Winnipeg
I suppose there are good things and bad things to every place; balance, after all, is at the heart of everything.
Winnipeg is remarkably tilted, however, towards the bad......
I don't think this is a particularly malevolent remark- especially given native winnipegers are prone to the exact same sentiments.
Maybe a more diplomatic way of stating (the obvious) is to suggest that Winnipeg isn't exactly the centre of the universe. The most exciting attraction in the city is the place where two rivers meet; an area with the exciting name of "the forks" which is a fairly self-explanatory moniker.
I was privileged enough to voyage to this city- innocuous and insignificant as it is, it is the debating centre of Canada- for, what else, a debate. No, just kidding, it was for a volleyball tournament- I'm very athletic, remember?
In any event, the debate was being held by the Jewish community in Winnipeg- in particular by the Asper Foundation (which I found out later, owns Winnipeg). Despite the bland surroundings, I really did enjoy myself- the Jewish community was very receptive and friendly to the lot of us, even giving us a place to stay in their homes.
_
We (meaning Twin and I) tied for second at the debate. We tied, incidentally, with the Aussies.
Understand, however, that Australians have a significant advantage in debate; namely, that their accents make anything they say sound good! It's peculiar, but they could be telling you about how ugly your chihuahua is, and you would nod as though they were speaking with great wisdom. In first place, was a team that had made it to World Speech and Debate championships previously- somehow, we were only 1.4 points away from them!
I was actually surprised we made it as far as we did; I had not entertained any previous notions of making it to the Finals, so was surprised when we did.
There was another pair of twins, debating together, from Montreal! I had thought that only twin and I were creative enough to do something like that. It would have been a great show if we had debated against one another ; alas , some things are not meant to be.
_
It was kind of a week of quips, however. Mazal and I had this contest to see who could say the most number of quips (cool, I know) and we had such gold one-liners, like:
"I always read the wedding announcements, in the paper..." I was musing, when Mazal came back with, " Why? To see who's off the market?"
OK, some of them were funnier then that. I'll ask Mazal and see if she remembers the others.
Besides, quips, we also had gaffes aplenty. The one I did, mostly because I was not paying attention and was thus inarticulate was kind of embarassing.
For some reason we were talking about wedding gifts, for a couple that we thought had a strong likelihood of getting together at the debate. It was a joke; they weren't actually getting married. I mean, they were our age and debaters.
So, I said, " I'll get the groom handcuffs." Now this sounds very wrong, for a number of reasons.
The thing was, I was thinking of cufflinks when I said that, but couldn't get the right word out. So for some reason I said the other, with absolutely no attention of making it sound so bizarre.
They stared at me for a couple of seconds, and it was a few minutes before I realized the implications of what I had said. I'm slow...........
_
The billets I was staying with, had two cats. They're peculiar creatures- especially for someone like me who only knows dogs. They move very stealthily, slinking along with glittering eyes that seem eternally malevolent. I can't help but feel that they're......evil.
They also are very clever. Although Winnipeg by-law prohibits cats from being anywhere but indoors, they will lurk in the closet by the door and wait for some unsuspecting person to open the door, so they can escape from the confines of their apparant captivity.
In any event, I didn't really expect anything like this to happen when I was there, so I wasn't to careful whenever I opened the doors.
Once, however, when I was in the process of getting into the host family's car, I heard a tinkling- the characteristic sounds of the bells on the cats. We were in the garage at the time- I had left the door to the garage closed, but somehow the cat's had slipped in before it completely shut. Realizing that the garage was wide open to the outside world, I dropped all of the bags that I had been hauling into the van to the floor, in a resounding crash, and leapt towards the direction of the sound.
I saw a brief blur of orange sweep out from no where and make a beeline for the garage boundary. With a muttered cry, twin and I ran forward to try and intercept the creature; effortlessly, it veered to our side and leaped over our bags and out into the drizzling rain and blistering winds. Without really thinking about it, I followed. Twin stayed behind, apparantly satisfied that I was taking care of it.
Winnipeg indeed lived up to it's alternate name, Winterpeg, and it became very obvious, very abruptly that I had no coat or really any kind of protection. Freezing I ran through the rain, racing after a cat that could easily run twice as fast as I could. It streaked across the lawns of at least a dozen neighbours, leaping nimbly while I stumbled after it, desperately saying it's name and asking it to halt.
It raced across sidewalks, and roads,under trees (which I hit, face on, in my wild chase) and mailboxes and over garden ornaments, through wet grass that made me slip, and (deliberately, it seemed) right through the center of muddy puddles. I cursed at it, calling it a variety of names that must have drawn the attention of the people who watched as I raced by in the early hours of the morning, very afraid that I had just lost our billet family's cat. The gap between us did not appear to be any smaller, I remember noting with some desperation.
Then suddenly it stopped, in a recoiled position that looked as though it were ready to pounce on something. I swept the thing upwards in my hands- noting idly that it was like holding a big stuffed animal- and marched with it firmly secured, all the way back to the home.
"It likes to do that," our billet family noted," but it always comes back."
Nice to know.
