a trip to Saskatoon

Two weekends ago I went to Saskatoon, city of bridges, to attend a conference. As luck would have it, I was able to arrange with my bud Paul Young to meet on the last day of my stay there and hang out. It was an illuminating experience.

First of all, Saskatoon is in Saskatchewan, and Saskatchewan is flat. It is the flattest place I’ve been. If your dog runs away from you in Saskatoon, you can watch it go for three days. You won’t lose sight of it until it goes over the horizon, obscured by the curvature of the planet itself. It’s so flat that it’s almost two-dimensional. Local physics teachers have to take their students on field trips to look at object like haystacks so that they can grasp the concept of "height." Kids get together and play "kick the puddle," pushing splashes of water around the landscape, a game made possible by the fact that there is no low-point in which water can pool. This flatness actually makes you feel dizzy, like you’ve accidentally entered a mathematical paradigm or some sort of first-generation video game, like Pac Man.

I knew that Saskatchewan was going to be odd as soon as I got on the local plane. See, I flew from Vancouver to Calgary and changed planes there. The gate where I had to wait for the second flight was reserved for local flights, flights to places like Medicine Hat, Brandon, Dead Gopher, Big Tree, and Blackfly Corner. These flights were all prop planes. The plane I got in flew so low over the prairies that I had no trouble looking out the window and telling the gender of the farm animals we passed over. Once I arrived as Saskatoon International, I caught a cab and was immediately told by the driver that I had lucked out: mosquito season would not begin until the next rainfall. I was also told that Saskatoon is a great place to raise children. Indeed, everyone in the city will tell you the same thing. Ask them, how’s Saskatoon? And they’ll reply, great place to raise kids. Why is that? Because the land is so flat that they can’t hide from you? Because you can punish them by sending them outside during mosquito season? Because it’s so mindnumbingly dull that the children are made compliant by sensory deprivation?

Got to the university and checked in. I arranged to stay in a residence room. Why? A): It’s cheap. B): It’s a salutary reminder of the conditions faced by political prisoners in third-world dictatorships. The conference itself was the usual academic larf-riot. I skipped off part of it to play video games in the student union building.

On Saturday it was over and I headed downtown to meet Mr. Young and to see the sights. Now, Saskatoon calls itself "city of bridges." Why? Because there are six bridges spanning the Saskatchewan river that runs through the town. This river is no more impressive than the run-off you get at the curb after washing your car. The bridges themselves, two of them actually train trestles, are of no architectural interest, of no historical importance, of no great size. It’s just that there is so little in Saskatoon that when the Chamber of Commerce went looking for something to name the city after, these bridges were the only thing in sight. They could have just as easily have called Saskatoon "city of fire hydrants" or "city of sidewalks."

The downtown, uh, "core" is made up of a bunch of low buildings and unusually wide streets. Why have six-lane streets in a town that rarely has more than two pick-up trucks waiting at any intersection? I don’t know. I asked a few locals and they said, "Great place to raise kids." I see.

But perhaps the most distressing thing about Saskatoon is the food. Now, when I was at the conference I ate poorly and didn’t mind. I expect to eat badly at a conference. That may come as a shock to those or you who are not academics. You undoubtedly hold the widespread belief that when academics gather at, say, a conference reception, that it’s one wild time. You envision a huge and ornate room, pulsing with music and light, replete with tables groaning under exotic foods, expensive drinks, salad bowls full of cocaine. You imagine the academics themselves, handsome and erudite, trading deathless quips as they’re being cruised by supermodels eager to sexually service rockstar intellectuals (I swear, if Kate Moss calls me one more time I’m going to slap a restraining order on the ho). You, like most of the world, are wrong. Picture instead an empty bingo hall. Now imagine a group of ill-dressed, pretentious goobers, most of them homely, some of them with obvious cranial deformities, standing around a sad little table and sighing over the carrot sticks. That’s about it.

