Saturday, August 13, 2005
Ottawa, Ontario
All I have to say about Ottawa is you can't get free wireless internet access here (at least I can't find a place where you can) so I'm now being charged by the minute.
Ottawa, Ontario
Now in Ottawa. I had a slight misunderstanding with a kerb here last night and came off the bike again, though this time it was more embarrassing than painful. I thought the kerb, which was painted yellow, was going to be a nice smooth ramp but the kerb had already decided it was a kerb, something the bike didn't appreciate much. Luckily my elbow broke our fall and we're both okay - me and the bike.
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
Suddenly and quite unexpectedly the cashpoint gives me money and I can return to the surface and breathe again like a normal human being. Don't know how the money got into my account but thanks if someone paid something in, and as soon as my debtors pay me I'll pay you back.
Now about to leave Montreal, though it's pretty late now so I won't get far.
Now about to leave Montreal, though it's pretty late now so I won't get far.
Montreal, Quebec
Back from the hospital (after coming off the bike here in Montreal, just cycling in to town and hitting a pot hole) with 3 stitches in my chin, a few cuts and grazes, but OK, and the bike's OK too, and the laptop which was on my back at the time survived since I'm using it now. Just spent my last couple of dollars on a baguette and then had to pay for a glass of water in order to use this internet cafe - they wouldn't let me sit here and use their internet connection without spending money.
I've just uploaded some more video - still way behind on that though. Didn't get a chance to do as much as I would have liked here in Montreal. Too many distractions. But the videos are from what I've called Day 6 and Day 7, which dates back to 17th and 18th July when I was cycling across New Brunswick, heading for the Maine, USA border.
Day 6 video (5.4 MB Mpeg-4 video)
Day 7 video (5.6 MB Mpeg-4 video)
For the other videos see my LegJoints page.
Will hopefully be heading off towoards Gattineau/Ottawa tomorrow. Need to properly check over the bike first, but I've been in Montreal for almost a week now and time is passing. It's already tomorrow back in Britain and will soon be the middle of August everywhere, and after that comes the end of August, and then September, but the further West I go the earlier it gets.
Now I need to eat. I've just bought a baguette and have some paté, salami, tomatoes (quite a luxury out here at $1.69 per pound) and cheese in the fridge in my room so I'll be having a late night feast. I also have a large box of peanuts and some fruit. Unfortunately I finished off the last of the chocolate croissants this morning.
I've just uploaded some more video - still way behind on that though. Didn't get a chance to do as much as I would have liked here in Montreal. Too many distractions. But the videos are from what I've called Day 6 and Day 7, which dates back to 17th and 18th July when I was cycling across New Brunswick, heading for the Maine, USA border.
Day 6 video (5.4 MB Mpeg-4 video)
Day 7 video (5.6 MB Mpeg-4 video)
For the other videos see my LegJoints page.
Will hopefully be heading off towoards Gattineau/Ottawa tomorrow. Need to properly check over the bike first, but I've been in Montreal for almost a week now and time is passing. It's already tomorrow back in Britain and will soon be the middle of August everywhere, and after that comes the end of August, and then September, but the further West I go the earlier it gets.
Now I need to eat. I've just bought a baguette and have some paté, salami, tomatoes (quite a luxury out here at $1.69 per pound) and cheese in the fridge in my room so I'll be having a late night feast. I also have a large box of peanuts and some fruit. Unfortunately I finished off the last of the chocolate croissants this morning.
Royal Victoria Hospital, Montreal, Quebec
I'm sitting in the waiting room of the Royal Victoria Hospital in Montreal after coming off the bike. I was cycling into town and must have hit a pothole or something in the road cos I just felt myself going over the handlebars and then sliding along the road on my chin. I eventually found my way to the hospital but was told I'd have to pay $459, which I don't have. I was heading into town to see if I could get any money out - I haven't been able to for the last two days. The guy said there was a cheaper place I could go to where they'd only charge $40, but I only have $2.79. So I said well, I can't do it. I think I'm OK so I'll just go. A few cuts and grazes and a bit of pain in my jaw, but nothing serious.
As I was walking out the nurse who first checked me over said she'd clean me up, but then realized my chin needed stitches. She spoke to the doctor and they agreed to treat me now and bill me later. I have insurance so I should be able to claim on that and pay them, it's just that at the moment I'm up to my overdraft limit with my bank so can't get any money out or pay for anything.
