Tochi's Hut

Saturday night marked the official architectural opening of the Michael Lee-Chin Crystal at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM). An astounding bold structure in the heart of the city, this $270 million jagged outcrop took four years to complete. There were big holes in the ground in years one and two and a really ugly steel structure in year three. So it was very nice to see the building finally completed.

Some people love it, some people hate it, but this crystal has everyone talking about it. I really love the fact that it is daring and so different. Walking down Bloor Street, it's hard not to slow down and take notice. In broad daylight, the structure does not look as magnificent, as the planked facade gives it a dull weathered looked. Maybe it would look better if it was all glass - I dunno. At night though... Wow.

The opening of the Crystal was launched to coincide with the opening ceremonies of Luminato, Toronto's Festival of Arts and Creativity. Luminato is a week long celebration of film, literature, dance, music and imagery. A LOT of activities going on this week, so definitely check some of them out if in town.

Following the opening speeches by the many distinguished guests of honour was the night's free concert dubed"A World of Possibilities". My group came out from dinner late, and by the time we got back to the ROM, it was PACKED. A little unfortunate that we couldn't get close enough to the stage, but we were close to a big screen that was projecting all the action.

The theme of the concert evolved around humanity and time, fitting for a museum setting. In short, evil "Dr. Time" has had enough of humans' mistakes over the past centuries and want to end the world at 11:02pm on June 2nd, 2007. The rest of the concert was to convince Dr. Time to give humanity another chance (more time), by showcasing aspects of the cultures that make humans so different and unique. A bit cheesy, but a good way to tie all the performances together, and suitable for the family.

The concert was a collection of assorted performances, ranging from pop, classical, rock, jazz, opera, folk and gospel, aboriginal and David Suzuki. Some of the more memorable performances: Eva Avila, winner of the Canadian Idol. I don't follow any idols, but her song was great (especially after the subpar tap-dancers). Then, there was the Trinidadian-born comedian Jean Paul, who gave us a load-down on Trinidad and Zulu, including their nice accents and how to use "I own five cows" as pickup lines. One of the most impressive performance of the night featured The Canadian Tenors. I've never heard of them before, so I was thinking since they bear the "Canadian" title in their name, they better not be a disgrace. Man, their voices sounded so awesome, and was the first and one of the few performances of the night that brought the "crowd to its feet". Isabel Bayrakdarian, some opera soprano, was pretty cool. I've never really paid any attention to opera before, so it was a good first experience. The best part of the show was definitely the finale, an original musical that David Foster composed and orchestrated for the event. Started off with Alexandria Maillot, who was joined by Cody Karey, followed by a children's choir and Jann Arden! It was such a passionate inspirational piece - totally captures the energy, emotions, and really, the human spirit of the evening. "Imagine what we could do!"

Went to some sketchy Korean joint on Bloor afterwards. To get to the place, you had to go through some nondescript entrance and up some narrow stairwell. However, the place was a nice bar, with really fancy cushions as seats in their booths. Tried some cocktail So-ju for the first time and played rounds of Big 2 for the rest of the night.

Oh yeah, one thing I should mention. On the way back to ROM after dinner, we saw this topless woman walking ahead of us. Apparently, she had patches covering the essential areas. The gals accused us guys of showing too much reaction! In my defense, we only saw the back of the woman, so it was natural that we were curious, when there's so much left to imagination. hahah.