Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Beer at the Airport

Hello all..

I'm having a seat at the airport here in Mon'ree-aaal, catchin’ a bird a day early due to some weather conditions brewing in Quebec, which would, heaven forbid, undoubtedly imprison me here for the weekend if the weather network is even half correct. I have only been here a few days and already looking forward to my fellow red-neck-english-speaking place of glory known as ALLLLberta. Well OK, just Calgary.. cause Edmonton still sucks.
As the insidiously expensive Heineken makes it way from my lips to my brain, I thought I would throw down a few comments of this great and wonderful place we call Quebec.

1. The only similarities between Quebec and Alberta is the currency, only it seems of little value here as they require a shit load more of it for the same item anywhere else in the fricken universe. Check this:

A buck forty eight / l of gas. No shit. I have a receipt to prove it, only it's all in French and they don't use a fricken decimal, it's replaced with a comma so it reads 1,48/l. I asked them, I says.. does this mean I have a choice? A dollar or a 48? I mean that's what a comma means don't it? And why are your gas pumps only au francais? I'm just guessing at the pay-at-the-pump push buttons here, for all I know I paid for everyone's gas, and they just laugh at my anglophonic ass, oh they laugh.. LAUGH IT UP.. Go Ahead, we sold you this gas anyway.

Twelve bucks for a pint of beer. Qu'est que hell? Yea you heard me right. Twelve bucks for a pint of DRAFT beer, and it's almost done. Most expensive beer I've ever bought, save for the beer I had a few years back which cost me fifteen, but that was a frothy golden south African beer served in a glimmering silver sleeve and delivered by a virgin, i would've paid more, way more. THAT was a good beer, this one is heineken out of a dirty tap. I says to her I says.. "that's what a six-pack costs where I come from." She says "pardon moi?" I repeat "THATS WHAT A SIX PACK COSTS WHERE I COME FROM" following the tried and true method of interlinguistic vocular crescendination technique, or a method of translating one's self my simply raising the voice, commonly practiced by americans whilst on vacation.

2. Signage. One word: IT SUCKS. For some reason, and I’m assuming not that long ago, the people of Quebec came up with the fricken idea of re-naming every road, every highway, every gravel road after some great French Canadian leader, completely and totally confusing the hell out of any English speaking Canadian daring to travel the roads without knowledge of francais history. I even had a GPS for the love of everything, but the names are so fricken long they don’t FIT on the SCREEN. And what the hell is a “rang”? I remember candies when I was a kid called rangs.. and the’re all over the signs here.. rang this, rang that.. what the hell, and “hippocyte”? seriously.. It took me over an hour to find the damn airport cause guess what? They recently renamed “Dorval International” to “international Pierre–Elliott–Trudeau (YMQ) et Mirabel (YMX).” I say recently cause HALF THE BLOODY SIGNS SAY ONE THING AND THE OTHER HALF SAY ANOTHER.. Oh I could go on and on.. and on.. and on..

Let’s see… is there a number three? Oh yea of course..

3. Pizza. Please please PLEASE dear francophones.. get the heck out of the pizza business. You have no idea how to make it, no idea at all. The pizza here is like cold wet meat on a soggy napkin, and tastes far worse. What?? No kidding. I was actually looking around for the hidden fricken camera, Hello? I’m on that stupid Just For Laughs Gags? I was afraid to see how much that cost and didn’t even want to look. Stick to your poutiny type cuisine and small expensive foods. Trying to impress a westerner with your pizza is like.. (trying to think of a good metaphor here).. like a French poodle trying to impress a pitbull with his lame-ass bark. (Does that work? I’m in a rush here.) Don’t screw with the pizza.

4. Traffic Signals. Holy crap. Lets see how many fricken signals we can fit in an intersection shall we? Oh then, let’s make some lights square, some triangle, don’t allow right turns on red and then remind them of that with eighteen red lights.. ok I get the point, can’t turn right on a red, THEN.. THEN.. LETS GET RID OF ALL THE LINES ON THE ROAD SO THEY CAN GUESS WHERE TO GO AFTER BEING TOLD THEY CAN GO BY A TRILLION LIGHTS!!! OH!! AND FEEL FREE TO USE YOUR HORNS AS MUCH AS YOU WANT! Cause THAT’S GONNA HELP!

5. Hotel rooms that flood, Delusional Drivers, the list goes on.

VIVE LE SEPARACION!!

Holy.

AS.

9 comments:

Pauline said...

Did you try the sushi there???

I really hope you come to Toronto next, I love coming to visit you in fancy hotels! Toronto's sushi is nothing exciting, but it is sure better than Guelph.

