Montreal City Quotes

Mr. Couture is not an American citizen. He is from Montreal. It is a large city, about the size of Boston, in that very large country just north of here. You may have heard of it. They play hockey. —

When all of the family was stilled in sleep, when the streetlamp a few paces from the house shone at night and made grotesque shadows of the trees upon the house, when the river sighed off into the darkness, when the trains hooted on their way to Montreal far upriver, when the winds swished in the soft treeleaves and something knocked and rattled on the old barn, you could stand in the road and look at this home and know that there is nothing more haunting than a house at night when the family is asleep, something strangely tragic, something beautiful forever.

Montreal is nothing like Manhattan; it’s smaller and more concentrated, and unlike the city that never sleeps, Montreal feels like a city that’s gotten a good night’s rest and woken up in time for a bike ride alongside the Saint Lawrence River.

C’est un plaisir que de supputer, subodorer, côtoyer le mystère qui se tramait dans les quartiers, villages et ruelles de Montréal, et de se demander comment tout ça allait finir. J’avais confiance. J’avais confiance en l’humanité entière qui arrivait à Montréal, en l’humanité qui unissait Montréal aux autres villes du monde, celles qui fascinent par leur site, comme Istanbul, celles qui fascinent par leur prestige, comme Paris, par leur taille, comme New York, par leur élan, comme Shanghai, par leur lourdeur, comme Moscou. Montréal fascine par son mystère, rien de plus, mais rien de moins, me disais-je.

She seemed nice, but she was most likely one of those American women whose knowledge of Africa was based largely on movies and National Geographic and thirdhand information from someone who knew someone who had been to somewhere on the continent, usually Kenya or South Africa. Whenever Jende met such women (at Liomi’s school; at Marcus Garvey Park; in the livery cab he used to drive), they often said something like, oh my God, I saw this really crazy show about such-and-such in Africa. Or, my cousin/friend/neighbor used to date an African man, and he was a really nice guy. Or, even worse, if they asked him where in Africa he was from and he said Cameroon, they proceeded to tell him that a friend’s daughter once went to Tanzania or Uganda. This comment used to irk him until Winston gave him the perfect response: Tell them your friend’s uncle lives in Toronto. Which was what he now did every time someone mentioned some other African country in response to him saying he was from Cameroon. Oh yeah, he would say in response to something said about Senegal, I watched a show the other day about San Antonio. Or, one day I hope to visit Montreal. Or, I hear Miami is a nice city. And every time he did this, he cracked up inside as the Americans’ faces scrunched up in confusion because they couldn’t understand what Toronto/San Antonio/Montreal/Miami had to do with New York.

Jake recalled standing with Luke at the ship’s rail, afloat on champagne, euphoric, as Quebec City receded and they headed into the St. Lawrence and the sea. “I say! I say! I say!” Jake had demanded, “what’s beginning to happen in Toronto?” “Exciting things.” “And Montreal?” “It’s changing.” Tomorrow country then, tomorrow country now. And yet – and yet – he felt increasingly claimed by it, especially in the autumn, the Laurentian season, and the last time he had sailed the tranquil St. Lawrence into swells and the sea, it was with a sense of loss, even deprivation, and melancholy, that he had watched the clifftop towns drift past. Each one unknown to him. Circles completed, he thought.

