C'mon. Come from Away. Come to Halifax

I’m listening to last.fm. They’ve recommended the Israeli singer Noa to me. Which is nice, because I love Noa. I always feel like I’m watching La Dolce Vita when I listen to her sing, no wonder she’s so popular in Italy.

Smile, no matter what they tell you
Don’t listen to a word they say
'Cause life is beautiful that way

la la la, I'm wearing a drindl skirt and I have pointy boobs!

I watched La Dolce Vita again on dvd recently and realised that the opening sequence of Goodbye Lenin is an homage to its opening sequence. I had forgotten that. I had forgotten what a great movie it was. The dvd had interviews with a lot of the actors, including Anita Ekberg, thirty years on. My, she is dippy. And the dvd also contained a long interview with Fellini, in which he described his love-hate relationship with Rome.

I suppose we all have those relationships with cities. Queenie certainly has it with Dublin. But she hasn’t developed it with Halifax yet. She’s still in the first flush of madness that is her love affair with a nice city. So she’s on a mission to get people over here to visit, for a number of reasons, not least because she’d like a bit of company to look forward to.

Gypsy has promised she’ll come next year. And Jersey Girl and her BH. And Ken said he’d come after he’s been to New York. And the Queen Mum and Dad are going to get a bit of an arm-twisting as well. But the rest of you should come too. And some of you should come back. Because Halifax is great. And I miss you all.

So, step one of the C’mon, Come from Away, Come to Nova Scotia marketing campaign, for which I should be paid by Nova Scotia Tourism, not that I ever will, is a taste of some of the nice evening/ weekend things to do in Downtown Halifax.

Go to the Farmers’ Market for a crepe on Saturday morning

The Farmers’ Market starts at seven am on a Saturday morning and goes on until one. It’s packed for most of that time. I worked on the Acadiana Soy stand for a few Saturdays during the summer, you may remember, so I got a good look at the clientele and it ranges from wildly prosperous yuppie types of the brand you get in the Temple Bar market, to cruise liner tourists browsing for gifts, to committed vegans looking for their weekly food, to the Food Bank people soliciting donations. That’s one of the nice things about it.

After you meet Anna and George at the stall, you can go upstairs and visit Maurize, who runs the crepe stall near the front entrance. His crepes are to die for. He’s an oceanographer with a second job. So many Nova Scotians do that – run a little business on the side.

I always have a banana and chocolate crepe. I’m usually so hungry by the time I get it, I wolf it down in about three bites. Sometimes I have some Thai food from the ladies out in the hall, who do a nice fried rice special for lunch. And if I’m feeling really flush, I buy a loaf of the most expensive bread in the world, the five grain organic Vienna, at the next stall, which comes in at a whopping $4.50 a loaf, but which tastes fantastic.

But not fantastic enough that I’d ever serve it at a dinner party!

The Farmers' Market does lots and lots of interesting jewellry, clothes and crafts as well and there's no tax usually. Which is good, as it's 15% here.

Check your email in the Paperchase

I started eating in the Paperchase when I arrived first in Halifax, because it was mentioned in the Rough Guide and because it has free wi-fi. Now, although a lot of the coffee shops and even some of the Asian restaurants provide the service, I still go back to the Paperchase because of its atmosphere. And the samosas are really good.

It’s on Blowers’ St. near the sk8ter shop, upstairs from a small shabby newsagents, which seems to have more free newspapers on view than periodicals. Most of the staff in the newsagents has dreadlocks, or braids, or Afros of one description or another. They ignore you completely if you want to buy anything, being engrossed in their mates who hang out in the shop to keep them company.

You head past the cash register and up the stairs in the middle of the shop to the Paperchase. As soon as you reach the turn of the stairs, which are pretty steep, you get a strong whiff of coffee and then you bounce up into two bright rooms; one of which has windows all along one side that are taken out in summertime, and lots of comfy sofas and PC stations and high stools if you want to sit at a bar near the window. The other side has tables and chairs, if you want to work at something on your laptop.

