As the past vanishes

Tags

decor, Family, Food, hospitality, Hotels, memories, Montreal, Restaurants

Two days ago I read in the Montreal Gazette that George Lau the owner of L’Orchidée de Chine was closing his restaurant after 34 years in operation. The restaurant is located at the corner of Peel street and De Maisonneuve in Montreal. This was a favourite of my parents who lived just one block North on Peel street. So many family reunions took place there over the years. George is aging and he and his sister Eva want to move on, his children have their own careers. George Lau came to open his restaurant after the celebrated and luxurious Ruby Foo’s restaurant closed on Decarie Blvd. He wanted to have a Chinese restaurant with class for fine dining with dishes well prepared in a traditional manner.  L’Orchidée de Chine was also the place where we had my father’s wake, all his favourite dishes and champagne, the way he and Mom would have wanted it.  My Dad had known George and Eva for decades.

Over the years many restaurants in Montreal patronized by my parents came and went. Years ago a standard was Les Jardins du Ritz in the Ritz Hotel on Sherbrooke street and its famous garden with duckling pond, you felt like you were in Paris. This was before the renovations 10 years ago when all changed.

Then there was many years ago The Coffee Mill on Mountain street, which closed around 1994, a Hungarian coffee shop which catered to so many Hungarians who fled the Uprising of 1956 in Hungary. It was very European, in its food, service and atmosphere, my mother loved it.

My parents also loved The Beaver Club dining room at the Queen Elizabeth Hotel, it was modelled on the famous Fur merchant’s Club established in 1785 near Beaver Hall Hill it closed in 2014.

Le Paris on Sainte Catherine street West, my parents knew the owner a Frenchman and it was a great little restaurant. Then the owner died suddenly and the restaurant closed a year later.

It seems that when I go back to Montreal now there are less and less places left where my parents and all of us went to, replaced as time moves on my more hip places but not as it once was.

Not in Montreal but in New York my Dad liked The Plaza hotel before it was turned into a condo style hotel and the restaurants and bars all closed. Only the Palm Court is left but it is not quite the same.

My parents spent their lives in the hotel/retaurant business and my Dad loved to find new restaurants and find out who was the Chef and what was his background. Before his death a few years ago, it became difficult to go out with him, he did not like the direction restaurants in general were taking, too much decor and not much on food and service. He was often appalled by the lack of attention to details or cleanliness, he wondered why people would put up with such low standards, noise and expensive prices. He did not find often good value for the money spent. In the last year of his life he was teaching restaurant management at the Hotel School in Montreal, he told me how un-motivated the students were and he finally asked them why they wanted to work in the hospitality industry, the answer was to make money, he was shocked by the answer. He explained to them that you went into that business because you liked people and wanted to offer a service not to make money.

For me there is nothing or little to return too in Montreal nowadays, I do not recognize the City, it has changed a lot and the people we knew save a few old friends are gone. The  place of my childhood is gone but then again this is what happens in life, nothing stays the same.

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A sad anniversary in Russia

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assassination, Family, Imperial, Russia, tsar Nicholas II

July 2018 marks the centenary of the death of the last Russian emperor of the Romanov dynasty- Nicholas II and his family: the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, their five children, as well as their entourage. They were shot on the night of July 16 to July 17, 1918 in Yekaterinburg in the basement of the house of mining engineer Nikolai Ipatiev.

Today on the site of the house stands a church built recently and pilgrims gather to pray for the Imperial Family. Each year well over 100,000 people gather for this commemoration and pilgrimage to the mining pits site of their original burial by the communists.

The remains of Nicholas II, the Empress and their 5 children, as well as persons from the entourage of the Imperial Family, all shot in the house of Ipatiev, were found in July 1991 near Yekaterinburg. On July 17, 1998, the Tsar and his family were given a State Funeral and buried in the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St. Petersburg with the exception of Alexei and Maria whose remains are still kept in the State Archives awaiting burial with their parents.

Burial chapel of the last Tsar and his family in the Peter and Paul Cathedral in St-Petersburg, site of the burial of all Tsars and other Royals.

In 1981, the Russian Orthodox Church abroad listed them as holy “martyrs”. In 2000, the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate of the murdered members of the royal family ranked the “passion-bearers” as holy.

In October 2008, the Presidium of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation decided to rehabilitate the Russian Emperor Nicholas II and his family.

 

Nostalgia

Tags

Birthday, CBC, Family, Montreal, Music, Peggy Lee, Radio Canada, San Francisco, Tony Bennett

The definition of the word Nostalgia is thus; a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations.

