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Toronto a ses tours de verre, Montréal a ses petites fenêtres carrées.

This is why we love Montreal and what makes our city so unique. I miss the newspaper stands, the neon lights of cinema palaces. Why is it so difficult to put a Tramway in Montreal? I think 'Colette' may be Janette Bertrand : ) http://www.nfb.ca/film/montreal_by_night/

http://business.financialpost.com/2011/11/09/european-firms-look-to-canada-to-grow-assets/ It is quite an interesting article. I would say more, but I do not want the jinx it. Is Canada the new land of opportunity? Which countries is Canada really competing with? Australia and Brazil?

(Courtesy of The Globe and Mail) (Courtesy of Travel+Leisure) Plus its ranked 3rd in Canada. Only 10 hotels made the list for this country. T+L 500 List. The Auberge is not in the Top 25, not really sure where its ranked though. So if your looking for a romantic getaway for a few days with the wife or girlfriend, check it out. She will be happy with the massage

this is kinda old, but it's well written and pretty interesting from an 'historical' point of view, of sorts ... it's a 1999 washington post tourism piece, set in the context of a d.c. man visiting montreal, and going to a ball game "to see the team washington will probably inherit". it nicely highlights the city's unique attractions, all the while quite accurately summing up the general mood that surrounded baseball in montreal at the time. oh, and for extra sentimentality, read with in the background ... ----------------------------------- Montreal, Expos'd Visiting the City Whose Team Might Call D.C. Home By Mike Tidwell The Washington Post Sunday, July 11, 1999 Hundreds of crazed fans in this crowd of 5,000 foreigners begin standing and savagely slamming the backs of their chairs up and down, up and down to register their intense approval of what's going on on the playing field. The act creates sharp explosions of sound not unlike small-arms fire. The only people not banging chairs, it seems, are the sticky-fingered children eating deep-fried dough or forking strange mounds of fried potatoes laced with cheese and gravy. Suddenly, down on the field halfway through this "match," something bad happens for the home team. The French-speaking fans begin yelling at the mostly Spanish-speaking players: "Pourri! Pourri!" Rotten! Rotten! People whistle and blow long, booming plastic horns. I am, of course, taking in a major league baseball game in Montreal. I'm watching the pinstriped Expos on their home turf, a nine-inning experience that's perhaps the best multicultural adventure available to Washingtonians within easy flying distance of Reagan National Airport. It's a spectacle, a combination of God's two greatest inventions: baseball and international travel. As a junkie for both, I'm borderline apoplectic, immersed in fastballs and home runs, foreign billboards and surnames I can't pronounce. But a worrisome question nags as I sip my Molson: Do we really want these guys? Unless you're tone deaf to sports news, you probably know there's rampant speculation that the financially troubled Expos may move to the D.C. area. So I've come here as more than a sports tourist. I'm on a scouting mission, crossing the border for a sneak preview. I've already told my 2-year-old son, an emerging fan back in Takoma Park, that this is his team. He wears a tiny Expos hat when we play Whiffle ball in the back yard. But seeing this team firsthand reveals the naked truth: They're awful. Just now, an Expos batter strikes out on four pitches against the Philadelphia Phillies, triggering grumbles from the sparse crowd at Olympic Stadium. The team mascot--an orange and hairy something called "Youppi" (French for "hooray")--leads the fans in more chair-slamming fun, trying to keep a rally alive. The next batter runs the count full, teasing the fans, before popping out to the pitcher. More grumbles. The Expos have the lowest team payroll in baseball and some of the youngest players--and they are off to one of their worst starts in the team's 30-year history. Two nights ago, the players committed six errors in a single game. Again: Do we really want these guys? The answer, of course: Oui! Si! Yes! Please! Pretty please! Pretty please with whipped cream and a new, stylishly retro downtown stadium within easy walking distance of the Metro on top! Expos second baseman Wilton Guerrero steps to the plate as Youppi waves his