I just got back Tuesday night. After a really really long rest, I have finally recovered from all the vacationing fun. All the dirty clothes have finally been washed and put away.

Anyways, I had a blast there. I forgot to point out from my last entry, Martina and I decided to surprise Paolo by only disclosing to him that one of us would visit. We thought about it carefully, and we mutually agreed that it made more sense that I would be the surprise, because I think it would be awfully suspicious for me to tell him that I'm going to visit him, alone.

When we arrived at the Grenada airport, I was tied up in customs, so it worked out with the surprise, since I made my red carpet entry many minutes after Martina. He didn't even notice me until I came right in front of him, I even had to wave my hands a bit. Haha. While he was surprised, I wished for a reaction that was a little more dramatic.

Anyway, Paolo was a super host, just because it's not often that we can get to really live and understand how the locals live.

We visited many beaches, the Grand Anse, the BBC (Morne Rouge), and the Lance Aux Epines beach, and got an awesome tan because of it.
Colour on day 1...

Colour on day 8...

We also made a hike up the mountains, and it was a gorgeous view looking down onto Grand Anse and St. George’s.

We also enjoyed the many fruits that Grenada had to offer. We were addicted to those wax apples and the fresh bananas from the Marketing Board.

For some odd reason, I also found that the eggs in Grenada are way better than those in Canada. Luckily for us, we also got a great chef-slash-server.

They also had the awesomest banana bread. We 'prepared' a nice cake for Paolo.

We also went snorkeling as you suggested, unfortunately I didn’t take my Gravol, and got so complete seasick! Haha, I ended up puking on the boat (thank god that I aimed toward the waters). I felt much better after puking and I continued to snorkel after that. Here's a picture before the seasickness.

We also visited Fort George, it was built on a cliff looking towards the Atlantic in the 18th century by the French. It has specatular views the the city and the water.

We also went on what the call the Rhum Runner. For EC$40, you can drink as much rum punch on the boat ride to your hearts content! Though unlimited drinking is never a good idea for me, given my tolerance.

Weirdly enough while having dinner, I bumped into Nithi! Apparently, we were eating at a medical student hangout. Low and behold, we bumped into a fellow high-school-classmate-turned-medical-student. There seems to be strong ties between Canada and Grenada.

Oh man, I digged the bus rides in Grenada. It so darn efficient! There’s always a bus coming along, and it’s so darn cheap, EC$2, which is just under C$1! I also like the fact that they play Reggae and Soca on the buses. Here's a picture of the central bus station.

The crappy part about the trip was that our flight was delayed upon our return to Toronto from Trinidad. We were already tired having not slept the night before, and we simply wasn't amused about the delay, which made us arrive 1.5 hours late at Pearson. There was a huge army of soldiers coming home from Barbados for the Cricket World Cup. Anyways, the soldiers were used for the event’s security. According to our pilot, they delayed our flight because of the weapons and amunition from their plane required paperwork. Plus, they held a large press conference right where our departing gate was. Argh. Let's just say that people go pretty nuts about cricket.

That's it. I have since returned to reality. Expect my regularly scheduled programming soon.

I have a few minutes to kill before heading off to the airport.

Yes, I'm off to Grenada with Martina for a nine-day adventure to visit our old pal Paolo, who has been working there on contract doing GIS work since January. Grenada is within the West Indies, just north of Trinidad and south of St Lucia.

Oh man, I'm looking forward to thinking about absolutely nothing and laying there on the beach. Some snorkelling and hiking adventures should be fun too!

We have quite a long flight trip, because have to make a six-hour stop-over in Port of Spain in Trinidad and Tobago. So it's about a six-hour trip to get to Trinidad, and another hour from Trindad to St George's, where Paolo is currently residing.

That's it from me for now, expect perhaps some sporadic updates until my return on May 1st.

Grenada - [wikipedia.org]
Grenada - [wikitravel.org]

A few days ago, Bowie and I took a road trip around the Golden Horseshoe to visit our neighbours in Buffalo, New York.

Our mission: succumbing to mass consumerism in the "land of the free and home of the brave." Because of my planning nerdiness, I also had a secret agenda to understand what's going on in the planning world in Buffalo.

