My mother and my sister were keen on going to see an art exhibit in Montreal's underground complex because a part of it featured pieces made by artists from Barcelona. My sister spent six months this winter in the capital of Catalonia as a foreign exchange student and my parents went to visit, so they were looking forward to see some objets d'art that reminded them of their beautiful journey there. That particular part was exhibited at the Complexe Desjardins, so that's where we plan to meet. My mom, dad, sister, her boyfriend and my little cousin all showed up around 1pm. When they saw what the oeuvres d'art were all about, they were severely disappointed. It turned out to be just a few booths with video projections of artsy fartsy crap that don't make sense. Like watching a bunch of shadows move in the light reflected off of a bunch of steel balls. Another was a video of someone filming the ground as he walked and some captions talking about how a close up view of moving pavement looked like canyons and valleys (it didn't). When they saw that, they decided to cancel out on the whole art exhibition thing and go to Chinatown instead.
Walking in Chinatown I discovered a brand new ramen place. Apparently, they make their own noodles. But, after my experience at Sumo Ramen, whose ramen noodles are also home-made, it doesn't mean that it's actually good. It'll be worth a try. Maybe I'll go for lunch sometime.
In Chinatown, my folks wanted to go to a tea shop. They came out of it and my mother suddenly felt queasy. She's been ill for a while and the doctor told her to stay home and get rest. She thought she felt good enough to go out but it turns out she was wrong. So they turned back and decided to go home. My poor mom has been working way too hard lately and it finally affected her health. So, I understand it was best for her to go get rest. I invited my sister and her boyfriend to stay with me and hang out downtown, but they rode in with my parents and didn't want miss their ride home. Besides, my sister's boyfriend went to a rock concert the night before and his head was still ringing from the noise. So everybody left.
I tried to call a bunch of people to hang out, but it was already late in the afternoon and most people had made plans already or were too tired from partying the night before. So, "screw it" I said. I decided to go have dinner somewhere and enjoy the rest of the day by my own damn self! On that day, there were a couple of cool events happening. First, there was a roller derby somewhere in Montreal Nord with the three local roller derby teams doing a round robin. Later, there was a burlesque show happening downtown. I knew there was another roller derby happening some time soon, so I opted for the burlesque show. But first, dinner.
I walked up Saint-Laurent until I reached a restaurant I found no so long ago. I talked about it when I walked in the Mile End. It's a vegan restaurant called Aux Vivres. A friend of mine highly recommended it and said it was his favourite restaurant. So I decided to try it out. Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to turn vegan anytime soon. Hells no! I'll eat bacon every god damn chance I get.
It's a little place that looked like it was under renovation. They sat me down at a table and handed me the menu. I was a little uncomfortable at first because there was nothing with meat and I was afraid I might end up paying for a meal that's going to leave me on my appetite. Their soup of the day was a sweet potato, carrot and ginger soup. Their specialty seemed to be some kind of big bowl filled with veggies and tofu or big pratha bread sandwich wraps. Their pratha bread is made from scratch too. I decided to go with the wrap. It had a slice of grilled seasoned tofu, pickled carrots and turnip and lettuce and a really great Thai peanut sauce. And the thing was motherfucking huge! I really had trouble finishing it. I was completely stuffed. When I was done with my plate, I paid and left and I didn't feel too bad. You know that stuffy bloated feeling you get after a big meal sometimes? Well I didn't have that. It was great!
I went home for a bit and tried to call some people to accompany me at the burlesque show, but it was too late. Nobody could come. So, again, I went by myself and felt like an idiot to go see something like that alone. But, I didn't want to miss it. I'm sure glad I didn't because it turned out to be a cool show. It was happening at the Café Cléopatre on Saint-Laurent at the corner of Sainte-Catherine. The old red light district. I went there just before the doors opened up and stood in line.
When we were finally let it, we went up the stairs to the cabaret. 10$ entry fee. It was a nice little place. The show turned out to be pretty cool. The show was sponsored by Les Toutounes Atomiques (The atomic chubbies) which is a cool retro pin-up style fashion store for plus size ladies. The girls are members of a group of performers called Sublimes Rondeurs (sublime curves) and they do burlesque cabaret shows like this regularly. Also, it just so happens that one of the girls is a mutual friend of a bunch of friends of mine. The show that night was called French Kiss and mostly had a French theme, though there were some cowboy and lumberjack scenes. The host of the evening was a drag queen and was able to get the crowd cheering and applauding. The ladies gave us a good show and were very entertaining. Overall, I had a great time.
I had quite a few drinks and ended up taking one of the last couple of metro trains of the day to head back home. When I got home I just crashed and went to bed. And that was my Saturday.
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