Rebecca D Reeve's Blog

This weekend I saw Alvin Ailey’s American Dance Theater at Place des Arts. It was an amazing show and if you’re ever able see one of their shows I recommend it highly. Alvin Ailey was born in Texas in 1931 and when he began creating dance he drew on the ‘blood memories’ of Texas, the blues, spirituals and gospels as inspiration.

There were three acts. The first set was a collaboration with Ailey and Duke Ellington from 1970 and was series of dances reflecting nature scenes where the dancers moved like birds and rivers, and somehow it was all very romantic. The second set was created by the current artistic director Judith Jamison and was a lighter, jazzier set that had a sense of humor and made us laugh out loud. The final set was created by Ailey in the 1960s and has a heavy political weight to it given its historical context. The spiritual and gospel songs were amazing and there was a lot of strong color and fabrics used, elements that had been absent from the first set where neutral leotards and single color backdrops were the order of the day.

Watching the dancers made me acutely aware of my own physical inadequacies, right down the poor posture I was holding while watching the show. Too bad I’m not in NYC or I could stop in for a pilates or beginner dance lessons.

After the show we stopped into a lounge with some sort of experimental jazz to meet up with a birthday crew. After finishing up at the lounge (and a certain someone inspired by the show/the music? performing twirls in the snowflakes at the top of the stairs) we were all hungry and the only open spot we could find at that time was a chain poutine joint. It was a strong close to such a cultured evening. HA

I recently returned from two weeks down south in the sun and the delightful tropical humidity that my skin and hair loves so much (as an aside: I once spent the summer in a place where Ottawa was referred to as ‘down south’. When I busted my co-worker for whistling Christmas carols in July he said it was 11 months of winter and 1 month of hard sledding). It turns out that it’s not just my hair and skin and general well-being that prefers warmer climates, but also my trusty hairdryer. I’ve had this hair dryer for almost nine years! I bought it the summer after I finished high-school and was working at a beauty salon until the fall. Recently Ol’ Blue has been making some nasty screeching noises, but those all disappeared while we were luxuriating in the humid heat. Unfortunately those noises are back with a return to the Deep Freeze. The hangover from my sunburn continues to drag on as my body readjusts to the cold, cold winter. Woman and machine are both rejecting the temps.

The first day back I decided to humidify the apt by boiling a pot of water for 6 hours. I added some cinnamon to the pot to make it smell pretty while it boiled and toiled. Some how though the smell didn’t make its contents obvious to my roommate at at the end of the day he asks if I had been cooking shoe polish.

This video would have been such an informative tool in early 2005 when I was looking at grad schools. I’m not involved in the media production stream (although they appear to be doing an excellent job by the looks of this vid) but I would say this is an accurate portrayal of the department agenda. Score for journalistic integrity!

Check out the video at this website.

A few weeks ago a classmate and I were trudging home in the cold and the snow when we passed a newly appeared bistro a few blocks from our respective flats. The classmate is also a restaurant critic so we stopped to take a look in the window and the menu intrigued her. Since I had the good fortune to be with her when she spotted the place I received an invite for a review dinner the next week. Dinner was a delightful array of small dishes we watched being cooked while seated at the bar, and Bistro Bienville received Sarah’s highest rating. If you’re interested in reading more about it check out the review here.

Looking for casual dining tips in Montréal? Pick up a copy of Sarah Musgrave’s Resto à Go-Go.