Bowie, being an experienced bargain shopper, wanted to directly head to Walden Galleria after checking in at the hotel. Walden Galleria is a regional mall near Buffalo International Airport and is about 25 minutes from Downtown.

Us at Pottery Barn Kids. Geez, kids who own these toys are darn fortunate.

At first glance, I was surprised to see such a wide selection of stores-- they have almost everything that you would find at the Eaton Centre. Having not shopped much at American non-outlet retail stores, I became quite impressed that even malls in the suburbs had such a wide spectrum of stores. To my dismay, though, I realized upon doing further research that Walden Galleria is the epicentre of shopping in Western New York.

It's a shame that the region's busiest mall is way in the outskirts of the city. I guess we can say the same thing for many mid-sized cities in southern Ontario like Kitchener-Waterloo and London.

Here's me at Johnny Rockets, you will find the same at Vaughan Mills. Service was awful.

The mall is quite a retreat. After some shopping, we ate, and returned to shop and then ate some more. The mall is undergoing an incredible expansion, and included in the expansion is this neat cheesecake restaurant aptly called the Cheesecake Factory. The décor is extravagant and resembles sort of a fusion between Disney and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. I have not seen so much cheesecake in one place. This place was very exclusive-- we had to way just under an hour for a table.

By the time we finished our cheesecake desserts, it was already 11 pm-- this meant that we spent nine hours in a mall. While we contemplated visiting their 4-am-last-call bars in downtown on West Chippewa Street, we were too exhausted and called it a night and watched quality American television: syndicated Dawson's Creek, and popular "little people" programs on TLC.

The next morning, we dragged ourselves up to head to a non-descript outlet mall near Niagara Falls called Fashion Outlets. This was after some directional troubles; but forgive us, we didn't have coffee yet.

Me at Bob Evans, a homey American restaurant. They made us a specially ordered blueberry crepe. It was good.

I swear being a planner, driving around this portion of New York State is incredibly depressing. I seriously believe that there were no planners when these commercial strips were constructed. It reminded me of an aged Hespeler Road in Cambridge-incohesive buildings structures, large setbacks, no sidewalks, large commercial signs. Below is a stolen picture that best depicted what I saw.

There was not much to report at the outlet mall. It was bland and full of thrifty Canadians.

We then returned back to Buffalo in the afternoon to pursue my secret agenda. I knew I had planned more than the time permitted, but I tried to prioritize as much as I could.

For those don't know, Buffalo is part of a region informally coined as the Rust Belt. This region of the American northeast first grew as a result of good transportation links with the Eric Canal, and later with great railroad connections. Buffalo was once a manufacturing powerhouse, and it thrived on the automobile industry back in the former half of the 20th century. Because of the impacts of globalization, many automobile manufacturers left, and its population fell considerably from its peak in 1950 at 580,000 to a current population of just under 280,000. While there are emerging economies in bioinformatics, given its well-represented post-secondary institutions such as SUNY, they have been unable to bounce back to its former glory.

Given its lack of economic progress after the war, Buffalo was blessed in the sense that it did not experience the severe effects of modernism that plagued so many North American cities like Toronto. Many of its heritage buildings remains in tact today, and my secret agenda was to visit each one of them.

Buffalo City Hall, a gorgeous Art Deco building at Niagara Square.

Old Post Office now occupied by Erie Community College.

Ellicott Square Building, one of the neo-renaissance structures built in the late 19th century.

After a bit of sightseeing, we took the Buffalo Metro to eat at Anchor Bar. Anchor Bar is believed to be "Home of the Original Buffalo Chicken Wing," and we thought we'd be gullible and go there. The décor was a bit shabby, and reminds me of Coyote Ugly. The wings were quite disappointing; it was overcooked and lacked flavour.

Because we were so short of time, we had to quickly pack our dinner, and rush to get catch the production of Of Mice and Men at Studio Arena Theatre. The show was great, and the performers were very convincing.

Bowie waiting for the train to arrive at Theatre Station.

