But the ultimate banality of seasons does not prevent us from imbuing the passage of one year with significance. The New Year is a time for new starts; it is a time when we "reboot our system" as it were. That doesn't mean we erase the past, but we try to take into account the challenges of the previous year so that we may make the most of the 365 days to come.

For me, it was a welcome change. Two thousand six was an ambivalent year for me. It had its ups--such as finally being reunited with Andrey and having the opportunity to build a life with him. Most of the year, however, was an anxious one, spent in a state of unpleasant ambiguity.

Ambiguity came from starting from scratch in a new city--again. Since living Chattanooga after high school, I have not lived in the same place for more than three years. In the past seven years, I have lived in six different places (Artyom, Vladivostok, Chattanooga, Monterey, Chattanooga, Toronto). At some point, one just wants to put down roots, and Toronto has been a rather difficult place for us to find a sense of community.

The major down, as most will know, was my inability to secure employment in Toronto in 2006. This challenge came as a surprise to many--a bright, trilingual person with international experience and two master's degrees can't find work in a cosmopolitan financial center. Believe me, it was equally frustrating for me. I reached several emotional lows, and by the end of 2006, I was ready to throw in the towel on Toronto and Canada.

Luckily, that was exactly the time when we left Canada to spend the holidays in Tennessee. Sometimes you just gotta get out of your head, and the only way to do that is get out of your seat. Having the three weeks in Chattanooga took off some of the pressure and anxiety.

Three weeks, a lot of thought and many useful conversations with long-time friends and mentors later, we returned to Toronto, and I came up with a new plan for 2007--to reboot myself and get my life on track.

One of my first realizations was that I was not being true to myself. I had sold myself a story: just get a job in business, any job. It will be good experience, good training, good money. Moreover, since there would be few policy-related positions available in Canada, it made more sense to focus on the private sector. There was a certain logic to the story, and I tried hard to make it my story.

"The heart has its reasons that we know not of," wrote Pascal. And the sentiment continues that, all too often, reason alone has no heart. My heart was not accepting the logic of this story, primarily because it was contrary to all the choices I had made over the previous ten years. And those choices were not made lightly. They were based on the priorities I had set for myself after significant contemplation and self-reflection. All of a sudden, I was abandoning my passions, as well as the accumulated experience and training of three years in Peace Corps and three years in graduate school. All of this was in the name of putative pragmatism. It seemed the reasonable, logical thing to do.

But a round peg does not fit into a square hole, and I need to be doing the things that I went to graduate school to do. Because Canada has so little to offer me professionally, this means making a strategic change in either geography or outlook. Geographically, the most logical place for me to be is Washington, D.C. That is where the jobs are for people with my interests, whether that be in government, at a think tank, or with a non-governmental organization. More importantly, I have a well-established network of friends, as well as family, who live in D.C. Nevertheless, I am not anxious to leave Toronto--that is, to leave Andrey again.

Attitudinally, I need to look at my current situation and figure out how I can get back in the game. After spending one year in Toronto, my knowledge of my field has depreciated somewhat. Now is the time for me to build back up my familiarity of current events--which change so quickly these days. Furthermore, I must really make an effort to build up my credibility: through research, through writing and through participation in meaningful, public projects.

At the same time, we still have financial realities, especially after the winter holidays. Therefore, I will continue to do international marketing and business consulting for ANZU Technology in California. We have built up a positive working relationship over the past eight months. They seem to be satisfied with my work. After the new year, we renegotiated the terms of my work for ANZU, which make me happier to continue the relationship. The critical point here is that working part-time for ANZU will allow me the time to pursue my first goal of getting back in the Russia field. While continuing to grow as a business professional, I will also have the time and financial resources to stay engaged in international policy issues.

So that's where I am, three weeks into the New Year. I've rebooted my system so that I can look at the same situation from a different perspective. It's an ambitious resolution, but I think it's doable. Now I just have to lose thirty pounds, exercise regularly, brush up on my Japanese, correspond more regularly with dear friends, eat more healthily, read more literature, go to the opera, take in an art exhibit, and darn my socks. Then 2007 will truly be a great New Year.

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Over seven years had passed since I had seen my friend Melanie. The years had taken us along varied paths and to distant corners. My fate sent me to Japan, then Russia. Melanie had blazed a trail to Dubai. Over the years of criss-crossing the globe, our paths never crossed and we never met. E-mail allowed for infrequent correspondence, but it wasn't until my "exile" to Canada that we began to rekindle the friendship in earnest.

October brought an e-mail: "I'll be in Detroit in December. Can you meet me?" This would be the closest we had been to one another in more than seven years. Of course, I would meet her. Considering my current employment situation, it would be no problem to make the short jaunt from Toronto to Detroit.

