The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version):Chapter 19: Escaping Quebec Nationalist Fervor from Montreal to Hogtown!

I graduated with two law degrees from the University of Cote St. Luc Law School in Montreal. Despite the fact I spoke very good French having learnt this noble language at the King’s School for Young Men in Bombay my French was trés Parisien and nowhere near the joual of the Montreal working class. I was a “L’etranger” and a “Tete Carré” to the locals. Quebec at this time was going beyond its “Quiet Revolution” and trying to neuter the English or anyone not born in La Belle Province. The nationalistic Quebec Government’s Bill 101 criminalized all languages but French. In any Canadian city in you were free to advertise in your language of choice without any restrictions but oh no in Quebec you could only advertise in French with any other language secondarily measured in centimetres below the French text. This is how bureaucratic bean counters save a culture. Anyone perceived as English was penalized for the defeat of Quebec on the Plains of Abraham by the English in 1759. Oddly penalized for not completely wiping out the French population and giving them certain fundamental and cultural rights. No need to further discuss lest the FLQ terrorists who graduated into respectability with the Parti Quebecois firebomb a mailbox outside my home!

I headed down the 401 Highway with 425,000 Quebec “anglophones” to the safety of Toronto. What a horrific wasteland Toronto was! Everything closed on Sunday (churches excepted!) leaving only the smell of Yorkshire pudding and roast beef wafting in the air. Locals dressed in sweatpants and running shoes. Frightening but at least you could advertise in Punjabi without any restrictions. And the subway creaked and squealed like a pig in a slaughterhouse unlike the beautiful Montreal subway running on rubber tires! And bagels were Kaiser rolls. I recall heading out to a pizzeria after arriving in Toronto and asking for a mushroom pizza only if the mushrooms were fresh. After sitting down I heard the stoned out server ask his pizza maker to open a can of mushrooms to ensure they were fresh. Yes, high gastronomic culture in Toronto! Torontonians were well deserving of their nickname of Hogtowners due to their love of peameal bacon.

My publisher Wuhan Wet Market Publishing demanded I replace my view of the Quebec government’s attitude with a kinder word “nationalistic”. I had another word in mind. Unlike Rosa Parks I decided to disembark from the non inclusive Quebec political bus and flee.

RKS 2025 Wine: “Back to the Volcano”: Italian Red from ETNA

“Under the Volcano” is a novel by Canadian Malcom Lowry not to be confused with my heading above “Back to the Volcano”. I have had the pleasure of a day of intense fine tasting on the slopes of Mt. Vesuvius outside of Naples 5 years ago and in May I am heading to Mount Etna in Sicily for some more volcanic tastings. To get a head start we try a Torre Mora Cauru Etna Rosso made from a blend of Nerello Mascalese and Nerello Cappucio.

Aroma: Black cherry, raspberry and dark chocolate but its essential core black cherry.

Palate: Black cherry just keeps on charging (and it loves the top palate) with some diffuse blackberry. Moderately tannic. Short finish.

Personality: Scrappy and persistent.

Food Match: Tomato maccheroni.

Cellarbility: No later than end of 2027 please.

Price: $26 CDN. 13.50 Euros.

RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 89/100. Luca Maroni 96. Wine Align 90.

(Torre Mora 2022 Cauru, DOC Etna Rosso, Torre Mora Societa Agricola, Castigone I Sicilia, Italy, 750 ml, 13%.).

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version): Chapter 18: Mind Numbing Law School at the University of Cote St. Luc:

My Bombay relatives were incessantly chattering about what my next step in life should be and it was the same story, MEDICINE, LAW, ACCOUNTING and COMPLIANCE! I could have lived a life of idle luxury with my wealth but the voice of my late father Paneer incessantly advised, if not nagged, me to improve myself and my fellow human beings by my actions. I could not see how my idleness would do either.

Having nothing much better to do I applied to and was accepted by the University of Cote St. Luc Law School in Montreal in their 4-year National Programme to obtain an LLB (common law degree) and BCL (civil law degree). I was accepted. I turned down McGill University Law as the United Mutations had funded a study by the Cote St. Luc Law school to further define how Canadian mutants were discriminated against by the judicial system and the United Mutations held the view I should be heavily involved with the project.

It was 4 more years in Montreal this time and instead my lodgings at the Presidential Suite at the Four Season’s Hotel in Montreal it was an “executive suite deluxe efficiency suite” at the Cavendish Congress Centre Hotel in the Montreal suburb Cote St. Luc. This eliminated the 45-minute commute from Montreal city centre. Food was much more basic in my new digs. I ate many a meal at the Ben Ash Restaurant in the nearby Cavendish Mall and at Delly Boys on Westminster Avenue. I developed a fondness for Cote St. Luc Bagel Bakery’s blueberry Danishes and pickled eggs at the Robert Burns Tavern.