Things like this, having to pay for hospital treatment, make me realize the good things about Britain. I stayed up late last night creating a play list of British music on iTunes on my laptop (which fortunately survived the crash): The Fall, Half Man Half Biscuit, Ivor Cutler, New Order, Nick Drake, The Beatles, The Smiths...
I'm supposed to be heading off towards Ottawa/Gattineau tomorrow but don't feel ready at the moment. The money situation is the main worry right now, and with things like this happening I realized I can't go around without access to cash. I could do with eating some food as well. The $2.79 is set aside for a loaf of bread. I have some meat and cheese to go with it in the fridge in the university room I'm staying in, plus some peanuts so that should keep me going for a while.
There are a few other people in the waiting room. Not that many. The health service here doesn't seem nearly as stretched as the British one, but maybe that's because people have to pay.
Someone is wheeled in on a stretcher. I wonder if they do ever turn away injured people who can't pay. From my experience just now, the administrator was willing to watch me walk away but the nurse wasn't. Mixing up money with dealing with sick and injured people seems very alien, but I guess that's the way it is in most places. I thought Canada had a similar type of health service to Britain - basically free, but maybe that's not the case if you're not Canadian.
There's a woman sitting opposite me writing in a notebook. She doesn't look injured. And the guy sitting next to me reading a magazine, I can't see what's wrong with him. But when I broke my arm there was nothing to see, and I remember then sitting in the hospital waiting room (for about 4 hours) pissed off that people who were covered with blood (mostly due to getting pissed and doing stupid things on a Saturday night) were getting seen before me. But I don't know what the order is here. I feel a lot better than I did earlier and could just get up and walk out. I probably don't really need those stitches. I do look rough though. I have a bandage on my chin, blood stains on my trousers and grazes on my arms and hands. As I was walking along the street earlier, pushing my bike, people were staring at me. As I picked myself up off the road after coming off the bike a guy on a bike and a woman in a car stared at me. I'll have to go back to that spot to see exactly what it was I hit. Though I was saying before that Montreal is a great city for cyclists, it's not that great really. When there's a cycle lane it's good, but when there isn't and you have to cycle on the road the road's are terrible, huge potholes, cracks, canyons and crevices, and mostly towards the side of the road, which is where you want to be when you're cycling. The pavements, which they seem to prefer cyclists to cycle on here, are just as bad, or worse.
There's another cyclist here, with a bandaged elbow. I know he's a cyclist because he's carrying his helmet and water bottle.
As he comes out I go in. There must be a bike accident specialist here. I follow some guy along some corridors and I'm now sitting in a treatment room waiting for the doctor. There a cupboard labelled Bed Pans, Bed Pan Support, Urinals. A drawer labelled Needles, Scalpels, Razors, Syringes. I can't remember the last time I had stitches. I hope it isn't painful. I think I had stitches in my chin when I was about 3 years old and was standing on a chair doing the washing up and slipped and hit my chin on the edge of the sink, but that's probably not significant so I don't think I'll mention it.
They all seem to speak fluent English here, which is good. Speaking French when your jaw is stiff is not easy. I was trying to think of the French word for chin on my way here, but didn't need it. I was able to say "J'ai tombé de mon velo" which means I fell off my bike, though that probably makes me sound a bit pathetic. It would have been better if I could have said "I was thrown off my bike by a canyon in one of those grey bumpy tracks you have the nerve to call roads out here." Perhaps it's a good thing my French is un peu merde.
Still no sign of the doctor. I've not been waiting that long though. It must be less than an hour since I got to the hospital. Before coming here I went to a clinic in a shopping mall which was no use at all. They totally refused to treat me.
I've been sitting in this treatment room for about 15 minutes now and no sign of anyone. I'm sitting behind a curtain so maybe they can't see me and have forgotten they put me here. Or maybe this is how they deal with patients who can't pay. There's a gas in here called Nitronox - not sure what that is but I reckon it probably puts you to sleep, so I expect that's what they'll do, though not in an obvious kind of way. Once I'm asleep they'll be able to recycle my organs (which are still intact) and give them to the paying patients. They say they're going to send a bill to my address in London, but they can't be sure I gave them a genuine address or if I did whether I'll pay their bill, so why take the risk? They checked my temperature and my blood pressure, they know I'm a healthy specimen. They can't just let me walk out of here. That wouldn't be good for business.
