Paul Georges . Alterego Construction

This passed weekend was one filled with excitement. I didn’t get much sleep, not many Québécois did. St-Jean in Québec was super sweet. Had a bunch of people over to the apartment (thanks everyone, merci tout le monde!) to kick off the night. We then made our way to les plaines d’Abraham to continue the festivities. It was my first St-Jean spent on the battlegrounds, not to mention the first time that I’d witnessed so many people gathered at one particular place to celebrate La Fête Nationale. It was a great experience overall: I wasn’t sick even though I drank quite a bit, was surrounded by great friends and Les Cowboys Fringants were excellent live as usual.

On Sunday Frank and I put our newly acquired skills to the test by paddling down the Jacques-Cartier river. The both of us attended river kayaking courses at our respective universities this Winter but paddling in a pool simply can not be compared to paddling in live water. The scenery on the Jacques-Cartier was exquisite, the flies were annoying as hell and the rapids we caught were just wicked. River kayaking is such a rush and to most people’s disbelief, it isn’t a very dangerous sport when you know what you’re doing. Next summer my first purchase is definately going to be a good river kayak; Sunday’s outing has got me hooked.

On another note, I’m going to be spending the upcoming weekend in Chandler. It will be my last visit before I leave for Sweden, so I plan on taking advantage of my time in order to see with family and friends.

Bonne chance en fin de semaine Aurelia! Je vais être à New Richmond pour t’encourager avec une belle pancarte. Tu peux conter sur moi!

This last week has been completely nuts. Lately the days have been passing by so fast, proving that time flies when you’re having fun! Work is going great, preparations for my departure for Sweden are almost complete, my first St-Jean on les Plaines is right around the corner, it’s Evi’s birthday tomorrow so I’ll be in Montréal for that, Frank and I are supposed to go river kayaking on Sunday and the Festival d’Été de Québec begins soon (that’s gonna be two one hell of a exhausting weeks).

I met up with JP today for lunch at Café Sultan (excellent food, cheap too) to talk about Sweden and how we’re going to get there. JP bought his ticket this afternoon. We decided to leave from Montréal on the 9th of August for London. We’ll be spending two nights there. Afterwards, on the 11th at night, we’ll be flying from London to Stockholm and spending another two or three nights there. We’re then going to take the train from Stockholm to Linkoping in order to make it on time for integration week and to begin our Swedish courses. Can’t wait to be in the air… first time flying! I’m so incredibly psyched; everything is going to be so new and wonderful.

I was reading up about Sweden and Linkoping a few nights ago (it’s become some sort of daily ritual) and it came to mind that I should start a forum for all the exchange students that will be attending Linkoping University for this coming year. So I set up some boards and spammed the url to the 400 people that are going to be present this coming year; the turnout was great! There are already approximately 100 registrations and the number keeps growing everyday (it’s only been two days)! Everyone that has presented themself seems so pleasantly genuine… I can’t wait to meet every single one of them. My ultimate goal is to return home with memories of everyone I’ve met and all the places I’ve seen, not to mention the photographs to go along with the unforgettable souvenirs. The majority of the people that will be attending Linkoping are German, Spanish and French. However, a few people from Chile, New Zealand, Austrailia, Italy, Denmark, Austria, Russia, Turkey, etc. have also posted to the boards! Too motherfucking cool; I can’t wait!

I’m really hoping to be able to permit myself to travel on weekends. I would love to get to know Sweden really well. I already know that I’m going to meet up with my parents in Venice Italy for a weekend and hopefully I’ll get a chance to visit some friends in France as well. I would kill to go to St. Petersburg for a weekend. Edinburgh would be nice too. There are so many places that I want to see and experience; I think the hardest part of traveling in Europe will be knowing that I will never be able to see everything that I want to. Thankfully, flying inside Europe costs virtually nothing; if you plan ahead, you can get most flights for 1 euro plus taxes. Trains are fairly cheap and fast too!

I can’t wait… I was nervous about the whole studying abroad thing at first, now the only thing that scares me is the fact that I may never want to come back.

On another note, St-Jean is coming up soon. I’ll be kicking the festivities off tomorrow in Montréal with Evi for her birthday. I simply can’t wait to see her and hear all about her trip. Then, on Friday, Evi, Frank and I will be coming back to Québec City for a night with friends here at the apartment and on les plaines d’Abraham. If everything turns out well, we should be one hell of a nice gang at my place. The more the merrier I say! I wanna see how many people I can fit into my measly one and a half. Seems that there are going to be some great bands playing on les plaines too, entre autres France D’Amour, Marjo, Mes Aïeux et Les Cowboys Fringants. Une maundite belle soirée en perspective!

Tomorrow I have to call to rent two river kayaks for Sunday. Frank and I are supposed to ride the Jacques Cartier river. It will be my first time riding a river since I’ve taken my kayak classes this winter. Should be a lot of fun.

After the weekend is over, I have a week of rest before the Festival d’Été de Québec begins. There will be so many great bands present this year (see previous post) and I plan on taking full advantage. To top off all the festival, I’ll be going to Montréal on the 16th of July to see Panic! At The Disco live at the Metropolis with Greg. Now THAT’S gonna be one fuck of a show! I’ll be missing Hot Hot Heat here in Québec City. Concessions, concessions…

Joie!

Attention all Dashboard Confessional fans, Chris’ new album has been released and it kicks ass. It’s called Dusk and Summer and it sounds quite a bit like Carrabba’s last work of art. A must listen for all DC fans, even the most hardcore of hardcore (like me).

Evi est de retour du Pérou et j’ai trop hâte de la voir! Elle m’a envoyé une photo par e-mail quand elle est arrivé pis y faut vraiment que je partage ça avec tout le monde, c’est juste trop malade (et full zen)!

