Aga Khan Museum in Toronto

Below are a few pictures from the lovely Aga Khan museum in Toronto, Canada.

French frame over Middle Eastern art. 

That's real gold on those pages.

Toronto, Canada: Diversity and Chill

Indigo bookstore in Eaton Centre/Mall

Dundas Square

Hockey Hall of Fame

Ryerson University Student Centre

If diversity, walkability, and integration are your top desires, then Toronto is your destination.

Want a donut? Try Tim Horton's or Von's.  Tim Horton's is Canada's version of Starbucks, but with more food options. Von's is more specialty and expensive, but where else can you get a Homer Simpson donut? Canadians are divided about Tim Horton's coffee, but everyone seems to have an opinion. Try the dark roast, regular (one cream, one sugar), and the latte. McDonald's continues to make the best black coffee, followed by Dunkin' Donuts and Tim Horton's, but I was surprised how much I liked Tim Horton's plain non-fat latte and how much I disliked all its other "specialty" espresso drinks. (My dream latte was too sweet, whereas the mocha was too watery.)

Toronto is a walkable city except in its harshest winter months, December and January.  I visited in mid-February and wanted to slap the many people who claimed it was too cold (Dear Americans: if the sun is out, it's not that cold, even if there's ice on the ground. Put on a beanie, gloves, and a Canada Goose or thick Columbia Sportswear brand coat, and you're good to go. I brought waterproof Bogs shoes and only wore them two of my eighteen days). The "touristy" subway station is Union, and from there, you can head in any direction to see the sights.

Public transportation is decent but woefully inconsistent. Some stations need physical mini-tokens, while others will accept certain cards but not others. Toronto's transportation system is nowhere near the modernity of Taiwan's, Singapore's, or Japan's, but it's serviceable. Upgrades are sorely needed; as of today, Bangkok's trains are more consistent to use. Another tip: Toronto's subways require you to know which direction you're going (North, South, East, or West), and you should determine the next station on your way to increase your chances of not getting lost. Unlike most other systems, some of the signs--when they exist--point you to the next station rather than the last one on the line.

Toronto also has buses, which are an easy way to see parts of the city you might not otherwise walk.  One of my buses took me past a small harbor, and I saw a few boats and clean water. You can get a weekly pass for buses and trains, but it's only good from a specific Monday to the next Monday, so be careful of the timing of your purchase--or get a Presto Card/Pass and load up as needed. Toronto's public transportation system is a mess, but it works once you get used to its quirks. (Update: Surprisingly, Montreal has a better subway system than Toronto.)

The most common spots on a savvy tourist's checklist are the Space Needle and surrounding downtown area; Aga Khan Museum; Greektown; St. Lawrence Market (come hungry); Hockey Hall of Fame; Chinatown (not a must-see, but still fun); Kensington Market (a must-see); and Dundas Square.  The Distillery is trendy, but I didn't like it--it's just a bunch of hipster shops with modern art thrown around old industrial architecture. (I was tempted to say, "You're trying too hard, Canada," but most Canadians are too damn polite to ever justify casting aspersions in public.)

My favorite spots were Queen St. (indie shops and interesting architecture), Kensington Market (very diverse and colorful), Dundas Square (similar to NYC's Times Square, but with a more relaxed vibe), Niagara Falls, and the extended Greektown area (food and coffee).  Bloor St. West at the Dufferin subway station also has lots of indie shops. And I especially enjoyed sending a letter, old-style, with a quill at Toronto's first post office.

Two hours driving outside of Toronto is Niagara Falls, one of the most interesting sights you'll ever see.  I spent hours walking around the area, which extends quite far and over a small bridge that no one else but runners seem to use.  Nearby the waterfall, just sucking in the chilled air is a pleasure--it cleared up my lungs immediately, and I kept craving more.  You can walk around near the USA/Canada border if you're into super-touristy stores--your kids will like it, but you probably won't.

The beautiful Niagara Falls

I'll attend my first Toronto Raptors game on March 1, and I hope to see Serge Ibaka play.  Lowry is 30; DeRozan is 27; Carroll is 30; and Ibaka is 27. The nucleus for a future championship is there. For 2017, the team will probably experiment with different combinations to see which players adapt best to the other four, though the best strategy might be to change the fifth player as soon as his defensive intensity diminishes.

Speaking of defense, it's Carroll's bread-and-butter--he comes out of the Mizzou trapping school--but he can score, too, and I'm worried Ibaka and Carroll will take a long time to figure out their offensive roles.  Good coaching will be key. The pick and roll should be used, because Ibaka can hit the short-range jumper consistently. P.J. Tucker is a recent pick-up whose defensive skills can give Carroll bench-time as needed.  (Interestingly, Toronto drafted Tucker out of the University of Texas at Austin in 2006 and later waived him.)