hirsute arms wildly and the fans begin yelling things in French I can't understand. Guerrero, like the rest of the team, is in a terrible slump, and he falls behind in the count just as I come to a realization: Whatever happens in this game, I'll leave without regrets. If the Expos decamp for Washington, this will be the last summer to see French Canadian big-league baseball, a phenomenon worth catching before it goes, if for no other reason than it provides something found nowhere else in North America: minor league baseball with major league players. For anyone fashionably tired of big pro salaries, high ticket prices, arrogant players and the hassle of big crowds, the Expos offer the best of all worlds. I took a cheap Air Canada flight here, spent two days touring one of the world's great cities, and now I'm getting the farm league treatment: a tiny crowd, players barely old enough to shave, a crazy marriage proposal in the stands brokered by the mascot, and a wooden outfield scoreboard with numbers updated manually by teenagers. All this for the ridiculously low ticket price of less than $5 U.S. and a seat so close to the action that I can almost smell the pine tar. Guerrero bounces to second for an out, ending the inning. I do the only sensible thing. I order another Molson. My innkeeper in downtown Montreal, Madeline, says in accented English, "So what if the Expos leave town? There are many things fantastique and unique in Montreal besides just the Expos." She's right, of course, and during my two-day stay I'm determined see some "things fantastique" before hitting the ballpark. I begin by renting a mountain bike and pedaling straight to the top of Mont Royal, the dramatic, forested mountain (okay, a big hill) in the dead center of town that gives the city its name. A winding gravel road takes me through stands of Canadian maples to a beautiful summit park designed by Frederick Law Olmsted. It's odd to stand at the grassy pinnacle and be eyeball to eyeball with the tops of skyscrapers just 10 blocks away. On the way down, pausing for great views of the lovely St. Lawrence River, I pass a pair of oddly segregated cemeteries--one for French speakers, one for English speakers--a site that mutely summarizes the long-festering cultural divisions within Quebec. I pedal to the cobblestone streets of Old Montreal, a 40-square-block delight of colonial structures and alleyways filled with horse-drawn caleches and itinerant artists. A warm spring sun has unloosed crowds of diners on the city's Euro-gamut of outdoor cafes, bistros and restaurants. The legendary French Canadian reputation for highly developed leisure skills is on full display this Sunday afternoon amid a sea of white tablecloths and red wines so good that even the vin de maison is a pretty sure bet. I eat grilled salmon served rare with escargots on a bed of scallions and garlic, and nearly swoon. The next day is game day. I visit the Old Fort on St. Helen's Island, in the middle of the St. Lawrence River, before heading to Olympic Stadium. After the War of 1812, the British prepared for a possible American invasion of Montreal by building this moated fortress with eight-foot-long cannons and two-meter-thick stone walls. As something of an invader myself, I grow slightly self-conscious inside those walls. Maybe I'm paranoid, but the eyes of those period-dress sentries make me think they're onto me, pegging me as the expeditionary fingertip of Washington's long arm reaching up to snatch the Expos. I make a discreet but hasty exit. I arrive three hours before the game, leaving plenty of time to tour the flag-festooned Olympic Park. I buy a ticket for the highly touted gondola ride rising from the spine of Olympic Stadium. Photos of the 1976 Games ornament the waiting area: Nadia Comaneci, Kornelia Ender, Sugar Ray Leonard. But I soon learn something unexpected about myself: Facing backward in a gondola rapidly moving upward at a 45-degree angle makes me afraid. At the top, pale and sweating, I take in a dramatic aerial view of the famous Olympic Village, the Montreal Botanical Garden and the city's 1967 international Expo site. Back on terra firma, there's time for one more stop: Moe's Deli and Bar, where Expos fans gather. It's a friendly place with exposed-brick walls, barbecued ribs and desserts kept in an old phone booth by the bar. It's happy hour--two-for-one Labatt beers--till well past game time, perhaps to anesthetize the fans for the poor play sure to follow. I sit at the bar next to Daniel, a baseball-hatted Expos loyalist, who has a message for D.C. fans. "Don't accept our Expos," he tells me. "You've lost two teams of your own before, so you know what it feels like. Please don't do this to us." I grimace and finish my second Labatt and push back my stool while Daniel, like all Montrealers I meet, remains a friendly sport to the end. "When you reach the stadium," he says, "buy the cheapest ticket in the house. It's only $7 Canadian [$4.80 U.S.]