Toronto: October 14th-17th

 

Hello All!

 

Ozell and I are now in Toronto, Ontario.   For those of you wondering why we are in Toronto when we said we would be traveling through the southern hemisphere, it is because the airline alliance we are with for our around-the-world ticket only has Air Canada flying to Peru.  Toronto is Air Canada's hub.  The nice feature of the ticket is that if we are routed to another city in order to get to one of the cities listed on our formal itinerary, then we are permitted to stay in that layover city if we wish.  Since Ozell and I both had an interest in visiting Toronto sometime anyways, we were happy to stay a few days checking it out now.

 

We are also currently staying with Andrew who is a fellow "couchsurfer".  If you do not know what a "couchsurfer" is, then I suggest checking out www.couchsurfing.com when you have the chance.  You can find my profile under the user name:  pater_mulcahy and Ozell's under: etnaix.  Andrew has been a consummate host.  This is our first experience staying with a couchsurfer, and I am afraid that we may have been spoiled.  :)  I have been hosting fellow travelers in San Diego the last few years.

 

I also want to mention that Ozell and I have been technically homeless for over a week now.  A very kind friend, Greg, was generous enough to host us at his home in North Park the last five days we were in San Diego even though he is dealing with the consequences of a busted water heater.  Greg also found me a place to store my oil paintings and is looking after my car while we are gone.  We really appreciate your friendship and hospitality, Greg.  :)

 

Toronto has been very pleasant overall.  It is also nice to see all of the Fall colors and the crisp, but still quite pleasant, temperatures.  The city is clean and is also experiencing the urban residential revival that many cities have been experiencing- at least up until the mortgage and credit crisis in the States.   Here in Toronto, development appears to be unaffected.  If you ask yourself, "Why haven't I heard anything about Canadian banks failing when I know that American, European, and Asian banks are failing?", the answer is because here in Canada they actually have some banking regulations so their banks have remained quite solvent.  Imagine that!  BTW-  anyone who votes for McCain is a selfish or ignorant imbecile or extremely feeble minded and easily manipulated.  I personally don't know anyone who has verily benefited from the NeoCon agenda, and yet I know many who continue to vote against their own best interests because their pride and loyalty to the Republican party means more to them than their children's and grandchildren's future.   And no, I did not vote for Obama.  I voted for Cynthia McKinney because Obama has pissed me off with his capitulation to the NeoCons and Corporations on some key issues and because I know that McCain will not win California.  Personally, I would like to see 95% of our federally elected officials of both major parties imprisoned or executed depending on their personal responsibility for the destruction of our once great republic.  But enough of that...

 

Andrew, our host, took us around the first evening we were in Toronto to see some of the downtown landmarks like the St. Lawrence Market and the Flat Iron building which is smaller but older than the famous Flat Iron building in NYC.  The next day he showed us more of downtown including Yonge-Dundas Square, the Eaton Center, the old City Hall, and the new City Hall.  He then cut us loose, and Ozell and I walked pretty much around the entire perimeter of the downtown area.  We saw the financial district and Bay Street (their Wall Street), Queen Street West which is like OB or the Haight District in San Fran (this is the neighborhood I would probably choose to live in), Chinatown, the Ontario legislature building, and Church Street.  Church Street is somewhat funny to me because it is named for the numerous christian churches that line the street, but it is also the main street of Toronto's gay neighborhood.

 

We met back up with Andrew in the evening, and he treated us to a late dessert at RichTree Market restaurant.  This place was really cool.  It was a grocery store style buffet of all kinds of wonderful freshly made food:  pastries, soup, coffee, seafood, meet, vegetables, and pretty much everything in between.  I just had a glass of wine and a bowl of fresh berries covered in chocolate syrup.

 

After we were finished with that, Ozell and I met up with Miles (a guy we met in Cancun this past February who lives in Toronto) and his boyfriend, Kevin.  We met them at a club called The Barn which was a cool enough venue except for one major flaw.  This club had three floors.  Last night, the first floor was not open, but the second and third floors were.  Almost everyone stayed on the second floor, but I made my way up to the third floor a few times when I wanted to get a beer because the bar up there had no line.  That worked for a while, but then on my third trip for a beer up there, I was stopped and not allowed back down to the second floor where all of the action was.  For whatever reason, each of their floors has a maximum occupancy limit, and once the limit was reached on the second floor, they would only let people back down as other people came up.  Of course, no one wants to come up to the third floor because of this ridiculous policy, plus the bar was still letting people from outside come in so us on the third floor were doubly screwed.  It took me about an hour with only ten people ahead of me before I could get back downstairs.  This left very little time to enjoy myself before the bar closed, and I was in such a bad mood that I didn't want to be around Ozell or Miles and his bf.  I finally came out of it, but there is no doubt in my mind that is the worst design for crowd control in a bar that I have ever seen.  They had some disgusting drag queen with a megaphone trying to keep people's spirits up on the 3rd floor by saying things like, "Come on everybody,  let's see those faces smile!" and inane shit like that.  I wanted to rip off her fake titties and use them to bang both sides of her head in.  Lol

 

I did notice that this bar/club also had a sex play area on the third floor!  Goddamn puritan Americans and their sexual repression.  What a pity we can't have darkrooms in our bars!  Again, this was just a normal bar and club in all other aspects.

 

Today, I just milled around the city for a bit and then had a trick in the afternoon.  It was not worth my time.  Nice guy, but not exactly what I thought he was going to be like.  However, he was Iranian and 26, and he did tell me his interesting story of how he had to leave his family, escape to Turkey, and then apply for asylum in Canada because he is gay.  Hearing his personal story is just a reminder that even though I bitch and am dumbfounded by Americans' sexual repression and  bigotry, there are many other places in this world that are even more devolved and paranoid.

 

Tonight, Ozell and I will be heading out to a couple of the bars on Church Street.  We'll check out the leather bar, The Eagle, and one of their landmark establishments, Woody's.

 

I'll upload Toronto pics soon!

 

Tomorrow we leave for Lima and the real fun and strangeness begins!!

 

Cheers to you all.  (except those of you who vote for McCain.  You deserve all the shit that is coming your way...  Just try not to take the rest of us down with you, you sadistic and masochistic sons-of-bitches.) 

 

Sean  :)