Day one at law school witnessed a friendly and encouraging talk by one of the professors who said look to your left and right and amongst the three of you only one will graduate. So supportive and nurturing. What devils had I got myself caught up with? The professors liked to demean students although a lot could be said about students demeaning professors. That professor with his fly open. The hot shot professor who flew in from Quebec City to give lectures on “Being an Effective Tool for Megacorp Profitability”. For his exam he overloaded students with so many questions no one finished that exam causing student mass trauma. He later joked about it saying this is the stress you will have to live with in practice so get used to it. Nice man. I could go on but suffice to say these male professors were mostly nasty.

Being an “artsy fartsy” graduate it was difficult to be treated like a receptacle for judicial decisions. Were they good or bad? That was not important. The trick was to reduce all judgements into four sentences and memorize all those sentences and spew them out. The critical mind was not necessary or appreciated.

The competitive atmosphere fostered the aims and ambitions of the cutthroats. The most successful students had a tremendous ability to parrot and memorize but possessed limited intellectual ability. They were excellent regurgitators. One shocking incident involved 4 students I saw give a wad of cash to some janitorial employee who passed along a large brown envelope in return for the cash. It no doubt was meant to be secretive but word soon circulated about a bribery to obtain advance copies of several final exams. These students were award winning model students! I wonder why! One was eventually arrested for homicide and one other became the Minister of Justice of Quebec.

After 4 years of tough slogging I did indeed graduate and it was off to indentured servitude called articling before I could take my final exams and be a full fledged lawyer.

RKS 2025 Film: Scarborough Hits the Big Screen in “Morningside”

I grew up in Montreal and fled as a refugee to Toronto. I encountered incessant references about this neighbourhood called Scarborough and not always in the most positive language. An undertone of poverty, crime and naughtiness. Scarborough seemed so far away from Toronto it earned the derogatory nickname of Scarberia. 

The only relevance Scarborough held for me was the appearance of the Scarborough Town Centre on my drive home on the 401 from Montreal. A “almost home” beacon.

The film will be flickering on Canadian movie screens in February. To watch television commercials advertising this film well before it has hit screens means it is being extraordinarily well marketed and perhaps an indication it is already headed toward being a Scarberian classic and perhaps even a Canadian one! Remarkabke buzz for a Canadian indie movie.

Director and writer Ron Dias refers to the film as a love letter to his cherished Scarborough and that he has a responsibility to present it accurately.

What can you expect? A fictional account of Scarborough with enough reality to take it out of “fictional”? Violence, drugs, crime and the refusal of many to give up on Scarborough and its youth? Too dramatic and light to be “City of Vultures” yet too rough edged Canadian to be a “Boyz in the Hood”?

Coming to Canadian screens in February 2025. You can watch the trailer here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_IoV8DZvFs&t=2s

RKS 2025 Wine: A Devilish Bulgarian Wine

We try a pentagram Cabernet Sauvignon from the Bulgarian Black Sea Coast. Pentagram hmmmmm. What the devil’s going on here!

The winery sits on a 3.5 km. peninsula on the Southern Black Sea Coast. The area has been under Greek, Byzantine, Roman and Ottoman rule.

The grapes were hand picked and sorted and fermentation was in stainless steel then 6 months of ageing in oak barrels.  

Aroma: Blueberry, black currant, blackberry and hints of dark chocolate.

Palate: Black fruit abounds. A bit brackish and curt. Moderately tannic and minuscule chalkiness. Decent structure but the fruit has largely wandered from the bouquet into the waiting waters of the Black Sea.

Personality: Why did someone give me a devilish name. I am neither Damien nor Linda Blair. I’ll be stuck with this curse until they change my name.

Food Match: Kiofte

Cellarbility: Drink by 2025-year end.

Price: $16.50 CDN.

RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 85/100.

(pentagram 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon, PGI Thracian Valley, Black Sea Gold, Pomorie, Bulgaria, 750 mL, 13.5%).

RKS 2025 Wine: Armenian Wine: A Daring Move by The Liquor Control Board of Ontario!

Shame on you who decry the monopolistic Liquor Control Board of Ontario (LCBO)! The “Control” in the corporate name shouts out a paternalistic and profitable heart. The LCBO wants to control what you drink reducing its administrative and business costs as much as possible to maximize profits. No expensive forays into new wine markets only “new” as they have been ignored. Higher LCBO profits mean increasing sums will gush into our efficient medical system to the extent that money will be spent on groundbreaking and next century medical technologies like the relaxing effect Bailey’s Scottish Cream dispensers will have on overly “popular” emergency care waiting rooms. Brilliant strategies for better health.