. Then, after the first pitch, sit wherever you want." "A $7 seat, please," I tell the stadium ticket seller moments later, handing over my money. I walk through the turnstile, past the popcorn and pennant venders, toward Section 139, right field. Virtually alone in my area, I take in batting practice amid thoroughly modern trappings: artificial turf, a space-age stadium roof, a gargantuan replay screen in center field. But already it doesn't quite feel like major league baseball. First, of course, there's the ticket price, about a quarter of what you'd pay at Camden Yards. Then there's the action on the field. An Expos coach is pitching batting practice using a wobbly shopping cart full of baseballs, and he's throwing to the beat of French rock music blasting over the P.A. Thirty feet below me, two teenage boys are standing on a crude scaffold, diligently updating a sprawling pre-World War II-type wooden scoreboard that gives results from around the league. This old-fashioned work, utterly exposed to those of us in the cheap seats, involves taking scores from a press-box official, then reaching into several wooden troughs for wooden slabs hand-painted with numbers and sliding them into the appropriate slot. One of them wears a felt Gatsby hat. I exit the stands for a quick pregame bite. "One order of poutine," I tell the uniformed attendant at a concession stand. Poutine, a uniquely Quebecois concoction combining french fries, cheddar cheese and beef-stock gravy, is so popular that it's served at McDonald's restaurants throughout the province. I watch the cook in back combine the fries and cheese in a tall paper cup, then slop on a ladleful of thick gravy from a stainless-steel vat. He pauses and then, momentarily indecisive, adds a second, heaping ladleful. I'm back at my seat in time for the national anthem, spearing dripping mouthfuls of poutine with a fork. For extreme junk food, it's not so bad, though halfway through the serving my stomach begins making odd noises that compete with the junior high school band playing "O Canada" with tubas and French horns on the field. The Expos take the field next, and the crowd, sprinkled more or less evenly across the stadium, begins banging empty seats up and down in preparation for the opening pitch. Twenty-five-year-old Expos pitcher Mike Thurman is on the mound, and as he warms up you can almost sense the whole place cringe. With an 0-2 record and an ERA of 8.05, he's the worst pitcher on the second-worst pitching staff in the National League. Just two nights ago, Expos pitchers gave up 17 runs in a game. But the first pitch from Thurman is a strike on the outside corner, and cheers go up just as the strange migration begins. True to Daniel's prediction, everyone in the stands not already seated behind home plate makes a beeline for amazingly choice (and empty) lower-level seats just 20 rows from the field (above a narrow VIP section) in an arc from dugout to dugout. I grab the rest of my poutine and join the exodus. By the end of the first inning, we fans are huddled cozily around home plate. In the third inning, the Expos stage a mini rally. Third baseman Mike Mordecai lines a clean single to left, and the juices start flowing in the stands. I get caught up in the excitement--this is my team, too--so I stand and begin slamming the back of my chair and cheer madly like those around me. The noise coming from these fans is, no exaggeration, as much as I've heard from crowds four times as big in other parks. Despite the high-decibel support, the rally sputters when Thurman strikes out trying to lay down a bunt. Next to me, a serious fan named Jean Yves Leduc is studiously scoring the game. He says he's attended at least 40 Expos home games every year for the past two decades. He puts down his scoring pencil and reminisces about highlights, including the 22-inning game against Los Angeles in 1987 and the time he shook hands with third baseman Tim Wallach in the parking lot before a