{"id":198,"date":"2004-07-27T12:17:20","date_gmt":"2004-07-27T12:17:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/34.95.25.178\/maggie\/2004\/07\/27\/montreal_monkey\/"},"modified":"2004-07-27T12:17:20","modified_gmt":"2004-07-27T12:17:20","slug":"montreal_monkey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/2004\/07\/27\/montreal_monkey\/","title":{"rendered":"Montreal Monkey"},"content":{"rendered":"

July’s monkey<\/a> is “Describe your first impression of Montreal.”
\nI’m not sure that I have<\/i> a first impression of our fair city. I was born at the Royal Victoria hospital<\/a>, and lived on the South Shore until we moved to the Eastern Townships when I was about 7 years old.
\nOne thing I remember is being astounded at how many of my classmates in high school had never been to Montreal. Our school was in Cowansville, less than an hour outside Montreal.
\nA lasting impression for me is the city skyline<\/a> – every time. When I drive home and cross the Champlain bridge<\/a> my heart skips a beat – every time. We may not have the most impressive downtown core, but there’s something about those majestic buildings standing against the forested mountain, with St. Joe’s dome and the worst-lit cross on the planet, that speaks to me.
\nI guess a first impression must exist, but just as it’s hard to remember my first impressions of my oldest friends, it’s hard to remember how Montreal first struck me. What I enjoy now is watching my kids discover the city – this summer, we’ve gotten to know places like Westmount Park<\/a>, not to mention the metro<\/a>, part of Colin’s obsession with all things cartographical.
\nI love Montreal – I love that we’re an island, I love that we’re bilingual and multicultural, I love that we can drive in the snow, I love that we have the Jazz fest and the comedy fest and fireworks and F1 and a guy on stilts playing the sax downtown. I love that we all, regardless of race, creed or whatever, hate potholes, yet they continue to infest the city. I love that we consider ourselves inherently superior to upstart metropolises like Toronto. I love that we don’t go to work wearing power suits and running shoes – I met a tourist once who told me that we “all dress like it’s New Year’s Eve every day.”
\nSo, perhaps not a first impression, as such… sorry!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

July’s monkey is “Describe your first impression of Montreal.” I’m not sure that I have a first impression of our fair city. I was born at the Royal Victoria hospital, and lived on the South Shore until we moved to the Eastern Townships when I was about 7 years old. One thing I remember is … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Montreal Monkey”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wprm-recipe-roundup-name":"","wprm-recipe-roundup-description":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-monkey-see-monkey-do"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.golding.ca\/maggie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}