Net Flicks And Cilic

On Monday, I would be attending the first day session of the National Bank Open (formerly Rogers Open). This year, the men will be in Toronto with the women playing in Montreal. But with pandemic restrictions, attendees could only watch centre court matches with the smaller courts and site grounds being off-limits.

I was reluctant to pay cut-throat prices for mediocre food. In any case, you needed to order from your seat using their app. Since I didn't have a modern smartphone (related: would my ancient Android tablet run TicketMaster's annoying SafeTix app?), this option was off the table. So on Sunday, I dropped by Yam Chops after Yoga class to buy some vegan victuals.

For lunch, I ordered 2 fysh tacos ($4.99) and a loaded kale salad ($10.49) to go. Tacos go for $5 a pop nowadays so I wasn't expecting a large portion but it was a shock to be given appetizer-size bites. But I was mostly disappointed with the soft, flat-bread-like shell. Was I suddenly in Europe or the U.K. where you'd get some ersatz copy of North American cuisine? The salad (with edamame, red peppers, shallots) was much better the next day during the tennis match although the coconut bacon bits had softened.

It was a bright, sunny day on Monday and relatively busy at the venue. But with no vendors and other activities set up at the site, it felt less exciting than previous years. I wasn't surprised that an elderly gentleman couldn't get in at first using a screenshot of his ticket. To prevent "fraud", you needed to run the SafeTix app since the barcode on display would change every 30 seconds or so.  Luckily, you don't need internet connectivity but I'm not thrilled that I will have to bring my tablet to other shows. Along with their exorbitant service fee, this is another reason to avoid TicketMaster events.

The first match between Cilic and Ramos-Vinolas went the full 3-sets. It looked to be a cake-walk with Cilic winning the first set 6-2 but his opponent fought back with several breaks to take the second set. But truthfully, Cilic was never in any trouble except from his own playing. There were still some exciting rallies which I could now follow compared to several years ago. I didn't hang around for the second match because 2.5 hours of direct sunlight was plenty.

Most people didn't stay masked while sitting even if this was the tournament's official policy. The organizers did block off seats within the same row to create "pods" of various sizes but their promise of at least 1 empty row between spectators wasn't true. So although I don't normally don a face covering when outside and socially distanced, there was a woman sitting directly behind me. And there was something in her manner that suggested (perhaps wrongly on my part) that she didn't believe in masks and other health measures. As such, I kept my mask on the whole time just to be safe.