I really enjoyed having the opportunity to take the Buffalo Metro Rail. While it is called the Metro, it really isn't by definition. It's a metro only in the northern parts of the corridor, and an LRT in the southern downtown portions. The downtown portions are on a dedicated right of way along a pedestrian-only boulevard, but they have to obey signals at intersecting streets.

While Buffalo built the LRT and the pedestrian boulevard as a way to revitalize the struggling downtown, it is believed that it did the contrary. The pedestrian boulevard restricted access to automobiles, and essentially killed the only source of traffic it could've generated. As you can see from the pictures on Main Street, where the LRT corridor serves, it is void of any substantial retail or pedestrian traffic.

Okay, to sum up, as a tourist, I have to say that the trip was fair, at best. Again, perhaps we live in a diversity bubble in Toronto, but it seems to me that we were constantly reminded that we were tourists, and we were stared with such explicit scrutiny. I definitely did not feel like I belonged there.

I felt that it went beyond the fact that Bowie and I were these Asian minorities in a predominately Black and White society. It seemed as though the locals did not know what to do with these seemingly displaced tourists. We were told not to take photos, and while it was apparent that we were tourists, people a bit cold and did not share a feeling of hospitality.

However, as a planning adventure, I really enjoyed this trip. Planners often make field trips to see how cities accommodate for growth and what they're doing right. But I felt that it was equally if not more satisfying to understand how we plan for decline. I suggest all planners to give Buffalo a chance.

After the show, we ran back to the car, and drove back to Toronto.

PS: Canadian citizenship cards are still accepted at the border; you just need another piece of photo ID.

Buffalo - [wikipedia.org]
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo
(That's a grammatically correct word!) - [wikipedia.org]
Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority - [nfta.com]
Walden Galleria - [waldengalleria.com]
Fashion Outlets Niagara - [fashionoutletsniagara.com]
Studio Arena Theatre - [studioarena.org]
Buffalo Niagara Tourism - [buffalocvb.org]

So I lied, I did not publish the second installment of Friday. Sorry la. Hope everyone is enjoying the great Canada Day weekend. It seems like the whole world is out-of-town-- since my suburban world seems quite devoid of traffic.

Enjoy guys.

Martina and Tiff are geeks who inadvertently bought the same dress from Primark. Apparently, it was a crazy power buy-- something in the figure of 10 to 20 pounds. What's interesting is that it seemd like all the Oxford women owned this dress.

This is another great shot of Tiff near Christ Church. I told her to pretend to stare towards the sun so that I can get her in that imfamous fobby photography pose.

Here are the "hardworking" quattro in the lab at Brookes trying to complete our final assignments. Shawn and I compared between the growth management and greenbelt strategies of England vs the Greater Golden Horseshoe. Take note that Liz's eyes are closed!

Here is Henry punting on the River Thames. Let me tell you, punting is not easy. That rod was blasphemously made of some metal compound, whic made it trememoudously heavy to hold.

Here I am, don't I look buff and manly? Tee hee. Henry and Carmen were definitely our best punters in our group. In fact, Henry called Carmen 'Hercules'-- which isn't all that flattering. :P

Here's Tiff at Primark at the Westgate Mall--where the white polka dot dress was purchased. I don't understand why clothing in the UK is so affordable, but everything else is outrageously overpriced.

This is the Brookes bus laying over at our Brookes Harcourt Hill Campus-- isn't she a beauty? Oxford's transit companies do a great job with service marketing-- something TTC should really take a look into.

Here's everyone at the Oxford University Press. This is the home of those famous dictionaries-- or at least so we thought. They unfortuantely don't give tours in that complex.

This shot is for all urban designers. Here's a typical bench on Cornmarket-- Oxford's pedestrian street. Margaret called these the "homeless proof" street furniture-- because their design inhibits anyone from lying prostrate. You can rest only by leaning against it.

That's all from Oxford folks, I still need to publish some pictures from our field trips and time in Spain. That's next.

Back to regularly scheduled programming.

I received a few comments that for being on an Oxford Exchange, there hasn't been that many pictures of... Oxford.

Me and Mel on the upper deck front seat of the infamous 30-minute headway Brookes Bus.

