Sunday, January 07, 2007
china town
China town, Ottawa, holds a special place in my heart. It had been my home and residence for a year and a half and will continue to be so for another 4 months (does anyone wanna sublet the place from me in the summer?).
In Chinatown the city turkeys roam free, living off of human waste (the stuff we throw out, not the stuff that comes out of us). You can almost walk up and punt them, they no longer fear people. They’ll walk across your foot while you wait for the bus. They sit outside kitchen windows and watch what you’re making for supper, maybe waiting to see what you’ll through out.
Chinatown is a diverse community. My neighbors include the acupuncture clinic, a pho-bo-ga restaurant, the Buddhist community centre, the Caribbean food restaurant and the black barber shop (to name a few). Most days when you walk past the black barber shop there is a host of Rastafarians hanging outside discussing loudly different topics and listening to reggae music that I’m not familiar with. I try and not let my smile show at the irony of Rasta’s hanging outside a barber shop. On a few occasions you can here and see the Buddhist monks (often white women with shaved heads in the orange robes) walking down the streets and banging a drum. I’ve only witness this a couple of times so I’m not sure if it’s for a religious day or is on a monthly/weekly basis.
I’m also right around the corner from Little Italy. In the fall they have a wine making festival where you can take it to the streets and step on grapes in barrels and become part of the winemaking process. Little Italy has a ton of restaurants, little coffeehouse’s and most importantly a whole host of family owned and run pizza joints. No more big corporation pizza with cardboard crust (I’m looking at you pizza pizza), you can get the small stuff in a wide variety and better quality.
Although I haven’t done much stuff in this community, it has become a bit of a home for me. I’ve never seen myself as a big city person, but I have loved living here. So much variety, so many languages being spoken in the street, multiculturalism working, or at least trying to work; beginning to work. I’ve got another semester here and then I am home, likely for 8 months. I’ll miss this place but it will always be a part of me. I am a china towner now.
pictures of my section of somerset
In Chinatown the city turkeys roam free, living off of human waste (the stuff we throw out, not the stuff that comes out of us). You can almost walk up and punt them, they no longer fear people. They’ll walk across your foot while you wait for the bus. They sit outside kitchen windows and watch what you’re making for supper, maybe waiting to see what you’ll through out.
Chinatown is a diverse community. My neighbors include the acupuncture clinic, a pho-bo-ga restaurant, the Buddhist community centre, the Caribbean food restaurant and the black barber shop (to name a few). Most days when you walk past the black barber shop there is a host of Rastafarians hanging outside discussing loudly different topics and listening to reggae music that I’m not familiar with. I try and not let my smile show at the irony of Rasta’s hanging outside a barber shop. On a few occasions you can here and see the Buddhist monks (often white women with shaved heads in the orange robes) walking down the streets and banging a drum. I’ve only witness this a couple of times so I’m not sure if it’s for a religious day or is on a monthly/weekly basis.
I’m also right around the corner from Little Italy. In the fall they have a wine making festival where you can take it to the streets and step on grapes in barrels and become part of the winemaking process. Little Italy has a ton of restaurants, little coffeehouse’s and most importantly a whole host of family owned and run pizza joints. No more big corporation pizza with cardboard crust (I’m looking at you pizza pizza), you can get the small stuff in a wide variety and better quality.
Although I haven’t done much stuff in this community, it has become a bit of a home for me. I’ve never seen myself as a big city person, but I have loved living here. So much variety, so many languages being spoken in the street, multiculturalism working, or at least trying to work; beginning to work. I’ve got another semester here and then I am home, likely for 8 months. I’ll miss this place but it will always be a part of me. I am a china towner now.
pictures of my section of somerset
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