Quebec: proud province, weird language, friendly people
Quebec is a huge province. I mean, it's bigger than I don't know how many European countries together. And yet, there's only 6 million people living there. In the north, near the Hudson river, you have the Inuit people. And in other distant places to the north west of the province you have some more Algonquin tribes. They call themselves the First Peoples and don't feel Quebecuois. Neither do some English speaking immigrants in Montreal. But all the other 5,8 million people of Quebec are QUEBEQOUIS! And proud to be so too.
We spent a week in Quebec and really felt like we were in an indepedent country, where French is the main language and where you can see the blue/white Quebec flag hang everywhere. Being supportive of an independent Flanders, I couldn't help showing much respect for the positive nationalism that exists in Quebec. I don't think the next referendum will be in favour of a united Canada. This is already a country on its own.
First of all you have the language. My God, they call it French, but I am still not sure after one week of talking to the locals. They complemented me on my French, in which I have become really fluent after two years in Brussels (at least one positive thing of my stay there!). But most of the time I thought I was speaking better French than they did. Their accent and their vocabulary is so weird. You hear French in it, words like 'oui' and 'merci', but the overall impression is that they speak a secret language they can only understand. It sounds like the Letzenburg language, but then more English than German. It sounds like someone with a speech impediment from Marseille prolongs his words even more. Sometimes, it just sounded like Dutch tourists in Brussels asking for 'ei peign aveic froimayge ei jambong'. Honestly, the language in Quebec is weird. The strange things is that you think people just talk like that on the street in their dialect, like they do in west-flemish places, but no no no.. the news anchor, weatherman, sports commentator, advertising people.. they all speak that funny dialect. 'Bonjour' becomes BOING DJOEYR. 'J'ai faim' becomes JAY FEIGN. It's an incredibly ugly language, but you start to speak like them after a week. I constantly was thinking about those poor immigrants who learn Dutch in school and then end up in Passendaele or Ardooie. (two west-flemish villages, for those unfamiliar with the region).
The people are very friendly though. We haven't encountered one single rude person on the trip. Of course, it helped that we spoke French. The people in Ontario did ask suspiously if 'the people from Quebec treated us well?'. Apparently they are met with very arrogant behaviour. After all, the french speaking Canadians do decend from the French. The only thing i really found surprising is that they have no idea about Flanders. For them Belgium is this french-speaking country in Europe. At least you would hope nationalists allover the world would support each other, but no.
We arrived to Quebec City via a region called La Beauce. It was the first impression we got from Quebec and from Canada. Our first stop was at a beautiful wooden covered bridge, of which you see a lot in New England as well. Apart from that, the first thing you notice is that everything is in French, nothing in English at all, and that all villages start with saint something. I mention the no english thing, because in the border region in Maine, USA, everything is bilingual. But as soon as you pass the border, it's only in French.
From Quebec city we drove along the Charlevoix coast. We took the highway as we had a long journey to go on, but i really would recommend the road that you from one coastal village to the other. We didn't get too see much of the St Lawrence river, until we decided to get of the highway and descend to a fisherman's village for a light lunch. After that we headed north to the Saguenay river, which we crossed with a ferry boat, that gave us a nice view over the whole merging of the Saguenay river in the LAwrence river. THen we drove along the north side of the Saguenay river, which was one of the most beautifl stretches for me. That was the Canada that I thought I would see, huge trees, small rivers, in which you can imagine bear catching salmon. The highway doesn't really go along the fjords though, so you have to make a detour to see them and we did in Sainte Rose Du Nord. Very nice views there.
I had booked a hotel in Saint Felicien around Lac Saint Jean. I had imagined it to be this typical Canadian lake district with a hotel near the water, but NO. The drive from Chicoutimi (which is an ugly industrial city of 500.000) to Lac Saint Jean, was incredibly boring. We felt like we were driving from Calais to Bruges. Just flat farmland with one small uninteresting village after the other. I was constantly thinking why I didn't read more about this region, as our Flanders Fields are ten times more beautiful to drive through. We did not see moose, we did not see bears, we saw cows, sheep, horses, chicken... just like we do at home. Even our end stop St Felicien wasn't really that interesting and the Lake, well it was just a lake. No beautifl setting at all.
However, we did visit the zoo in St Felicien and more the next day (see other item). And the way back from Lac Saint Jean to Montreal was gorgeous, although that was the stretch i feared most of being boring. That stretch took us in binding roads along the Mauricie region and that is a drive (a long one though) that i would definitly recommend. Again no bear or no moose, but a lot of dead racoons...