Announcements come over the PA system. They're in English but don't make any sense. Must be code. Now muttering, also in English, from the other side of the curtain. All I caught was "when he comes back...", said by a man. A woman is replying but a trolley being wheeled by covers her words. Now squeaky footsteps, and the sound of something churning. Liquid. Like a toilet filling itself after being flushed, but deeper and richer. Like the liquids involved are more viscous than water.
The guy who brought me here said take a seat, but I think he meant sit on the bed whereas I'm sitting on the chair which is probably meant for the doctor, so when they look in here they don't see a patient on the bed so they think, aha, an empty room with no one to treat (or put to sleep) and so I get left here, obscured by the curtain. I took a look out into the corridor just now but didn't see anyone. Can still hear voices though. Perhaps I'll go and sit on the bed and see what happens.
What happens is I start reading the notice on the wall next to the bed.
How to choose a dressing
Surgical wound: Clean wound with normal saline or Baxedin. Cover wound with Tefla or Gauzes and abdominal pad.
Pink (epithelialization) Ulcer stage 1: Clean wound with normal saline...
A patient out in the corridor wearing a bed gown comes into my room. You eat something? He's an Indian guy, in his fifties, or maybe older. No, I haven't eaten anything, I say.
I want to eat something, he says. They give me medicine but they don't give me anything to eat. I want to eat something.
Have you been here a long time?
Since 5 o'clock.
It's now 7 o'clock so he hasn't been here much longer than me. But I usually eat something around this time, he says. I last ate at midday.
He goes away, asking the cleaning lady who's now working her way down the corridor where he can get some food. She suggests he try the canteen.
This is getting a bit crazy. If they're going to put me to sleep and recycle my organs they should just get on with it. Unless I am already asleep. In which case I'm dreaming that I've been sitting in this treatment room for over half an hour now and no sign of a doctor or an anaesthetist. A notice on the door to the room I'm in says: ATTENTION!!! DO NOT USE FOR ANY ISOLATION. For patients who need isolation use MCA 1-5.
A doctor comes in and asks if I'm Mr Latif, which I'm not so I tell her I'm not, though I consider telling her I am since whoever he is he's obviously next in line. She tells me I'm next after Mr Latif. So I guess there's not much more to say now.
As I was walking out the nurse who first checked me over said she'd clean me up, but then realized my chin needed stitches. She spoke to the doctor and they agreed to treat me now and bill me later. I have insurance so I should be able to claim on that and pay them, it's just that at the moment I'm up to my overdraft limit with my bank so can't get any money out or pay for anything.
Things like this, having to pay for hospital treatment, make me realize the good things about Britain. I stayed up late last night creating a play list of British music on iTunes on my laptop (which fortunately survived the crash): The Fall, Half Man Half Biscuit, Ivor Cutler, New Order, Nick Drake, The Beatles, The Smiths...
I'm supposed to be heading off towards Ottawa/Gattineau tomorrow but don't feel ready at the moment. The money situation is the main worry right now, and with things like this happening I realized I can't go around without access to cash. I could do with eating some food as well. The $2.79 is set aside for a loaf of bread. I have some meat and cheese to go with it in the fridge in the university room I'm staying in, plus some peanuts so that should keep me going for a while.
There are a few other people in the waiting room. Not that many. The health service here doesn't seem nearly as stretched as the British one, but maybe that's because people have to pay.
Someone is wheeled in on a stretcher. I wonder if they do ever turn away injured people who can't pay. From my experience just now, the administrator was willing to watch me walk away but the nurse wasn't. Mixing up money with dealing with sick and injured people seems very alien, but I guess that's the way it is in most places. I thought Canada had a similar type of health service to Britain - basically free, but maybe that's not the case if you're not Canadian.
There's a woman sitting opposite me writing in a notebook. She doesn't look injured. And the guy sitting next to me reading a magazine, I can't see what's wrong with him. But when I broke my arm there was nothing to see, and I remember then sitting in the hospital waiting room (for about 4 hours) pissed off that people who were covered with blood (mostly due to getting pissed and doing stupid things on a Saturday night) were getting seen before me. But I don't know what the order is here. I feel a lot better than I did earlier and could just get up and walk out. I probably don't really need those stitches. I do look rough though. I have a bandage on my chin, blood stains on my trousers and grazes on my arms and hands. As I was walking along the street earlier, pushing my bike, people were staring at me. As I picked myself up off the road after coming off the bike a guy on a bike and a woman in a car stared at me. I'll have to go back to that spot to see exactly what it was I hit. Though I was saying before that Montreal is a great city for cyclists, it's not that great really. When there's a cycle lane it's good, but when there isn't and you have to cycle on the road the road's are terrible, huge potholes, cracks, canyons and crevices, and mostly towards the side of the road, which is where you want to be when you're cycling. The pavements, which they seem to prefer cyclists to cycle on here, are just as bad, or worse.
