Toronto the Good
If you hate parties, and especially parties that feature large quantities of delicious free food, wine and microbrewed beer, are attended by hundreds of good-looking and interesting people, and are thrown in gorgeous reclaimed Victorian industrial spaces, then count yourself lucky if you missed the Spacing/[murmur] fundraiser on Tuesday, because -- whew! -- you would've been miserable.
The event was enlivened by a number of little features and activities that people seemed to genuinely enjoy, and that allowed guests to strike up conversations with total strangers without feeling awkward or put on the spot. For one thing, there was the giant city map that took up most of one wall. There was a basket of stickers next to it, and guests were instructed to place a blue sticker where they lived, a yellow one where they worked, and a red one where they felt "the heart of the city" was located. It generated tons of discussion and, as you can see in this photo, people were clustered around it all evening.
Also, guests were issued nametags when they arrived, and asked to write the name of their favourite Toronto building beneath their own name. (I wrote "Coach House Books." Yay, the Coach House!) I was working the door for much of the evening & had fun seeing how people reacted to this question. Some froze up, some put "my house," or the name of their favourite pub. Many people put down the names of U of T buildings, prompting a lot of "Oh, are you a U of T grad? Me too!" exchanges. The new OCAD building was a popular choice. A man who arrived with his very cute toddler in tow (the kid seemed deeply worried about the size of the crowd, but didn't fuss, just stared in solemn fascination) wrote in the name of his local community centre. My favourite was the guy who wrote, "YOU."
I met several interesting people, including Dale's friend Mark, the infamous pickle-dropper. He's a funny guy, and it was great to meet him face-to-face & get the story of the pickles first-hand.
More pix on flickr, including these pictures of Dale and Matt B. Out of context these photos look very sinister & mysterious, and I have made up alternate explanations for what is happening in them.
The event was enlivened by a number of little features and activities that people seemed to genuinely enjoy, and that allowed guests to strike up conversations with total strangers without feeling awkward or put on the spot. For one thing, there was the giant city map that took up most of one wall. There was a basket of stickers next to it, and guests were instructed to place a blue sticker where they lived, a yellow one where they worked, and a red one where they felt "the heart of the city" was located. It generated tons of discussion and, as you can see in this photo, people were clustered around it all evening.
Also, guests were issued nametags when they arrived, and asked to write the name of their favourite Toronto building beneath their own name. (I wrote "Coach House Books." Yay, the Coach House!) I was working the door for much of the evening & had fun seeing how people reacted to this question. Some froze up, some put "my house," or the name of their favourite pub. Many people put down the names of U of T buildings, prompting a lot of "Oh, are you a U of T grad? Me too!" exchanges. The new OCAD building was a popular choice. A man who arrived with his very cute toddler in tow (the kid seemed deeply worried about the size of the crowd, but didn't fuss, just stared in solemn fascination) wrote in the name of his local community centre. My favourite was the guy who wrote, "YOU."
I met several interesting people, including Dale's friend Mark, the infamous pickle-dropper. He's a funny guy, and it was great to meet him face-to-face & get the story of the pickles first-hand.
More pix on flickr, including these pictures of Dale and Matt B. Out of context these photos look very sinister & mysterious, and I have made up alternate explanations for what is happening in them.
posted by Nadia at 3:08 p.m.
1 Comments:
I have two m@b tees, a fistful of comics, and one fond memory of a conversation about desire that lead to Matt's recommendation of Carl Sagan's The Dragons of Eden. Ahh, Toronto....!
Joots
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