Dates traveled: July 29-30, 2016; Oct 9-10, 2016; Apr 21-22, 2017; Aug 4-6 2017; Dec 17, 2017; Apr 27, 2018; July 5-6 2018; many others before 2016.
I’ve visited Montreal more than any city I haven’t lived in. The first time I was there was 2008 or 2009, before I had a smart-phone, before I could say more than ‘bonjour’ and ‘merci’. My girlfriend at the time and I stopped at a gas station to get a map and I was very nervous that I couldn’t speak French, and about the line that piled up behind us as the cashier tried to show us places we could go.
I remember discovering a park that seemed so far away. It had houses that looked the same but were different colours, all adjacent to each other. I re-discovered that spot – which turned out to be very close to the bus station, we must have been walking in circles – when I visited about ten years later.
Visiting a place often makes you notice the idiosyncrasies of the neighbourhoods, how they feel distinct even though they’re in the same city. The demarcations become more refined the more I walk around, take the subway, and overhear conversations about local politics. Like Ottawa, English and French are concentrated on different sides of the city. According to some guy in a niche bookstore, the major split in Montreal occurs on either side of Park Avenue.
On long weekends, Old Port and Saint Catherine Street are packed with tourist families, which creates a game of weaving through them to walk at a normal pace. I got so good at this that I’ve been stopped more than once by people more tourist than I asking for directions, and at least once I was able to give them accurately.
It’s funny how Plateau feels like somewhere I belong when I’m there. The long strip on St Laurent and the one-ways with all the bars. The hanging pot lights from strings above the street. All the brunch places whose servers sport the Montreal tuck with ironic t-shirts. The long lines to buy a pair of recently released sneakers.
I like the busyness of the downtown sections, but I’ve seen it all enough times that I can pick out the parts of the city I want to soak in. I can find my way around without a map now, and in the downtown area I can figure out what streets belong and lead where, which makes me feel like even though I’m only there four or so times a year, it’s enough a part of my life to factor into my experience of where I live.
I feel like I’ve gotten to occupy a space in Montreal that’s far from being a resident, but I’m not exactly a tourist either. I’m the human version of a place in the final stages of gentrification, where people no longer actually live in the neighbourhood. I’ve become all short-term rentals and landmarks and reviews and panhandlers who can grind thru the annoyance of being in a living diorama, watching the world move around you, unsure whose version is more real. If I know my way around and have some personal connections, am I still part of the problem, or am I allowed to side with the people whose routines are being disrupted by more and more bodies piling weight on old streets?
There are few places in Canada that have architecture like Montreal. People compare it to Europe for a reason, and I’d say it’s more because of the way it looks than a distinct cultural feel. My favourite parts are the long outdoor staircases that go from the sidewalk to the second and third floors, which must be awful to carry groceries up in the winter; entire blocks of a single three-story brick building, split into small apartments or town houses; street signs imprinted directly on the bricks of houses instead on posted fixed into the pavement; and the decorated buildings with elaborate city-sanctioned graffiti.
People in Ottawa, and even in Toronto, romanticize Montreal. I don’t think I’d want to live there. It’s just as cold as Ottawa, which is probably the worst thing about either city. And I imagine it’s hard to progress in one’s career with Duolingo-only French, even though I’ve been at it close to two years. And the cost of living, for so long so much cheaper than the other big cities in the country, starting to rise.
Much like when I was a teenager crossing the border to Detroit, one of the main reasons I go to Montreal is for concerts. Often a concert is the main fare of my trip, with all the site-seeing and drinking and walking around as add-ons to colour in the context. I’ve seen Osheaga, dance music, jazz hop, hardcore, and things I’ve by now forgotten.
One of things that’s great about living a two-hour bus ride away is that I can go for a day-trip. There’s something that makes me grin thinking about hopping on a bus in the morning, grabbing lunch in a different city, going out, then taking a late bus back to get home at 2am, the same time I would’ve gotten home in my early or mid 20s from the bar anyway. But I almost never take advantage of this, for whatever reason, over-complicating the experience by booking accommodations, plans, making the trip ‘worth it’.
I don’t think I’ll ever live in Montreal, so it will never really be home. It’ll remain a fantasy, close enough to visit for an affair without feeling guilty, with Ottawa knowing that as long as I remain in central Canada, it’ll likely remain my home.
describing space 