Imagine my shock seeing a bottle of wine from Armenia tucked amongst the “Holiday” Vintages Catalogue of 14December2024. The LCBO is rightfully championing a newcomer to its shelves in its “inclusive to some exclusionary to many” wine buying programme. Thank goodness for this international forward-looking outlook as why start bringing in wines from over 100 Quebec wineries when Eastern Township wineries are a mere 7 hours drive from Toronto!

A blend of Syrah, Malbec and Cabernet Franc. Predominately volcanic soils. Winemaker is Gabriel Rogel from Argentina and consulting “blender” Michel Rolland.

In a salute to the bravery of the LCBO we try a Karas 2022 Red Blend from the Ararat Valley.

Aroma: Dense black fruit. Blackberry, black cherry, cassis. Soft, smooth and some creamy lushness and density one might find in a Mendoza Malbec. A bit of dark chocolate and chili oil. I am picking up a hybrid of sorts almost Foch or Baco Noir but according to their website and label no such mention of hybrids. Hmmmmm? Some funk too reminiscent of many South African wines some 25 years ago.

Palate: Dry. Moderately tannic. The fruit tucked into the inner recesses of the wine but there is sufficient black fruit lurking that make this an interesting wine teasing you with much more to offer if you scrunch up the eyes and concentrate when tasting it. The Malbec is noticeable on the nose but more so the Syrah on the palate. Creamy blackberry with dark chocolate.

Personality: Dusky, dark and mysterious not capable of any convenient categorization. 

Food Match: Not having visited Armenia a more domestic food suggestion would be roast lamb with lots of garlic with roast potatoes and a heaping pile of rapini sauteed with garlic, olive oil and red pepper flakes.

Cellarbility: Perhaps it will take until the end of 2025 for more fruit to emerge but consume by 2027-year end. This wine is uncertain in what direction it is heading and its key to brilliance is maintaining its stern structure “while letting its fruit out” in a measured fashion. Take a bit of risk and hope some age will draw more fruit out.

Price: $20 CDN and as low as $8.95 in the United States.

RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 91/100. Wine Align 90.

(Karas 2022 Red Blend, Ararat Valley, Tierras de Armenia, Yerevan, Republic of Armenia, 750 mL, 13.5%)

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version): Chapter 17: A Big Shot with a Bachelor of Arts: What Next? The Panacea of Law

I breezed through my Bachelor of Arts programme at McGill University begging the question what was next? In the midst of my political science studies, I noted hordes of political science students slavishly busting their butts day and night in search of high grades to enable entrance into the hugely competitive law school admissions stream. Marks determined the true mettle of a lawyer but the smart ones had mommy and daddy pay big bucks to some dubious charity that built homes for starving Central Americans as that selfless act of “gratuitous labour” was a stellar addition to the resume. Law was the Holy Grail to wealth and respect. Poor buggers I used to think. Academia came to me naturally but many of my fellow students struggled with their courses and even the inability to write a term paper.

As a rich bastard I could have lived a life of luxury anywhere in the world but I had visions of my father Paneer who pulled himself up from poverty to establish a huge commercial enterprise albeit it was founded on dealing hashish to Indian monks and tourists. Ambition can be your best friend or worst enemy.

I applied to McGill Law School and was accepted with my high marks and Indian ancestry that led to an advantage those law school administrators could exploit internationally. I rejected my acceptance to their dismay and delight of those ragged band of political science students who dreamt of what I rejected.

My choice was to work for a year in Montreal and write a novel. So I accepted a position as a casting assistant for the Melanie Blue Talent Agency in Montreal to place, as I was told, leading talent in the emerging Canadian movie industry.

Melanie was a throaty chain-smoking lesbian and a real dandy, Jimbo her “fronting husband” ran the agency which was a two-bit supplier of underwear models for discount chains Zellers and Woolworths. Their lead talent an anorexic Russian who had the talent and body but was “overburdened” by cocaine. It was a fruitless job for me. One day in my best Parisian French I dealt with a client and that French I used was mocked by Connie. I said, my piece and walked out the door.

I focused on writing my novel, “Pirates of the Aegean” around the clock for 6 months pounding on a 1935 typewriter. It was filched from me and picked up by Hollywood and manufactured into a series of billion-dollar films on a pirate. The criminal pirate was the thief who stole my novel. He never was seen after his vacation to Bombay. My friends saw to that.

What was next?

RKS 2025 Wine: More Quiet Whites From Bordeaux

White Bordeaux have an understated quietness to them rejecting flash and bang descriptors. Bordeaux Sauvignon Blanc is entirely demure in comparison to the raucous New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. Blending some Sémillon with the Sauvignon Blanc adds honey and marzipan to the aroma and palate although I refer the cleaner Bordeaux Sauvignon Blanc sans blend.