Can't wait to see you in Onterrible!

Alex said...

Oh I passed by a few sushi places, but when I asked a few locals they all said, "You probably don't want to try the sushi here." while they eat the soggy pizza. "good pizza though hey?"
So needless to say, I didn't want to try the sushi. ;-)
AS

Mattie said...

Schapper,

Hilarious, I couldnt agree with you more!! I think that they should separate and then see where they are at. And by separate I mean, no money, no govenrment, no aid, not health care.. NO NOTHING!!! you want to try it on your own, go ahead. I give it a year before they would amalgamte into the states, then see if you had it so bad in Canada where we let you have your language and customs. In the states you would be told, we dont speak no freakin french, the language here is english ombre!!

Awesome AS AWESOME!!

The Big DC said...

Ah Schappy - Once again a fine read my friend.

Reminds me of my last trip to Montreal last summer. From the sounds of it, I enjoyed it much more than you did your current trip. I surmise that the 2 biggest reasons for that were 1) that I was there in the summer and 2) that there was not 20 feet of snow on the ground.

The summer must be the only time one should ever go to Montreal. If for the only reason that the, shall we say, scenery REALLY picks up when the weather warms up. I seriously kid you not, even Julie was oogling the women in Montreal while we were there. If there is ever a place to try and find out if your wife or girlfriend would be into "experimenting" then Montreal is it. But alas, I have already said too much. Gotta save something for my own blog eh? :)

And thanks for the new saying - I laughed pretty hard when I saw the Qu'est-ce que hell? That is my new replacement for WTF.

Speaking of WTF. C'mon - qui est-que hell goes to Montreal to eat frickin' pizza? That's like going to Mexico and expecting to get good Italian - it's just not going to happen. I'll bet you that every pizza joint in Montreal is owned by some english speaking Newfie - okay, I use the term English loosely. Dear readers, do not let Alex fool you. You will not find better food anywhere else in Canada, dare I say North America, than you will find in Montreal. Just don't go to a pizza joint.

I hear you about traffic, but I think they ahve some really weird looks when driving around over there - especially downtown on the island. I kept getting weird looks and a few fingers until I found out that you can't turn right downtown PERIOD - let alone on a green light. The guy I work with finally told me that ONLY downtown you are not allowed to turn right unless specifically posted. QCH is with that??? Figures - that explains the tendency for French people to vote Liberal.

Alex said...

I should mention that due to a lack of flights for the day, I had to fly to Montreal and drive to quebec city.. so most of this experience comes from QC, not Montreal. and THAT being said, no I didn't go to "old quebec city" although I'm sure it would've sucked. "Hey look at me, my buildings are older than yours and filled with high priced crap!"
sigh.

Eric said...

I always wonder why canada puts up with that crap... "we're canadian! by location only" I should say that the average canadian (alex) does not put up with that crap. And I agree.
Hey frenchies.. take your wimpy ways and body odor and leave! I'm sure you can survive on your own... heck, I bet you'll even thrive. Get out of the crappy canadian health care system and crazy high income taxes... just free yourself from a country where everyone hates you... cut the cord already!

But of course, living in america, I'd hate to see them come crawling to us. I don't know why.. I just don't like the french! Although I think we are one of the most diverse countries in the world. The "melting pot" crap we all got fed in school and college is nothing buy garbage.. it pertains to language only. Visit the islam community of western detroit and you'll see what I mean. Or the french district in New Orleans. Or china town in san fran... on and on. The only differnce is that ENGLISH is the national launguage here and everyone can read the signs... thank you! that's all we ask, be able to read our signs.
But still.. i'm supposed to hate you so I guess I will... stay away!

wow alex.. I love it when you rant, it gets me all worked up!

good times...

Anonymous said...

Now,now. Sad to see the negativity here about the canadian french. For me, a Vancouverite, the Quebec french culture as a whole enriches our country and I hope they will stay within the confederation. I also visited Quebec and greatly enjoyed the unique flavor of its society and above all the generosity of the french speaking people. Not speaking french myself was never a problem. I found the french canadians much more relaxed, less uptight then western canadians. Old Montreal is much like being in Europe; a real tangible history, relaxed atmosphere and cozy out of the way eating places with great cuisine. I must add, I came to the above opinion after visiting Quebec myself for about a week. Before that my views on the matter were much the same as those of my western compatriots. So, just go for a visit there yourself. Even a business trip will do, providing of course you can get some time off to do the scene and not being worked to death by some telefone company.
Sheepers

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