Chi town

Chicago is by far the largest American city I've visited in my life. I really was a bit frightened at the prospect; most Canadians I speak to are certain that big US cities are really dangerous, and I still hold this opinion but Chicago was amazing.

The person I was staying with had gated parking for my motorcycle. Here it is behind bars, and me longing for it...

The L

Maybe it's my ever-growing interest in trains, but the elevated trains in Chicago really caught my imagination. They basically built scaffolding to drive trains on and it is as sketch as it sounds. They are noisy trains, riding on uneven rails planted on wooden planks, throwing wild sparks everywhere, and they ride right through people's backyards; you can literally see people taking showers in their houses. From below, you are never quite sure if the whole platform is just going to collapse on you!

I enjoyed sitting outside of Dunkin' Donuts watching people climb the stairs to the platform and seeing and hearing the trains roar away bathed in flashes of spark light. It would reflect off of the glass skyscrapers like on a welder's face mask, very industrial and rough like.

Taste of Chicago

During my time here, the Taste of Chicago was running, which is this food festival that takes up a street close to the lakefront. They sell tickets to purchase food for $8 for 12 tickets, where a sampling of food is usually 5 tickets. I tried some potstickers, bought a huge slice of watermelon, some crabcakes, and a beer. It was a super hot day and I saw this black guy walking the other way, shirtless, and decided he was doing it right and I popped the shirt and walked around that way for most of the rest of the day.

I then wandered down to the famous "bean" in Millenium Park and took some good photos and video, too.

Shedd Aquarium

I walked along the waterfront to the Shedd Aquarium. The water is surprisingly clean-looking.

The aquarium had a Jellies exhibit running (sponsored by Walgreens, the same place offering for me to meet Dan Aykroyd, these people really get around). 

I was waiting in line for a few minutes in the terrible heat until this guy offers me a CityPass, which offers a set price for a bulk of attractions including the Sears/Willis Tower. It was $80. $80 to get out of this heat into the fast lane? That sounds fair to me! So I bought the CityPass.

The Jellies exhibit was pretty cool, the rest wasn't much to look at, except the seahorses and they had a live scuba diver in the large main tank at the entrance who had a full face mask on where he could answer questions from guests, which I thought was pretty cool. As he was talking to the audience, he was feeding fish to some of the rays, every sentence interrupted by the hiss of him taking another scuba breath.

Jellyfish by definition are pretty uninteresting, they have no brains, can't respond to their environment and basically have to wait until food floats into their mouths. But they sure are pretty. I guess they're kinda like the dumb blondes of the sea. There was a bit of talk about Jelly blooms, where Jellyfish overbreed and flood the waters with their brethren, and there was a case where a fishing boat was capsized by trying to pull in a fishing net filled with thousands of pounds of huge jellyfish. In another instance a power plant had to shut down because jellyfish clogged up their cooling system.

I met a family from Argentina who took this pic of me.

Chicago skyline from the Shedd Aquarium

Art Institute

I saw Van Gogh in twice on this trip, the first time I can't really remember where it was...and the other was here at the Art Institute of Chicago. They had his more famous works including his bedroom at the asylum he lived his last days in. Apparently he painted 3 copies of this, so it's not quite as rare as I thought. Here's what I'm talking about: 

Sears Tower

I promised myself I'd go late to the tower because I was convinced I'd get a more interesting view of the city. I was right.

They have these extending glass sky boxes that you can stand on so that you are suspended right above the street.

There is something gritty and natural about Chicago, maybe it's the jazz heritage and the black influence, but the city never left me feeling unsafe, and it seems well integrated.

I stopped by this dive bar close to the canal and straight off the lake from Navy Pier, and chatted with a few locals for an hour or so, who recommended that I go to Weiners Circle for late-night food. Here we go...

The Weiners Circle

So I hop on the bus and head this way on a lark, at 2:30am, expecting nothing special (except maybe trying my first Chicago-style hot dog), and ended up getting a cultural experience I won't soon forget.

I've never been so close to black culture as this time, the amount of slang coming from the back of the counter was so foreign to me. I must have looked really white. So I order my dog, and go to sit down when I hear the cashier girl shout to two girls getting out of a cab, "Tell that ho to get out of my neighborhood, I ain't never seen her but I can see she's a ho!" Well, the sister of the "ho" comes inside the restaurant demanding an apology and soon 10 people are involved in this argument and the ho's sister is loosing the argument quickly. I've never heard so many creative insults in such a short period of time. I actually recorded this on my music player, player below. WARNING:This is pretty vulgar.

Meanwhile, me and everyone else not involved is just laughing about the whole thing; sitting at a junk food place, 3 in the morning, witnessing a neighborhood verbal brawl, in the big city...was quite an experience for all of us.

Here is the place, and here is the dog.

Seeya guys later, I'm off to Detroit!