I always get this at this time of the year as my birthday approaches. Lately we have been listening to Radio-Canada the French language national broadcaster whose head office in is Montreal. They have a lot more music than the English service of the CBC in Toronto who appear to be big on talk show, Radio-Canada also has a wider choice of music, I find it more agreeable.

Radio-Canada plays a broad range of classical music and popular music but will do more retro music from the 1930’s to 1970’s, Brazilian, South American, West African, Middle Eastern. I do prefer it to the mostly American/Canadian hipster music played on the CBC which is very limiting and who has developed the unfortunate habit of talking to listeners as if they were 5 years old and on the French service you do not get news every hour.

So here is this song by Tony Bennett, I left my heart in San Francisco which was a favourite of my parents, I heard it last night on the radio programme C’est si bon, I remember this song from the late 1960’s, lots of family memories.  I visited San Francisco in 1982 and stayed at the St-Francis Hotel, the have a very good memory of the city. Another song by Peggy Lee, my favourite being Is that all there is, again it brings back vivid memories of Montreal between 1966-1972 the downtown core.  All this was 50 years ago but it was a far more optimistic period than what we see today.  A lot of the people I knew then are gone now and the City has changed beyond recognition. This is not to say that we did not have a good life afterwards. Like a lot of people the past it seems was less complicated than life today one wonders about all the change and if there is just a little too much of it.

 

 

Bonne Action de Grâce

Tags

Canada., Family, Friends, PEI, thanksgiving

Well another year has past and Thanksgiving in upon us, time to look back not just at the year but life in general and take stock of what we have. So many have so little, I have been fortunate in so many ways, with my family, friends and life in general, living here on this beautiful Island of PEI.

May you all have blessings in your life, best wishes for Thanksgiving.

 

Busy few days

Tags

Family, Florida, hurricane, Irma, Musicals, PEI, theatre

Despite being retired we do have a busy schedule of activities. We completed our week of attendance at the Theatre conference at the Confederation Centre, on show Canadian musical theatre by Canadian authors. We had visitors from out of Province and then Irma the hurricane.

My brother and sister-in-law both Americans, live in the Tampa Florida area where they have a house. They bought on higher ground and away from the beach front, they prepared for the coming storm and getting all necessary supplies. Stay or go what to do, at one point on Wednesday last it looked good and the storm was to be on the Atlantic side only. Suddenly all changed on Friday, they have her family near Atlanta, Georgia, could they risk driving up, was there time. On Saturday morning, my brother and his wife decided to make a go of it, they said goodbye to their neighbours, those who were left and did not want to go. They offered to drive them North but no they wanted to stay. The big truck was already loaded up, so they left their home and drove non-stop at snail pace North. It was pretty slow and in heavy traffic up to Gainsville, Fla. after that the road opened up and they arrived at their destination in Georgia, very tired but relieved to be away from immediate danger. They plan to return but who knows now when they can go home and what will be waiting for them.

We also have other friends in Florida vacationing in Venice or friends who have homes and condos for the Winter months, they are beachfront properties in this area also South of St-Petersburg. They fear for the worst and do not know when they will be able to go down to survey the situation after the storm.

Another friend has family in Chiapas, Mexico which was struck by a huge 8.9 scale earthquake. The quake was so strong that people in the Capital Mexico City felt the vibrations more than 1000 Km away, the good news the family is fine and safe.

In Canada we also have the enormous forest fires on the West Coast which have been raging for the last 6 weeks, something never seen before.

Sunday morning 10 September 2017.

 

Official Portrait

Tags

Anniversary, Austria, Canada., Family, Laurent, life, Salzburg, tradition, Trudeau, vacation, Will

Many years ago my parents were friends with Armenian born Yousuf Karsh, the World famous Canadian photographer who lived for many years in a suite at the Chateau Laurier Hotel in Ottawa, he offered to my parents on their Wedding Anniversary to do a series of portraits of them. We kept those wonderful portraits and I use to kid my Mother that she had now something in common with Josef Stalin and Winston Churchill, that of having her portrait taken by Karsh. Those portraits are family heirlooms now.

Ottawa being the Capital many Politicians have their picture taken by photographers but some shine above the rest and one is Jean-Marc Carisse who came to prominence in the late 1960’s with his portraits and action shots of our then Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau, the father of Justin. Carisse then took pictures of all manner of famous people and his work was in great demand. He became identified with the Liberal Party of Canada, the natural governing party of Canada. His skill was to take perfectly natural photos of his subjects and their humanity just shine through. Jean-Marc Carisse is an award winning Canadian photojournalist. He has photographed the political, cultural and social scenes in Ottawa and around the world for over 40 years, including stints as official photographer serving the Prime Minister’s Office (Pierre E. Trudeau, John Turner and Jean Chrétien) and as a freelancer. His photographs have appeared on many covers of magazines including Time, Paris Match and Maclean’s.