He found that when the Montreal Canadiens ice hockey team—once described as the national team of French Canada—got knocked out of the playoffs early between 1951 and 1992, Quebecois males aged fifteen to thirty-four became more likely to kill themselves. Robert Fernquist, a sociologist at the University of Central Missouri, went further. He studied thirty American metropolitan areas with professional sports teams from 1971 to 1990 and showed that fewer suicides occurred in cities whose teams made the playoffs more often. Routinely reaching the playoffs could reduce suicides by about twenty each year in a metropolitan area the size of Boston or Atlanta, said Fernquist. These saved lives were the converse of the mythical Brazilians throwing themselves off apartment blocks. Later, Fernquist investigated another link between sports and suicide: he looked at the suicide rate in American cities after a local sports team moved to another town. It turned out that some of the fans abandoned by their team killed themselves. This happened in New York in 1957 when the Brooklyn Dodgers and New York Giants baseball teams left, in Cleveland in 1995–1996 when the Browns football team moved to Baltimore, and in Houston in 1997–1998 when the Oilers football team departed. In each case the suicide rate was 10 percent to 14 percent higher in the two months around the team’s departure than in the same months of the previous year. Each move probably helped prompt a handful of suicides. Fernquist wrote, “The sudden change brought about due to the geographic relocations of pro sports teams does appear to, at least for a short time, make highly identified fans drastically change the way they view the normative order in society.” Clearly none of these people killed themselves just because they lost their team. Rather, they were very troubled individuals for whom this sporting disappointment was too much to bear. Perhaps the most famous recent case of a man who found he could not live without sports was the Gonzo author Hunter S. Thompson. He shot himself in February 2005, four days after writing a note in black marker with the title, “Football Season Is Over”:

Della & I are drunk at the top of Mont-Royal. We have an open blue plastic thermos of red wine at our feet. It's the first day of spring & it's midnight & we've been peeling off layers of winter all day. We stand facing each other, as if to exchange vows, chests heaving from racing up & down the mountain to the sky. My face is hurting from smiling so much, aching at the edges of my words. She reaches out to hold my face in her hands, dirty palms form a bowl to rest my chin. I’m standing on a tree stump so we’re eye to eye. It’s hard to stay steady. I worry I may start to drool or laugh, I feel so unhinged from my body. It’s been one of those days I don’t want to end. Our goal was to shirk all responsibility merely to enjoy the lack of everyday obligations, to create fullness & purpose out of each other. Our knees are the colour of the ground-in grass. Our boots are caked in mud caskets. Under our nails is a mixture of minerals & organic matter, knuckles scraped by tree bark. We are the thaw embodied. She says, You have changed me, Eve, you are the single most important person in my life. If you were to leave me, I would die. At that moment, our breath circling from my lungs & into hers, I am changed. Perhaps before this I could describe our relationship as an experiment, a happy accident, but this was irrefutable. I was completely consumed & consuming. It was as though we created some sort of object between us that we could see & almost hold. I would risk everything I’ve ever known to know only this. I wanted to honour her in a way that was understandable to every part of me. It was as though I could distill the meaning of us into something I could pour into a porcelain cup. Our bodies on top of this city, rulers of love. Originally, we were celebrating the fact that I got into Concordia’s visual arts program. But the congratulatory brunch she took me to at Café Santropol had turned into wine, which had turned into a day for declarations. I had a sense of spring in my body, that this season would meld into summer like a running-jump movie kiss. There would be days & days like this. XXXX gone away on a sojurn I didn’t care to note the details of, she simply ceased to be. Summer in Montreal in love is almost too much emotion to hold in an open mouth, it spills over, it causes me to not need any sleep. I don’t think I will ever feel as awake as I did in the summer of 1995.

