Where the Sidewalk Ends

(Shout out to Mr. Silverstein for the title.)

Walking in cities frustrates me. You can never just walk in a straight line anywhere. You go up and over, down and around and through, but never ever straight.

This week I decided I would get off at the Fish Creek/ Lacombe C-Train stop just simply because. And I was excited because the train had passed by a park (later identified as Fish Creek Park which makes sense) that looked nice, having a scenic bridge. 

But do you think I could figure out how to get there?
It's not a rhetorical question. Rhetoric is for difficult, thought-inspiring questions. The question I just asked is simple.  

I wandered down a slope from the station, found a pond, and then of course a highway. That was not bordered by a sidewalk and as far as I could tell unsurpassable. Unless I intended to do a kamikaze run through traffic. But seeing as how I enjoy life and am not quite that dedicated to the blog I decided that I would return to Fish Creek Park another time.

Plus I had more pressing issues. Finding a bathroom. It's a substantial C-Train ride.

While on my way to the Humpty's across the tracks (up, over, and down) to solve Issue #1, I noticed two old-school churches across the highway, so once I had solved Issue #1, I figured I would do some trespassing. Nothing like trespassing on a Saturday afternoon.

Up and over and down again (after being threatened by the sign shown above) and I was across the street and staring at yet another post-secondary institute in Calgary that I had no idea existed: St. Mary's University College. Add that to the pile with ACAD and Bow Valley College. Not to mention all the random secondary campuses of non-local institutions that exist. So I took a quick glance at St. Mary's because I was a little puzzled, and then back on track to the churches.

I crept down some side street with the night and into the graveyard through a cast-iron gate.

That might be a bit of an elaboration. It was midday. And I couldn't tell you the make up of that fence. Could have been regular iron for all I know. I don't even know if there is a difference between iron and cast-iron.

Plus graveyards stopped scaring me when I was approximately 13. Ok, I was a bit older than that.

The point is that now I like them. My favourite headstones are old, large, and ornate. I also like when one family has a section fenced off from the rest of the cemetery.

My major is archaeology. This should be known. Otherwise unless you are also fascinated by old things as well, you probably will not understand how enthralled I was to have stumbled upon these churches. St. Paul's (the one I spent more time looking at on account of the other church being under repair and bearing a sign saying that it was under video surveillance) was built in 1885 and has a bell from England that is more than 200 years old. Which is not really old by world church standards but was old enough by Alberta standards for me to geek out about.

I took a few minutes to check out the other church which is in a bit of rough shape. There was no sign of the name of the other church in sight.

Heading back to St. Paul's chapel, there was still that glow from the windows that I was fairly certain was neither the sun reflecting off the glass, nor my imagination. And sure enough as I paused to take a picture, out of the church came a man who also was photographing the church. Which was pretty good timing. When I asked him if the church still held service regularly on a whim (because most churches of that age don't but the whole 11 am worship on the sign was misleading) he said that it has about 5 masses a year and 2 weddings this year. I'm not Anglican but I would consider getting married there. It's a pretty nice church. Backdrop of the church not so much. Content with all that had happened, I followed a curving path out of the church site, retraced my steps on the back street and hit the spot where the sidewalk ends, or rather from my direction where it began.

And that is a corny ending to this post. Too corny.

I found a lotto max ticket from January 13th when I was trying to walk straight, cutting through a parking lot. Then, with much serendipity, a friend later told me that January 13th's ticket was indeed bought in Calgary.

And had not been claimed!

How awesome would have that been? Yes, "would".

I checked the numbers of last week's win and they're not mine. I signed the ticket anyways. I wouldn't want to be a chump like whoever lost that ticket in the hypothetical scenario where the ticket I found was a winner. Instead of just a piece of garbage that can't even win me another ticket.

But maybe you have more luck than me? 

Cheater, Cheater, Cupcake Eater

Ok, so I cheated a bit this week. Even more so than last week's just heading downtown which was pretty uninspired (but eventful nonetheless). The Crew (2 actually returned and I was able to sucker a newbie into joining) and I went to Kensington.

Which I have been to before.

But in my defence, I needed to kill two birds with one stone having regretfully put off homework all week and having limited weekend free time. I had to take my weekly trip and I also needed to start looking into places to live for next year and Kensington is conveniently located in the sphere of Calgary I know. Kensington is thus a viable living option but a less viable option for the "How to Get Lost in Calgary" blog.