One of the more famous portrait of Prime Minister Pierre E. Trudeau with a dedication by Trudeau to Carisse. A Prime Minister in 1969 as a young Caesar. One of our truly great Prime Minister’s

I always wanted to have a picture of us taken by him and we went to see him at Studio Café Carisse on Elgin Street in Ottawa just a few steps away from our house. At Christmas time our puppies Nicky and Nora arranged a gift certificate, they are such clever Dachshunds.

Here is the result of Carisse’s work. This portrait is to mark my 60th and Will’s 70th Birthday.

Wearing our Traditional Austrian Trachten jackets a souvenir of the many vacations spent in Innsbruck, Salzburg and Vienna and of many happy memories of our long life together. This year, 2016 is an anniversary year for us and the beginning of a new adventure.

 

 

 

When I arrived…

Tags

1976, 2016, Birthday, cake, Chocolat, Events, Family, FATE, Fortune, Friends, memories, World

In 1976 was the great year of the Montreal Summer Olympic Games, I celebrated by 20th Birthday that year in Montreal with my family. I do not remember exactly what I did, but I do remember attending the Opening Ceremonies of the Olympic Games. I had won excellent seats in the great stadium and it was exhilarating. Then in August I left to start my University courses at Ottawa U. So I arrived in Ottawa at the age of 20.

Today some 40 years later I am 60 and just celebrated with some 45 guests this great event here at home. Will arranged a wonderful party, the food was varied and very good, our guests were pleased. Instead of a cake we had 12 dozens of mini cupcakes in various flavours made by Thimble Cakes on Bank Street. Minou of BelFiore on Elgin street prepared a wonderful, delicate floral arrangement for the party. Everyone brought gifts in the form of fine Champagne, wine and single malt scotch, though the request had been made not to bring anything and with it an avalanche of good wishes and cards.

 

Flowers by Minou of Bel Fiore on Elgin street.  www.belfiore.ca

It was so good to see so many friends and old acquaintances, I feel honoured by their presence. Many of whom I have known for all these years and with whom I share so many life experiences here in Canada and abroad.

There has been many Birthdays in between in those 40 years, all around the World, from Istanbul, to Cairo, to Warsaw, to Chicago, to Rome, to Mexico City, To Amman, to Beijing.

What an incredible life it has been and now on the cusp of a new adventure, a new Province a new life. Life goes on with newness. One can only be thankful for all the many blessings.

My little sister came up from NYC with her husband and father in law and reminded me of stories my late parents use to tell about my birth and early childhood. So many stories, happy memories of a time long ago. Will, had gathered some old photos and everyone teased me about how I had not changed that much in 60 years.

Thimble mini cupcakes of various flavours. thimblecakes.ca

Cylie Artisans Chocolatiers of Ottawa   cyliechocolat.com

 

A final page

Tags

Canada., Family, Funeral, Hotel, Montreal, Restaurant, Saint Laurent

This past weekend was a final page in the sense that we, the three orphans buried our mother’s ashes and held a memorial for my father who died 3 months ago.

We were lucky with the weather like two years ago when we had the Funeral Mass for my mother, it was a beautiful sunny day in Fall colours. The old Cemetery of Saint-Laurent dates back to 1740. My mother’s family have been buried there since 1830.

The immediate family gathered at the grave site with the Curé de la Paroisse for a final prayer. It was nice to see everyone, some cousins who were part of our childhood I had not seen in 40 years.

the Gougeon Family Monument

In the afternoon we held the Memorial for my father who died suddenly on Sunday 12 July at Holt Renfrew his favourite store in Montreal.

I was asked by my sister and brother to deliver a short speech to both families Beaulieu and the Gougeon and to gathered colleagues and friends. I was somewhat nervous about what to say, how to present it, what to recall. Did not want to bore people or say something that would not be accurate or in keeping with the memories people had of our father. Again many people at this gathering I had not seen in 45 years but I remembered them well. They are all quite elderly now it brought back a lot of memories of all those years past and of my father’s contribution to the development of the Hotel industry in Montreal, in Canada and North America.