By the way: exits are not numbered from 1 to 10 or so, no exit 75 means the exit is 75 kilometers from the source. the next exit is not going to be exit 74, but maybe 67. I thought it was a good system, but my sis found it very confusing. ANd yes, they talk about kilometers in Canada. Even in Ontario.
We spent a week in Quebec and really felt like we were in an indepedent country, where French is the main language and where you can see the blue/white Quebec flag hang everywhere. Being supportive of an independent Flanders, I couldn't help showing much respect for the positive nationalism that exists in Quebec. I don't think the next referendum will be in favour of a united Canada. This is already a country on its own.
First of all you have the language. My God, they call it French, but I am still not sure after one week of talking to the locals. They complemented me on my French, in which I have become really fluent after two years in Brussels (at least one positive thing of my stay there!). But most of the time I thought I was speaking better French than they did. Their accent and their vocabulary is so weird. You hear French in it, words like 'oui' and 'merci', but the overall impression is that they speak a secret language they can only understand. It sounds like the Letzenburg language, but then more English than German. It sounds like someone with a speech impediment from Marseille prolongs his words even more. Sometimes, it just sounded like Dutch tourists in Brussels asking for 'ei peign aveic froimayge ei jambong'. Honestly, the language in Quebec is weird. The strange things is that you think people just talk like that on the street in their dialect, like they do in west-flemish places, but no no no.. the news anchor, weatherman, sports commentator, advertising people.. they all speak that funny dialect. 'Bonjour' becomes BOING DJOEYR. 'J'ai faim' becomes JAY FEIGN. It's an incredibly ugly language, but you start to speak like them after a week. I constantly was thinking about those poor immigrants who learn Dutch in school and then end up in Passendaele or Ardooie. (two west-flemish villages, for those unfamiliar with the region).
The people are very friendly though. We haven't encountered one single rude person on the trip. Of course, it helped that we spoke French. The people in Ontario did ask suspiously if 'the people from Quebec treated us well?'. Apparently they are met with very arrogant behaviour. After all, the french speaking Canadians do decend from the French. The only thing i really found surprising is that they have no idea about Flanders. For them Belgium is this french-speaking country in Europe. At least you would hope nationalists allover the world would support each other, but no.
We arrived to Quebec City via a region called La Beauce. It was the first impression we got from Quebec and from Canada. Our first stop was at a beautiful wooden covered bridge, of which you see a lot in New England as well. Apart from that, the first thing you notice is that everything is in French, nothing in English at all, and that all villages start with saint something. I mention the no english thing, because in the border region in Maine, USA, everything is bilingual. But as soon as you pass the border, it's only in French.
From Quebec city we drove along the Charlevoix coast. We took the highway as we had a long journey to go on, but i really would recommend the road that you from one coastal village to the other. We didn't get too see much of the St Lawrence river, until we decided to get of the highway and descend to a fisherman's village for a light lunch. After that we headed north to the Saguenay river, which we crossed with a ferry boat, that gave us a nice view over the whole merging of the Saguenay river in the LAwrence river. THen we drove along the north side of the Saguenay river, which was one of the most beautifl stretches for me. That was the Canada that I thought I would see, huge trees, small rivers, in which you can imagine bear catching salmon. The highway doesn't really go along the fjords though, so you have to make a detour to see them and we did in Sainte Rose Du Nord. Very nice views there.
I had booked a hotel in Saint Felicien around Lac Saint Jean. I had imagined it to be this typical Canadian lake district with a hotel near the water, but NO. The drive from Chicoutimi (which is an ugly industrial city of 500.000) to Lac Saint Jean, was incredibly boring. We felt like we were driving from Calais to Bruges. Just flat farmland with one small uninteresting village after the other. I was constantly thinking why I didn't read more about this region, as our Flanders Fields are ten times more beautiful to drive through. We did not see moose, we did not see bears, we saw cows, sheep, horses, chicken... just like we do at home. Even our end stop St Felicien wasn't really that interesting and the Lake, well it was just a lake. No beautifl setting at all.
However, we did visit the zoo in St Felicien and more the next day (see other item). And the way back from Lac Saint Jean to Montreal was gorgeous, although that was the stretch i feared most of being boring. That stretch took us in binding roads along the Mauricie region and that is a drive (a long one though) that i would definitly recommend. Again no bear or no moose, but a lot of dead racoons...
By the way: exits are not numbered from 1 to 10 or so, no exit 75 means the exit is 75 kilometers from the source. the next exit is not going to be exit 74, but maybe 67. I thought it was a good system, but my sis found it very confusing. ANd yes, they talk about kilometers in Canada. Even in Ontario.
posted by That Guy From Flanders at 3:05 PM
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