Two years in Toronto

Québec is, in a word, charmant . One of the oldest cities in North America and the capital of Canada’s francophone province, it effortlessly embodies grace, elegance and Parisian style. Founded by Samuel de Champlain in 1608 on a promontory overlooking the Saint Lawrence River, the city is named from the Algonquin ‘Kebec’, meaning ‘where the river narrows’. As one walks on the cobbled streets up from the waterfront, past the bistros and boutiques of the Rue Sainte-Anne, with the Fleurdelisé flying alongside the Cathedral of Notre-Dame, it’s not hard to imagine that one has crossed the Atlantic, travelled back in time, and retreated to a European idyll. Canada, rather touchingly, offers a national holiday to commemorate Queen Victoria’s birthday on the Monday nearest 24 May, so with cheap flights from Air Canada there seemed no better place than Québec for our second foray out of Toronto. But even this offers an insight into the city’s complex history: Victoria Day is considere...

Going to church in Canada is challenging not just because the sermons are far too long (though often they make English homilies seem pithy). It’s because nowhere better exemplifies the tension at the heart of our Canadian experience: how we’ve travelled thousands of miles to be here and find it – almost – an exact replica of home. The buildings are very familiar: except for the ferocious central heating, they could have been taken from the Victorian streets of London. The liturgy too is recognisable, and has been faithfully handed down from the Book of Common Prayer. Even the quintessentially Anglican atmosphere – a genial befuddlement that largely avoids controversy – has somehow made its way across the Atlantic. Take, for instance, a recent Evensong at Trinity, the Anglican College at the University of Toronto, where canticles by Herbert Howells and organ voluntaries by Marcel Dupré were performed confidently by the college choir. The music was originally written for King’s Col...

Be careful what you wish for. Within two days a long winter turned into summer, bringing humidity, gale-force winds and hordes of tourists. The change happened so quickly that there was still ice on the streets as Toronto’s restaurants opened their outdoor patios and scantily-clad drinkers supped their lagers in the sunshine. So, in an effort to reclaim the spring that never was, we’ve enjoyed our trips back to the Islands – now busier with families and cyclists, even if it’s not yet warm enough to swim – and to the beautiful cherry blossoms at High Park. A gift from the citizens of Tokyo in 1959, their ten-day bloom is eagerly anticipated by large crowds every year. For the last few weeks it’s been difficult to walk around Toronto without seeing polka dots, on everything from subway billboards to the sides of streetcars. Their source is the Art Gallery of Ontario, which is hosting an exhibition by the Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama entitled ‘Infinity Mirrors’. The campaign has bee...