#6 Mid-level samaritan adventures in Montreal

Transcript

So I just thought I'd wrap up Montreal with just little Montreal stuff that happened. And just today, so I just went to a Vietnamese restaurant and had beef noodle soup and the like crazy, I don't know what it's called specifically, but the Vietnamese coffee with condensed milk. And I haven't had that stuff in four years. I just, because there is a place that opened up in my hometown, but I only learned about it right before I left. I was like, oh, that's been here this whole time, and it was really expensive, but I feel like I probably would have gone at least once if I had realized it was there. I just assumed there was nothing in my hometown. I shouldn't have known. New Brunswick's coming on by leaps and bounds. There is one whole place that has Vietnamese soup, but anyway, that I had had it for the first time in four years. Pretty goddamn delicious. There's something to be said for four years of lockdown. Once you get back out into the world, it's pretty cool. But the lady there asked me if it was good, and I was like, yeah, it's great. I haven't had this in four years. And we got blabbing just like, oh, where are you from, whatever. She told me she'd been to New Brunswick once. It was treasoli. And I was like, yeah, I guess it's alright. But this was where my French was really stretched, the farthest it has been stretched on this journey because, yeah, generally, there's a pretty big Asian population in Montreal. And generally, if they have to pick a second primary language, they usually pick French. English is their third language most of the time. And that was definitely the case here, where I kept trying to, you know, I would get a little gummed up and get my words confused or forget something or have to, you know, it's mostly just if I forget a word, I just have to talk around it. So my sentence is longer than it needs to be. So I just toss in some English, those little of like, let's just let me off the hook, please. Let's just speak in English, please. And this is the first lady here in Montreal who did not let me off the hook. It was very evident she did not want to revert to English. She's like, no, no, we're going to talk in French, my friend. But it was kind of cool just to be forced. It's like, no, no, you use your French now. Use your words. And it went okay. But I do think like my third grade self, if I was talking to, if they were talking to me now, they'd be like, what happened to you, pal? Your French is awful. But I basically survived. But then I had another nice little encounter, where I was wandering down the street. And this lady was having trouble figuring out how the parking machine worked. She was, she was very anglophone. So that made things easier. But I, but she stopped me and was just like, hey, do you know how this machine works? This thing's not working.

And I was like, oh, sorry, I do not know. I'm not a driver, man. I've never used this machine.

But I helped her with a little menu and stuff, and it just wasn't working. This chick looked really cool, too. She looked kind of like, she kind of reminded me of Chris Tucker from the fifth element. Yeah, this little machine was not reading her card. And then I realized, wait a second, because when I had all my laundry adventures here in town, and my Airbnb listing said there was a washer and dryer, but I couldn't find it. Turns out there is a washer and dryer. It's in the basement. I never even realized there was a basement. I never thought to look down there. So now I know. But I didn't find out till after I went on a whole odyssey of trying to find different laundromats and getting money out and getting it all converted into quarters. So I have a bunch of quarters in my bag. I got like $6 worth of quarters. And I was like, I don't know, I guess I'll just spend these on coffees and put them in tip cups and stuff. As I go, try to get rid of them all before I leave. But I saw that her little parking ticket was only $250. And I was like, hey, wait a sec. Now I know this is going to send a little weird that I'm just offering you money. But I have so many quarters in this bag. And I need to get rid of these before I leave Canada. So I can just put the quarters in the machine and pay for your thing. And I was glad that she just accepted. She didn't go through the whole dance of, oh no, you can't do that. I hate when people do that. Like it's like, oh, you're really putting me out with my $250. You know, it's no big deal. And in fact, it's a bonus. You get to park, I get to get rid of some of these quarters. But she also asked where I'm from.