game. "I could feel all the calluses on Wallach's hand from taking extra batting practice every day," Yves says. "I'll never forget those calluses. He was so dedicated to this team and to the game." And what will Yves do if the Expos leave town? "I had a talk with my girlfriend," he says, "and I decided that, with all my new free time, I would just go ahead and get married and have a life." It's the top of the fourth when Thurman makes a mistake pitch and Phillies right-fielder Bobby Abreu lifts a second two-run homer into left field. Four-zip, Philadelphia. "One more Phillies run," mutters the old farmer next to me after removing his teeth, whistling and putting them back in, "and I'm going home to watch hockey." Halfway through the fifth inning, Yves gets into an animated conversation with a hot dog vendor. It's all in French, and they both laugh a great deal, and I ask Yves what's so funny. "The crowd's so small tonight that the stadium is telling all the vendors--when they go back for more hot dogs--to go home. They're getting paid for only half a game. But this vendor's decided to avoid the order by not going back to resupply. That way, he can at least get his base pay for the rest of the game." Sure enough, the vendor walks away with a smile, barking to the crowd, "No hot dogs here! No hot dogs! Pas de chiens chauds!" Unexpectedly, the Expos make a heroic comeback with three runs in the seventh, while a young relief pitcher called up from Double-A somehow keeps the Phillies scoreless. By the bottom of the ninth, the drama escalates. The Expos are down 4-3 with two outs and a man on second. First baseman Ryan McGuire, who has power, steps to the plate. We may be few, but we fans do our best. Youppi claps his hairy orange hands and directs our cheers to the field. Chairs are banging. The vendor has stopped not selling hot dogs and is rooting like everyone else. The scoreboard guys are smoking nervously, peeping through a hole in the outfield scoreboard. The guy with the false teeth, true to his word, has stayed to the end. On a 2-1 pitch, McGuire lifts a towering blast to left field. We jump for joy and cheer louder and louder. But the Phillies's left fielder refuses to give up on the ball. He drifts back, back, back and, incredibly, makes the catch standing against the outfield fence. Five thousand people collapse in their seats in anguish and disbelief. It was a good game, and the young Expos have no reason to drop their chins. But there is something very sad about the way these previously boisterous fans shuffle slowly out of the stadium. An unusually large number stop and linger at souvenir stands by the exit gates. Souvenir. A French word meaning "to remember." For many of these fans, this may very well be the last time they see their Expos. They buy hats, T-shirts, pennants. To remember. I take the Montreal Metro back to downtown thinking two things. First, I sincerely hope Montreal figures out a way to keep its team, and prosper, even if it means we in D.C. don't get one. Second, if the Expos do come to us, I can't wait for the day when I can take the Washington Metro to a baseball game with my son. I'll really show him how to make a stadium chair hum. ----------------------------------- :rolleyes:

Montreal church stands as mariners' rock A view westward, toward the core of downtown Montreal, from a tower of the Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel in the Old Montreal district. The Marguerite Bourgeoys Museum is adjoined to the church. (Marcos Townsend for the Boston Globe) By Patricia Harris and David Lyon, Globe Correspondents | May 9, 2007 MONTREAL -- Poet-songwriter Leonard Cohen was hardly the first Montrealer to gaze fondly on the chapel of Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours when he wrote "the sun pours down like honey / on Our Lady of the Harbour" in his pop hit "Suzanne." While the statue of the "Lady" wasn't erected until 1893, homecoming mariners have watched for the welcoming visage of the Old Port church since the first wooden chapel was erected on the spot in 1655. Although the church is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, it is equally a monument to its founder, Marguerite Bourgeoys , who was born in France in 1620 , became known as "the mother of the colony," and was ultimately canonized by the Roman Catholic Church in 1982 . In an era when most women rarely left their villages, Bourgeoys crossed the Atlantic Ocean seven times in her mission