chapter 75: Alison in Wonderland; the Hali-Fax of life

"You take the good, you take the bad, you take 'em both, and there you have, the facts of life, the facts of life."
"The Facts of Life"

I know, cheesy. But this is my blog, deal with it.

Halifax is another one of those unique places that punches way above its weight class in the culture and creativity department. It's a small city with an angsty, artistic vibe, fueled by a mix of youthful disillusionment, underemployment, and beer. It has six universities, by far the highest per capita in Canada. Not surprisingly, it also has one of the highest concentrations of bars. The city's motto may as well be "fuck it, let's get wasted."

Anyway, I rolled into this tempest in a beer glass looking forward to re-connecting with my long-lost Africa colleague and partner in clumsy, drunken falls, Alison Lang. She lives in the gritty north end among idealistic twenty-somethings and down-and-outers whose ideas are pretty much limited to their next bender.

Unlike many Haligonians, Alison has a pretty decent job, but she still embodies the energy of her surroundings. She sings, er, screams, in a hard rock band named Peeler, with a guitar player named Mingus who likes to spit whiskey at the crowd. He looks pretty much exactly like you're imagining. I saw them at a bar called the Seahorse, which is fittingly decorated with demonic looking, red-eyed seahorses. Typically, locals decry the renovations that transformed it into the dingy rock dungeon it is now. Apparently, its previous grimy incarnation was way cooler.

Alison has an anchor tattoo on her shoulder and a scene from Alice in Wonderland on her back. Fitting, because as soon as I arrived, she pulled me down into her rabbit hole. I stayed at a hostel the first three nights, quickly meeting a typical cast of characters, ending the first night drunk at a neighbourhood dive bar. The next day, I met Alison after work, and we proceeded to drink in the park and catch up. She, somewhat like me, seems to have an unquenchable thirst to complicate her life. Basing a fictional character on her would almost be too easy.

Anyway, the week went by with drinking while relaxing in Halifax's many parks, drinking in bars, drinking at Alison's house and a trip to the famous lighthouse at Peggy's Cove. Legend has the town is named after the sole survivor of a shipwreck in a storm in the 1700's. The locals named her Peggy after she couldn't remember her name. Today, the lighthouse is a major tourist attraction. But wicked storms are a constant threat, and despite warnings posted all over the place, rogue waves typically drag several foolhardy visitors a year to their ultimate, watery demise.

I also got a chance to meet ex-Global National colleague Ross Lord for drinks, and another friend who offered me the use of her apartment for a couple nights.

So no, I didn't go to Lunenberg, and I didn't see this church or that Celtic band. But I did meet the locals who showed me the Hali-fax of life. It's a small city with deep cultural roots, boundless creativity, and a mild stench of fatalism that drives its people to live in the now.

Carpe diem, Halifax.