I also asked people to join in and say a few words about their own memories of him. One anecdote told by an old friend of my Dad was during the late 1960’s when speaking with an important new customer by father explained that by holding their convention banquet in his hotel, guests would be served an 8oz filet of steak. My Dad’s friend who was the Banquet manager asked him afterwards why did he say 8oz to the customer knowing that all steaks were no more than 5oz in any hotel in Montreal, the standard for the industry, my Dad replied that a customer should never be disappointed in what he is expecting from an event, in this case the size of the steak on the plate. The art of the sale as they call it. It made everyone laugh because that was Dad alright, and his clients always remembered him fondly, many followed him from one hotel to the next because they trusted him with their events.

The Memorial was catered in one of our parents favorite restaurants in Montreal, L’Orchidée de Chine on Peel Street. The owner was an old family friend who was quite overwhelmed with grief.

The food served was wonderful, Dad would have approved and of course we had Champagne, always bubbles the way both Mom and Dad enjoyed it. It was a weekend of memories and in many ways a good one. Death does not have to be a sad ending when so many good memories remain with us.

Photo I took in Mykonos during our trip for his 80th Birthday.

Auguste Rodin how did he work?

Tags

Dad, Family, MBAB, Montreal, Rodin, Rue Sherbrooke Ouest

This museum in Montreal started in 1860 on the always fashionable Sherbrooke Street surrounded by the Mansions of the powerful and wealthy, the Golden Mile. The Museum backs unto the slopes of the Mount Royal, the ancient extinct volcano which forms the Island of Montreal, a city founded in 1642 and a commercial metropolis ever since due to its geographical location. It is now a city of 4 million people where 90% of the population speak French.

The Desmarais wing across the street from the original museum building, the two buildings are connected by an underground gallery.

the street Avenue du Musée has been closed to create this outdoor revolving and ever changing work of art between the original museum building and the Bourgie Hall, a former protestant church converted in a concert hall and museum space. The old church is famous for its numerous large Tiffany glass windows.

Bourgie Hall with the gift of Montreal sculptor David Altmejd, The Eye (2011).

From its original Beaux-Arts style building the museum in the last 25 years has expanded and continues to do so with generous gifts from patrons. A fourth building of 49,000 sq. meters is currently being added, Pavillion pour la Paix, a gift of Michal Hornstein and his wife Renata, a generous Montreal couple.

The sculpture called Sun by Dale Chihuly now grace the front steps of the Museum in the Summer time. Sold by Chihuly to the Museum for $1 million dollar, it was bought through public donations, the sum being raised in a matter of a couple of months.

In the last few years the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts has rivalled and sometimes outshone some other Canadian Museum like the National Gallery of Canada in terms of attendance, patron loyalty, generous endowments and varied exhibits.

The latest exhibits on Auguste Rodin (1840-1917), father of modern sculpture is most interesting. Unlike other exhibits showing simply the finished works, this exhibits explains how Rodin worked and how he created his masterpieces. You enter into the secret world of his Atelier and read about his routine to create works which astonished and brought about much criticism. Rodin did break well established conventions and the critics of the time were merciless.

First the drawings, all his life from childhood Rodin was a gifted artist and would draw many subjects. During his life time he would also only use live models, never statues or mannequins. He said that it was important to draw live people because you saw the way the body actually looked and had a better appreciation for all the natural human form, the tension in the muscles, the natural curves, the elasticity of the flesh. He appreciated that no one human looked like another and that bodies came in various shapes. He rejected the academic sculptural school which copied the Classicism of Antiquity. He also used his own body, per example his hands which can be seen in his creation in marble ”The Hand of God”. Taking his cue from the saying that we are made in God’s image.

For all his creations he would first draw, then make a clay model from clay that he collected. He worked hours with clay, shaping it from small round balls and then flattening them. Once the clay model was done he would ask an assistant to make a faithful exact replica in plaster. Like the artists of the Renaissance he used assistants widely who often were themselves masters in their field of work. This was an expensive process but Rodin used it from the beginning, even when he had little money to spare.

The plaster models look like white meringue, they are fine and are said to be very light, a man could lift with his own hands the model in plaster of The Thinker. It speaks volumes of the incredible artistry of the assistants of Rodin.

From the plaster model he would cast his work in bronze or marble again using many assistants. This exhibit had numerous plaster models from the Musée Rodin in Paris, which I am told is currently under renovation. One in particular was the plaster model of ”The walking man” a statue which in its finished form has no arms and no head. The viewer concentrates on the legs and the thrusting movement, the energetic walking pose, the legs like a compass, the muscles in the thighs and their movement forward, the walking man is aggressively moving forward with great strength.