Dinner time at the Harcourt Hill refectory-- our local place to eat. This is where we stuffed ourselves with marginal English food.

Henry and I at Radcliffe Square.

Liz and I enjoying England's finest for takeaway-- Pasties.

Us being fobs in front of Christ Church.

Liz and Me being bouncers at Tamas' birthday celebration (who knew I had it in me?). Because the party was hosted at our house, people had to pay cover at the door, or come through the window. Everyone, like Henry pictured above, chose the latter.

Me being a nerd on the green pastures near Headington Hill.

Purchasing goods at the local Co-op. The convenience store has quite a selection of booze. UK should be applauded for their progressive stances for exercising alternatives to corporatization.

Outside for lunch during our day in lecture. You can see people, like Martina, preparing their final presentations.

Tiff chowing down that free burger. A united Christian society decided to throw this big bash with free food, and live Christian music. How can two students turn down free food, even if we have to hear about Jesus' feel-good messages?

The second installment of Oxford-Oxford pictures will be published on Friday.

We're back to regularly schedule programming...

Shawn gets really annoyed when I pronouce things wrong in Britain. Boys and girls, for your first British English lesson, you will grasp that "Leicester" is pronounced LES-ter, as in the name-- not Le-SES-ter.

I was disapponted at the outcome of a lot of my pictures in London-- this is probably because of the crappy weather. All my London Eye pictures, which where such Kodak-moment material, were pretty much a write-off.

With no further ado, here's the pics.

Tiff showing that naan no mercy. There was a great Indian restaurant close to our hostel-- being the pigs that we are I am, we I had to pig out.

Here's Tiff Matt on the Hungerford Bridge.

Quick! Pronounce this tube station! The answer is at the end of the entry. I heart the Underground.

What I didn't enjoy about the tube is the continuous reminders to not leave your bags unattended, and to report suspicious activity. I know the London bombings spark a reason for more vigilance-- but these continuous print and voice messages starts to create a sense of paranoia.

This is my favourite picture of my London excursion. I told Tiff to pose like a Cover Girl. Coincidentally, a big red upper-decker whooshes by.

No Tiff's were hurt during the shoot.

[A picture is supposed to replace this paragrah of text, but because I'm lazy, you're just going to read this.]

The background is Westminster Abbey-- I want to bring your attention that "Westminster" does not have an 'I' between 'N' and 'S'-- it's not "minister." I don't know how many times Tiff corrected me.

We stopped by the Burberry flagship. Burberry associates are definitely less bitchy than LV.

Tiff and I relaxing at Costa (a UK coffee shop chain) near the Portobello Market-- the Kensington Market of London.

A pretty truck and a nice piece of public art near Portobello Market. Something to note: the street is named Blenheim Street. Pronounce "Blenheim." Answer at the end of the entry.

I have no idea how many pictures of the Tube I have. Here is a Underground Service Update board, which shows the operational status of each of the 12 lines. Delays on the Underground is inevitable. We almost missed our flight home for that reason.

More tube pictures. Could you see why I had to be in this picture?

Ahhh! Me on Abbey Road! Too bad the street was too busy to really emulate what the BeetlesBeatles did.

Me and the Abbey Road Studios. The BeetlesBeatles recorded in there! Woo!

Me and Buckingham Palace. Where's Prince Harry?

ANSWERS:
Southwark: Suth-uck, the W is silent.
Blenheim: Blen-em, the H is silent.

I have no idea what the history is, but it is apparent that England has a highly entrenched culture of drinking-- and particularly binge drinking. So what should us good Canadians do? Join them of course!

Here are some interesting shots of the bar trips we made while we were in Oxford.

Park End:
Park End was the first place we ventured to-- this place was definitely ranked top out of all the bars/clubs we went to. It was a multi-genre, multi-level club-slash-lounge. Levels are open to below, so that you can look down to see what's going on-- similar to the now demolished I.T.

Music rocked! By the way, the English pretty much listen to the same stuff as us-- there was hardly any songs we weren't familiar with.

Still quite sober.

Tiff and me with Shawn's favourite beer.