Regardless, Kensington is a wonderful place with unique stores: an import store, used clothing store, art store, cupcake store, and yes, a drug paraphernalia store (whether or not that is unique is debatable).
(Some bongs now 50% off in case you're interested...)

Note: my hand only looks so demented
because my fingers were curled up to avoid frostbite.

I'm not exactly sure if living in Kensington is a good idea for me. If I could afford it I probably would not be able to live there for very long since I would spend entirely too much money. Not on drug paraphernalia, I promise. But on the items in the other stores I mentioned: clothes and art classes and cupcakes with cream cheese icing. Also I probably couldn't afford to live there for my health in the case of cream cheese icing.

We passed many cute homes. The old, wooden kind with character and colour. The Newbie decided that to live in Kensington was on her life's to-do list. And I decided that I might be able to afford some of the places. Exhibit A to the right. (Squatting in an burnt building doesn't cost anything, right?)





But, honestly, there were some places that were still up and running that might have been in my price range. Bland and colourless and looking like apartments generally do. However, a home's a home, and I'm sure I could grow to love it all the same, it just might take longer than some of the other places. (If anyone is willing to donate some money so I can live in one of the houses in the next three pictures feel free, you would have my immense gratitude.)

If you desire a balcony in your future home, come on down to Kensington.  Kensington really should be paying me for all this advertisement I'm giving them. Maybe they could pay for me to live there and I could change this blog to "How to Find Your Dream Home in Kensington" or something more clever. Give me some time, Kensington, I'll come up with something good.

Kensington is a bit of a hippie's hub. Which is why I enjoy it so much. The Newbie also appreciated this. The home seen below was clearly a part of the Occupy Calgary movement, offered free hugs, and, of course, smelled slightly of marijuana as we walked by. Plus it was entirely purple.

Kensington: Perpetuating Stereotypes.

 

For you hypocrites (of which I am one), Kensington is a wonderful place to live and work:

Don't worry he got it the second time around.

After all this we were sufficiently cold and realized that of course we were terribly ill-prepared to actually go home hunting (which we pretty well knew before we left) and so we headed back to the C-Train. And guess what there is in abundance on the other side of the tracks in Sunnyside? Apartment buildings that look affordable literally 100 steps from the C-Train station.

Guess we did take a wrong turn after all.

When Given the Choice

I roped some friends into joining me on the first series of adventures in Cow-town. I was a little nervous that taking a random bus would get us nowhere except an uninteresting suburban area of Calgary, after all Calgary is majority urban sprawl. While I had not guaranteed my friends a good time, I didn't want them to disown me forever. So I agreed to take the C-train downtown and then we could jump on a random bus there.

Turns out I know relatively nothing of what is in the downtown. I have passed it on the C-train and yes,  I thought that there wasn't too much to see: skyscrapers that look like any other skyscrapers.

But, in fact, the downtown has the Olympic Plaza complete with skating rink for the winter months (and I believe fountains in the summer), houses political activists, displays the Famous Five, is reminiscent of Vieux Quebec's Rue St. Jean with its Stephen Avenue to meander down, and of course contains Chinatown.

I felt like a mother as I shepherded my ducklings around downtown which was made harder by the fact that some of my ducklings were the high energy type who like to climb on everything. (Clearly I'm still one of those mothers who is still in denial as I didn't mention A.D.D.)

I'm also clearly not ready to be a mother, because I let them climb on the structure to the left, which is quite the unstable piece of art and strictly speaking, art isn't something you let your children climb all over.

What struck me about the downtown is the odd assortment of things that it contains. You can see an A&W by a classy restaurant (not that A&W isn't classy in my books). As you climb some stairs up by sketchy looking apartments, you find a rooftop with the piece of art seen in the image to the left. And also a scary children's daycare, all of which shares a street with glass-fronted shops.

At one point the group split, letting the children scamper off to find other things to climb (they turned up again unscathed, I promise) while a few of us decided to try Bubble Tea.  I'm still not entirely sure the pearls add anything to the delectable tea, but they give you something to chew on.

After all this wandering around and seeing the sights, we were of course hungry. So we sat down in a sushi place in Chinatown. Full of food, we headed home.

What constitutes an adventure? Is it standing as close to the edge as you can? Is it the amount of times you nearly die as you climb an unsafe structure? Or can it be measured in the amount that your stomach is upset after trying new foods?

When given the choice between sea urchin, octopus, and eel, I would recommend not choosing the urchin.