It's like, oh, New Brunswick, kind of reminds me of, I don't know, I don't really have a good read on Montreal people 5:00 exactly on the friendliness scale. But I'd say like Toronto people aren't rude, but they are just busy. They're doing their own thing. Where on the west coast, people really do come off standoffish and sort of like their friend groups are insulated, they're not just open to everybody. Where the east coast, as much as I complain about it, we are very gregarious and just friendly. Hey, how you doing? And I remember when I first moved to Vancouver, I was waiting for a bus. And I just struck up a conversation with some girl who was also waiting for the bus. And she asked where I was from, and I was like, New Brunswick. And she's like, oh, I'm from Newfoundland, I believe it was. And then we both were like, oh, that explains it. She's like, yeah, this whole time I've been here, no one's ever talked to me waiting for the bus. Back home, everybody would always talk to you while you're waiting for the bus. And I was like, yeah, I know, right? East Coast represent.

So those are my little tales of being forced to speak French. I would rate myself six out of ten, maybe five out of ten. It was pretty bad, but I got through it. I had a whole conversation with somebody and it was all right.

And, you know, because I was just kind of a little vaguely annoyed. It's not a big deal that I went and got coins and went to a laundromat instead of using the one at the Airbnb. But I don't know why it took so long for the Airbnb person to reply to me. I get them days. So I was a little, just a little annoyed, that had all these coins, but this all worked out. Having the coins, let me be Johnny Carter's seed. You can just put quarters in machines for people.

Now I'm going to go to Tim Hortons and buy a coffee and get rid of... How many quarters have I got left? What are we looking at here?

Fascinating podcast content.

$2.50 and then I'll be back to the magical modern world of just debit cards. No cash whatsoever.

All right, fast forward to the last day that I'm in Montreal. The last couple of days are a bit of a wash because it was raining a lot. So I didn't make it too far. I just stayed in my direct neighborhood. Rain really is kind of the worst. I like rain when it's a big, crazy storm and it's exciting. But when it's just kind of mid-level rain, I definitely prefer snow. Because snow, you can just go outside and walk around in the snow and it's no big deal. Where I did just pick up a new jacket while I was here. It's pretty good, pretty waterproof, kind of nice hood and everything.

But rain is just a bugger. I was just watching a YouTube video actually about rain gear while hiking. And apparently this is the power of the poncho. Because it's got slits on the sides, it keeps air flow going. Because one of the big problems, even if you have rain stuff, is that inside the rain gear, you start to sweat and the sweat can't get out. And you get as wet from the sweat as you do from the rain. So yeah, this guy was talking about ponchos and that's why it's like this jacket and one of my other jackets. I never really knew quite what this was for but it's got these zippers along the side so you can kind of open them like by the armpit and it's the same idea just to let air in. It's like, yeah, cool, that makes sense.

But the other thing this guy was pitching is if it's not too windy out, he did a test hike with an umbrella and a rain kilt. So the umbrella would keep his upper body mostly dry. And then the rain kilt, which is just plastic, wrapped around his waist, would keep his pants dry. It seemed to work pretty good. It's kind of cool.

But yeah, as a bit of a cold snap that came with this rain, which is kind of nice. It's actually been almost annoyingly warm here because I'm carrying all my layers. You know, I've got all my different coats and stuff. All the layers I think I might need for winter in Japan. I don't have them packed away. I'm wearing them all, not every day.

But it's been unseasonably warm here. Now the cold snap hit. And there's tons of leaves on the ground. And it's like, for my last day, I'd get a really good blast of fall.

Although one thing, it hasn't been too bad today, but I did catch a bit of it earlier.

I've mostly been to Montreal in the summer, and then a little bit in the dead of winter. 10:00 I've never been here in the fall before. And there was just a pervasive bad smell that was just like everywhere. So the point that I was like, is that? It can't be me, right? But how is it that everywhere I go, I smell this. That's sometimes a sign that it's you. But I did a quick little Google research. And it turns out in the fall, the farmers around Montreal put manure on their properties. And it basically makes all of Montreal smell like manure. So that's one of those little travel tips you don't hear about so much. But if you visit in the fall, beware, it wasn't like the worst smell. But when it was at its peak, it really was everywhere.

So I was thinking today, since I never did get a metro card while I was here, I'm going ahead toward at-water. I'm starting at Monk Station, heading to Atwater. I haven't actually gone up to St. Catharines and walked down. St. Catharines is like the major strip, like the downtown.