They always have lots of free newspapers and magazines lying around. And you can hang out nursing a coffee as long as you want. The coffee is all organic fair trade blends, from Just Us!, which is the Nova Scotian free trade brand which is rapidly becoming ubiquitous. The clientele is predominantly green, as the Ecology Action Centre is just across the road on Argyll. After work, however, you get a good smattering of people hanging around waiting for a play in the Neptune or the Khyber. So lots of earwigging of people with interesting shoes who/ affect strangely placed pauses in the middle of their/ sentences, which signifies that they are intellectual/ Canadiennes.

Stupid Canadians just have an uplift at the end of their sentences. Or an eh!

I jest of course. I much prefer ehsters myself.

I found out recently that Buck 65 owns it. He used to have his coffee there, and when he got rich he bought it.

But I was a regular there before I knew that.

I wonder is he an artic. pauser, or an ehster? An ehster, I’d imagine.

Get a bikini wax or a DIY facial in Remedy Spa

If I were to bring back one business idea from Nova Scotia to Ireland, it would be Remedy’s DIY facial. It’s a brilliant idea, so watch someone nick it asap. I’m sure it’s common practice in Canada, but I’ve only seen it here.

For twenty five bucks, you go in and sit at a long counter like a diner surrounded by LOVELY products. They you get pampered by the staff, who are fantastic at making you feel like a queen no matter how much you spend there, while you do your own facial using their line of products.

Then you can go into one of their treatment rooms for a waxing session. Their waxing specialist has won all kind of awards for it. I don’t know what the wax is, I’ve never seen it before. It’s a bright orange paste, like liquid plasticine. She dobs a big splodge of it on your whatsit, then dips her finger into the pot to create a candyfloss style bubble of the wax, which she then sticks onto the wax cooling on your body and lifts her finger, thus ripping the lot off.

And the best thing about the best bikini wax in the world and I’ve had them on four continents, is IT DOESN’T HURT AT ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

She also told me to exfoliate to prevent ingrown hairs. Which is the best advice I have ever got from a beautician, or aesthetician as they are called here. Why did I not know this?

Then they often give you a free something or other, like a paraffin hand treatment, or some face cream or something. They're really nice women and great business women. I'd say their repeat business is phenomenal. They do half-price waxing every Wednesday and they are booked solid weeks in advance.

Browse in the Barrington Bookstore/ Schooner’s Books

Last FM is playing me Fatboy Slim’s Drop the Hate which is a great geddupoffyoassandshakeitwildlyforabit song, so excuse me a minute.

So far I like its recommendations. I’ve had everything from John Coltrane to Sonic Youth, and from Black Sabbath to Cocteau Twins. I had forgotten about them.

Anyways, on with our tour.

Halifax is a second hand book lover's dream. There are three great second hand bookshops that I can think of offhand. And there are three other great new stock bookshops, inclduding Frog Hollow on Spring Garden Rd., where I bought all my Christmas presents.

Of course, there are second hand books on sale everywhere; at yard sales, in newsagents, in second clothes shops, all over the place. Truly Canadians are the biggest readers in the world.

We have a book club in work. It’s easy. It’s more a pile than a club. When you’re finished reading a book you bought second hand, you bring it into work and stick it on the pile. If it disappears forever, then good luck to it. If it doesn’t, and you get a sudden change of heart, you can take it home again. In the meantime, PFW get to read it. And then you can talk about it if you want. Or not.

One or two of the PFW have mentioned that they’re amused at how highbrow the book-pile has gotten since I arrived. The first book I brought in was Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children. Which was the first Rushdie I had ever finished and it blew me away – so funny/ erudite/empathic/plus a ripping good yarn set in Mumbai. I was amazed; I always imagined Rushdie to be like Banville. Amazing to think that such a man could write such a book (I’m reading Bruce Chatwin’s biography at the moment and Rushdie sounds like a complete prick, as does Paul Theroux, but we already knew that after his book on VS Naipaul).

Anyways, I arrived in with MC and the PFW were very amused. Then I brought in a Michael Chabon. Then an Alice Munro. Then I stole them all back again, not having gotten over the ‘must keep the precious paper with the story on it’ thing I have. Then I relented and brought them all back in again, because I have no shelves.

Although I am thinking about taking them home again for posting to Ireland to add to the collection. If it's not too expensive.

