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<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\nLyra showed up at my place at 10:30 AM. Combining our stuff in my car, we headed off for Canada. The haze endured, but so did the sunshine. Fortunately, the humidity also remained relatively low, so we didn’t sweat gallons as we have during other Otakuthon trips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We took the Interstate 89 N and passed through the US-Canada border at Highgate Springs in short order around 11:20 AM, making a pit stop at the worst public restrooms ever. The doors opened with difficulty. The stalls barely accommodated non-disabled people, much less people in wheelchairs. The sinks released undrinkable water. There was only one hand dryer. Everything was grayish, cracked, and worn. It smelled very faintly like a pit toilet or an outhouse. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Using Route 133 N, a local provincial route with an 80-kph speed limit [except in settled areas], we then traveled through a flat, rural section of southern Quebec characterized by few major settlements. Mostly we saw stone farmhouses or small single-family houses surrounded by vast fields of either potatoes or corn. Silver grain silos, culvert-shaped barns of corrugated metal, and cow barns with open, ventilated sides met our eyes. These contrasted with the many sagging old wooden barns, chicken coops, sheds, and other outmoded agricultural structures I am used to on smaller Vermont farms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
About halfway between the border and Montreal, we passed through St. Jean sur Richelieu, and our surroundings became more thickly populated. We made good time, admiring the Montreal metro area’s light rail and deploring our own lack thereof. The Samuel de Champlain Bridge, whose endless construction we still recall for how it complicated previous trips to Otakuthon with detours and construction, lifted us high over the St. Lawrence River. At the apex of the bridge, we passed quite a few bikers, all without helmets and all in the bike lanes, of course; simultaneously we viewed the downtown\/centre-ville<\/em> of Montreal spread out along the river’s edge before us. As usual, it was full of gray skyscrapers, some silvery and reflective. Unusually, a scrim of wildfire haze effaced the city’s luster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lyra’s trusty GPS narrated directions to us in miles even after we crossed into Canada, even though it provided speed limits in kph. Despite this inconsistency, we successfully navigated not to our customary hotel, the Travelodge, but to our trusty parking garage just off Boulevard Rene Levesque. Parking the FLE car and paying $30.00 for 24 hours of parking, we took our luggage a few blocks to the hotel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n The infographic on the building facade, warning people of construction above, entertained me greatly. Even though check-in time was not until 3:00 PM, room 319 was ready for us, so we moved in. In previous years, we’ve had bunk beds, so we were glad to have two singles and no bunk bed sticking out of the wall at eye level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pine immediately stretched out to relax on my bed. Among the BJDs that Lyra brought was her Xagadoll Sylvie, who is more of a standard 1:6 scale fashion doll size. Next to Pine she looks like an eleven-year-old!<\/p>\n\n\n\n Taking our small portable dolls, we headed out to buy something to drink and pick up our Otakuthon badges. We stopped for at C&C Korean Cosmetics at 998 Boulevard St.-Laurent. I took pictures of the cute product illustrations in the front window and the most interesting product I saw there: CosRx Advanced Snail Power Essence Duo Set. I’m pretty sure there are not actual snails in the products, just, as the French says, mucine d’escargot<\/em>, or snail slime. According to Korean skincare manufacturers, snail slime has antiaging properties, making it a very popular ingredient in Korean skin products. Evidently snail slime’s popularity does not necessarily transfer to other countries; of the many products I scanned on the C&C shelves, only CosRx Advanced Snail Power Essence Duo Set advertised its use of snail slime.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We then hit up Coco Patisserie. I bought some extremely sweet mango tea with boba, which tasted more of sugar than mango; then we walked a few blocks down Rue de la Gauchetiere to the Palais de Congres, where we picked up our Otakuthon badges. Fortunately the line moved quickly, so we escaped with our badges to the little park in front of the Palais. The area was eerily devoid of hordes, so we paused in the shade to take pictures. Pine contemplated the flowers on the top of my bubble tea as Lyra struggled to dress Sylvia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Note lack of hordes. I’ll have to take a panoramic series of shots from this same spot on Friday for comparison! The label on the building, difficult to read in the frosted glass, says Le Palais de Congres.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Pine sent earnest prayers to the boba gods. Sylvia joined in. Even though the boba tea was big [for them], their prayers were very small, so they remained unsure of their effect. Then they showed off my out-of-scale Otakuthon badge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Pine tried to consult the map that I picked up, but it soon attacked and overwhelmed her, much to Sylvia’s consternation. Fortunately, the map on the reverse of my badge proved to be much more useful for their scale. I call this embedded photostory “Map Mishap!”