And I haven't actually done that. I could walk down St. Catharines and then up Mount Royal and then come back down the backside like I did the other day. It's St. Joseph's and head on back. But we'll see, I don't know. That would take all the live long day. So we'll see how far I get.

But basically, I wanted to finish off Montreal with another just weird little thing that happened, a little adventure in very mildly helping people, where this Airbnb I'm staying at, it's a pretty old Montreal house, but they do keep it really well cleaned and stuff. But then you can tell when you go into the basement and all of a sudden it's really musty. And you can feel the oldness of the house. Like, oh yeah, this is just an old house. And weird skies today too. I just realized behind me, it's beautiful blue Simpson skies with perfect clouds. But in front of me, it is ghost busters, looming gray clouds. And it's like, hmm, it's actually, I guess this just might decide the day for me. If it starts raining, I'm bailing out. I'm thinking though, if this weather stays clear, if it rains obviously, I'll just buy a day pass so I can take the little bus to the airport.

But if the weather's clear, I'm seriously considering walking back to the airport. I think I'm gonna. Now that I know how to get there, I gotta leave the Airbnb in the morning anyway. Got the whole day to kill?

I might do it. But anyway, I was saying about this old house. It was kind of notable that, you know, it had electronic locks on the front door and then on the inside door. But they didn't look too out of place.

But they didn't look too out of place. But then on each actual room door in the place, it was like futuristic. It was like where it was like this black, shiny handle that had a screen on the handle when you touched it. It lit up with little numbers and your key and the numbers. And then the circle on the fucking handle changes color. It's like 2001, a space odyssey. It's like don't let you in.

And I really don't know much about electronic locks. I mean obviously they've been around for a long time. This was just an especially sleek looking one. And it was just neat that it was built right into the handle. But I learned an unfortunate amount about them. I guess it's good to stuff to know. I don't know. But I came in Friday, like 5 o'clock. I just was done whatever I was doing that day. I have a feeling once I get to Japan. I'll be doing a lot more.

I'm mostly in a round all night. But a Montreal is like, yeah, you know, I'm done for the day. Let's head on back. And the front door was wide open. The interior door was wide open. And there was a non-stop really loud beep. Just this beep, beep, beep. It was ear piercing. And it turns out what happened. So there was a new guy, a guy from India, who I ended up becoming fast friends with because the Airbnb people messaged him and said that the battery was dying on the lock. So they left a physical little key he could use to open this lock. But unfortunately he went to the washroom. He didn't have the key on him. And he couldn't get back in his room. And then this all happened when I wasn't there. But I guess in his attempts. 15:00 Then to try to use the buttons on the lock because the battery was low. It just freaked out on him. It just started beeping, incessantly. Which I guess, I mean, I guess it makes sense. Like, if you have a digital lock, I guess it is very important that you know the battery is dead, right? Like, if the battery just died and you didn't realize your lock wasn't working anymore, that would be bad. So I guess it's like a pretty important thing, you know. Make sure you know. But this thing just wouldn't stop beeping. And I guess that wouldn't be a problem either if it was just in your house and you were around. This whole issue arose where it turns out this person who runs this Airbnb lives nowhere near here, not even in Montreal.

