maintenance pt. VI

So as you know, I just got back from a country-trotting vacation of sorts. I'm hoping to get into a more regular schedule with this posting business, but I do apologize for being largely absent as of late.

Let's start off slow. Halifax was an experience in and of itself, not because of the sightseeing or what have you (although that was really great), but because of the general niceness of people that lived there. I have never ever seen a city where all the waitresses/waiters have been ridiculously polite, and where everyone holds the doors open for you, no matter how far you may be away from the door. Mag and I had no qualms about tipping 20%+, simply because it was just absolutely fantastic to be in such an atmosphere. People on the streets give out change to the homeless like it's candy on Halloween, so regularly in fact that Mag and I would pool our change and make sure we had some to give out along the way. It was such a pleasant, charitable environment, none of this hustle-and-bustle, I have no time for anything type of New York style people we sometimes see here in Edmonton.

There's no litter anywhere, and I think we saw like 3 cops our whole time there, two of which actually were in front of us the whole way to Peggy's Cove and were only going there because they wanted some lunch, not because they were on patrol. The malls are open at night for anyone - even though it seems like everybody drinks a lot, generally people aren't rowdy or raucous. You feel very safe on the streets, the type of place where I would feel totally okay with leaving everything visible in my car and not stash it in the trunk for worry of theft. Everyone is so polite and so courteous and everybody talks to everyone like they've been friends for years.

I'd have to say that even though I've given a lot of thought of what I'd do if I were accepted to Dalhousie, now that I've actually visited the east coast, I'd have no hesitation in living out there. I'd accept in a heartbeat, hop on the nearest plane, and get ready to be happy for the next two years. I had expected a vacation of general misery and a complete lack of things to do, but I encountered quite the opposite, and will let you know gradually what we got up to as the week progresses.

So to conclude, just a little thing I found lovely. I was perusing this quaint little bookstore near the Halifax public library on Queen St. called Back Pages, and I found a book that I purchased called "Notes to Myself". They're just little thoughts and musings from some author who is sometimes quite deep and other times just thinking out loud. Anyways, there was an inscription on the inside cover that I found particularly touching, because rarely nowadays do people encourage each other to lose themselves in their thoughts. We always stress practicality and doing rather than thinking, so it's nice to see the push to do the opposite, a push to be tangential, whimsical, cathartic.