting colder and I have plenty of work to keep me busy.

Chapter 6: It’s “ka-BECK”

This past weekend a group of 16 Champlain Students, plus one Activity Coordinator, took a trip to Quebec City!



The way I’ve described the part of the city to friends and family since visiting is ‘it’s like they sawed out a huge chunk of a piece of an old European city and dropped it in North America”. We spent our weekend in Old Quebec, which is still walled in the way it has been since the original French settlers set up camp generations ago.
The streets in this area are still almost entirely cobblestone, aside from some main roads, and almost all the buildings are stone, brick, or stucco. There are cobblestone courtyards with monuments in their centers, an old fort with a main building called the Citadel, the Chateau Frontenac, and out-of-commission cannons at every convenient location. Like I said, right out of Europe.

It’s about a three hour ride by bus from Montreal to Quebec city, but it felt like less than that to me. The bus ticket was included in the cost of attendance, which was $120 Canadian or $100 US, as was the cost of our room for two nights, all our meals, and the various tours in which we took part. However, we were definitely treated to much more than what we paid. We stayed at an amazingly nice youth hostel called “Auberge International de Jeunesse,” which was basic but very clean and accommodating. Our rooms included two good continental breakfasts (your choice of tea, coffee, juice, yogurt, toast, bagel, apple, hard boiled egg and/or cereal), and I don’t think there was a single complaint about the hostel. (We loved the showers!)

On the first day, some friends and I took a walk up to the old fort walls and climbed around up there for a couple hours. As we were all in the Game major, there was many a comment about whether or not the old fort would serve as a good level in a game, existing or potential. The general consensus was no, because, as one of the guys pointed out, game levels are designed to be balanced; this fort was designed so the people inside would win. After walking around on the walls, we found a look out point over the St. Lawrence Straight with a path of stairs that led down around the face of the fort. Harbored in the river were the two largest cruise ships I’ve ever seen. They were essentially floating city blocks. Later that night, we went on a ‘Ghost Tour’ of old Quebec, where we were led around the area by a costumed guide with a lantern who told us old tales of murder and ghosts in the city. There was already a strong ‘Halloween’ air in Quebec, so I’d love to come back for the 31st.

During our stay we visited the Museum of Civilization, le Chateau Frontenac, the old French Parliament, the monument to Samuel de Champlain, and went on many little ‘side-quests’ of our own devising. There were many shops, most of them for tourists but some unique, and a definite feeling of ‘European’ throughout. I’d love to return again some day and see more of the city, outside Old Quebec, even if it isn’t for Halloween.

PS: Many thanks to Stefi for organizing this trip and taking us on a fun weekend adventure!!

Chapter 5: It’s On Their Five Dollar Bill

This Sunday, the 27^th, was the opening home game for the Montreal Juniors at the Verdun Auditorium. And to help us become more culturally immersed, Champlain bought us all tickets to the game. The hockey game, that is.

In America, football and baseball are pretty much the two big sports, depending on the time of year. In Canada, it’s hockey. Hockey is like football and baseball rolled into one; they sing the national anthem in the beginning like in baseball, but then the players beat each other up like in football. There’s an image of kids playing hockey on the Canadian 5$ bill for crying out loud. Although, as we learned in our Canadian Culture Through the Fine Arts class, the official national sport of Canada is actually the precursor to hockey, lacrosse. I betcha didn’t know that, did ya?

So, a whole bunch of us, if not all of us, went to the game on Sunday and I think it’s fair to say we all had a good time. I sat with some of my friends in one section, and others were assigned to a different section. Our teacher was in that other section and my friend Michaela said that during the game he explained about the history of the team, the players, and even what was going on in the game. The announcements were in French and English, but it was so loud in the auditorium that they could have all been in Greek. It really was loud in there, too. They passed out these inflatable noisemakers, music played whenever the game clock wasn’t running, and everyone was shouting or laughing or, when a fight broke out, hooting. Between periods (three periods in hockey) they entertained the audience with a brief game of what I called ‘Tiny Hockey’ where young players probably about eight years old came out onto the rink in over-sized jerseys and played a short game of their own. Very cute.

There were only two fights at our game since, as I was told, the college-level hockey community is trying to cut back on the amount of on-rink violence. The crowds love it, but it’s a matter of player safety. At our game, I almost couldn’t help but wonder if the fights weren’t somehow planned to liven things up.

The game had all the things one expects from a modern sports event. Young women with over-priced beer for sale, excited employees throwing rolled-up tee-shirts to equally excited spectators, blasts of catchy popular music and game music, a video projection on one wall, 1$ hotdogs, burgers, and poutine (fries in gravy with cheese – so good), and a big fuzzy mascot of a raccoon bouncing around the stands and posing for photos with little kids. I can’t help but wonder- did we learn this from them or did they learn it from us? I always thought sports events like this were an American tradition, but did it simultaneously develop in Canada? Or did they just learn it from us recently?

It was sort of an overcast day, but you’d never know it in the auditorium. The Montreal Juniors lost 3 – 1 to the visiting team, so the local fans were disappointed, but we Champlainers were just cheering for whoever had the puck.