Reunion part IV

The trip to Niagara Falls was a success, and we had no rain to boot!

The next day (Thursday) we sleep late. We plan to do nothing, except take back the rented car at the end of the day. We make coffee, and then some more an hour and half later, and gab, gab, gab about everything and nothing. Old times, things that happened since, people we knew and know, the immigrant experience then, in 1982 and now in 2010, (the really big difference being the internet and connectivity) news there and here, and even a little politics.

Diana Gabalon's "An Echo In The Bone" has come out in small size paperback, and since I have been eagerly waiting for this for a while, We make a small excursion to the local bookstore to pick it up.  Next to the bookstore is a Winners store where we make a thorough inspection of the summer purses on offer, but don't find anything we can't leave behind. No new wallet for me either, the old one is showing it's age but I am picky, I want specific pockets.

We eat a shawarma in the sandwich shop in the plaza and go back home. We return the car in the afternoon, and make the acquaintance of a couple of grouchy car jockeys in the parking lot, who talk to us while an intercom announcement is broadcast in the parking garage (great acoustics!), and when I tell them I can't hear them (three times) I am told to calm down. (Huh?) I feel that I am tired after the driving, but seriously, no one could hear them. Once car returned we stop by a grocery store for a few things, and to give Carla a taste of what it is like in this neck of the woods (expensive).

We roast a pork loin in the oven and have fiddleheads and asparagus with it for dinner. It's been a while since I ate fiddleheds, and I have a hard time to describe the taste. Sometime in the next little while I will buy fresh ones, to see if they have more flavour than the frozen ones. A little nutmeg livens them up.

After dinner we drive into down town and take the original "haunted walk" tour. The tour guide takes you on a pleasant 90 minute walk of a small area of down town. At various places she stops, and points out buildings, (and on one occasion a fountain) talks about the history of the building, and who supposedly haunts it and why. She is pretty good at disguising the fact that she has memorised all these stories, and does not suffer from telemarketers verbal diarrhoea. We walk through the more scenic part of business down town as the sun slowly sets, and finish at the Bytwon museum (yes, haunted) after dark. It is cool, but the rain holds off until we are back at the car. As a sceptic I think they should tax all the ghosts and make that whole national debt thing go away. They sure make you believe there are enough ghosts for that. We walk back along Wellington to the parking and manage to stay out of the rain until we drive home again, when the downpour starts.

On Friday we were planning to go to Montreal. Carla us visited there in 1983, and we were looking forward to seeing the place again and seeing what Carla remembers. Old Montreal has (of course) not changed that much, but Down Town has had some changes, and of course I know it much better now. Unfortunately it still pours Friday morning. It rains like ugly fall rain, and the forecast is for solid rain all day in both  cities. After much hesitating we scrap the trip to Montreal, and I am really bummed out about it. But I agree that it would have been little fun walking like drenched cats in a likely deserted tourist area. I can't believe how crappy the weather is this late in May! This is one of the worst spring seasons I have ever experienced here.

Instead we get in the car and visit two local shopping malls. First we go to Place d'Oreans, where  I have not been for a long time. The place is quiet and feels a little claustrophobic with the low ceilings. No go on the purse and wallet front here either. We have lunch at a Timmies in a nice clean and quiet foodcourt. We then decide to move on to Bayshore shopping center. Airier, less claustrophobic, and more fun stores await. The elusive summer purse is also there, but in the wrong colour. But I finally score the right wallet with the right pockets. I see a pretty water colour  skirt at Laura that I go back to get it a few days later.

We go home and BBQ chilli-lime pork steak, and eat tomatoes, sweet onions and cuccumbers with that. We have vanilla ice cream and fresh raspberries for dessert. At some point during our discussion I pull out the file with letters we wrote. Carla re-reads them from the beginning, and when her husband texts her, she informs him she has just married him. Too bad we could not see his face.

The next day is departure day.

The line-up at the airport is brutal, mostly due to one group with ticket problems who keep one counter busy for the entire time we wait to make it to the check in counter, which is over 45 minutes. We say goodbye there at check in.

I am hoping that in the near future she will be able to accompany her husband if he needs to visit Montreal,and we can still do our excursion in Old Montreal.

When I told people around me that I was going to spend a week with someone I had spent no real substantial time with in 28 years, they were all wondering how that would work. Would we still have things in common? Would we want to kill eachother after two days in such close proximity? Doing this is what most rational people would call a recipe for disaster. Familiarity breeds contempt, as the saying goes.

We have had different lives with very different expriences. One of us left out home country young, the other stayed. One of us became a mother, the other did not. One faced serious health problems, the other has not. We have very different extended families, which have impacted us differently. We chose different carreer paths, and of course we have different different tastes and priorities.

But even with all that I really enjoyed re-connecting with her. The proof of that has to be the endless gabbing that went on. There were no awkward silences. Each night I had a sore throat, because I am no longer used to pronouncing the sharp "g" sounds needed in Dutch.

I once again experienced the essence of my own cultural background. I realised how much I have adapted to this culture in the last 29 years. Many little things were pointed out that I had forgotten. I laughed at expressions I had forgotten. But also there was the general feeling of familiarity of a culture and it's sober pragmatic attitudes towards a great many things.


And we are both sick of people telling us that drugs are legal in Holland. (Not the case, sorry!)

Carla suugested that we plant a flowering perrenial shrub in the garden, so that we have something to remind us of this experience for a long time. The weather during the week she was here unfortunately made it impractical to do it together. But this past  weekend I planted a beautiful rose bush in the backyard, with six thick buds on it.

I think we may have the first flower this weekend.