Just got back from snapping some shots on Cartier and Crémazie. Both streets are blocked off today for the annual Marché Aux Puces Cartier. It’s currently 36 degrees celcius outside, making today the hottest day of the summer yet. Herds and herds of visitors were out thrifting though other people’s shit for sale, proving that “one man’s junk is another man’s treasure.” Beautiful day, people are happy, beer AND wine in the fridge and an invitiation to a pool party tonight… what more can I ask for?

My Mom just had a fit on the phone. Why? It’s a long story about my cat. Yeah, I know, it sounds terribly lame. In fact, it is, but let’s forget about that for now because it’s of very little or even no importance to me.

“Of very little or even no importance to me…” now these words are important. They tend to be floating through my little psyche quite a lot lately. I guess I’m subconsciously getting my priorities straight. However, my Mom tends to think that my new approach to life is very cynical; she just mentionned that I seem to be developping a devil-may-care attitude.

Webster

Main Entry: dev·il-may-care
Pronunciation: “de-v^&l-(”)mA-’ker, -’kar
Function: adjective
: EASYGOING, CAREFREE

I’m guessing that she meant to use a adjective with more of a negative connotation than devil-may-care…

“Je pense avec mes peurs, j’aime selon mon horaire. J’ai le coeur dans la tête…”

So what is important to me? Throughout this last year, my values have evolved into a set of moral standards that I truly believe in and that I try to share with the people that surround me. Just about this time a revolution passed, I began comtemplating many things:

• Is life meant to be spent alone? With one person? Many people?
• What is success and how is it defined?
• Are jealousy and regret things that I really want to deal with throughout my short life?
• What if I died tomorrow? What have I accomplished? How will I be remember? Do I want to be remembered?
• Do I really know myself? What do I want/need? What is my goal?
• What are my values?

I know you guys and gals are saying this all sounds very artsy-fartsy and shit, but I’m serious; I ask myself these questions on a daily basis. Personally, I think it’s important to ponder life’s mysteries. If we don’t ask ourselves significant questions, we are then no more cultured than our beloved house pets. The meaning of our existance would thereby be minimalized to that of survival; the need to eat, to sleep and to fuck in order to spawn children. These are the questions that have lead me to my present set of values which I happen to be very proud of. Maybe I really have adopted a devil-may-care approach to life but it sure seems to be working for me.

edit: This post is most obviously the least coherent I’ve ever written.

Un vent chaud venant de la fenêtre. La musique apaise mon esprit et transpose mon cerveau. Le sourire me vient au visage. Un parfum que je reconnais.

Des mots pour une amie:

“The way your face could light the bitter dark of every street in every town I’ll ever go, it’s not for anybody else to know, for anybody else to know…”

So I didn’t get to see Duncan Sheik this weekend… kind of bummed out about it but I had a great time here in Québec anyways. I could have done without the shitty weather though. It’s sunny today, that’s all that counts.

I’m at work now, taking my daily fifteen minutes to read my fave newsfeeds and blogs. I must admit that it feels great to be thinking of something other than lines of code and how the hell I’m gonna get my sub-project to function correctly here at the office.

The working world, the so called “real” world, is a scary one that I’m only beginning to understand and that I will more than likely never appreciate. I spend eight hours per day in a building with other programmers and artists typing away at my keyboard and staring at a (beautiful) LCD hoping that my shitty code will compile. Don’t get me wrong, I love this place. However, if this is a window portraying the image of what my life is set to be, I believe that I’m going to have to pass my turn. I never thought that I would fit in with the rest of generation Y, the rich suburban kids that mommy and daddy will do anything to please, but it seems that I’m the spitting image of the archtypal twenty-something who wants everything without having to do anything. I know my brother would be pointing his wise finger at me right about now if he was reading this somewhere near.

This last month has been a difficult one… adapting to a new environment, learning constantly and occassionally being treated like a retard. My first internship here at Ubisoft has been a swift methaphorical slap in the face; I’m not the coder I thought I was, but I’m getting there.

Moral of the story: school is fun and easy. Study for as long as you can afford it!

edit: Damn… I really tend to be a drama queen! I love what I do, I just had a really crappy day.

Hmmm… Duncan Sheik is going to be in Montreal on Saturday promoting White Limousine… damn I wanna go so bad!

I might just go up to Montreal this weekend boys and girls!

I’m finally set up in my new place. All I can say is that I’m loving it and I definately believe that I’ve found my little corner of paradise to call my own. It’s small, it’s ordinary, but it’s just so me… when I walk in, I feel at home.

When I look out the window I see a cute little park that welcomes a constant flux of passerbys no matter what the hour. Yesterday, returning from the grocery store which happens to be right next door on Cartier street, I spotted a dude that was playing guitar on one of the park benches. The sun was exposing its rays through the big fluffy trees of the park creating a warm canvas of backlit orange against the families of leaves. I sat in the grass. I eventually laid in the grass. Staring upwards I examined lifes natural artistic talent at its best. I smiled as I held my ear open and let my problems drift.

Sunlight is a remedy for fear. Anyways for me it is. Everything seems so trivial through squinted eyes. Maybe the sun just blinds us… but blindness in itself is a paradoxal cure for many things.

Dunno what more to say… I’ll edit later. Back to work!

edit: Note to self… it’s impossible to pick up writing where you left off.

“You can come, you can stay,
If there’s something you need to get away from…”

AHH! La rapace de la planète: les vendeurs de cellulaires! I hate them all. I have yet to meet an honest cell phone dealer who can offer friendly service. Cell phone vendors are like drug dealers but much worse. They cheat and lie, just like your friendly neighbourhood pusher… however, they are no where near as cheerful as the pusher. I guess I’m gonna have to deal with them because I need a fucking phone soon. Suggestion on companies? Holla!