There's another cyclist here, with a bandaged elbow. I know he's a cyclist because he's carrying his helmet and water bottle.
As he comes out I go in. There must be a bike accident specialist here. I follow some guy along some corridors and I'm now sitting in a treatment room waiting for the doctor. There a cupboard labelled Bed Pans, Bed Pan Support, Urinals. A drawer labelled Needles, Scalpels, Razors, Syringes. I can't remember the last time I had stitches. I hope it isn't painful. I think I had stitches in my chin when I was about 3 years old and was standing on a chair doing the washing up and slipped and hit my chin on the edge of the sink, but that's probably not significant so I don't think I'll mention it.
They all seem to speak fluent English here, which is good. Speaking French when your jaw is stiff is not easy. I was trying to think of the French word for chin on my way here, but didn't need it. I was able to say "J'ai tombé de mon velo" which means I fell off my bike, though that probably makes me sound a bit pathetic. It would have been better if I could have said "I was thrown off my bike by a canyon in one of those grey bumpy tracks you have the nerve to call roads out here." Perhaps it's a good thing my French is un peu merde.
Still no sign of the doctor. I've not been waiting that long though. It must be less than an hour since I got to the hospital. Before coming here I went to a clinic in a shopping mall which was no use at all. They totally refused to treat me.
I've been sitting in this treatment room for about 15 minutes now and no sign of anyone. I'm sitting behind a curtain so maybe they can't see me and have forgotten they put me here. Or maybe this is how they deal with patients who can't pay. There's a gas in here called Nitronox - not sure what that is but I reckon it probably puts you to sleep, so I expect that's what they'll do, though not in an obvious kind of way. Once I'm asleep they'll be able to recycle my organs (which are still intact) and give them to the paying patients. They say they're going to send a bill to my address in London, but they can't be sure I gave them a genuine address or if I did whether I'll pay their bill, so why take the risk? They checked my temperature and my blood pressure, they know I'm a healthy specimen. They can't just let me walk out of here. That wouldn't be good for business.
Announcements come over the PA system. They're in English but don't make any sense. Must be code. Now muttering, also in English, from the other side of the curtain. All I caught was "when he comes back...", said by a man. A woman is replying but a trolley being wheeled by covers her words. Now squeaky footsteps, and the sound of something churning. Liquid. Like a toilet filling itself after being flushed, but deeper and richer. Like the liquids involved are more viscous than water.
The guy who brought me here said take a seat, but I think he meant sit on the bed whereas I'm sitting on the chair which is probably meant for the doctor, so when they look in here they don't see a patient on the bed so they think, aha, an empty room with no one to treat (or put to sleep) and so I get left here, obscured by the curtain. I took a look out into the corridor just now but didn't see anyone. Can still hear voices though. Perhaps I'll go and sit on the bed and see what happens.
What happens is I start reading the notice on the wall next to the bed.
How to choose a dressing
Surgical wound: Clean wound with normal saline or Baxedin. Cover wound with Tefla or Gauzes and abdominal pad.
Pink (epithelialization) Ulcer stage 1: Clean wound with normal saline...
A patient out in the corridor wearing a bed gown comes into my room. You eat something? He's an Indian guy, in his fifties, or maybe older. No, I haven't eaten anything, I say.
I want to eat something, he says. They give me medicine but they don't give me anything to eat. I want to eat something.
Have you been here a long time?
Since 5 o'clock.
It's now 7 o'clock so he hasn't been here much longer than me. But I usually eat something around this time, he says. I last ate at midday.
He goes away, asking the cleaning lady who's now working her way down the corridor where he can get some food. She suggests he try the canteen.
This is getting a bit crazy. If they're going to put me to sleep and recycle my organs they should just get on with it. Unless I am already asleep. In which case I'm dreaming that I've been sitting in this treatment room for over half an hour now and no sign of a doctor or an anaesthetist. A notice on the door to the room I'm in says: ATTENTION!!! DO NOT USE FOR ANY ISOLATION. For patients who need isolation use MCA 1-5.