Montreal October 1704 Temperature 55 degrees Eben was looking at Sarah in the way every girl prays some boy will one day look at her. “I will marry you, Sarah,” said Eben. “I will be a good husband. A Puritan husband. Who will one day take us both back home.” Wind shifted the lace of Sarah’s gown and the auburn of one loose curl. “I love you, Sarah,” said Eben. “I’ve always loved you.” Tears came to Sarah’s eyes: she who had not wept over her own family. She stood as if it had not occurred to her that she could be loved; that an English boy could adore her. “Oh, Eben!” she whispered. “Oh, yes, oh, thank you, I will marry you. But will they let us, Eben? We will need permission.” “I’ll ask my father,” said Eben. “I’ll ask Father Meriel.” They were not touching. They were yearning to touch, they were leaning forward, but they were holding back. Because it is wrong? wondered Mercy. Or because they know they will never get permission? “My French family will put up a terrible fuss,” said Sarah anxiously. “Pierre might even summon his fellow officers and do something violent.” Eben grinned. “Not if I have Huron warriors behind me.” The Indians rather enjoyed being French allies one day and difficult neighbors the next. Lorette Indians might find this a fine way to stab a French soldier in the back without drawing blood. They would need Father Meriel. He could arrange anything if he chose; he had power among all the peoples. But he might say no, and so might Eben’s Indian family. Mercy translated what was going on for Nistenha and Snow Walker. “They want to get married,” she told them. “Isn’t it wonderful?” She couldn’t help laughing from the joy and the terror of it. Ransom would no longer be the first word in Sarah’s heart. Eben would be. Mercy said, “Eben asked her right here in the street, Snow Walker. He wants to save her from marriage to a French soldier she doesn’t want. He’s loved Sarah since the march.” The two Indians had no reaction. For a moment Mercy thought she must have spoken to them in English. Nistenha turned to walk away and Snow Walker turned with her. If Nistenha was not interested in Sarah and Eben’s plight, no Indian would be. Mercy called on her memory of every speech in every ceremony, every dignified phrase and powerful word. “Honored mother,” she said softly. “Honored sister. We are in need and we beg you to hear our petition.” Nistenha stopped walking, turned back and stared at her in amazement. Sarah and Eben and Snow Walker stared at her in amazement. Sam can build canoes, thought Mercy. I can make a speech. “This woman my sister and this man my brother wish to spend their lives together. My brother will need the generous permission of his Indian father. Already we know that my sister will be refused the permission of her French owners. We will need an ally to support us in our request. We will need your strength and your wisdom. We beseech you, Mother, that you stand by us and help us.” The city of Montreal swirled around them. Eben, property of an Indian father in Lorette; Sarah, property of a French family in Montreal; and Mercy, property of Tannhahorens, awaited her answer. “Your words fill me with pride, Munnunock,” said Nistenha softly. She reached into her shopping bundle. Slowly she drew out a fine French china cup, undoubtedly meant for the feast of Flying Legs. She held it for a moment, and then her stern face softened and she gave it to Eben. Indians sealed a promise with a gift. She would help them. From her bundle, Snow Walker took dangling silver earrings she must have bought for Mercy and handed them to Sarah. Because she knew that Sarah’s Mohawk was not good enough and that Eben was too stirred to speak, Mercy gave the flowery thanks required after such gifts. “God bless us,” she said to Sarah and Eben, and Eben said, “He has.

This campus was an island of quiet in the city's roar, and at night it was an island of dark in the city's blaze.

Ken Dryden, writing in “The Game” (1983), his celebrated rumination on hockey and on the particular experience of playing for Le Bleu-Blanc-Rouge, as Francophones call the Canadiens, described the old Montreal Forum as “hockey’s shrine, a glorious melting pot of team, city, and sporting tradition.

One of the misconceptions in minor hockey is a belief that players have to get on “big city” teams as young as possible to gain exposure when being identified by major junior clubs. For example, the Greater Toronto Hockey League (GTHL) has long been considered a strong breeding ground, with three or four elite AAA teams each year producing some of the top players for the OHL draft. However, on the list of players from Ontario since 1975 who have made the NHL, only 16.8 percent of those players came from GTHL programs while the league itself represents approximately 20 percent of the registered players in the province—that means the league has a per capita development rate of about –3 percent. What the research found was that players from other Ontario minor hockey leagues who elevated to the NHL actually had an edge in terms of career advancement on their GTHL counterparts by the age of nineteen. Each year several small-town Ontario parents, some with players as young as age eight, believe it’s necessary to get their kids on a GTHL superclub such as the Marlboros, Red Wings, or Jr. Canadiens. However, just twenty-one GTHL “import” players since 1997 have played a game in the NHL in the last fifteen years. This pretty much indicates that regardless of where he plays his minor hockey from the ages of eight through sixteen, a player eventually develops no matter how strong his team is as a peewee or bantam. An excellent example comes from the Ontario players born in 1990, which featured a powerhouse team in the Markham Waxers of the OMHA’s Eastern AAA League. The Waxers captured the prestigious OHL Cup and lost a grand total of two games in eight years. In 2005–06, when they were in minor midget (age fifteen), they compiled a record of 64-1-2. The Waxers had three future NHL draft picks on their roster in Steven Stamkos (Tampa Bay), Michael Del Zotto (New York Rangers), and Cameron Gaunce (Colorado). One Waxers nemesis in the 1990 age group was the Toronto Jr. Canadiens of the GTHL. The Jr. Canadiens were also a perennial powerhouse team and battled the Waxers on a regular basis in major tournaments and provincial championships over a seven-year period. Like the Waxers, the Jr. Canadiens team also had three future NHL draft picks in Alex Pietrangelo (St. Louis), Josh Brittain (Anaheim), and Stefan Della Rovere (Washington). In the same 1990 age group, a “middle of the pack” team was the Halton Hills Hurricanes (based west of Toronto in Milton). This club played in the OMHA’s South Central AAA League and periodically competed with some of the top teams. Over a seven-year span, they were marginally over the .500 mark from novice to minor midget. That Halton Hills team produced two future NHL draft picks in Mat Clark (Anaheim) and Jeremy Price (Vancouver). Finally, the worst AAA team in the 1990 group every year was the Chatham-Kent Cyclones—a club that averaged about five wins a season playing in the Pavilion League in Southwestern Ontario. Incredibly, the lowly Cyclones also had two future NHL draft picks in T.J. Brodie (Calgary) and Jason Missiaen (Montreal). It’s a testament that regardless of where they play their minor hockey, talented players will develop at their own pace and eventually rise to the top. You don’t need to be on an 85-5-1 big-city superclub to develop or get noticed.

