Who's asking: Christopher, a visitor to this blog
Because Montreal is the largest city in the French-speaking province of Quebec, people may not realize what a diverse city it is. Montreal houses the largest English-speaking community in Quebec, as well as large and long-standing Asian and Jewish communities.
Montreal, like the rest of Canada, used to belong to England, and the Empire's pawprints are still all over it. The statue of Robert Burns in Square Dorchester (formerly known as Dominion Square) stands near a monument that commemorates Canadian soldiers killed in the Boer War.
Burns' statue honors Montreal's Scottish heritage, which dates back to the city's earliest days. General James Murray, the first British governor of Quebec, was a Scot; the founder of Montreal's largest institution of higher learning, James McGill, came from Glasgow. The St. Andrew's Society of Montreal, founded in 1835 to provide "welfare and educational assistance to those of Scottish descent and sustaining Scottish culture and traditions within the local community," remains active today.
Once again, I'm posting by e-mail today. If you have trouble leaving comments, send me an e-mail -- among the many rotten features of the allegedly "upgraded" Blogger beta, my e-mail address is now in the upper right-hand corner of this thing. Glad to see that Google is encouraging new strategies and tactics for the spammers of the world.
2 comments:
Someday I truly plan on hosting a Burns Night party. Here's a recipe for haggis if anyone's interested:
http://www.gumbopages.com/food/scottish/haggis.html
Yum!
-Kathleen
I've eaten haggis and enjoyed it, although I kind of wish now that I hadn't read that recipe.
Tried to post by e-mail this morning, but it hasn't worked yet. This is getting worse and worse... if these issues do not resolve themselves by the end of this week, I'll be moving this blog to WordPress.
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