L’anglais est interdit – July 6th, 2009

First day of school today - apparently BC is the province w/ the 2^nd highest number of students in the program, closely following Ontario. There was a cocktail mixer earlier tonight which was pretty fun. From now on, all hrs I spend at school will have to be "tout en français". Highlight of my day was definitely being handed a stack of cash.... I got $530 to buy food over the next 5 weeks – and that's only because I get breakfast at home stay – the dorm kids get $700 to buy their 3 meals a day. A ridiculous amount of money for food – but it's great because my roommate and I have already kind of got a list of restaurants lined up for the next 5 weeks:

1. Crepes/Gratin at Au Petit Coin de Brêton – I heart gratin BIG TIME, it`s essentially a savoury crepe baked in cheese with things like asparagus, mushroom, and meats
   
2. Le Cochon Dingue (sp?) – suppose to have fantastic breakfast till 2pm, I walked by it last time I was in Quebec, I wanted to go but we didn't have enough time; shall also make an effort to visit Chez Cora (when I find it...)
   
3. Poutine – of course, can`t leave w/o this – Chez Ashton is apparently the way to go here
   
4. I think we're also gonna do a hop-on-hop-off thing with the bus – there's a little stretch of road entering Old Quebec that had tons of really nifty looking restaurants
   
5. Pastries – don't know where yet, but can't leave w/o those yummy French pastries!! Suggestions welcomed!!
   

Shocking info, NO CHINATOWN in Quebec, they DO, however, have a street where a lot of Asian restaurants have opened, my home stay family tells me it's like a "quartier asiatique" – yeah I have no idea how that's possible, because I was under the impression that every major city has a Chinatown in some way/shape/form – but I guess not! Too bad, b/c I was really curious as to what the Chinatown looked like here. Each one is of course a little different – the one in Montreal was super touristy, really play up the faux Chinese gardens and gates, and have tons of imitation Chinese buildings, much more so than the one in Vancouver I thought.... and SO much cleaner!! TONS of good food – can't ever forget those wonderful $8 lobsters!!

If any of you decide to visit Quebec in the future, Quebec City apparently has internet hotspots run by a non-profit called ZAP Quebec – all you have to do is create an account – then as soon as you're at one of the free spots, you'd be able to connect. I tried it the other day – there's a hotspot nearby – connection was pretty good, definitely was happy to find out about it. Apparently they have the same thing in Toronto (though of course a diff org) – just thought I'd drop that lil' tidbit for future ref.