American accent. Broad shoulders, at least fifty years old. He was wearing generic sunglasses and a cap that read NASHVILLE PREDATORS. His lips were thin, sharp like a palm leaf. Lucie stood up; the man took up position behind her. The cop looked around for pedestrians, witnesses, but no luck. Alone and unarmed, she was helpless. They walked about a hundred yards without encountering a soul. A Datsun 240Z was waiting under the maples. “You drive.” He pushed her roughly into the car. Lucie’s throat was knotted and she was finding it hard to stay calm. The faces of her twins swam before her eyes. Not like this, she kept thinking. Not like this… The man took a seat next to her. Like a pro, he quickly patted her pockets, thighs, and hips. He took out her wallet, removed her police ID—which he looked at carefully—then turned off her cell phone. Lucie spoke in a slightly shaky voice: “No need—it isn’t working.” “Drive.” “What is it you want? I—” “Drive, I said.” She started the car. They headed out of Montreal due north, via the Charles de Gaulle Bridge. And left the lights of the city far behind.

I reflect on Bicycle Bob Silverman, who prodded and pushed Montreal into being one of the best biking cities in the world. I think about Dan Buettner and the Blue Zones gang, who’ve shown entire cities of people how to live healthier and longer lives. I think about Bea Johnson, who through her passion and pint jar of trash has changed the way thousands of us view our garbage. I think about Dr. June McCarroll in California and Dadarao Bilhore in India – on their hands and knees – painting center lines and filling potholes, one by one, to make our roads safe. These are people so passionate about changing some sliver of the world that they just rolled up their sleeves and dug in. They forged ahead without job title, majority vote, business card, salary, office, or political affiliation. Writer Thomas Friedman refers to these people as “leaders without authority.” Where do we find more? Well, we can start by taking a selfie. And listening to a pair of voices from the past. Alexis de Tocqueville – a man absolutely smitten by democracy in America – reminds us that one of the beauties of living in a democracy is that policies aren’t decreed from on high by “church and state” but from the bottom up, by “village and congregation.” And anthropologist Margaret Mead expounds, “never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.

Seattle sports had once risen briefly to international prominence, in 1917, when the city’s professional hockey team, the Metropolitans, became the first American team to win the Stanley Cup, defeating the Montreal Canadiens. But the Metropolitans ordinarily played only in the Pacific Coast Hockey Association, and when the owner of their arena did not renew their lease in 1924, the team folded. Given

