tour cn by -nikkon-

The only sport I watch with any regularity or enthusiasm is Formula 1. I’m not really even sure if it really qualifies as a sport – I know that the drivers have to be physically fit, but that fitness isn’t the major contributing factor to them winning races. In Formula 1 it’s truly a team effort requiring a skilled driver, skilled pit crew, and skilled engineers. If just one of those elements is missing, the race is pretty much over.

The other reason I like Formula 1 is because it seems much more fair than most competitive sports. I like to compare it do downhill slaloms, for example, where differences in athletes’ times can be in the tenths of seconds — easily accounted for by an errant gust of wind. The athlete’s training, the coaching, the equipment, etc., can all be negated by something completely beyond the athlete’s control. Luck, in other words. In Formula 1 the whole aim of engineering is to mitigate the effects of luck, but even more important, all the drivers race at the same time so that elements like wind, rain, etc., affect everyone equally.

The Toronto Criterium is very similar to Formula 1 in these respects.

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Naturally there’s been a lot of talk about the G20 coming to town and how, overall, it doesn’t seem like there’s going to be any benefit for the city from this crazy assembly. Costs have gone up almost ten-fold to about a billion bucks (how does the government manage to get everything so wrong all the time?), all of which is going toward making the G20 leaders’ visits nice and comfortable. Chunks of downtown are being completely shut down, much to residents’ chagrin, and not a penny of that exorbitant sum is being spent to help locals or businesses with lost profits, protest damage, etc. Organizers aren’t even hiring local security for the job.

Basically, unless someone can come up with one tangible benefit, the summit will end up being a huge middle finger to Toronto as well as the taxpayers of Canada. Nebulous statements of “benefits to the city” made by officials are not very convincing. Like, what benefits, exactly?

Well, there is one that I can think of, and it applies to only a very small group of Torontonians. Like myself. :)

I’m talking about the global media coverage that the G20 will invariably get. It’ll do nothing for local businesses, and I’m fairly certain most Canadian tax payers don’t give a flying fuck if the summit makes headlines in Brazil. But for anyone in the media, stories like this are akin to a sundae with whipped cream and a cherry on top, especially if shit really does go down and the protests start to get violent. For insignificant bloggers who happen to live near the turmoil, that’s especially true.

As crass as that may sound, it’s the truth. Tragedies, disasters, protest movements – they’re all headline fodder extraordinaire.

Take the recent seizing of Palestinian aid ships by the Israeli army, for example. Israel, Palestine, and the ships may all be half a world away, but thanks to Toronto’s Palestinian population the story came right to my front door. And thanks to an unfortunate series of events that resulted in the pro-Palestine demonstration yesterday, the topic can happily fly under the Toronto City Life flag.

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Ants on the Green Roof by Bryson Gilbert

In retrospect it’s obvious why I had to at least attempt the journey.

You see, the Aga Khan is putting in an Islamic history centre, with a special nod to Ismailis, in the community of Leaside, a woody central-eastern patch of the city running along the Don Valley.

The Aga Khan. Not Aga Khan. The Aga Khan. With a title like that, I don’t see how one could resist going to see what this man will install in our city. Apparently it’s supposed to be the first of it’s kind anywhere around these parts, and it has been described as a “gem”. All out of the Aga Khan’s love for Canada.

I tend to walk until I come to a major intersection and then stop to look at Google Maps on my mobile phone to figure out my next turn. I guessed I must’ve misjudged the majorness of a few intersections because I soon wound up in a neighbourhood adjacent to the Science Centre. Having gotten there, on foot, from Yonge-Dundas Square, I was starting to feel a tad worn out. Plus I had the return trip to think about.

So I decided to call it a day, vowing to return. But it wasn’t a total loss. The highlight of that part of town is definitely the awesome vista from the Don Mills Road bridge over the DVP:

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DSC_0077 by proofer2008

Unfortunately I missed this gentleman’s name and some of his earlier comments, but this is ultimately what it boils down to, in a nutshell, the crux and the nexus, as it were:

The police are always giving the same message, if you break the law, be prepared to be prosecuted for it. There’s no excuse for something like this [recent G20-related vandalism]. People can… the legal right to protest is there in Canada, the freedom of speech is there, you can say what you want, you can march, you can do those things, but as soon as you cross that line, police are going to have to deal with you.

There you have it, terse and policey. At this point the details of the police plan, and that line being alluded to, are probably already out there although no one really has much info otherwise. Hopefully this doesn’t come as a big surprise to anyone.

By the way, did I wish you a happy Friday yet?

In the past few days anyone stepping off a plane for the first time at Pearson or City Centre Airport probably got a bit of a rude awakening to the real Toronto.

I do my best to try to warn people that, no really, it gets pretty fucking hot here in the summers, but usually I just get an incredulous expression in response. When I compare recent Toronto temperatures (31 Celcius  / 88 Fahrenheit) to, say, The Bahamas (30 Celcius / 86 Fahrenheit), they just kind of look at me funny, like maybe I’ve been spending too much time in the igloo or something.

It’s a bit warm for May, granted, but not by much.

“Yeah, but it’s not a humid heat like they get on the islands”, is often the next follow-up. Once again, spoken by someone who hasn’t been to Toronto in the summer. No, it really is. It can get as soupy here as it does in Hong Kong or Jamaica. I mean, did you ever wonder how south Asians, East Indians, West Indians, and people from similar countries could manage to live in Toronto if it’s some dreary northern podunk town? That’s because it’s not so foreign to them. In the winter they’re usually a miserable bunch, but in the summer they’re right at home. Right from the horse’s mouth that.

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Barber Shop: Vitrolite, Toronto by onasill

photographer cop by -nikkon-