A round for all my friends!!

I was going to respond to comments from my previous post in the comment section, but decided my idea warranted a whole entry.

I believe I’ve unlocked the reason why Montrealers are perceived to be friendlier/ chattier/ warmer than Vancouverites.

Add up the “facts” from comments to that last post, including information that was sent to me privately, and I think the reason will be obvious to anyone:

Randy extended “more friendly” to everywhere else in Canada, not just Montréal. **

SMM commented on the car culture in Vancouver, which is very, very different from Montréal’s transit culture.

Severen, who is one of those old friends I made in my first year in Montréal, and who still lives in the city, said (in an email, rather than as a comment): “I wonder if Montréal feels more like home to you because of how intense the years were. There was so much going on all the time. I just say that because, while Montréal feels like home to me, it doesn't feel "friendly".”

Massawippi, another one of that 18-25 year old gang, and who made the move to the Lower Mainland commented that “Montreal feels like home… because they sell beer and wine at the corner store.” (Which MVL challenged, but I have to agree with Massawippi, which should become clear in a minute).

Doug, who has lived in pretty well every major city in Canada, said in an email, “I love Vancouver. I have great friends, a great life, and it is certainly beautiful. But compared to Halifax or Winnipeg... well, it doesn't.”

MVL said, among other things, “as a native Vancouverite, I don't find this city unfriendly at all. My neighbours all chat, I have conversations with strangers, I find meeting people easy.”

Here’s how I add this all up.

When Severen says that my years in Montréal were “intense” and that there was “so much going on all the time” what he means, if my memory of those years is the same as his, is that we spent an enormous (probably unhealthy) amount of time drinking at pubs and going to see live music (which involved great amounts of alcohol).

Massawippi’s comment reflects the fact that the alcohol culture in Quebec is very… progressive. Kids can buy beer from the corner dep for their dad… or for themselves as long as they say it’s for Dad. And all my friends started drinking with their families as children… my brother got his own beer stein at age 5 or 6.

I don’t know Doug very well (never met him), but I know that he was born in Halifax and grew up in Winnipeg – thus his younger years were spent in the two cities he says don’t compare to Vancouver, where he now resides as an over-40 adult.

SMM’s comment can be linked to drinking and driving issues. If you’re driving everywhere, you can’t be drinking to the same degree as you can when you have a friendly bus driver to take you home at the end of the night.

And MVL, despite being 40 or older like the rest of these commenters, manages a pub as his job, and reviews live music and theatre as a hobby… and he experiences Vancouver as friendly.

Can you see where this is going?

D’uh! Cities are friendlier when you’re consuming copious quantities of alcohol and surrounded by others who are also three sheets to the wind!!

Which is why I’m going to be going out to the Whisk(e)y pub behind the Irish Heather in Gastown next Tuesday night, gettin' friendly with the locals!

** Randy I tried to find some statistics that would support (or refute) Vancouver having lower per capita alcohol consumption than other cities, but came up dry!