Tee hee. The face that was cut off is Tessa. Me and Tessa couldn't fit in the 5-person cab that night, so we walked for a hour back home.

FUBAR @ The Venue:
Just like Waterloo, Oxford has a FUBAR-- but FUBAR refers to the weekly event-- aptly the venue is called "The Venue." FUBAR, I learned, stands for "fucked up beyond all recognition" and has references from the military. I suppose this term can easily be applied to a bar setting.

FUBAR is the Fed Hall of Oxford Brookes. Beer is served in damn plastic cups-- campus anal-retentive measures-- which means beer is spilt left right and centre. But on the bright note, beers are £1-- a Carling, which nastily resembles a Moosehead.

Us on the Brookes Bus to the bar-- don't be fooled by the picture. English kids get really rowdy when drunk. Drunkenness on the bus involves singing the Oxford Brookes theme song-- unknown to us-- as well as nearly smashing bus windows.

"Hey sexy lad[ies], I like you flow (wuh oh)."

Peekaboo! Matt becomes FUBAR at FUBAR.

dIs iZ mY aTemPt aT soMe AzN pRyDe.

Here we are in that neat Salsa room. There was this great salsa dancer who definitely had a handful with our ladies.

Last minute pose before we're off for the last Brookes Bus.

Fuzzy Ducks @ The Zodiac:
Fuzzy Ducks is another themed night in a more grungy-looking venue. At night, the street setting, Cowley Road, resembles the Annex on Bloor-- a lively street with a great sense of community.

The music that night was acceptable. The drinks were again cheap, probably because of the student town-- £1 to £2 for beers and cocktails.

Here's the only picture of the evening. All other pictures are censored to protect the innocent. Let's just say it involves many planners taking off their shirts. Oh boy.

The Stumble Inn:
Do you follow the pun? Stumble Inn is the local pub in the Harcourt Hill campus-- where we were staying. It's a much quieter bar, since our campus is quite tiny-- and is more seen as a pre-drinking venue. People actually purchase drinks here, bring it back to their residence to drink before they head out.

This place is also great for getting change for the laundry in the afternoon!

Jeff, our prof in green, treated us to drinks-- courtesy of our late-arrival program: anyone who doesn't arrive on time for field trips are fined £1.

It looks like Tiff is attempting to eat Fadi's head. I could understand because she was always hungry. Look how frightened Fadi is.

Cheers to Oxford!

Now that I life is back to "normal," I have been staring at my Oxford pictures to keep my reminiscing going. So, like Tiff, I will be posting pictures in little groupings whenever I get a chance.

So, Tiff and I decided to spend one day spontaneously and take the train to whereever it leads us. Lucky for Bristol, we chose you!

Sounded like Pokemon for a second.

Bristol is in the southwest region of England and was a thriving nautical trading post, I believe in the 17th and 18th centuries. Bristol has also had a long history of slave trade from Africa to the Americas during that time. Now, Bristol has evolved into a prominent industrial centre for aeronautics and finance.

Zoom zoom, Tiffany.

Zoom zoom Matt as he attempts to write his aspiring travel memoir.

Matt's head next to an airplane engine at the Bristol Industrial Museum. As I said, Bristol has a long history of aeronatics-- in fact, the University of Bristol has a recognized program in that field. (Something for you, Leo)

Guess what's the boat's name?

Tiff found her dream job in Bristol.

Oh baby. Organic meats at this neat supermarket, Fresh and Wild.

A little sense of home in Bristol-- though neither of us live in Richmond Hill.

Me stuffing my face at this trendy "noodle bar", Wagamama. One of the best meals we've had in the UK. Nice trendy place with an ambience similiar to Salad King.

As some of you might know, I have stepped back into Canadian soil. Although I do miss travelling and catching all the neat sites from Tiff's godsend Eyewitness books, I do miss being home and getting a bite of some home-cooked (aka take-out) eating. I also miss my comfy bed, my clean sheets, my conditioner (not like that travellers 2-in-1 I've been using), my cellphone, my computer, and of course, high-pressured showers.