But anyway, back to bookshops. Both Barrington Books (it has another name as well which I forget) and Schooner’s are old style second hand bookshops of the Kenny’s variety.

Important Announcement: Do you all know that Kenny’s Bookshop, Shop St. Galway is closing in the New Year?

It will be the end of an era for many of us. Anytime I went to Galway I would stick my head in the door and ask Mrs. Kenny if she’d seen my uncle that day. She usually had. I spent hours in there; with my parents, with Jersey Girl, with my uncle, by myself. The sculpture gallery at the back in particular was one of my special places; it was so rare for me to see sculpture, which is my favourite visual art form.

Funny that, I just remembered I always dreamed I’d have a house in which I could display sculpture. Probably not going to happen now…

One of the last times I was in Kenny’s was a few summers ago during the Arts Festival; they had an exhibition commemorating the art of hurling. Some really clever pieces. And some really beautiful pieces. I still have the catalogue.

But anyways, yes, Kenny’s is dead, long live Schooner’s.

All of the second hand bookshops in Halifax are blessed with wonderfully eccentric owners and their patient spouses. As they should be. In Barrington’s, I always have an argument with the owner, because he has Brian Moore in the Canadian section. Brian is of course Irish. Even though he only admits it intermittently.

I am determined to have him moved. And the owner is determined to hold out for the pleasure of watching me approach the argument. The staff, who are all tall male college student-aged (I like to think he hires them for their ability to reach the high shelves) and are very possibly SMU English majors, all like to chip into the argument as well.

It makes for a nice lunchtime every couple of weeks.

Recently, I went in for a minute during my lunch break and came out with a first edition hardback of Nicholas Shakespeare’s biography of Chatwin, a copy of The Moons of Jupiter, which is the only Alice Munro short story collection I haven’t yet read, and Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake, which I had to stop reading because it was upsetting me too much.

Ya kinna work on policy concerning the apocalyptic nightmare that is the environment today all day and then go home and read Ms Atwwod. Ya jes kinna.

Although I'm going to try, as it is fantastically well-structured and sardonic, as only she can be. It's just so goddamn plausible.

Potter around the Mary E Black Craft Gallery (geddit?)

Halifax has a fine design college – the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, or Enscad, as it is called. I think the Mary E Black Gallery is its principal exhibition space, but it curates craft exhibitions from all over Canada.

It took the Mary E Black to make me realise to what extent Irish ceramics are influenced by the Irish landscape.

OHMYGOD I wish I could win the lottery one day, so I could buy you all one object from this gallery. The ceramics in particular are superb; the Canadian landscape and Inuit and Mi’kmaq heritage provide a very different inspiration to artisans than our peaty, mountainous landscape and Celtic tradition.

Not better, I’m saying. Just different. Different colours, different washes, different shapes.

They also have wonderful silkscreen and batik applications, room screens and objects like that, as well as wonderful stained glass collection that’s on view sometimes. Or maybe not – I don’t go in as often as I should. Just press my nose against the window and stare in longingly.

It’s just up the street from the art gallery as well, so you can pop in there afterwards and look at the collection and have a cup of tea in the café.

I have decided I am going to do a course in enscad next year. I want to learn how to make stained glass. I have wanted to study this for ages. I think my way of looking at colour would serve it reasonably well.

Find that obscure jazz record you’ve been looking for for ages in Sam’s Records

Sam’s Record Store occupies two lots on Barrington, which are broken into one another unevenly, so you find yourself walking down a slight slope to the indie section at the back of the shop. You can find most things here. They stay open till nine. They let you bring back cds if you don’t like them.

And they put a big blackboard out every Monday with all the week’s releases chalked on it so you don’t even have to go into the shop to check what’s in.

When you go in, say hello to Terry. He's down the back with the really long dreads. We went to see Bedouin Soundclash last week.

THEY WERE SHITE!!

I don't care if they're from Montreal.

Have supper in The Wooden Monkey

I’ve had dinner (or supper, as it’s called in Canada) in several restaurants in Halifax, and apart from Chives, which no one else will go to because it’s too expensive (it’s about the same as a nice restaurant in Dublin) the Wooden Monkey is my favourite. Even though their wine glasses are too small.

