Here we are folks, the final stage on my virtual world tour. France, of course, is famous for its food. In this video I have breakfast and lunch. The latter includes far more cheese than is entirely sane, and a plate of escargots. Enjoy!
In case you were wondering, I did eat all of the snails. So much garlicky goodness.
As always, if you have enjoyed these videos, please donate to help One25. Every little helps. I’m only on 68% and today is the final day of the challenge.
Important as all this fundraising is, I will be glad when this week is over. I might be mostly free of virus-like symptoms, but I’m not fit enough for long work days. Thursday and Friday won’t be quiet as I have to cram a week’s worth of day job into two days, but I don’t have a radio show next week so I won’t be working all weekend.
Today’s bit news from the real world is that Hungary has passed a law banning gender changes. There are going to be a lot of very frightened trans people in Hungary right now. It will be interesting to see how the EU reacts to asylum claims. They must know that the same sort of thing is likely to happen in the UK soon, so anything they do for Hungarians will set a precedent.
I don’t think the UK government will start repealing laws just yet, but what they are doing is issuing “guidance”. Well, the government isn’t doing it. Random politicians are doing it. But that’s just testing the water. What I expect to happen is a new “interpretation” of the Equality Act which defines trans rights as being discrimination on the grounds of sex so, even though trans people are theoretically protected, anyone who tries to give equal rights to trans people will open themselves up to being sued for discrimination under the Act.
Oh, and the government has also been boasting about taking away our freedom of movement. I note that I do not earn enough to be allowed to move to the UK as an immigrant, but I apparently also earn too much to be eligible for income support under the government’s scheme to help the self-employed during the pandemic.
My final post from Virtual Canada is a set of photos from inside the Royal British Colombia Museum. The light wasn’t great for my poor photography skills, but in one way it enhances the incredible art on display. As with the Inuit, I think that the native peoples of Vancouver Island speak for themselves through their art and craft.
We are almost done with our trip across Canada. Here are some photos of beautiful Victoria on Vancouver Island.
For us the big attraction of Vancouver was Chinatown (once Kevin had ridden the railway). If we were skiing people we’d have been a lot more excited.
Surprisingly I can’t find a lot of photos of Toronto, but I do have a lot from my visit to the Museum of Inuit Art. It is one of the best art galleries I have ever seen. I’ve not bothered to try to comment on the images. The craft and artistry speak for themselves.
A quick break from the fundraising here because over lunch I had the opportunity to listen to the Tolkien Symposium, the online event that replaced this year’s Tolkien Lecture. A fine job was done by all. You can listen here.
Here are some photos of a trip that Kevin and I made to Montréal, I think as part of the planning process for the 2009 Worldcon.
As usual, click on any image for a bigger picture and slide show.
I have been very restrained and only posted a few of the restaurant photos.
Author Nalo Hopkinson was born in the Caribbean but spent much of her life in Toronto. Weather-wise it was a huge shock, but she still loves Canada’s largest city. Here we talk about ethnnic diversity and tourism opportunities. I make a geographical error of such magnitude that I had to leave it in so you could all laugh at it.
Here’s out latest tourism video. We travel Canada from east to west (sadly not by train).
Here’s the first video of the day from Canada. There’s not a huge amount of native food to talk about, but I did make my own poutine.
Check back later from more views of Canada from Kevin and from Nalo. In the meantime I’m going to look for some photos.
I have spent the entire day in Finland. The occasional piece of UK news from Twitter suggests that our government has got back into “persecute the immigrants” mode, rather than applauding their contribution to our health service. I guess that indicates some sort of return to “normal”.
It is time to leave Finland now, but before I got I want to share this photo. Otto, Paula, Irma and I were chilling in a cafe on a place called Women’s Island in Jyväskylä. While we were eating Paula spotted the little lady above watching us. You never see red squirrels in England these days, but they are still common in Finland.
I see that my fundraiser has been stalled on 45% all day. Hopefully that’s because you have all been too busy enjoying the Finnish content to pledge money. You can do so now. I’m going to answer the day’s work emails, then go to bed. I’ll see you all tomorrow in Virtual Canada.
More snow, eh?
My final set of photos from Finland is from my favourite restaurant, Harald. It is a very silly place, but the food is excellent. Besides, they are making fun of the Swedes, which is a very Finnish thing to do.
Tampere is a little easier because the cathedral is so very photogenic. Thank you, Hugo Simberg.
I have even fewer usable tourist photos of Jyväskylä. Sorry Irma!
I have huge numbers of photos of Helsinki, but few of them are a) of tourist sites and b) any good. Here’s a few I managed to find that seem worth including.
And here we are in the beautiful Ã…land Archipelago, home of Ã…con.
I don’t have many photos of Turku, as I’m usually passing through going to or from the Ã…land Islands. But in 2011 Finncon was in Turku. Here are some memories.
Who knew I had so many photos of Finland? Let’s start with a few to give a sense of the country.
