Montreal

Sunday

Estella Shardlow

Montréal serves up a surprising array of off-season delights

There’s cold, then there’s winter-in-Canada cold. The kind where I’m jamming hand-warmers into my ski gloves — yet still somehow my fingers go numb — and snowflakes keep their intricate patterns as they scatter over my clothes (back home in comparatively balmy England, they’d melt instantly). But what did I expect? I’d made it my New Year’s resolution to travel off-season. Think Rajasthan in the summer monsoon, Sicily’s midwinter citrus harvest, Portugal’s Atlantic Coast when the record-breaking waves roll in come November. I’m not the only one with this idea.

Montréal

Tuesday

Brian Lee Crowley and Richard Audas

A letter from Canada: we’re handling COVID worse than you

Dear Americans, We're Canadian and, yes, we're sorry. No, this time we mean it. You likely hadn't noticed, but Canada has lost one of our greatest sources of consolation during the COVID-19 pandemic: that things weren’t nearly so bad as they have been south of our border. Even the editorial board of Canada's leading national newspaper, the Globe and Mail, acknowledges that Canada is doing far worse at managing the pandemic than the US. A smug feeling of moral superiority over Americans is a regrettable part of our national character. This attitude seemed more justified than ever as we watched the apparently chaotic early American approach to COVID. None of this is to say that any sane person took pleasure in the suffering of our American neighbors and allies.

canada