So he was stuck outside of his room. He couldn't get in. His phone was in there. The key was in there. And it was a very innocent mistake because I thought the same thing. Like, with the whole building, there's so many numbers to get into all this stuff. And I've got them all on my phone. But I think if I was out in the world and my phone, I'll have two different phones. So I had two backups. But if somehow both phones ran out of batteries, how would I ever get back in here? What would I do? And whenever I went to the washroom, I left my door a jar and made double sure that I had a phone on me with the number in case I didn't need it to get back in. So this dude, he was here on a business trip just visiting Montreal for the weekend. You know, he just got in. He's all exhausted and he just didn't think the door would close on its own. Just an accident. Also, I know, I don't know if this is what happened, but I had noticed in that house just because it's an old house. Anything that's open, any window or whatever, we'll just blow the doors open and close and stuff. So he managed to find some people that I guess live upstairs from us. It appears that the upstairs is a different thing. It's just like a normal rental. And they were trying to help them out, but it was much easier once I got there because obviously I just had the same Airbnb person could just go into the little Airbnb app and send messages on his behalf. But yeah, that's where it turns out that the levels of obfuscation were. There was cleaning crew that came in pretty regularly to clean this place, but they were independent. They had nothing to do with the Airbnb really. There was the landlord who was renting to the Airbnb person, so maybe they could help, but they're also not exactly directly related. And the Airbnb person themselves lives in who the hell knows where, but not close. You know, the initial idea was to not come in to fix this battery on the lock till the next day. But once it started beeping incessantly, it's like, all right, that's not going to happen. That's not an option. And it is tricky just because this Airbnb person English is not their first language, so that made everything tricky as well. And this was the same person who took days to tell me where the washer and dryer were. I don't know, generally my experience of this Airbnb was pretty good. Everything went pretty good for me, but clearly that was just the role of the dice just because nothing really went wrong for me. Once something went wrong, it's like, oh jeez, yeah, this actually sucks. This is not a good situation. So I sent some messages to the Airbnb person and we figured out that okay, the landlord person is going to come and fix this, this handle thing. But again, this is like 5, 530. He wasn't going to get there till 8 o'clock. Just tons of dead time.

So, oh man, I just realized I'm walking by, I walked by this the other day, just at the bottom of Monk Street, right by the canal.

There was like, I'm pretty sure there was a Vietnamese beef noodle soup restaurant down here, which is one of my favorite things. But it closed really early, it closed at like 3 p.m. Right now it's only 1.30 p.m.

Oh my god. I think it's open. I think it's open. I think I'm going to go in there and get some stuff.

I'll return to this riveting story afterward.

Well, that was kind of cool. That was one hip-ass place. So, so yeah, it only is open till 3 o'clock. I noticed the other day when I walked by it was already closed, so it's only for lunch already. Exclusive.

And as I was going in, there was this girl sitting out front who was smoking. And she was just like, oh hey, I'll be in in a couple of minutes. So, it was a combination of the laissez-faire French attitude, but also she didn't even try to talk to me in French. She just talked in English. I was like, oh wow, this is okay, cool. I can never quite tell. I mean, I think the east side of Montreal, if I remember right, is kind of the more French side. But I'm not totally sure how it all delineates. I know when you're near like McGill University, then it's much more English. I was like, yeah, that's fine. Just take a time, don't worry. That's one thing I don't really like about going into restaurants and doing the whole sit-down thing. I don't like being weighted on. I don't like having people pay special attention to me. It feels uncomfortable.

And it just kind of always has. I remember even when I was a kid in elementary school, I always way preferred to sit at the back of the class when I had the option. Just so people weren't staring at me. And I used to have these weird little fantasies of like, I wish if I'm going to be stuck near the front of the class. Like, nobody's paying attention to me. And I knew that. But it's just knowing that there's people behind you that could be looking at you all day. It's just like, yeah, I just don't like that feeling. I wish I could just sit inside a box. I wish my desk could just be inside a big box with a slit in the front. So I could see forward and I could see the chalkboard. We still use chalk in my day. I could hand my papers out. But just so people couldn't stare at me. I just don't like it. And I kind of still get that feeling in restaurants. Like, I just don't like the feeling of a waiter coming over and doing waiterly stuff and ingratiating themselves to you. Oh, how is everything? It's like a negative to me to go to a restaurant. Cosmore, and it makes me uncomfortable.

But this was nice because man, this is the opposite of that. This girl did not give a fuck. And that's what I like. Like, I noticed that, too, even the last proper job I had at the fancy cheesecake shop in Vancouver on Granville Street. You can really feel a difference kind of in the generations, I would almost say. Where most of the people who worked there were in their early 20s. And they were real go getters. The customers always write. Then my friend Doug, who got me that job, he was in his late 20s, significantly more relaxed. And I was the old man of the job at mid 30s. And I didn't give a fuck. I'd go by the clerk's fucking adage of the customers always in asshole. Fuck these people. And they really are, too. I mean, we were next door to a diamond store. Just every fancy pants fuck from downtown Vancouver would come in to get their expensive ass lunch.