The subject for this statue was an Italian peasant by the name of Pignatelli from the Abruzzo. He impressed Rodin who would say that this man, exhibits a primeval strength born from the Earth devoid of the refined beauty of civilization. He stood like a rock, when you see him you can imagine a Hercules.

The Saint John the Baptist is taken from the Walking Man same pose and is instantly recognizable as the Saint. He is a man of nature, a true believer, someone who comes to announce the Messiah, what we would call in French un Illuminé.

Rodin would often re-use some plaster casts of arms and legs and putting them in different poses on new creations to suit the dramatic effect he sought to create.

The exhibit also devoted a portion of the presentation of this exhibit to show the Gate of Hell and how Rodin re-used some of the figures in other works he would them make into giant forms.  The figure of ”The Thinker” who reflects on what he has done, the man is lost in reflection, he has just committed murder and reflects on his act of violence. The monumental Gate of Hell was a commissioned work for a new building in Paris which was never built. It is now in a museum garden in Paris.

Rodin also employed for his marbles what he called metteurs en points, these were assistants who would take a bloc of marble and chip off and prepare the bloc for him, Rodin would examine the prepared blocks carefully, his observation based on the clay models and the plaster models representing faithfully his vision of the final work. Rodin would then employ other practionners to continue the work under his strict supervision. He employed some 100 practitioners working on 400 marble works between 1872-1917, they sculpted most of the blocks and Rodin only did the finishing touches, using them again to put the final polish to the completed marble figure. Rodin loved Pentelic marble from Greece and the Seravezza marble of Italy for its incredible purity, the same marble used by Michaelangelo. He would use these types of marbles exclusively.

When you see this exhibit and how it was curated, you wish to thank the curator for such a well done job. I will never look at Rodin in the same way, now that I understand the incredible artistry of the man and his vision of how to represent the human form.

I completed this visit to the Museum by having lunch in their elegant restaurant Le Café des beaux-arts. Great menu and service. A wonderful way to say goodbye to my Dad.

Auguste Rodin towards the end of his life.

What a week it has been

Tags

children, Denis Beaulieu, Drummond street, Family, Green ave, heir, Holt Renfrew, Montreal, Peel street, Ritz Carlton Hotel, Rosemount Ave., Son, Westmount

As I am getting older, I will be 60 in 7 months, I find that I am happy to have little on my social agenda. I am retired and I have been very active in the last 3 years with various volunteer jobs. However this summer we had 9 weeks of interminable renovations and then suddenly my father died. I feel like I want to get off the merry go round. I am very tired and not sleeping well. Blame it on too many emotions and memories. Too much to do to sort out my late father’s affairs and belongings, finding the right people to dispose of things, etc. I am not alone in this task, my sister and brother-in-law are also extremely helpful and very well organized.

It’s mental fatigue more than anything else, maybe a slight depression. Loosing a parent is like a part of us has died.

As I travelled within the City going from the North side of the Mont Royal to the Western Side I criss-cross streets and neighbourhoods between Montreal and Westmount, everything reminds me of my childhood, my old schools, the streets, etc. The Office where my mother worked in Real Estate in Westmount and the stories of houses and people she met. Shops where my father liked to do everyday shopping, restaurants, people he knew, he spoke to everyone. Even the last street he lived on Rosemount, a street of large mansions, he knew all the neighbours, who they were and their family stories, if anyone told him something he would remember it did not matter if the conversation occurred last week or 20 years ago. He certainly had a sense of observation and he knew Montreal.

Thursday last was the appraiser who took what was going to auction and then Friday the Charity to whom the rest of his belongings went to. The apartment is now empty and I walked around it one last time, it felt very strange. This is what he wanted, he was against expensive funerals and chose to give his body to science and his belongings to charity. We the children respected his wishes simply because it was his will and he would have been disappointed in us if we had not.

I do not know how much time it will take to put the events of July 2015 behind me. A neighbour told me that it could take several months. My Mom died two years ago this September and I still think of her. I think that with Dad it will be the same, they remain a presence despite having entered the afterlife.

After completing my task at Dad’s apartment I went to the Museum of Fine Arts of Montreal on Friday to see the Rodin exhibit, the museum is on Sherbrooke Street one of the main arteries of Montreal, in the heart of the district my Dad liked so much.

I will write on Rodin and the secret of his Atelier in another post, it was beautifully curated and gave me a new understanding of Rodin the sculptor and how he worked, something I had not seen before in other exhibits.