When we were waiting for our fully booked plane in Montreal, they made an announcement about upgrades and vouchers to go on a later flight. We decided to check it out. When we got to the front of the line at the counter, the clerk in front of us (skinny balding Bob Cratchit type) was harassing his coworker. She was wondering about what to do, and he was yelling at her, sending her off in near tears, but not before he gave her this advice: “Go with the flow, Yoko”. We’ve been using it as a mantra all week (along with “Hemi!” – we’re renting a Durango).
Lunch yesterday was at the mall – I had a pita, pretty decent. We got out of work the earliest yet, at 7PM. At one point I thought I might get to go skiing – there’s slopes 15 minutes north of the city, but it’s been rainy since Monday (and they’re open ’til 10 – not a lot of time). We thought we’d hit Chinatown, but went to find a bookstore first. The nearest one was a Chapters (Canadian Borders) in the Metrotown mall. Not a great selection in the bookstore, but the mall has a Playdium (Canadian Dave & Busters) and we spent an enjoyable hour there. When we got to Chinatown, we discovered nearly the entire place shut down at 6PM. The one restaurant we found that was open didn’t have much vegetarian for Jitesh (and no duck for me), so we went wandering up Main Street. I found a good Chinese place mentioned in my Frommer’s book, and it was near Sweet Revenge, so we went up around King Edward’s Street and parked.
We found out why we couldn’t find Sweet Revenge the night before – it was tiny and closed. And the place mentioned in the guidebook wasn’t there – there was a Vietnamese place there instead. Luckily, two doors south there was a Chinese restaurant. I’d love to give the name (it was in kanji), because it was fabulous. I ordered the braised duck with meat, which turned out to be surrounded by bok choy and covered in seafood – fish, shrimp, squid, octopus and scallops. Best meal I’ve had here yet. And so much food, none of us were in any mood for dessert.
Back at the hotel, it was noisy – my floor had screaming kids and slamming doors. I headed down to the gym again, tried my luck with the balky weight machine. Happily, things had settled down when I got back to my room.
Today, since it was our last lunch (we’ll be at the airport tomorrow by 11:30), we went downtown to the Thai House on Robson Street. We shared some spring rolls, then I had the Gai Pad bai Grapau (chicken with Thai chilli, onions, mushrooms & fresh basil). I was only paying attention to the 3 chili spice level and missed the evil fungus, and had to spend time picking them out.
I’m waiting on a bug fix now, looks like it might be a late night. We want to finish as much as we can so we don’t have to come in for two hours in the morning before we need to leave for the airport (that redeye got changed to come in late tomorrow night instead). We found that the mall across the street has a Death By Chocalate Express, so we may go for a sugar boost soon.