Latin Quartier; Redpath Museum; Square St. Louis

May 3 (Mardi)

Woke up early & decide to not waste anymore time not planning anything. It's finally sunny too! There are so many places to go and I'm just overwhelmed with options, which leads to my inaction (what?). You just can't believe how much you would walk in a foreign city. I've spent more time walking around Montreal than I ever did in Vancouver. I decided to explore the Latin Quartier. I only brought a small map with #s that indicate what those places are “w/out” the paper that tells me what those #s are so it was such a hassle trying to figure out WHERE I actually went. NEVER do that again!

So I decided to take a walk around the St. Denis/Quartier Latin area before my class at 1:30. Following rue St. Denis, I passed by the bibliotheque nationale du Quebec. It was apparently closed when I went. The place collects and conserves documents about Quebec published in Quebec and else where.

The Bibliotheque nationale du Quebec.

Zoom in on the front door/gate.

There are numerous cinema and theatre on rue St. Denis. In the afternoon, there should be more people around.. sipping coffee and chatting and smoking in the outdoor cafes (bistros?!).

Walking down the St. Denis Street.

I made a turn around the Berri-UQAM Metro station and saw a long line of people waiting to enter a building. It wasn't 'til later that I realized that the building was the Grande Bibliotheque du Quebec.

People lining up outside of the Bibliotheque nationale du Quebec.

The Grande Bibliotheque was just opened recently (April 30). It houses the largest collection of books, meia docs, and etc.

Then I walked aimlessly with my useless map to Ave. Viger. Where I saw some nice-looking buildings.

Place J. Ernest-Laforce - Something to do with justice or police or something like that.

A nice-looking church on the same side of the street.

Another nice-looking church on the opposite side of the same street.

Then I kept walking down rue Berri, not exactly knowing where I am. It was then I saw a chateau-like building, which I'm not too sure what it was.

It looks like the chateau in Quebec City. I have no idea what it is.

View from the back.

I walked all the way to rue du Champ-de-Mars, which was 3 blocks from the St. Lawrence River... and decided to turn back because, after all, I had a class to catch. I passed by Square Viger and realized that I missed another nice-looking building (which I think was the Archives nationales du Quebec.. not exactly sure..).

Looking at the Archives nationales du Quebec from Square Viger. The Archives nationales preserves documents dating back to the 17th century.

I'm not too good with street names but I just know which direction to go. So before I knew it, I was back to the St. Denis Street again, heading toward the Berri-UQAM Metro station (p.s. UQAM stands for Universite du Quebec a Montreal - University of Quebec at MOntreal).

Looking at a nice-looking church from the Viger Square (a small park).

Close-up look at the church.

Walking by the UQAM building. See the Cathedral-like architecture ahead? I thought it was another church. But it was not! It was a part of the UQAM building! I went in the UQAM building and there was just one wall inside the building that matched the cathedral-looking exterior. The rest was just.. some ordinary building. Actually, it was a cafeteria.

Passing by another nice-looking building.

The UQAM exit in the metro station.

I took the metro to the McGill station. If you walk along Av. McGill College, you would pass by the blue Laurentian Bank Tower where you would see the "Illuminated Crowd". The crowd really stood out in the midst of all the blue-ness.

The Illuminated Crowd, constructed in 1985. The plate under it says:

"The crowd has gathered, facing the light, an illumination brought about by a fire, an event, an ideology - or an ideal.The strong light casts shadows, and as the light moves toward the back and diminishes, the mood degenerates; rowdiness, disorder and violence occur, showing the fragile nature of man. Illumination, hope, involvement, hilarity, irritation, fear, violence, murder and death - the flow of man's emotion through space."

Heading toward the music building:

McGill's famous Roddick Gates

The famous McCord Musuem on the right. It's just directly across from the McGill campus

The music building head-on.

The new music building under construction on the side. It's going to have a really high-tech studio & concert hall. I heard many Hollywood people have booked this place already. My prof said that the place was supposed to be constructed in a way that no sound would escape.. something about floating in the air.. vacuum.. a bubble. NO idea~

After class, I went to see the Redpath museum on the mcgill campus. It was soo cool + elegant! It had dinosaur bones, fossils, 500+ shells on display, minerals, mummies (REAL!), replica of hominid skulls, small heads, whale bones, etc etc. I wasn’t sure whether I could take pics in there so I didn’t take any. But I would go tomorrow again to see whether I could take some pics.

A pic of the Redpath museum taken on another day.

It was really windy when I got out of the museum (it closes at 5pm). The wind was unbelievably strong! & I was standing by the bus stop w/ a few ppl at the heart of downtown Montreal & heard 5-6 fire trucks sirening (?!) by us. A guy said “Grande Fou?. & I was like “Pardon?” It took me 5mins to realize what he said “Big Fire?. My Francais is really screwed. Life in a big city. Interesting.

I got back to the hostel around late afternoon & thought maybe I should go get some croissant from the market area around the St. Louis Square. Croissant - I did not find but I found the little streets near the Square was quite pretty at dusk. It almost looked European~

The small plaza with restaurants, small stores.. etc. near the St. Louis Square.