The Graduate

The first of our pack graduated recently from McGill University in Montreal. It was a happy and sad moment for us. We are glad that he finished. But we are sad that we won’t have a good reason to visit Montreal. If you have never been to this city, I encourage you to go. It is a great place to visit. And McGill is a great school. Now, I have been to lots of graduations. In fact, I have been a part of lots of graduations as a graduate and as faculty. But this one was a bit unique. First of all, it was the last of 12 commencements held in a HUGE tent over 6 days. Each school has its own ceremony with the School of Music the last. The dignitaries are piped in to the tent by a piper and the graduates have 2 pipers that escort them in. After all, it is MC Gill. Most of the faculty have those darling black velvet floppy hats with a big brim and a bit of gold braid. And McGill’s school color is red so the black robes are trimmed in scarlet. The color of the hood for music is “mauve” which really looks like lavender. Each baccalaureate graduate wears one trimmed in fake white fur. Also very cute. Now, each graduation has the required parts – the lengthy speech by someone distinguished, the granting of degrees to PhD/EdD/MBA….. well, you get the picture, and then the undergraduates get their degrees. And sometimes they will award honorary degrees. We had it all.





The new Chancellor spoke to the gathering about the importance of taking care of your health. An interesting subject for young music graduates. But he was quite elderly and he did stress that if you took care of yourself, you would be less of a burden on society. Hmmm…… And we did have an honorary degree award. Olivier Latry, the organist from Notre Dame Cathedral of Paris France was given a doctorate. As part of the ceremony, the honoree is usually expected to give a speech – on health or whatever they want to talk about. But THIS dean pulled a fast one on this guy. He opened a sealed envelope and handed the man a piece of paper. Latry was then escorted off the stage and taken out of the tent to Redpath Hall (a huge old granite building on the quad). This building used to be the library when the school first began. Now it houses the University’s mammoth manual organ with LOTS of keys and LOTS of stops.

In Redpath Hall, Latry is then expected to improvise for a very long time on the two little tunes he found on the piece of paper. And the tunes are very different. One is a chant – Ave Maria – and the other is this little wisp of notes that swoop up and abruptly stop and then swoop again and stop. And with a bit of dissonance thrown in. Now, this is no ordinary music school. It offers degrees in music recording and videoing. So while Dr. (almost) Latry is in a building to our left, we-in-the-tent can see him on these giant TV screens mounted above us.

AND we have surround sound to enjoy his performance. So, he starts by playing each little tune. And then he is off. And I never hear ANYTHING that even REMOTELY sounds like one of those tunes again. And he plays on…… and on……. And I feel that the whole experience is a bit musically intellectual as the faculty on stage and the students up front are smiling and swaying and looking like they are eating the best piece of chocolate EVER. And then it is over and he bows and we applaud – can he even hear us? And the ceremony continues. Now, he has just gotten a doctorate and he never even uttered one word. Another cute custom at McGill is to hit the graduates as they cross the stage to get their diploma. If you have never gotten a degree before, you get hit on the head. If you have a degree and are getting another, you get hit on the shoulder. No one was injured although several reached out as if to take the stick from the old guy hitting them…… or were they trying to shake his hand and he would have none of it?
And then all are graduated and all are piped out and we can go to Redpath Hall (of organ fame) for a little light refreshments. All 500 try to get through a set of very narrow old doors and, of course, the caterers put the wine RIGHT by the door so that everyone stops to get a glass and then just STANDS there. Mark and I get our wine and grab a brownie and hug our kid who has done so well and look for the exit. Thank goodness we have a while before the next one.

Sake to Me

We want to be a part of our community. So when Japantown has a festival, we attend. And the latest festival was the Sake Festival. So, of course, we went. I know almost nothing about sake and have only had it on a rare occasion. I do know that it is made of rice and usually served with Japanese food. But I didn’t know that there were over 1400 varieties and that only about 600 are imported to or made in the US. And I didn’t know that sake can be dry or sweet or fruity or bubbly. But after attending the festival, I learned a lot. I bought our tickets early – 700 were sold before the event with another 200 expected to be sold at the event. Once we turned in our tickets, we were given a map of all the places serving sake – 28 to be exact – and a bracelet saying we were over 21 (they never asked us for ID so I guess we look old enough). While registering at the Senior Center, we were entertained by a Japanese drumming group that competes in the area. Then at 5:30, we headed out to taste.

Now, I have shared the “Hop and Shop” phenomenon that NoCal seems so fond of. There was the quilt hop and shop, the wine hop and shop and now the sake hop and shop. When you reached a station – usually in a store or restaurant – you were given a small plastic cup (like the ones used in McDonald’s for catsup) with some sake. You tasted and then had your booklet stamped. When you had visited ALL 28 stations, you could turn in your completed booklet and be entered in a drawing for a mixed case of sake.
We started at Station 15 to avoid the crowds. We were handed our little cup and took the first sip. Now, I have learned the proper etiquette for sipping wine – the twirl of the glass to aerate the wine, the sniff of the bouquet and then the sip. I wasn’t sure what to do with the little catsup cup of sake. If I swirled, it would all end up on the floor. So I passed on the swirling and went right to the sniffing….. which is hard to do with a catsup cup. And as I quickly noticed, no one else was sniffing. OK, so no swirling and no sniffing. On to the sipping…. And, with wine, I would swish it around across the palate and suck air through my teeth (trying hard NOT to leak anything out of my mouth) and then spit or swallow contemplating the flavors – a little hint of blackberry, some oak from the barrel, nice finish – all the while staring off into space with a very intellectual look on my face. So I sip the sake and start to swish – and OH MY GOD this stuff tastes like turpentine! But trying to maintain the intellectual look, I try to suck air and that doesn’t help matters at all. And I’m sure I’ll start to dribble any minute. Forget the swish and suck! I just hope I can live through 27 more of these. And then we find out that this sake is probably one of the best we will be tasting. The gentleman overseeing the pourings is from a sake store in San Francisco. He starts to explain to Mark all about the process of making sake and what makes this one so incredibly amazing. I listen half heartedly as I am still sipping. We get our station stamp and move on to the next station. And after about 10, the taste is beginning to grow on me. We taste one sake that tastes like lychee nuts – very sweet, like fruit juice with a kick. Too girly for Mark. And then at the Hawaiian crepe store, we tried a bubbly one that was pretty tasty. And the little deep-fried chocolate filled goodie they gave us was even better. Oh, did I forget to tell you that there was FOOD at every tasting station. So you nibble and sip…. Nibble and sip as you wander through Japantown. One of the stations was in the brand new Japanese-American museum that will be finished the end of August. A local ukulele band was playing while we sipped several different brands of sake. And another station was in the old hospital that has been converted into offices. The hospital was mainly used for deliveries and is a beautiful old building with a lovely garden in back. As we got to the half-way point, I was determined to finish all 28 stations. AND to make sure that we put our tickets in for the drawing. But as I got closer to the end of the list, I realized that I’m not sure I really like sake. One station encouraged us to go BACK to the stations we really liked for MORE sake. Oh dear. I wasn’t sure I’d get through them all once. And then Mark asked what we would do if we WON the case of sake. Oh dear again. But being a Type A person, I just HAD to get all my stamps. And we did. And, thank goodness, we did NOT win the drawing. Better luck next year….. NOT!