Catch Up

I've been meaning to blog these last few days but having to catch up with all the news and blog feeds I get has actually consumed more hours than I expected. Many stories I wanted to comment about are now probably old news so it's probably not worth it. Instead, I'll quickly summarize my trips to Calgary and London, Ontario.

Having never been out west before, it was definitely an enjoyable trip, especially during the Calgary Stampede (no pictures unfortunately). Anyone would love a citywide party, and I am no exception. I got a general feel of the city (especially the way addresses are handled) and it's easy to figure out the history of the city based on the way the street layout.

Taking a stroll along one of Calgary's many trails with my friends Jess, Moni and her niece Emma to the Calgary Zoo.

In some respects, Calgary is a contradiction. There's now a resurgence in demand to live downtown, within walking distance of various amenities but at the same time new suburbs (in traditional, sprawling fashion) are being built at an enormous pace, as evident on the flight into the city. But I guess, if you have tons of money to spend, you can please everybody.

I was very impressed, however, by the large amounts of greenspace running through the city, moreso than, say, Toronto. While they're not prevalent in all areas, the irony is often you can only access them by automobile. It helped that the weather was gorgeous and people were frequenting these areas and that Calgary got more rain than usual, making the vegetation quite lush.

And of course, seeing the Rockies for the first time blew me away. I never even ventured in that far, ending up only in Kananaskis Country. Just being able to hike into some of the trails was just invigorating. With views like the one above, how can one not want to spend all their time there?


When you get to witness a cowboy fording a river on a horse, how can you not enjoy yourself?

Another area I was impressed with was the University of Western Ontario. Though people complain of its sprawling campus, it is large mainly because of the size of the university itself, hosting upwards of 30 000 students. Again, so much more greenery (particularly large trees and gardens rather than straight lawns) than say, Queen's University. It's also particularly interesting to see how the built form on the main campus tends to remain consistent throughout different periods, save a few buildings (Staging Building, Weldon Library and the Social Science Centre are unfortunately on the wrong side of different). But it makes me so disappointed at Queen's that it doesn't provide a proportionate amount of greenery that Western does, especially on a hot, summer day. So while I still think Queen's is one of the greatest schools in the country (I'm a little biased, I can be upfront about it), it's certainly lacking in the vegetation department (and the wireless internet, but that's another post.

But this felt good, getting me back into the swing of things.