Let’s put a Croix de Marsan AC Bordeaux to the test.

Aroma: Honey, marzipan and wet gravel courtesy of the 30% Sémillon. Peach and caramel. With 70% Sauvignon Blanc the soul of the wine reflects that.

Palate: Diffuse and weak and one wonders where the fruit has gone. Slightly brackish and just a bit bitter! Short and unremarkable finish.

Personality: As to your nose I offer you hope. As to your mouth mostly disappointment.

Price: $12 CDN.

Food Match: Simply prepared lake fish or turbot.

Cellarbility: Consume no later than 2025-year end.

RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 76/100.

(Croix de Marsan Bordeaux 2023, AC Bordeaux, Vignobles Genfrier, Bruges, France 750 mL, 12.5%).

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version): Chapter 16: Eastern European Espionage and that Spaghetti Sauce with Ground Horsemeat

My assignment for the Central Intelligence Agency caused me no moral dilemma. My assignment was simply to be somewhat of an academic traveller. I was a student of Eastern European politics so I had every “valid” reason to be visiting Eastern Europe hanging out in various universities in Eastern Europe and gauge the sentiment of students living behind the “Iron Curtain” about living there and their willingness to challenge the existing power structure. CIA operatives had already done the heavy lifting and I was simply adding a more “youthful” perspective to their findings. Over 3 summers “on vacation” I visited Bulgaria, Poland, Romania, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Eastern Germany. I was a popular figure in many a university campus with my Frisbee and a healthy supply of blue jeans. Just about all students once familiar with me and gaining their trust expressed their frustration of living in a “Marxist state” that never walked the talk. Special privileges for party members whether it be special shops with western consumer goods or the best holidays and flats. Making matters worse were the presence of Soviet troops “occupying” many Eastern European countries. There were small “party cadres” at some universities but the majority of students despised these “Soviet opportunists”. 

It was easy work. I was monitoring corrupt governments and their student victims. I also gained invaluable academic knowledge about Eastern European regimes. Waiting regularly in lines for food was a common occurrence in several Eastern European countries and yes you could read about it in the comfort of a North American campus but to line up for a loaf of bread or chunk of cheese was one of those unique real-life experiences. On occasion I was tailed by local security forces but my movements were unhindered unlike in the Soviet Union where visitors had to be at specified destinations at specified times regularly reporting to local police offices to “register” themselves.

It is amazing how many spaghetti dinners I cooked in student kitchens. Many had never had a spaghetti dinner before. Sometimes the ground horsemeat gave it a heavy flavour though.

The Penniless Pensioner: Misaligned, Maligned but Marvellous (The Final Version): Chapter 15: Fishing with the Central Intelligence Agency on Lake Champlain: Operation Berlin Wall Humpty Dumpty

You have read that I had been approached at McGill University by The Royal Canadian Mounted Police to act as an informant to turn in and rat on “student revolutionaries”. I walked away from that “opportunity”. I was an Eastern European political scholar and of course I made summer plans to visit Yugoslavia, Bulgaria and Romania to further my studies.

One spring afternoon leaving the visa centre of the Bulgarian Consulate in Montreal with a student entry visa in hand a huge black 240SL Mercedes pulled up alongside me as I was walking up Stanley Street. I was asked to come join two men in the back seat. I refused and one of the men said, “It’s about your mother.” I couldn’t resist.  A ride with these two men lasted 45 minutes and we were having iced tea at Tudhope’s Marina in the small Vermont Town of North Hero. After the iced tea I walked with the two men the marina docks. Three men dressed (perhaps suspiciously preppy) as fisherman picked me up in a beautiful wooden “cabin cruiser” for a nice little “fishing expedition”.

I was in the friendly clutches of operatives of the Central Intelligence Agency. Feeling a bit like Martin Sheen in “Apocalypse Now” having steak and Budweiser with high level military and CIA types. Off we cruised on the placid waters of Lake Champlain. We spent 50 minutes trolling by McCormick’s Reef and Gull Island arriving at a small uninhabited island called Knight’s Island. We dropped our lines in the water and had a chat. I was informed the CIA had conducted an exhaustive background search on me and they were willing to do me a favour if I would do them a few in the context of “Operation Berlin Wall Humpty Dumpty”.

The CIA knew the whereabouts of Abdul. You know the bastard brother of my former sweetie Minah who blew my mother’s plane from the sky in an errant attempt to snuff me. He had fled to North Korea then North Vietnam and now was in Tripoli operating a McFalafel franchise. The CIA would treat Abdul with “extreme prejudice” if I decided to participate in their covert operation. They had my attention as did the bass chomping on my nightcrawler hooked onto my Lake Champlain Spinner.