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many vendors lined the pedestrian mall along the narrow Rue de la Gauchetiere. Most of them offered cheap reproductions of popular designer goods spread over one or two tables. However, one of the most extensive displays featured at least six tables of 1:6 and 1:12 scale magnets and keychains with replicas of various foods. Most magnets were $4.00 Canadian. Pine admired them, but did not consume any.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We walked around Chinatown. I took a picture of a wonderful little duplex apartment building at 1074 Rue St. Dominique and a vibrant mural at the corner of Boulevards St. Laurent and Rene Levesque right near one of the Chinatown gates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It’s Pride season right now! In fact, signs on Boulevard Rene Levesque state [translation], “Warning of street closure \/ Rene Levesque [2 sides] \/ between Guy and Beaudry \/ August 10 \/ From 6:30 am to 3:30 pm \/ Parade for \/ Pride Mtl.” There’s no parking between midnight and 7:00 pm on that day, and they’re towing parked cars after midnight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Also on Boulevard Rene Levesque, directly across from the Travelodge, is the Hydro Quebec headquarters. Because it’s on the parade route and because it wants to appear pro-LGBTQIA, Hydro Quebec decorates in an extremely gay way for Pride. Even its logo, the Q with a lightning bolt tail, dons its gay [rainbow] apparel. We took pictures of Pine and Sylvia hanging out in front of a temporarily gay Hydro Quebec planter. Lyra took pictures of me showing off the dolls.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Despite hospitable walking weather with tolerable temperatures and low humidity, we thirsted for a drink, a snack, and a rest. We headed over to IGA, a grocery store also on Boulevard Rene Levesque, and discussed getting ketchup-flavored potato chips. Instead we got some Camille Bloch milk chocolate with 10% cognac syrup in the centers and two flavors of San Pellegrino seltzer, pomegranate black currant [purple can] and prickly pear [pink can], that I have not encountered before. The smooth sweet flavor of the milk chocolate blended with the joltingly strong cognac syrup in a pleasing manner. My pomegranate black currant seltzer had a mild flavor, predominantly sour. Lyra’s prickly pear seltzer tasted bright, sweet, and perky. It was also very pink!<\/p>\n\n\n\n After puttering around in the room for a while, me organizing my pictures and Lyra looking at cats online, we made our annual pilgrimage to Kagayaki for shabu shabu.<\/em> Their air conditioning had failed, but, between the pleasant exterior temperatures and rotating fans stationed in every corner of the restaurant, we felt cool. We enjoyed a delicious meal with the usual complement of lamb, vegetables, tofu, rice balls, and mushrooms [which we could have had more of]. I had some yuzu soda and some black currant soda. I had lime sherbet for dessert, and Lyra had vanilla ice cream with espresso on top. No pictures because I have extensively documented shabu shabu<\/em> from previous Otakuthons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We went back to our room. I organized pictures and began writing this blog entry while Lyra looked around online. She went to bed shortly after 8:00 pm, but I stayed up for another two hours.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I don’t think I slept at all. I did not bring my fleece jacket that I usually sleep in, but I should have, for I was too cold, especially across my arms and torso, with the aggressive air conditioning. [Lyra said she needed the temperature low to sleep, but I secretly moved it from 70 degrees F to 74 degrees F as the night progressed, and she didn’t notice.] Note to self: Bring fleece jacket next time!! I also didn’t sleep because the mattress was unfamiliar. Hey, at least I rested with my eyes closed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I decided to go to Otakuthon after all because I desperately needed a distraction and a vacation to someplace other than Colchester, where I live, Essex, where my parents live, and Burlington, where I work. Waking up bright and early at 6:45 AM as if I were going to work, I noticed that haze continued… Continue reading Otakuthon, 08\/07\/2025: Travel, hotel, and 1:6ers being silly<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[634,936],"class_list":["post-20135","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-cons-museums-shows","tag-pine"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20135","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20135"}],"version-history":[{"count":34,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20135\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20391,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20135\/revisions\/20391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20135"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20135"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/oddpla.net\/modernwizard\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20135"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n