A doctor comes in and asks if I'm Mr Latif, which I'm not so I tell her I'm not, though I consider telling her I am since whoever he is he's obviously next in line. She tells me I'm next after Mr Latif. So I guess there's not much more to say now.
Monday, August 08, 2005
Montreal, Quebec
Just added some pictures of Maine. That was two weeks ago, but I'm trying to get up to date with the video while I'm here. So far I've gone through 6 of the 12 tapes I've shot.
Montreal, Quebec
Still in Montreal. Just discovered the Trans Canada Highway website. For the next bit of the trip I plan to follow this highway, more or less. There's a Route Verte (cycle route) within Quebec from here to Gattineau, which is just across a river from Ottawa. From there it's Highway 17 heading across Ontario, which looks like it might be a bit hilly, but it's supposed to be very beautiful. Was talking to someone the other day and he said Ontario has what's called the Canadian Shield, which is where the earth's crust comes to the surface (I think).
Looking at the maps I think it's about 1700km to the Thunder Bay on the far side of Lake Superior. If I can do that by the end of this month - which will mean me upping my daily rate by quite a bit - then I'll have a chance of getting to the Rockies before they become too cold to cross. I reckon Thunder Bay is more or less the half way point. At the moment, if I take into account all these rest days I'm having, I've only been averaging 50km a day. But I'd always planned on spending some time in Montreal and Quebec City, and the route so far has been quite up and down and left and right and teething problems with the bike - now sorted out I think. The gears weren't adjusted properly and the chain kept coming off, but got a guy in Maison des Cyclistes here to see to that and he showed mr how he did it so hopefully that problem won't recur, though there's sure to be others.
One of them is that the areas I'm heading into are quite barren so I'll need to plan where I'm going to stop for the night - because I'm shooting video I need electricity to charge up the batteries, plus I need water and food for myself, so can't just camp by the side of the road. Moose could also be a problem, especially in the rutting season (but I think that's spring so I should be OK).
Some advice about bears - when you see raccoons you don't need to worry about bears, since they're never in the same place at the same time (like Clark Kent and Superman). Trouble is, I'm not sure what a raccoon looks like. Time for Google Image Search.
Montreal is a good city. I got lost on the Mont Royal the other night (the mountain in the middle of the city) trying to find a short cut into town, and had to navigate in the pitch dark down wooded paths, heading for the lights. I've been walking a lot here.
It was a mistake going into the downtown area at night since it was full of loud yobbish Americans saying "Hey dude, is there a Burger King around here?" and then they start shouting "America, America" just in case you anyone hadn't guessed where they were from.
A better part of town is the Plateau area, which is where I am now. It's called the plateau because it's flat, which makes it good for cycling around. Montreal is generally good for cyclists.
Looking at the maps I think it's about 1700km to the Thunder Bay on the far side of Lake Superior. If I can do that by the end of this month - which will mean me upping my daily rate by quite a bit - then I'll have a chance of getting to the Rockies before they become too cold to cross. I reckon Thunder Bay is more or less the half way point. At the moment, if I take into account all these rest days I'm having, I've only been averaging 50km a day. But I'd always planned on spending some time in Montreal and Quebec City, and the route so far has been quite up and down and left and right and teething problems with the bike - now sorted out I think. The gears weren't adjusted properly and the chain kept coming off, but got a guy in Maison des Cyclistes here to see to that and he showed mr how he did it so hopefully that problem won't recur, though there's sure to be others.
One of them is that the areas I'm heading into are quite barren so I'll need to plan where I'm going to stop for the night - because I'm shooting video I need electricity to charge up the batteries, plus I need water and food for myself, so can't just camp by the side of the road. Moose could also be a problem, especially in the rutting season (but I think that's spring so I should be OK).
Some advice about bears - when you see raccoons you don't need to worry about bears, since they're never in the same place at the same time (like Clark Kent and Superman). Trouble is, I'm not sure what a raccoon looks like. Time for Google Image Search.
Montreal is a good city. I got lost on the Mont Royal the other night (the mountain in the middle of the city) trying to find a short cut into town, and had to navigate in the pitch dark down wooded paths, heading for the lights. I've been walking a lot here.
It was a mistake going into the downtown area at night since it was full of loud yobbish Americans saying "Hey dude, is there a Burger King around here?" and then they start shouting "America, America" just in case you anyone hadn't guessed where they were from.
A better part of town is the Plateau area, which is where I am now. It's called the plateau because it's flat, which makes it good for cycling around. Montreal is generally good for cyclists.
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