It was a good morning run, in any event, I suppose.
Winnipeg is remarkably tilted, however, towards the bad......
I don't think this is a particularly malevolent remark- especially given native winnipegers are prone to the exact same sentiments.
Maybe a more diplomatic way of stating (the obvious) is to suggest that Winnipeg isn't exactly the centre of the universe. The most exciting attraction in the city is the place where two rivers meet; an area with the exciting name of "the forks" which is a fairly self-explanatory moniker.
I was privileged enough to voyage to this city- innocuous and insignificant as it is, it is the debating centre of Canada- for, what else, a debate. No, just kidding, it was for a volleyball tournament- I'm very athletic, remember?
In any event, the debate was being held by the Jewish community in Winnipeg- in particular by the Asper Foundation (which I found out later, owns Winnipeg). Despite the bland surroundings, I really did enjoy myself- the Jewish community was very receptive and friendly to the lot of us, even giving us a place to stay in their homes.
_
We (meaning Twin and I) tied for second at the debate. We tied, incidentally, with the Aussies.
Understand, however, that Australians have a significant advantage in debate; namely, that their accents make anything they say sound good! It's peculiar, but they could be telling you about how ugly your chihuahua is, and you would nod as though they were speaking with great wisdom. In first place, was a team that had made it to World Speech and Debate championships previously- somehow, we were only 1.4 points away from them!
I was actually surprised we made it as far as we did; I had not entertained any previous notions of making it to the Finals, so was surprised when we did.
There was another pair of twins, debating together, from Montreal! I had thought that only twin and I were creative enough to do something like that. It would have been a great show if we had debated against one another ; alas , some things are not meant to be.
_
It was kind of a week of quips, however. Mazal and I had this contest to see who could say the most number of quips (cool, I know) and we had such gold one-liners, like:
"I always read the wedding announcements, in the paper..." I was musing, when Mazal came back with, " Why? To see who's off the market?"
OK, some of them were funnier then that. I'll ask Mazal and see if she remembers the others.
Besides, quips, we also had gaffes aplenty. The one I did, mostly because I was not paying attention and was thus inarticulate was kind of embarassing.
For some reason we were talking about wedding gifts, for a couple that we thought had a strong likelihood of getting together at the debate. It was a joke; they weren't actually getting married. I mean, they were our age and debaters.
So, I said, " I'll get the groom handcuffs." Now this sounds very wrong, for a number of reasons.
The thing was, I was thinking of cufflinks when I said that, but couldn't get the right word out. So for some reason I said the other, with absolutely no attention of making it sound so bizarre.
They stared at me for a couple of seconds, and it was a few minutes before I realized the implications of what I had said. I'm slow...........
_
The billets I was staying with, had two cats. They're peculiar creatures- especially for someone like me who only knows dogs. They move very stealthily, slinking along with glittering eyes that seem eternally malevolent. I can't help but feel that they're......evil.
They also are very clever. Although Winnipeg by-law prohibits cats from being anywhere but indoors, they will lurk in the closet by the door and wait for some unsuspecting person to open the door, so they can escape from the confines of their apparant captivity.
In any event, I didn't really expect anything like this to happen when I was there, so I wasn't to careful whenever I opened the doors.
Once, however, when I was in the process of getting into the host family's car, I heard a tinkling- the characteristic sounds of the bells on the cats. We were in the garage at the time- I had left the door to the garage closed, but somehow the cat's had slipped in before it completely shut. Realizing that the garage was wide open to the outside world, I dropped all of the bags that I had been hauling into the van to the floor, in a resounding crash, and leapt towards the direction of the sound.
I saw a brief blur of orange sweep out from no where and make a beeline for the garage boundary. With a muttered cry, twin and I ran forward to try and intercept the creature; effortlessly, it veered to our side and leaped over our bags and out into the drizzling rain and blistering winds. Without really thinking about it, I followed. Twin stayed behind, apparantly satisfied that I was taking care of it.
Winnipeg indeed lived up to it's alternate name, Winterpeg, and it became very obvious, very abruptly that I had no coat or really any kind of protection. Freezing I ran through the rain, racing after a cat that could easily run twice as fast as I could. It streaked across the lawns of at least a dozen neighbours, leaping nimbly while I stumbled after it, desperately saying it's name and asking it to halt.
It raced across sidewalks, and roads,under trees (which I hit, face on, in my wild chase) and mailboxes and over garden ornaments, through wet grass that made me slip, and (deliberately, it seemed) right through the center of muddy puddles. I cursed at it, calling it a variety of names that must have drawn the attention of the people who watched as I raced by in the early hours of the morning, very afraid that I had just lost our billet family's cat. The gap between us did not appear to be any smaller, I remember noting with some desperation.
Then suddenly it stopped, in a recoiled position that looked as though it were ready to pounce on something. I swept the thing upwards in my hands- noting idly that it was like holding a big stuffed animal- and marched with it firmly secured, all the way back to the home.
"It likes to do that," our billet family noted," but it always comes back."
Nice to know.
It was a good morning run, in any event, I suppose.
posted by gah at 4:12 PM
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