And that's where I kind of came up with my adage of basically the guide to being an asshole is just, if you want something, even if it's something you deserve to have, or you should have, or you've paid for, or you've earned or anything.

What you want it to fast, you're an asshole. So in that situation, it was just simple stuff. Just lattes. Lattes and cappuccinos are a pain in the dick. Mostly what you're paying for is how long it takes to make these things. If you want to get in and out real fast, if you're in a hurry, and you ordered six lattes, you can suck a dead dog's dick. It's not going to fucking happen asshole. You're going to get it, but you're going to have to wait for it. And I realized that you could telescope that out infinitely. You know, that's just a small example of a coffee, but even say like grand sweeping social change, like things should be this way. And it's like, yeah, they should be. And we're moving in that direction and someday they will be that way. But if you want them to be that way tomorrow, you're an asshole.

If you want things too quickly, you're an asshole. So basically when the person working there is just like unapologetically, like, yeah, be it in a few minutes, I love that man.

That does not bother me at all. I prefer that. So then inside this place was fancy pants as heck. Although there was a ping pong table in the corner and some trophies, I'm not quite sure what that's all about. 25:00 But besides the random ping pong table, very fancy pants. And they had all the stuff like Vietnamese coffee is so good. It's very unique, but very expensive. And you do need to have the right kind of equipment and the right kind of coffee and stuff. And it's just not at all accessible in my hometown. But yeah, if I lived here in Montreal for real, I would go buy a bunch of that shit. That'd be awesome. You can make your own Vietnamese coffee at home and be fucking rad. Because I was going to spend way too much money on that stuff when I get a chance. But there was one other dude in there eating some stuff with headphones on. The music was like cool R&B. And then once this girl came back into make the shop come back to life. I think the best way to describe her style is she looked like a character from Parapa the rapper. She was just very small and she had a striped hat and just hip as fuck.

But anyway, I ordered the lunch special, whatever it was. And horrifyingly expensive. I've definitely noticed that all around since I've been here is, you know, the options were very limited in my hometown, but also everything seemed very expensive. And it was more expensive. But I've come to realize here in Montreal everything has gone up. Not only I guess were my prices four years at a date, but there's just no question that COVID did a number on everything. All of these restaurants obviously had a real hard time for a while. And all the prices went way up.

So to get whatever I got soup, sandwich, Vietnamese coffee, leave a tip. It's like $35. Like fuck. I mean, where I used to go, I'd go to like Vietnamese restaurants in Vancouver that were just like neighborhood ones. Hold in the wall. You know, it like Broadway and Ninmo, where it's not a particularly busy neighborhood. And there's two Vietnamese restaurants within a block of each other. So they're battling one another. But you can get a giant beef noodle soup and a coffee in there for a third of that price. But yeah, not only have all the prices gone up, like I said, this place was fancy pants. And it was really good. I think this is legitimately the best Vietnamese food I've ever had. I got like the bomb me sandwich and the soup and the coffee. It's so awesome. And again, whatever. It's my last day in Montreal. I'm getting out of here. In Japan, spoiler alert, I probably won't have the gall to go into many places where I have to order from a person. You know, I do a lot of convenience store eating in Japan because I think it's awesome. And it's just more comfortable for me. When I was there before, I was there with my friend Brad and he showed me, you know, he showed me the ropes of how Coco Ichiban, Coco Curry, how that place worked.