So, I don’t expect to eat well at a conference. But after a conference, when I head into the city, well, I expect to grab a real meal. Especially if my best bud and Lava-fan Paul Young flies into Saskatoon to hang out with me. Mr. Young and I, once ensconced in our hotel, were ready to paint the town red.. I was ready to drop some serious bucks on a first-class dinner. So I picked up the local newspaper’s Guide to Dining. This, gentlemen, is an astounding document. I have it before me as I type this. On page 8, under the title "Dining Facts," there is a drawing of a typical place setting. You know: forks, bread plate, etc. Beside each item in the drawing is a number that directs you to an explanatory note below. Here are some of those notes: "Forks lie on the left"; "A salad plate will be to the left of the forks"; "Wine is served after all are seated."
Do you understand the implications of this? The good people of Saskatoon have to be told where to find their forks when they go out for dinner. Where do they place them at home? In their back pockets? I can just imagine this scenario unfolding in a Saskatoon suburb:

PA: Well, Ma, put on your clean overalls and scrap the shit off your boots, cause I’m taking you into town to a real restaurant. And don’t you be bringing your eatin’ stick, cause we’re going someplace that uses them "forks."
MA: Now, Pa, a stick was good enough for my Ma so it’s good enough for me. I don’t trust that new fangled gadgetry. Don’t seem natural.
PA: Now, Ma, that’s what you said about drinking glasses, but once the bucket broke you got used to them right quick.
MA: Awright, but just don’t expect me to one of them "plates." I’m bringing my flat rock.

Apparently the emergency ward of Saskatoon General gets filled every Saturday night with restaurant-related injuries: people try to eat their finger bowls and clean their ears with steak knives. Fist-fights break out over what goes on the bread plate. People choke from tying their napkins too tightly around their necks. Patrons refuse to be seated before swigging from the wine bottle–they get hammered and stagger outside to be carried away by mosquitos.

The rest of the guide is a listing of restaurants in the city. Under "Fine Dining" they list four restaurants, one of which is The Keg. The Canard Noir Bistro, where the average dinner runs $11.95 a head including drinks, lists as one of its appetizers "Dill Cream Cheese with crackers." I eventually went down to the hotel concierge and asked him for the name of the best restaurant in town. He said The Keg. I said, how about an ethnic restaurant. He told me about Il Provimento, the best Italian place in the city. Great. Mr. Young and I piled in cab and the concierge gave the driver the directions. Big mistake. The guy took us out to a wasteland of strip malls, fast food outlets, and used car dealerships. Il Provimento was in a strip mall. It had a sign in the window boasting of $5.25 pasta specials. There was a line-up of people, all them with a dozen or so zombified children in tow, waiting to get into this place. So there we were, stranded in the outskirts of Saskatoon, ready to drop a hundred bucks on dinner but physically unable to do so. We would have had to order nine pasta specials each.

We ended up eating dinner in BP’s Sports Lounge, which was the licensed half of a Boston Pizza. They almost didn’t let us in because of the dress code: baseball caps mandatory. I made the mistake of wearing a blazer and slacks. The locals thought I was a member of the royal family.

We retreated back to the hotel, drank, then around 10pm went out on the town. Strange experience. The downtown is so small that you can move from a trendy commercial area, to an industrial wasteland, to a suburb in three blocks. All of these areas, at10pm on a Saturday, are entirely devoid of life. Not a human being to be seen, not a light shining in a window, not a car on the street. Maybe a curfew had been posted and nobody told us. Maybe the city was in blackout conditions because it expected to be bombed. Maybe the mosquitos were coming. Maybe the whole city is an elaborate practical joke and at night all the citizens return to their homes in New York and Toronto.

We went back to the hotel and drank more.

The next morning, Mr. Young left early. He is a very intelligent man. My plane didn’t leave until early afternoon so I had to go out and find breakfast. Now, on a Sunday at 10am in my home neighbourhood, that is in downtown West Vancouver (population 60,000), I can walk out the door to any of five very pleasant coffee bar/bakeries for a latte and a muffin. No prob. On a Sunday at 10am in downtown Saskatoon (population 219,000) there are exactly ZERO pleasant coffee bar/bakeries open. In fact, at the time of day there is only one restaurant of any kind open in the entire city: Lee’s Canadian-Chinese Restaurant. So Lee’s it was for the obligatory eggs, home fries, toast, and coffee, all of it (as far as I could tell) make of cunningly shaped and painted foam rubber that had been soaked in grease or a synthetic grease substitute. Good value, though: the meal so upset my stomach that I didn’t need lunch.

Deciding to cut my losses, I figured I go to the airport early and hang out there. So I got in a cab and the driver told me was a great city Saskatoon was for children. I got to the airport and checked in; the ticket agent told me to be at gate in an hour. I said, what gate? She looked at me like I was nuts and said THE gate. Ah. THE gate. As in, ONE gate for the whole airport. What does one expect in an airport that is the size of a Canadian Tire store?

Flew home, went into the kitchen, made a delicious meal, stared at the mountains, laughed.

You know that song, "Running back to Saskatoon"? Not in this lifetime.