Saturday, December 03, 2005

Body Worlds and South Indian Food...

And of course finally meeting some friends of mine in person. Today I finally met Todd, Sage and Paul in person. We met up at the Ontario Science Centre, which took longer to get to than I had expected. I had to to take the subway and then wait about 10 minutes for a bus and then the bus ride was about 15-20 minutes. But, the Science Centre is definately worth the trip. There's a lot of neat stuff going on and the Body Worlds 2 exhibit was particularly fascinating. Definately recommend that to anyone who has the opportunity to check it out in their city or any other city. The rest of the Science Centre was great too, especially because I had excellent guides. Paul and Sage visit there quite frequently. Sage hung out for a while with us, but headed home when we went into the Body Worlds exhibit. She had already seen it. Paul really wanted to see it a second time and Todd and I had not seen it. After that exchibit we got some lunch and then went around to more of the regular exhibits. I love going around places like that with kids. They just make it so much more fun. Paul had a great time leading Todd and I around and showing us his favorite exhibits.

We left the Science Centre at 5pm, when it closed, and headed out to catch a bus to get to the subway station to head to dinner. I'm not exactly sure where we went as far as streets and stops and what not, but that's okay. Dinner was wonderful. We went to a South Indian restaurant. It was just this tiny little place, but the food was fabulous. I had a Masala Uthapam, which is a pancake sorta thing with tomatoes, peas and chilis cooked into the pancake part and then it was folded around some potato stuff (similar to what's inside a vegetable samosa for those of you that know what a samosa is). My favorite part about South Indian food is the two side dishes of dipping sauce that come on the side. One seems to be a tomato/vegetable based sauce. The other one I haven't a clue what it is, but it's good. Sorry. Anyway, dinner was wonderful and then Todd gave me directions back to the hostel, which were very simple... get off at Spadina and then take the streetcar down the street.

So, to answer Sarah's question from my own perspective, the TTC (Toronto Transportation Commission) is a wonderful system with very clean stations, subway cars, busses and streetcars. It is very easy to navigate and from what I've seen can get you to a lot of places.

Oh and last night I was able to do exactly what I'd wanted. I just hung out at the hostel. I spent the night hanging out with Aussies. :) I met Bear, Erin and some guy who's name I don't remember. They were all Australian. Actually I had met Bear the night before and spent time playing pool and talking with him. It was fun hanging out with them, although sometimes they said things that went whoosh right over my head. But, I asked what they meant and now I know some Australian slang. Bear is really cool. He's got a pretty amazing life. He is a dive instructor in the Bahamas most of the time, spending a week at a time out on a large boat taking people on 4-5 dives a day. He also spends A LOT of time traveling. He was in Toronto for 3 days, then went to Toledo and New York for a few days and then came back to Toronto for another 3 days that turned into 4 when American cancelled his flight. In January he's going to Salt Lake City and Denver to go skiing. In the spring he's going to do a tour of Africa, from Egypt to South Africa. And at some point he'll go back and spend some time in Australia. That just sounds like such an amazing life. It actually sounds like something my friend Bob should be doing. That life would suit him well.

Maybe while I'm on this trip I'll find something I can do that could lead to a life like that. Stints of working and then traveling that alternate in month or two long bits.

Anyway, no I'm going to go figure out what I want to do tomorrow and then probably go upstairs and read some more. I'm a little worn out from walking around the Science Centre all day.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

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Anonymous said...

Hi Danielle - we had fun, too, though I'm with you - I was exhausted when I got home.

Answering your questions - the restaurant was here - just off the Landsdowne stop on the Bloor/Danforth line.

The two sides you like are sambar (the soup), and the other was coconut chutney (usually purchased already prepared).

I'm completely confident you'll find an interesting direction in which to proceed after this trip. As I mentioned yesterday, you can check the Caretaker Gazette. There's also the Peace Corps and Plenty. Others like to teach english overseas. If any other ideas occur to me I'll pass them on. You're also very likely to meet people along the way who have even better ones.