So I felt okay going there by myself. I'm sure none of these places would be a problem. But it's just embarrassing when you run into the language barrier and stuff. And I love the convenience store food so much that it's just so much easier for me to do the convenience store thing. But I guess we'll see once I get there. How it all goes. But yeah, then I was eating my fancy pans food. Not only am I in the hip ass Vietnamese restaurant with the hip ass music playing. But the hip ass cashier girl was wearing headphones because this music wasn't hip enough for her. You know, it was like I was inside Scott Pilgrim. You're just too fucking hip. This is ridiculous. But yeah, I mean, as far as a Montreal send-off, that's pretty good. And like I said, it was delicious. But anyway, there's the story of the Vietnamese restaurant I went to. I feel like that's pretty in line with what my goals are for this podcast. That's the plan is just a report on shit like that.

Man, this weather is really good. I think I'm going to do it. I think I'm going to do the whole run. Go all the way to St. Catherine's, walk down St. Catherine's, go up Mount Royal. It's really all I got to do once I get back to my place today is just pack up all my stuff. Do one last load of laundry. And yeah, I mean these could be famous last words but I'm a little excited about my 19-hour layover in the airport. Because I like those enforced down times where you just have to stop and just like catch up on some work at a podcast, do some writing, do whatever you can't leave, you can't do anything else. And the time always goes by so quickly. No matter how much downtime I have, it just goes by real quick but I've never had this much downtime before. So we'll see. And I went on the Where to Sleep in Airports website and there's this one place in particular. I learned a new term. There's land side and air side where land side in an airport is just the public 30:00 area. Air side is after you pass through security. So there's this one place in the Calgary Airport on land side in the International Terminal where I will be, where you go down this escalator and it's across the hall from a women's washroom like I saw the pictures and everything people have reported. I know exactly what to look for. Under the escalator is just this little look with some vending machines and like these two big long cushioned couches connected to each other and it's like the perfect place to sleep. But because it's the primo place, it's like all the little reviews and stuff said this is absolutely the best place to sleep in that airport. Who knows if it'll be free? It seems like it's the one. But it's so interesting to just know what's coming to be all set. Like my best possible chance of having an okay night in the airport is it's like just to know that ahead of time, not to just walk in blind, it's pretty cool. But all right, back to my friend from India who was trapped outside of his Airbnb room with the incessant beeping. So basically since I was done for the evening, I just made it my mission to you know do what I could to sort of make this situation a little better for him. So we knew a landlord guy was supposedly going to show up around 8 o'clock. At this point, it was like 5.30 or something. Long time to go. Traveling by oneself makes everything harder. And also, geez, what a bad impression of Canada, right? Like he'd been in Canada a little bit up to this point. But he'd more or less just arrived. And instantly he's just getting fucked. And I wanted to make sure this guy knew, hey, you got stuck with a weird, bad Airbnb situation. This person doesn't have their shit together. Whoever's running this place. But Canada's not like that. Don't, don't track that up to Canada now. So he asked me if I had any water. And at first I was a little confused. I was like, well, hey, there's a cups in the cupboard. And he said, like, oh, is that, is that okay? And so I was like, oh, yeah, this guy's from India. This guy does not drink water from the tap. But just coincidentally, when I first showed up in Montreal, when I went to the dollar store, I just got like four bottles of water for a dollar. And I'd just been refilling them with tap water. But I did have the fourth one. I hadn't opened it all. I was like, I maybe I'll take it to the airport with me. Just have a spare bottle of water. So just coincidentally, I did, in fact, have a bottle of water that you still had to seal on it. So I was like, oh, yeah, hold on. I got a bottle of water. Here you go. You know, tap water is totally fine in Canada. But if you've grown up your whole life not trusting water from a tap, I don't blame you for not wanting to start now in the midst of a crisis. But he did have his wallet with him. And he asked if there were stores nearby. So I thought, like, oh, yeah, here's what we can do. I mean, there's no need to hang out here. Anyway, while everything's just beeping, if you wanted to go find a convenience store or something, let me just get you the numbers for these doors. You know, we'll just kind of keep them a little ajar. But just in case they close, you need the numbers to get back in. I'll just jot these down for you. And that's where I ran into a problem of the modern world is I