Metallica Concert In Ottawa

You hadn’t pic­tured me as a met­al­head, had you? Well, I’m not usu­ally into heavy metal but I love Metal­lica. I had heard the band was great live and I couldn’t wait to attend the con­cert in Ottawa.

10 Canadian Bands

Wel­come to my new series, the “Cana­dian List of Ten”! Ten weeks, ten posts, ten lists and one hun­dred new Cana­dian things for you, from food to lan­guage, from city to weather.

Today, we will start with music, some­thing I really enjoy (and you may have noticed it given the num­ber of con­certs we went to!).

The Killers In Montréal

On Sat­ur­day, on an impulse, Feng and I decided to drive to Mon­tréal to attend The Killers’ con­cert. Ini­tially sold out, the show had been moved to a big­ger venue at the last minute: the Bell Center.

We hadn’t been the Mon­tréal since the very muddy Radio­head con­cert last year. This time, the weather was gor­geous… but we were indoor.

ACDC In Ottawa

On Mon­day, ACDC played in Ottawa and we had the chance to go see them.

The place was packed with over 17,000 fans and the con­cert was sold out. Sure, we didn’t have great seats like we did for Green Day a month ear­lier, but the atmos­phere was great.

Green Day In Ottawa

I remem­ber lis­ten­ing to Green Day when I was in junior high, back in the nineties. I had a tape of Dookie and we would try to under­stand the lyrics of Bas­ket­case… I like the late Amer­i­can Idiot album too.

The show was just great. The band had a lot of energy: “This ain’t TV,” front­man Bil­lie Joe Arm­strong shouted. “Get off your fuck­ing asses.”

Always Take The Weather With You

Radio­head was play­ing in Mon­treal and we drove the 400 km there and back to attend the show. By the time we got through the secu­rity, we were soaked. The park where the con­cert was held was extremely muddy — let’s just say I hadn’t been that dirty since I was 5 and loved to jump in poo­dles of water.

A Night With The Police

“Have a good evening Zhu… and good luck with the police tonight!”

I love my stu­dents’ sense of humor. I just wish he wouldn’t have said that in front of the whole class. Indeed, I didn’t rob a bank, I just went to a con­cert. The Police. Hence the witty comment.

Hockey (2/10)

One of the rea­son we can stand the cold weather and long win­ters is… hockey, Canada’s national sport. Think soc­cer for Brazil, NFL foot­ball for the US or cricket for India. That pop­u­lar.
Hockey is a really fun sport to watch. The game usu­ally lasts 60 min­utes (plus over­time if needed) and it’s a speedy game. A famous rivalry in Canada opposes Toronto’s Maple Leaf to basi­cally the rest of the coun­try. But Canada also love play­ing Rus­sia, Swe­den, Fin­land, and of course the USA.