Pointe-a-Calliere, Notre-Dame Basilica, & me as a tour guide!

Mai 22 (Dimanche)
Today was the day that Tamami, a friend whom I met through the UBC Community Learning Exchange Project, came to Montreal. Tamami is actually an exchange student from Japan & she is currently studying French at Trois-Rivieres. I told her that I would take around Montreal~ & that's what I did today~

First, we went to the Notre-Dame Basilica, where there was some kind of parade going on in Place d'Arms (the plaza right outside of Notre-Dame Basilica).

Walking toward one of the most famous tourist attractions in Montreal - the Notre-Dame Basilica de Montreal. The place where the trees are is Place d'Arms (built at the end of the 17th-century).

The parade that I was talking about. There were people who dressed up like army people & then there were these people who dressed up in these interesting colonial costumes..

I have no idea what I was going on but it was interesting. So many people were watching them too.

The statue in Place d'Arms. It's a statue of Paul de Chomeday - the founder of Montreal (aka "Sieur de Maisonneuve").

We went to the Notre-Dame Basilica but the church wasn't open to visitors (Sunday Mass?!) 'til 1pm so we decided to go to other nearby sites first. So then we came across the Place Royale.

The Old Customs House located in Place Royale. The Custom House was built to assert British's influence over trades in Montreal. Place Royale was the marketplace of the 17-18th-century. There's an archaeological site right under it and it's connected to the archaeological site under the Pointe-a-Calliere (a museum nearby). Now the place is a part of the Pointe-a-Calliere museum.

The Pointe-a-Calliere, Montreal Museum of Archaeology and History. The museum, located at the so-called "city's birth place", introduces the city's history to its visitors.The museum is built on the ruins of older buildings. There were 4 parts: The Eperon building (the modern building that hosts temporary exhibitions), the archaeological crypt in the basement, the Old Customs House (now called the Ancienne-Douane building), & the Youville Pumping Station.

We went to the temporary exhibit first. It was titled The Journey to Roman Gaul. There was quite a few interesting artifacts (eg. clay pots, jewelry, bronze tools, tombstones, large pieces of mosaics used as a "carpet", etc). One of the things that I remembered was that people in Gaul started building their homes with tombstones at the time that they thought the Roman Empire was coming to an end (ie. time of political instability). I just thought that was awkwardly intelligent.

Then I went to the archaeological crypt in the basement. This is what it looks like with all the ruined walls and foundations of the previous structures.

Within the crypt, there was Montreal's first Catholic cemetary (dating from 1643). One of the skeleton found here was of a man of about 30 y/o with an injury to the skull - which suggests that he might have been hit by an Iroquois club. I had a pic of it but now I'm feeling a bit creepy about it so I decided to delete it.

There was an explanation board that talks about how the orientation and the contents of the graves tell us about French and native practices. (eg. funeral offerings of natives => potsheard, bear's tooth, pipe,etc)

The display case that shows the differences in the kinds of things used by people of different eras - you get all the old, ancient stuff at the bottom, & coca-cola bottles at the top.

The collector sewer that was once the bed of the Saint-Pierre River. The river longer exists with the expanding city of the early days.

The display area just outside of the Place Royal Archaeological site.

On the floor, there were these models that illustrate what the place looked like in various stages of its development throughout history.

A nice animated display just outside of the entrance leading to the Old Custom House display building. There was a old French tune playing behind this. It sounded like a music box.

The Boutique shop w/in the Old Custom House.

Then we decided to walk back to the Notre-Dame Basilica. Then we passed by some interesting streets and buildings. It was really cloudy, cold and windy today, especially by the Vieux Port. It wasn't one of the best days to go out but too bad..

One interesting X'mas shop we passed by on our way to the Notre-Dame Basilica. It's really Christmasy but it's only May!

The famous Notre-Dame Basilica. You need to pay $4 CAD to get in! Tamami & I was saying how we usually don't need to pay to go in a church & then this kid just bursted out "WHAT? WE HAVE TO PAY TO GO INTO THE CHURCH?" I just thought that was funny... especially when it came from a kid about 5-8 years old. Yup. We totally agree with him & 4 bucks was a bit too expensive even though the church was elegant and etc.

Tamami & I in front of the altar in the Notre-Dame Basilica. You can't believe how many people there were! The place was super crowded. It was more like a "tourist site" rather than a real church.

The art work in here was just impeccable. It was really amazing, detailed, and dark. Thousands of tiny 24 carat gold stars dotted the blue-ness. The chapel is still one of the most popular place for weddings. Celion Dion was married here in 1994.

Me attempting to take a pic of myself & Tamami but my camera was just screwed. It had problem processing images in such dark setting w/out flash. But if I used flash, I couldn't capture the background. Sux.. so a lot of my pics of the chapel turned out to be really blurry.

The organ at the back of the church - an elaborate work too.

A side-altar -> one of the pics that was already "clear".

One more blurry view of the super-detailed altar and the pulpit. The current neo-Gothic architecture was built between 1824-1829. The previous church was too small for the population & thus a lot of people decided to not go to church and the church decided to build a bigger church to get people back to church; hence the new building was constructed.

The other chapel behind the Notre-Dame Basilica. It's called the Chapelle du Sacre-Coeur.

The elaborate work done to the ceiling.

The back of the chapel with the organ on the balcony. It was so much brighter in this room!

Then we went to China Town to eat lunch - the same Taiwanese place that May took me when I first got to Montreal. I miss the BBT & food in Vancouver. It's so much better.. but this place is pretty good too.

I realized that I didn't take any pics of the China Town before so I took some today. Here's the gate universal to all China Towns in the world - It just has to say "Tang Ren Jie" (which literally means Tang-Dynasty-People-Street, which really just means it's just a Chinese place).

A street in the China Town of Montreal.

Then we went to the eastern Vieux Montreal where I went a few days ago & we basically swept through most of the attractions that I went. I was pretty surprised that I remember quite a bit about every site! All that typing on this website really helped me consolidate my memory of places that I've visited. So I was acting as a "tour guide", telling Tamami about what were the most interesting things to know of the places I went. Tiffy as a Montreal tour guide! muahaha.. ANYWAY. We swept through almost all sites in Vieux Montreal and went up to the Clock Tower AGAIn. But this time it wasn't that scary->for me. I guess it was b/c the surprise element wasn't there anymore. It was REALLY windy near the river tho'. Here are some pics that I did not take when I visited the places earlier.

One of the old court houses near the City Hall.

A street performer joggling torches in Place Jacques-Cartier.

Habitat '67 - a cool architecture that was quite unconventional on an island.

Then we took the metro back to downtown and swept through most of the major sites in downtown - YOU NAME IT. It was A LOT of walking. I didn't know where else to go so we went up to the other end of the McGill campus - the part near Parc Mont-Royal & went down the Peel Street to all the sites in southern downtown.

Looking down at the main entrance of the McGill Campus at the bottom of the hill + downtown.

C'est possible to take a walking city tour of half of the major attractions in Montreal in one day.. but probably just photo-stop tours.
Then I was really hungry and needed to find a place to eat, went to all underground malls but they were all closed.

A pic of an underground mall that appears in a lot of travel guides.

So sux to that.. we went back to the Tim Hortons right opposite from my rez and ate there. Then I had to get back 'cause I was tired & I had a paper that I must complete this weekend, no matter what! Tomorrow - The Islands!