To conclude my entry, the following is a list of interesting notes about the exchange in numbers:

Number of scary local professors, 1
Days in overcast skies, 9,658
Number of flights taken, 6
Number of Spice Girls spotted, 0
Number of photos and videos taken, 2,373
Number of roundabouts travelled, 8,547,545
Number of hours airborne, 22
Number of visible stains on hostel beds, 3
Number of hostels stayed at, 6
Number of gravol pills taken, 6
Number of annoying hostel roommates, 0
Daily journal entries left to write, 15
Number of FCUK's spotted, 2
Number of times I said "oui" when I should've said "ci", 5,462
Cost in pounds for a 3-day pass on the London Tube, 15
Number of days in lectures, 6
Number of good fish and chip platters, 0
Total Canadian dollars spent, 3,519 4,059
Number of clubbing trips, 3
Number of times body-searched at the airport, 1
Cost of the cheapest beer at the bar in pounds, 1
Number of bubble tea places spotted, 0
Cost of the British Museum, 0
Number of times puked, 1
Number of really disgusting hostel bathrooms, 2
Cost of London Eye in pounds, 12 13
Number of class field trips, 6
Number of pairs of shoes tossed while on the trip, 2
Number of criossants eaten for breakfast, 8,696
Cost in Euros for a 4-pack of AA alkaline batteries in Paris, 6
Number of transit orgasms had, 12
Hours of good times had, 95,985,587

Oh man, Spain is awesome. It was been sunny since we´ve got here, and has no sign of stopping.

Something about Spain that I really like is that people are extremely laid back. The first vibe I got when roaming around the streets is that people really like life here. There are an ocean of people almost across Madrid just chilling, laughing and having a nice cold drink. For that reason, I have to say that Spanish people really age much more gracefully when compared to the others. If I knew more Spanish, I swear, it would be a great place to live.

Remember when I said that French guys are hotter than English guys? Well, Spanish guys are way in the lead when compared to the French.

Oh baby. I fact I met a Madrid "boyfriend" Luis-- the night reception . Haha!

Speaking of gayness, Spain is by far the most liberal country I´ve been to on this trip-- partly, methinks, because they´re so laid back. You can just see countless of gay couples hanging out, holding hands, and soaking up the sun.

Language has definitely been a barrier on this trip. Our great planner, Angie, has been godly to us because she was fortunate enough to have taken Spanish as a child. But now, Angie has left to head to Nice, and it´s now down to four people who are clueless about the language.

But we did pick up a few words however: hola, hablas ingles?, no hablos espanol, no comprendo.

I´m sure you can figure out what they mean!

That´s it for now. Hasta luego! See you later!

It seems like we just got here yesterday, but now we're packing our bags. Again, my brain is in no state to be writing long entries, but again, here are some last random facts from Oxford and Britain as a whole.

• Boxers-exposing low-rise jeans is widespread with the English male demographic, not just with the "Urban Outfitters" crowd like Canada. I suppose it could be hot-- and if you're until that, you might get to see butt crack too
• The privatization of public transit in the United Kingdom is a horrible move, and there is absolutely no coordination between all transit authorities. There are two private bus companies in Oxford: Stagecoach, and the Oxford Bus Company.
  • Oxford Brookes has its own marketed bus operated by Stagecoach-- it runs mostly on 30 minute headways and has serious schedule reliablility issues
• English men like to take off their shirts more than Canadians. Perhaps it's because of the humid and muggy climate. English men predomiately are built similarly: tall and lanky.
• But overall, French guys are hotter than English guys. But on the other hand, English guys have really nice hair. On a side note, there are Toni and Guy's everywhere.
• There are a lot of Tandoori places here. West Indians represent!
• There are no bubble tea places here. Chinese don't represent! I should really start a business and acquaint the English to something other than tea or nasty £1 Carling beer!
• Discount clothier, Primark, is friggin awesome
• After being in Britain for a while, you get sick of visiting the following:
  
  • Churches and cathedrals
  
  
  • Countryside
  
  
  • Historic buildings
  
  
  • Pedestrian streets (some)
  
  
  • English food
  
  
  
  

I should have internet access in Spain, but I'm sure the updates would be sporadic.

Cheerio!

The Queen!

Us all excited after meeting the Queen.