used to travel with a pen, but I just never used it. You know, same thing with I had a video game controller also, because I thought, who knows, maybe I'll plug it into my laptop and play a video game at some point. And then I spent the entire year circling the globe, and I never used it once. So this time I left the video game controller with my cousin. It's like, I'm not going to use this thing. Similar thing with the pen seems like you should just have a pen, but I just never used the pen. It's a digital world now. It's weird because way back in the day, you know, when I moved to Vancouver in the mid 2000s, like, I always had a notepad and a pen in my pocket for writing. If I had an idea or something, I could just write it down. I always had a pen. But in this case, I was like, well, I mean, we got this whole house, this big Airbnb and stuff. There has to be a pen somewhere, right? So that's where it became the adventure of trying to find a pen. So I looked through all the drawers and all the cupboards and stuff. Couldn't find anything. So I went down to the basement where the laundry stuff is. And there was so much crap down there, just old bicycles and old video cameras just boxes full of random stuff. And I was like, this is insane. There has to be a pen somewhere in here. There's so much stuff. So it became like an adventure game going through all the trying to click everywhere, trying to find the item pixel hunt. And eventually, I mean, I went through everything, just everything down there. And eventually, under the stairs, I found a box full of loose leaf paper, you know, lined paper. 35:00 So again, that takes me back. I haven't even seen that in a while. And I'm digging through it and it's like, there has to be. And way at the bottom of the box, I found a pen. So I was like, all right, I went back upstairs. Here we go. I can write down the numbers for you. But then I was joking to him. Like, imagine if after all that, this pen doesn't work. But I started writing front door halfway through door. It stopped writing. And I looked at this pen and it was almost out of ink. I had to shake it really hard. And I couldn't have the luxury of writing front door and inner door. I just had to write the numbers. And I barely got them down on paper. This pen barely worked. But I managed to do it. I wrote down the numbers for him, folded them up, and as they hear you go. But then he brought up the point of, even though we were pretty close to Monk Street, which is a pretty major street, there's a bunch of little convenience stores on it. Since he didn't have his phone, he said like, yeah, but if I do just wander out there, what if I don't quite make it back? What if I get lost? How do I get back to this spot? And he was right to be concerned because the first couple of days that I was at that place, I had a really hard time finding that Airbnb. Just because that neighborhood by Agrenel Park, all of these streets are at a diagonal from the main street. So that gets confusing. And they cut off in weird ways. And they all look absolutely identical. It is just identical, copy and paste neighborhood all around there. So I was like, yeah, jeez, you know, that's actually a good point. Even if you just have to take a right, take another right, it would be very easy to get lost and not to know how to get back here. And without the phone, without the magical phone, it's like, jeez, yeah, then what? So I was like, well, just hold on. I mean, I'm just doing laundry here. Let me just switch my laundry over to the dryer. And I'll take you to a convenience store. I'll show you where to go. So we did that. We went around the corner just to a kushatar, which is just a, in a childish way. I always think kushatar is a funny name for a convenience store because kushatar just means sleep late. And it's meant to insinuate that this place is open late. It's a convenience store that will be open for you when you need it. But the English words are couch for sleep and tar, the word late in French, is T-A-R-D. I won't say it. But you see what I mean. If you're a very childish person, it looks like the name of this store is couch and an ableist slur. But that's just my filthy, anglophone mind talking. In French, it's fine. Kushatar. So we went there and just conveniently, the wonderful multiculturalism of Montreal. There was an Indian guy working there with the turbine and everything. So of course, my new friend from India, beeline for that guy. And I don't blame him. Like that's when you're kind of in a stressful situation. Things aren't going so well. You're exhausted. You're trapped. And then you see somebody who you're like, ah, like this guy, his English was very good. We had no problem in communicating, but when you see somebody that is absolutely going to be on your wavelength, you go to that person. I felt happy for him that he must have just been like a nice little relief. That, you know, he just bought like a big gallon of water and just some snacks type stuff to eat. But just that he could go to the other Indian guy and just be like, hey, here's a, hey, I'm just, you know, commiserate a little. Like, ah, geez, here's what's happening to me. Where can I find X, Y, and Z? So we bought some stuff. We wandered on back.

