Can I still speak French?
Will my back stop being sore if I don’t shovel snow for a while?
Am I French in Canada or Canadian in France?

Plenty of time to think — I’ve been stuck in Montreal airport for 24 hours in a row now. And I’ve just decided to stop being cheap and bought a Wifi access (can you believe we have to pay for Wifi in this bloody airport???).

It all started about a month ago as a joke. Although I usually go visit my parents in France every year, Feng has never been with me: first we were too poor, then we had a business so someone had to stay in Ottawa to work, then we had more work etc. Conclusion: Feng has never met my parents (and it’s been many years).

So this winter we finally decided to go to France together. Trust me, my parents couldn’t believe it. On top of that, I was lazy myself and haven’t been there since Sept. 06. So we booked the tickets about a month ago and we were supposed to will be in France from February 25th 26th (hopefully!) to March 27th. That if the fucking plane ever leaves.

Flashback to yesterday (Sunday) afternoon. We packed everything (16 kilos for myself, 12 for my comrade) and took the 3pm Greyhound bus to Montreal. Got to the airport at 17:00, checked the bags in right away, went through security, took off our shoes and turned on electronic equipment while throwing away bottles of water as instructed and waited in the lounge. Many bags of Doritos and half a book read later, we learned that it was going to be that easy.

The plane was supposed to leave at 21:45. At 19:00, we were told the plane would leave at 23:30 instead. Then, we learned the plane was canceled. Or rather, that it was “cancelé” (beautiful Quebec French, that will always amaze me!).

We had to go downstairs to “Arrivals” to get our luggages back as if we were indeed arriving. Then go to the immigration. Then to the customs. Then to the airline desk where a bunch of angry French women were already yelling at the employee.

The airline send us to an hotel. Even though I’m not sure how big was the plane, there were at least 200-300 of us. Waiting outside the airport for the shuttle. The shuttle was as big as a big SUV. And it took many trips to the hotel to drive all of us. Of course, by the time we got there, the hotel was full. We were lucky though, we had the last room. Although they didn’t have a key for it, so every time we would need to get in we had to call the manager and his master key.

The next day, we woke up around 9:00 and all gathered in the lobby. We were sent to the airport once again with the little can’t-have-more-than-six-passengers-at-the-time shuttle.

We had heard the plane would leave at 18:00. It’s now 18:00 and last time we checked, the plane was actually delayed again: new time, 23:50. We were granted two $15 food vouchers (cheap bastards!) and didn’t get any other info.

I really hope we’re gonna leave tonight. I’m exhausted and so is Feng, we’re dirty, hungry and well, quite sick of all the BS.

Now, next time, if you’re nice, I’ll tell you more about French women (are they really that sexy?), French workers (are they really always on strike?), French politics (is the President really that stupid?) and the French society (have French really realized they’re not the center of the world anymore?).

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