Leaving the Connecticut River March 8, 1704 Temperature 40 degrees Eben realized that he need not worry about being burned or tortured. He was going to starve to death. Eben had thought that up here, where nobody lived or ever had, the deer would be standing in rows in the woods awaiting a bullet. He had expected rabbits and grouse, moose and beaver. But there was no game. They built shelters from woven branches, piling spruce and hemlock on top to keep out the snow. Each day some of the Indians left to hunt and each day they came back with nothing. It had never occurred to Eben that an Indian could go hunting and find nothing. He was not sure how far they still had to go to reach Canada. He had seen a map once that showed the Connecticut River, how it split the colony of Connecticut in half, then cut up through Massachusetts, headed north through unknown lands and bumped into Canada. The northern part of the map was guesswork. Eben needed a French map, which would show the city of Montreal, where the French kept their government, and the St. Lawrence River, down which fortunes in fur were shipped. He could not ask his master. An Indian kept his map in his head.

Soon after Cortez conquered Mexico, the French explorer Jacques Cartier cautiously sailed his ships up America’s North Atlantic coast. In 1534 his expedition explored the coast of Canada, and like Cortez, he also wanted to venture inland in search of treasures and new cities. To prepare for the excursion into the interior, he kidnapped Taignoagny and Agaya, two coastal natives whom he took back to France with him to teach them to speak French. Cartier returned in the spring of the following year with the interpreters, whom he used to guide his ships up the St. Lawrence River to the Huron territory of Chief Donnaconna and on to the Huron village of Hochelaga, which became Montreal.

Let Toronto become Milan. Montreal will always be Rome.

Montreal had a metropolitan population of over 400,000 in January of 1907. It was Canada’s biggest, richest, and most important city. Kenora, with a population of about 6,000 people, was, and will likely forever be, the smallest city ever to win the Stanley Cup.

Remember that three of the most bike friendly cities in North America also have serious winters Montreal, Minneapolis, and Anchorage.

then through the Indian Ocean, down around the Cape of Good Hope, and up to the Atlantic. The entirety of the world via water. So many of the places I went exist in my mind like a brochure when I try to recall them. Elephants in Tsavo East National Park, an elevator packed with people riding from Salvador’s upper to lower city. The rippling heat of Delhi and the bright turquoises, saffrons, and fuchsias of women’s saris. I learned about silk and sashimi, about wild animals and barren deserts. I also learned about intractable poverty, caste systems, indigenous tribes—things I might have learned about America if I’d been paying closer attention. But this is perhaps the most profound lesson of travel, that you don’t really know the place and culture you’ve come from until you’ve left it. Today, I think that even if I had someday left the States, without that voyage, I’d have trod the familiar: London, Paris, Amsterdam, Montreal. Instead, Semester at Sea gave me the courage to imagine a different kind of travel, and a blueprint for how to do it. To see the sights, certainly, but to understand that it was meeting people that really mattered. In this, I also count a legacy from my father, the salesman who could talk to anyone about anything.

The kid serving me seems scornful when I order a third beer. He asks me in broken English if I want anything else to eat besides soybeans. Why? Is he worried about my health? I hate these stupid soybeans but no, I don’t want anything else. And I hate this beer, as a matter of fact. And this restaurant. Does he think I want to be here? Really? That out of the entire, beautiful city of Montreal, I picked this basement to spend the rest of my night—here, where nobody seems to be speaking English?

Montreal, a city known for its fusion of cultures and vibrant lifestyle, offers a remarkable range of experiences for locals and visitors alike. Among the captivating social activities that Montreal has to offer, enjoying shisha (also known as hookah) in cozy lounges ranks high on the list. If you're eager to explore the city's shisha scene, your journey begins at CityMyWay's comprehensive guide to the "5 Best Shisha Bars in Montreal,

There were a few instances, and only a few, in which we knew any thing that was happening in the world; and even then our knowledge did not extend out of the city. I can recall but three occasions of this kind. Two of them were when the cholera prevailed in Montreal; and the other was the election riots.

Le chuintement des portes qui se referment masque mon salut au chauffeur, et le bus redémarre dans un sursaut poussif, sans plus s'attarder pour une fille oubliée sitôt descendue. Je reste immobile sur le trottoir. Quand le bus a disparu au loin, alors seulement je traverse et je rentre chez moi. Rugissements du vent d'Est Oiseaux de métal Sur les branches asphaltées