to educate the women of Montreal and raise money in her homeland to support the Congrégation de Notre-Dame , the religious order she founded. Just as Bourgeoys's legend became ever more expansive over the years, so did the church. She persuaded the community to rebuild it in stone in the late 1670s , and when that church burned in 1754 , it was replaced with the stone structure that stands today. In 1893 it sprouted a central tower topped with the nearly 20-foot-high open-armed statue of "Mary, Star of the Sea," flanked by two herald angels. The single-vault chapel's intimacy contrasts sharply with Montreal's more bombastic churches, and ship models suspended from the ceiling as ex-votos for voyages survived identify the church as the mariners' own. With the rapid secularization of Montreal (the Catholic Church dominated education, health care, and social services through the 1960s), public recognition of Bourgeoys has declined. But she remains one of the rocks on which the city was built, and the Marguerite Bourgeoys Museum , attached to the chapel, memorializes her accomplishments. The exhibits evoke an intimate vision of the early years of Montreal. Visitors can inspect the original foundations of the early chapels and view artifacts exhumed during archeological work here in the 1990s . Cracked blue and white porcelain cups and plates, discarded belt buckles, and broken pipes seem to conjure up their long-ago owners, who were determined to maintain the veneer of civilization in the distant wilds. They never stopped thinking of themselves as French, as the green glass wine bottles attest. The tour winds up a 69-step staircase to the 19th-century tower. Walls along this level's open walkway are lined with images of the St. Lawrence River and the port of Montreal in 1685 . For a perfect juxtaposition of old and new, turn and look outside to see people strolling and cycling along the modern-day Old Port promenade while the grand geodesic dome of the Biosphère shines in the distance. Another 23 steps lead up to the belvedere, where visitors are suddenly almost face to face with the herald angels and the broad expanse of the modern city extends down the waterfront to the horizon. By 1668 , Bourgeoys had moved her religious order from the center of the town to a rural farm on Pointe St-Charles near the Lachine rapids , a short bike ride or bus trip from Old Montreal. Bourgeoys originally taught the women of the colony to read, but soon expanded her activities to include schools for surrounding First Peoples villages and the care of the "filles du roy," the young women given dowries by Louis XIV and sent to the colony to marry and multiply. The old stone farmstead, Maison St-Gabriel , now functions as a heritage museum of 17th-century rural life with a focus on the filles du roy, who still loom large in Quebecois legend. Often recruited among the urban poor, many of the women lacked even rudimentary skills for colonial life. Tours in English and French by guides in 17th-century garb focus on the transformation of the filles du roy into sturdy colonists. Their re-created period vegetable gardens underline the need for self-sufficiency. The property's 19th-century fieldstone barn holds temporary exhibitions, such as "An Iron in Time," which opens this month. It recounts the evolution of clothes-pressing, lest there be any doubt about the hard work of women in New France. When Marguerite Bourgeoys died in 1700 , she was interred on the farm. But in 2003 , the 350th anniversary of her arrival in Montreal, her remains were placed in the left side altar of Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours below the statue she had brought back from France in 1672. Marguerite Bourgeoys Museum and Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours Chapel 400 rue St-Paul Est, Montreal 514-282-8670 marguerite-bourgeoys.com Tuesday-Sunday 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. May-October, 11-3:30 November-mid-January and March-April. Adults $5.10, seniors and students $3.40, family $10.20. Maison St-Gabriel 2146 place Dublin Pointe-St-Charles 514-935-8136 maisonsaint-gabriel.qc.ca Tuesday-Sunday 1-5 p.m. April 15-June 23 and Sept. 4-Dec. 21, 11-6 June 24-Sept. 2. Adults $6.80, seniors $5.10, students $3.40. Patricia Harris and David Lyon, freelance writers in Cambridge and authors of the "Compass American Guide: Montreal," can be reached at harris.lyon@verizon.net. © Copyright 2007 Globe Newspaper Company.