Nuit Blanche, Toronto

 

 
Huit Blanche is an all night festival in Toronto, when all eight million residents line the streets. The attractions are so spread out that you really have to know where to go, otherwise it’s just crowds, But pretty soon the crowds start to make their own fun. Right near my hotel a fiddler started playing and the whole crowd began to dance. 

I also saw some young women who had persuaded a policeman to let them pose in the squad car, a la Britney or Paris or Lindsey. 

Later I guess it all got even rowdier because I heard all kinds of cheering from my hotel and lots of sirens, but every time I went out I seeem to have missed the excitement. 

Toronto really rocks; you feel so much more connected to the world than you do in the US. We make a show of embracing diversity in the US, but here they’re actually walking the walk. And there are so many ethnic groups that everyone is a minority. I know a lot of Americans who are very unsettled by that prospect. I guess they’re just too accustomed to being a dominant culture. 

When I saw the mix of cultures in Kensington Market (where else can you find a Thai/Hungarian restaurant?) I felt that this was a place after my own heart. A place where a citizen of the world can really feel at home.