And I'd been meaning to give my hair a buzz before I go. And what better time than when this door is just loudly beeping? You know, I'll go into the bathroom, shut the door, add to the din with my electric razor. So I was like, hey, I'm just going to go, then I go do shower stuff. But I gave him one of my phones. And again, since I don't have a proper phone, you know, you couldn't call anybody. But he had like a friend he was supposed to meet up with. He could hear his phone ringing in his room. So he couldn't call this friend because my phone's not a real phone. I sort of started trying to explain like why I don't have a proper phone plan. But I just, I just trailed off. I'm just like, I just don't. You know, this guy who's like a business guy traveling to him, it must be crazy to not have a real phone. But I was just like, I'm sorry. I mean, I only have Wi-Fi. But, you know, you can use my Facebook. You can use email. I don't know if you can get in touch with anybody. And he's like, yeah, I don't know if she'd actually respond if I tried to send a message from someone else's Facebook. 40:00 But he couldn't really log into his own Facebook because he didn't know the password. Somebody, nobody knows any of these things anymore. But I gave him the phone just said, what's mine is yours. Don't worry about it. Use any of my social medias you need to if it helps. See if you can get in touch with somebody while I went and buzzed my hair and took a shower. So I don't think he managed to get in touch with anybody in particular. But he was very appreciative. He's like, you know, you can tell he was really glad just to have somebody there to hang out with him. And just, you know, to deal with this basic stuff. And I remember pitching him, I don't know if this helped or if this is what he wanted to hear. And I was like, oh, you know, let's see, what's the worst case scenario? If they just don't show up and this thing keeps beeping all night, there's a couch here in the communal kitchen. And worst case scenario, you get a sleep on the couch and a beeps all night. Like, that's bad. But that's the absolute worst thing that can happen. You're not like on the street or whatever. And I don't know that he particularly appreciated my that take. But I know I was just like, hey, just trying to lay it out here. Like, this is a disaster. But there's a floor to the disaster. But yeah, I could tell the guy appreciated it quite a bit. And afterward, when I got my phone back from him, I saw he did go on to my Airbnb app. And I'd say this is a bit of a slight breach of decorum that he messaged the Airbnb lady as me. But I mean, I honestly didn't care. Whatever, fuck this Airbnb lady. She was not, she's not a very good Airbnb host. But he just said in that polite guy from India way of just like, this is bad. My plans for the night have been ruined. I am very sad. Something like that. And it was like this sad little poem, a sad little window into the mind of an abandoned trapped Airbnb guy who can't get back into his room and everything is just beeping constantly.

But finally, a little before eight, the landlord guy showed up and fixed the door. And this is like those layers of obfuscation that just kind of like annoyingly frustrating that you can't actually get in touch with anybody who matters. Because the guy, Rajeeed from India, he tried to talk to the landlord due to bit. You know, just to say like, man, this is seriously not good. This is bad. I've been stuck here for four hours waiting for this situation to get ameliorated. Like this is crazy. But the landlord guy is not the Airbnb guy. And he was also not an English first language speaker. So he was just sidestepping constantly. All he said basically in response was, do you know the code for this door? Give it a try. Make sure everything's working. And Rajeeed would try to talk to him again and he'd say, just do you know the code? Try the code. That's all he said. It was, do you know the code? Try the code. But the code worked. The door stopped beeping. Everything was okay. That's when Rajeeed found out that he had missed like 20 calls from his friend. But at this point, it was again only like quarter to eight at night. It wasn't so bad. At least it wasn't like midnight or something. So he did manage to go out and rendezvous with his friend. And then I just happened to be up and about when he came home at about midnight. And he seemed in much better spirits. So ultimately everything worked out. But man, yeah, that just sucks, right? Like you're traveling from India. You arrive in Canada. And almost immediately you're just thrust into this situation where you can't get in the room. It won't stop beeping. You don't have your phone. And the Airbnb person is glacially slow at best to try to resolve this situation.