One of the waiters IS Chandler Bing. When you meet him, you suddenly realise that of course Matthew Perry is Canadian.

The restaurant is a typical Haligonian alternative venue: a vaguely astrological, well-meaning, hippified, hand-crafted wooden beamed, just me and my dreams and my hairy boyfriend type of place. In Halifax, this generally means that the food will be great, with lots of vegetarian options, the toilets will be sparkling and the service will be fantastic. And it will be great value.

Queenie likes her hippies with a bit of a business nose, so she does.

Have a pint in Ginger’s Tavern/ The Economy Shoe Shop

Really, you should have a pint in both, as they are very different.

The Economy Shoe Shop is on Argyll, just down from the Wooden Monkey. Argyll St. is the George’s St. of Halifax – lots of bars and restaurants. In the summertime, all the restaurants have tables on the street, so the Council puts a wooden walkway out on the road to protect pedestrians. In the winter time, it’s all put away, but the street is still nice.

If I were to import a business idea from Ireland to Nova Scotia, it would be patio heaters. But I’ve said that already.

The ESS is multi-roomed heaving mass of all types that I’ve described before, so I won’t go into it again.

Ginger’s Tavern is the opposite. It’s as if God knew I’d be homesick, so he recreated the International in Wicklow St., but a little bigger, because it’s Canada.

Long bar. Grumpy barman, who’s a big softie when you get to know him. Regular clientele, all with their own stools. Wallpaper on the ceiling, sticky brown from cigarette smoke. Tiny toilets. Uncomfortable little tables and stools at the end. Great music. Comedy lounge upstairs.

I kid you not.

Ginger’s is a microbrewery too, owned and operated by an Irishman. And the barman is from Newfoundland. His brother is the Minister for something or other over there. His name is Joe. The barman that is. The other night he said he’d like a postcard from Ireland. I said I’d see what I could do. His address is Joe Byrne, Ginger’s Tavern, 1662 Barrington St., Halifax NS B3J 2A2, Canada.

I’m sure he’d appreciate postcards from other places too. Tell him Queenie told you to send it.

Don’t let me down now.

Go to a gig in Stage Nine/ The Marquee Club

Finally, you can end the night wonderfully in any number of night clubs, venues, late bars, discobars, restaurant cum venues, dinner clubs, whatever, but my two favourite are Stage Nine and The Marquee Club. So far anyway.

Stage Nine is a small, low-ceilinged upstairs venue that shows mostly up and coming indie and alt-country acts and has a young indie crowd that makes Queenie feel ancient when she’s there.

The Marquee Club is much bigger – it’s up on Gottingen St., in the uber-trendy North end. You go there to see touring bands, from Toronto or Montreal mostly. It's got a nice raised bit at the back with a bar so you can sit down, or you can mosh with the kids up the front. It's really dark and dingy and they haven't taken the skeletons down from the Hallowe'en party yet.

People who live in the north end feel superior to people who live in the south end, due to the fact that they have to put up with gunfire and swarming and crime. And us southies just have to put up with joggers and dog walkers.

Recent crime statistics put Halifax at the top of the violent crime figures in a Canadian metro area. This is due to a small area of the city, around Gottingen, being very dangerous. Having lived in Dublin South Central for eight years, I am bewildered as to what Canadians define as very dangerous. First of all, there’s a ruddy great police station slap bang in the middle of it. Full of RCMPs with guns and taser sticks. I wander up and down that street at all hours of the day and night and feel completely safe. Apart from the drunks outside the Salvation Army hostel, but they’re not going to shoot me.

I am also bewildered as to how Halifax can be more dangerous than Toronto seeing as there is a gang war, comparable to the one in Dublin, going on in Toronto at the moment. I must compare the Halifax stats with Dublin crime figures and see if there’s any similarity. I doubt it.

There is definitely no link between violent crime and rubbish anyways, because even though the north end is less prosperous than the south end, it is just as clean.

Time to go to bed, eh?

After the Marquee closes at two, you can go play pool, or go clubbing in town, or nip up to the Citadel Hotel for a taxi, or walk down to the Dairy Queen on Spring Garden Rd. for a coffee. Or whatever. I’ll leave it up to you.

Hope you had a nice time. See you soon.