The One With Beaver Tails

(Let's have a mutual agreement to not mention just how behind I am on blogging about this past week, okay?!)

Monday took me on another excursion into town, but really by accident. The Canadian Tesco is called, well, actually I don't know what it's called. All these Canadians keep telling me to go to Blah Blah's and they have no idea just how what they're saying gets translated into my English accent. Blah Blah's is further away than I thought, but still not miles, so I kind of did a round trip from my house to town (buying first frivolous purchase of a moose Christmas tree decoration) to campus. Once on campus, I met up with Lydia, Gabby and Jon or as we shall henceforth be known, the Exeter Posse. That name may not catch on...

Monday was the first official meeting of the Exeter Posse. The others aren't too keen on the name, but I'm determined to make it stick. Never have I been so comforted by the British accent as I have when meeting up with Jon, Lydia and Gabby. We immediately got an opportunity to celebrate our British culture when it came to queueing for tickets for the International Office bus tour. Fear not, Britain, we're still the only nation who knows how to do it!

Despite being told that Ottawa was cold, the week has been anything but - on Monday, it was so hot and humid and I was sticky with sweat which was absolutely vile! The heat situ wasn't helped by being on the bottom of the bus, although the Exeter Posse made like hard year 11s and bagged the back seat!

A Brit lives here.

A bus tour was never going to really measure up to the boat tour from Saturday, but Ottawa is so pretty in general, that a couple of grey roads (over the border in Quebec) didn't spoil it at all. All I can say is, after passing the British Ambassador's house, I know what I want to do for my future career! It is gorgeous and something straight out of a fairy tale and right on the river and so so gorgeous and I think I am actually in love with a house! We also saw the Prime Minister's house and he gets a way better deal than David Cameron in dingy Downing Street, that's for sure! One of the things I really like about Ottawa (and which Tim Gorringe would absolutely love too) is that it will never become a concrete jungle like Toronto or New York City. There is a rule that no building can be taller than the flag pole on Parliament. Whether this law is out of concern for preserving the beauty of the city or some kind of subliminal 1984-esque gesture, I don't know, but it means that the landscape of Ottawa is totally unspoiled. Which, if you think about it, there really is no need for any grossly tall building in Canada - there is so much space! If you need more, you can go out, not up!

That evening, Gabby, Lydia and I went out to dinner. After much indecision, we settled for Barack Obama's favourite Canadian bakery - I understand from Twitter that this is of complete uninterest to Canadians who don't care about the USA! To be honest, we none of us actually wanted dinner proper, we just wanted to try a Canadian delicacy: beaver tails!

Yummy scrummy in my (expanding) tummy.

When I first heard about beaver tails and that they were edible, I put it down to that Canadian quirkiness; you know, the quirkiness that makes people choose to live with mooses in a wood cabin 20ft under snow. Turns out, a beaver tail is not a literal beaver tail (as that would be too gross even for a quirky Canadian) and are in fact Heaven on Earth.

Beaver tails are a calorific delight, just looking at one makes you put on 10ibs I'm sure. But I don't think I have ever tasted anything so completely wonderful! It's a pastry in the shape of a beaver tail, absolutely coated in sugard and then served with your choice of topping. The three of us went for chocolate and banana and none of us could speak as we were so consumed with ecstacy at this cuisine. Thank you very much to the British taxpayers who contribute to my student loan which I am using on beaver tails. Although I do fear I shall end the year with hips as wide as Canada itself and with less of a blood sugar count and more of us blood beaver tail count!



We then, with some difficulty owing to the sudden weight gain, dragged ourselves up to Parliament Hill where we watched a show of the history of Canada projected onto the Parliament building with lights. I have never ever seen something so clever! Whoever created the show is an utter genius! One of the major things I discovered from the show was that Canada isn't really embarrassed by its history. Whereas Britian completely overlooked its Empire time in the Olympics Opening Ceremony out of shame, Canada is seemingly open about the racist parts of its history and is seeking now to move forward from them without denying them. Basically, for a seemingly multicultural country, Canada has spent a lot of time closing its doors to certain groups such as Jews and Japanese. Canada even had concentration camps during World War II where it interred all it Japanese citizens, even if they were Canadian-born. And, of course, anywhere with an indigenous peoples has been ghastly to those First Nations at some point - and really paying the price now. Lydia, Gabby and I were all struck at the end of the show, given a standing ovation, by just how patriotic Canada is. Above all, there is a sense of community in the dislocation - so many nationalities moving forward as one nation. It was such a great evening! I found myself sitting on Parliament Hill pinching myself at how lucky I was to be in such a beautiful country and getting to call it home!