Bye Town

The revived Dough Re Mi was back on life-support after another visit on Tuesday. It first looked good for the vegetarian mannakeesh ($5.99), piled richly with olives and other ingredients. But it was a bust: the sourness of the sauce was off-putting. But all those wet toppings created a nasty combination of sogginess (the dreaded gum line) and bland dryness.

Needing a good pie, I returned to Ogilvie Pizza on Friday. The owner was happy to see me since I haven't been there in a year due to my Toronto sublets. The price for a slice and drink has gone up a dollar to $7.99. It wasn't perfect, but similar to Montreal pizza, putting the meat before the cheese reduced the moisture. I contemplated going to the NAC to see Anh Phung and the Civil Lizard (including Steven Foster on drums). But an evening of 3 sets of Jazz wankery didn't appeal.

To celebrate the 200th anniversary of Ottawa, transit was free on the week-end. I wasn't sure what other celebrations were planned I did see either locals or tourists wandering downtown with commemorative posters and other tchotchkes. I walked down Bank Street and thought about missed opportunities. A main street should not be this empty on a Saturday. But the combination of vacant-on-week-ends government buildings and local businesses have always killed the downtown core. There were now more condos (actual or planned) but at the cost of street-level attractiveness. Will there ever be a turn-around or it was too late due to decades of poor planning?

I turned on Somerset to head to the Mid-Autumn Festival in Chinatown. But poor planning also made this street festival seemed sad. Whether it was the BIA or the city bureaucrats, the vendors' were crammed into two small blocks. If there were more space between booths and they were positioned only on one side of the street, it might have stretched invitingly from Bronson to Booth. I didn't want to pay $15 for 5 dumplings with no convenient place to eat.

I turned again on Booth to go to Pimisi Station. When I briefly returned to Ottawa in the mid 2000s, I often looked at a lone condo under construction at Lebreton Flats while waiting for a bus to take me to a business park in Kanata. After 8 months, this desolate view convinced me to give Toronto another try leading to 15 years of urban bliss. That condo had no neighbours for years. It took 2 decades and an LRT, but the area was finally built up, even though most of the buildings were still under construction.

Two quick stops later, I was back on Bank. I stopped off at Kimbap, a new Korean take-out. The husband-and-wife proprietors and the nooks filled with small decorations reminded me of Roll and Bowl. The vegan bibimbap ($15) wasn't quite as good a deal because the order didn't have miso soup and salad. The bowl was tasty enough, but like other restaurants in Ottawa, they substituted mainstream ingredients ( green lettuce, cucumber). So I missed more authentic flavour such as bean sprouts and kimchi.

It wasn't just the city's anniversary but also Nuit Blanche Ottawa. This was a modest attempt to revive a decade-old bust. I haven't gone to the much larger Toronto one in a decade, mostly because it has become more of a party. During the week, I was curious to see if concentrating the installations in Byward Market could generate a crowd. There were also free shows at the Saw Gallery at the Pique festival (free because the city's anniversary) with some non-local acts including Karen Ng (The Weather Station). But once again, I opted out at the end. It was mostly living outside the core and dealing with unreliable transit. Also, this was Karen's in her improv mode and not the friendlier musical mode.