If you didn't see our photo in the newspaper, take a look!

Martina and me at Tower Bridge.

Everyone in front of Les Miserables in Picadilly Circus. We got rush tickets to see it-- for only £12!

Me and Liz on the streets of Picadilly Circus.

Transit orgasms in the London Underground.

Matt the treehugger, close to London City Hall on the Thames.

Here are some random facts about what I noticed in Paris:

• Not only is it the City of Love, it's also the City of Graffiti.

  No where in the world have I seen so much graffiti. People managed to get spray stuff in subway tunnels-- and I don't mean the station platform areas.

• Paris has very divided rich and poor communities.

  Beyond the grandeur of the central Paris, the outskirts are extremely dilapitated-- the city definitely has major poor/rich income gaps. Shawn and Fadi warned us before our trip of notorious pick-pockets in Paris-- which really freaked us out. Luckily, we were all okay.

• Paris is quite diverse

  Surprisingly, I witnessed a healthy mix of cultures in the city. Although it is hard to say, since many of the people we saw were probably tourists too. But nevertheless, I saw many Asian and Middle-Eastern looking workers in many of the many places were went.

• Paris has a extremely extensive subway and commuter-rail system

  Large historical cities have always been blessed with a healthy mass transit system. Paris is no exception. We travelled around the city at ease, though it often takes a long time to transfer to another platform at interchanges. Here's the map.

• Louis Vuitton is overrated

  All of us decided to visit LV on popular high-end shopping street, Champs d'Ellysees. There was this sexy Arab bouncer at the door, and he made visitors line up to get in-- even when it was clear that a lot of customers left. Once inside, there was many departments-- bags, accessories, clothes, watches, etc. It was so blah, we had to leave. There was a bitchy Asian sales associate there, but that's another story.

Me and the Grande Arche. We sketched this back in PLAN 210.

I told Tiff to pose for this picture. It looks like an apple pie. Tiff makes apple pies.

This picture is dedicated to Shima. It's our beloved flamingo, our pretty centerpiece public art in our Davis Centre site design.

Us chilling at the Charles de Gaulle airport. Here's Brennon blowing his birthday candle. I like this picture.

Me
and Angie at Centre Pompideau.

Here is everyone at our trio birthday get-together in Lizzie's room. It was Mel, Brennon, and Tamas' birthday on April 30th, May 1st and May 2nd respectively.

Me and the Eiffel Tower.

Me and the Arc de Trioumphe.

Me and LV. LV sales associates are little stuck up bitches. I guess that's no surprise. :p

Me and hot guys in a Paris Metro ad. Hubba hubba.

Angie, Mel, Tiff and I at the Louvre.

Here are some things I learned which might perplex Canadians when in Britain.

• When ordering food or drinks, they say "to stay or takeaway" instead of "for here or to go."

  I bought a drink the other day, and it look me a long time to actually understand what the server was asking-- and the accent doesn't help.

• "Are you alright?" is the British equivalent to "How's it going?"

  The former phrase when used in Canada is commonly used only when a person has a problem, so it definitely feels kind of odd.

• Fries are 'chips', chips are 'crisps', elevators are 'lifts', guys are 'blokes' or 'chaps', paper money are 'notes', lines are 'queues', highways are 'motorways'.

  These ones are obvious.

• Divided highways are 'dual carriageways', a cafeteria is 'refectory', sodas are 'fizzies'.

  These are less obvious.

• On your keyboard, the '@' sign is where the double-quotes are, the '#' sign is a completely new key to the left of the return key, the return key is smaller on that row.

  Typing really pisses me off. For more, see check out Wiki.

My brain is too tired for any real written update, so instead, enjoy some pictures.

All of us posing at Christ Church.

Shawn and Tiff enjoying pasties at Cornmarket Street-- Oxford's pedestrian shopping district. A pasty, after being corrected many times, are pronounced "past-y." Pasties are glorified pizza pockets.

Shawn, moi, and Julius at Warwick Castle. So nice.

Moi, Martina, and Tiff with the BBC duck in Stratford. Apparently it was Shakespeare's birthday that day, so it was sort of busy.