I'll end as a fictional white ACC (the American college conference, not the Air Canada Centre) coach: "You want to play with the four best players in the East? I need defense, son. The second anyone slacks off, the next man enters until we see which one of ya'll best resembles Dennis Rodman or Bruce Bowen. Let's get a championship for Canada, eh?"

© Matthew Mehdi Rafat (2017)

Update on February 27, 2017: Kyle Lowry will undergo surgery on his hand and will be out for the regular season.

Update on February 28, 2017: if you're looking for a nice nature walk or a place to take your dog, check out High Park--right outside the subway station by the same name.

Update on June 2017: other travel recaps are HERE (various) and HERE (Cuba).

Update on February 2018: the Raptors didn't seem to be able to utilize Tucker and Carroll effectively and traded them. They continue to have a very young team and are second place in the Eastern Conference. 

Toronto in February

My first snowperson!
(I didn't make it--it was there already.) 

Local mosque: Madinah Masjid.  

Toronto, Canada

Some candies I picked up at the dollar store--I like the Smarties, which are Canada's version of M&Ms

8am in Canada -- beautiful

I just arrived in Toronto, Canada.  My airport experience was smooth and pleasant in Canada, but not so in my own hometown of San Jose, California.  Funny how that works--the people to whom we pay taxes don't seem to care as much about us as the ones who treat us as guests.

Toronto is so diverse, I cannot tell where people are from, unless I see obvious clues, like being light-skinned, African, and wearing a headscarf (i.e., of Somali descent). In my own family, my male cousins are married to women from Guyana; Trinidad and Tobago; and Pakistan by way of Bahrain.  My female cousin, the youngest one, is dating a Filipino.  I once said, "If you want to be happy, marry a Filipino/Filipina."  I should probably expand my folk wisdom to anyone raised in Malay culture who has a strong work ethic.  In any case, my uncle and aunt--both born in Iran--love Canada.

They particularly like Canada's healthcare system.  With a federal income tax of about 40% and a 13% sales tax (5% is GST/HST and 8% provincial), they can go to the hospital and never receive a bill to pay.  In California, the upper income tax rates after combining federal and state are around 35%, and the sales taxes are around 9%; however, after numerous deductions, such as mortgage interest, very few people in the upper income brackets actually pay listed tax rates.  A single person making around 100,000 USD in California would probably pay around 28% to 32% federal and state income tax--not including property or sales taxes.  If the difference in income taxes is about 10%, one has to wonder why American healthcare is so inefficient.  In Canada, employees do not have any deductions from their paycheck for non-dental healthcare expenses.

Certainly, Canada's much smaller population and oil and timber wealth play major roles in being able to provide better social welfare benefits, but the key takeaway is that Canadians don't mind paying high taxes because they receive clear and tangible benefits. Meanwhile, I just spent weeks attempting to resolve a hospital bill around 1,000 USD (reduced from around 2,000 USD because I had insurance). Most of my bill was related to blood tests, and I received a separate bill from the doctor who saw me for about 10 minutes. I also received another bill from the same doctor later--apparently, the original bill didn't include all the fees. I managed to get it all resolved, but I'm a single person in between jobs who had the time to go in person to my health provider's customer care office multiple times.  (Oh, the "Pay Now" button on Covered California's website?  It's only a one-time use to get into the system--you can't use it to pay the premium once you've signed up, which must be paid through the third party health care provider's own website. And yes, it still says "Pay Now" even after you've signed up and can't use it anymore. Your credit card is charged 1 dollar and then deducted 1 dollar, and unless you're vigilant, you may think you've paid the monthly premium only to realize you haven't.  Good thing I visited the health care provider's office again to be sure, because what else would I be doing with my time that's more fun than resolving issues with a non-intuitive website?)

Before coming to Canada, I went through my own government's transportation check.  I always opt out of the futuristic-looking body scanner experience, which elicits apathy at best and scorn at worst.  While the American TSA located an agent to pat me down, my luggage was abandoned at the end of the conveyor belt for five minutes, and I was then groped in my groin area. (They point out it's the back part of their hands they're using before the inspection, though I'm not sure why the obvious-shaped bulge isn't a go-around area.)  As an American citizen, I get to pay taxes for inefficient healthcare, totally unnecessary risk of luggage theft, AND an R-rated pat-down?  Why in God's name would anyone want to move north?