Originally, we planned to rendezvous in Windsor for dinner. As the time came closer--and I procrastinated more--our plan evolved. Driving turned to taking the train, and dinner to twenty-four hours of marathon catching up, with me staying the night in Melanie's hotel room. If the circumstances were different--if Melanie were single (or not) and if I were a single (or not) straight man--our meeting might have the spicy flavor of a torrid, rekindled affair. The final change in the plan was to move the meeting from Windsor, across the river, to Detroit. That alone would've taken the fire out of the romance.

* * * * *

My first impression of Detroit was a brief and uninspired one. I took a wrong turn while driving back from Chicago to Toronto with Andrey. Trying to find the bridge to Canada, we had the opportunity to explore various back streets of Detroit. These types of misadventures do not endear a city like Detroit to you. After getting back to Toronto, I wrote to my friend Ejiro, originally of Detroit, about my disenchantment with her hometown. She promptly scolded me and told me that that's no way to judge Motor City USA. I was more than happy to grant her this point, and Detroit remained on my list of places to explore further (though not very high on the list).

It would be great to say that my second, longer trip to Detroit erased my previous impression of the city. But the there's no point in wasting any ink on a lie. Another twenty-four hours in Detroit only cemented what I felt the first time: Detroit is a dismal, depressing, dreary dump. Pardon my alliteration.

Downtown Detroit is dead. Even Cleveland, Ohio, where we were in September, has more going on. The concierge at the hotel sent Melanie and me on our way to the Detroit Institute of Arts, a promising first stop--if only our taxi driver could find it, and here I must digress about Detroit taxi drivers. Perhaps it was our bad luck, but all the taxi drivers we encountered in Detroit were either odd, frightening, or both. Contestant Number One had no idea where the Detroit Institute of Art was--an odd predicament for a cab driver to be in. Luckily, Melanie had grabbed a brochure for the museum, and we gave it to the driver. He more or less got us to the general vicinity, but we had to circle the building two more times (and point it out to him ourselves) before we got there.

The Detroit Institute of Arts is in that old style of museums, like in Cleveland or Chicago. It was probably built with money from robber barons or auto industry tycoons, and the imposing style is that Beaux-Arts design popular in the 1920s. It's a grand, ominous gray building, but I liked it in a way. It's the type of building that makes you say, "They sure don't build them like this anymore."

As luck would have it, the special exhibit was an extensive collection of photographs by Annie Liebowitz. The uniting theme was American Music--rather appropriate for a photographer who has taken many pictures over the years for Rolling Stones. In fact, I already owned the catalog to the exhibit. My mother had given it to me for the holidays a couple of years ago, so I assume that the traveling exhibit was making its way through the second-tier cities.

Before hitting Annie's work, we made our way through the permanent collection. The DIA apparently has too many art history Ph.D.s on its staff, because the collection was exhibited in one of the strangest hodgepodges I had ever seen. Somebody had come up with the idea of "Remix," perhaps in a drunken stupor at last year's Institute Christmas fundraiser where the DJ was remixing Tony Bennett with ambient synthesizer music. Here "remix" seemed to imply combining familiar works in unconventional ways in order to startle us into new modes of viewing. They might as well have put the names of all their works in a hat and drawn them at random for each gallery.

Some pieces were organized according to rather conventional themes, such as Art and Spirituality. This was a rather meager attempt at being politically correct, since "spirituality" was nonetheless quite traditionally religious. One gallery had a large assortment of Mary and Child paintings. This reminded me of the Vatican Museum, which has a nauseatingly endless number of rooms dedicated to variations on the Virgin and Bambini theme. Alas, Detroit is not Rome, and the DIA doesn't have the same devilishly handsome security guards dressed in Armani suits.

Spirituality became geographic when we entered the "East Asia" room, a paltry collection of paintings and objects, some nice, others average, and some garish. Though they tried to keep them Chinese separate from them Japanese, there was a rather confusing display that showed a large Japanese tea jar next to a small tea bowl. Unfortunately, an unwitting visitor might have assumed that the tea bowl was part of the set if they hadn't taken the time to read a tag on the other side of the glass that informed the visitor that the glazed bowl was in fact Chinese. Chinese, Japanese, what's the difference. The Koreans also got they're own little pedestal, although it's not entirely clear why the pieces went together, except for coming from a land mass that currently is under Korean sovereignty (North or South, who cares?).

If the East Asia room offended my sensibilities, Melanie, who was a history major, who has traveled extensively through the Middle East, and who now lives in Dubai, was appalled at the Islam room. It was even more a mish-mosh than the East Asia room. There was indeed a lovely Quran, but there was also a tile with an inscription that had been cut off. Oh well, who would mind if some archeologists in the future displayed a plaque that said "Raise Jes" instead of "Praise Jesus"?

There's no need to go through the whole collection. Suffice it to say, that the matchings became stranger and stranger. One gallery was dedicated to the animal world, and the objects ranged from grandfather clocks to sculptures to renaissance paintings to abstract expressionists. Another hall contained "everyday objects," including an Eames bench underneath a classical painting, with an electric plug suspended from the ceiling. Even Michael Graves had a piece of furniture there from before his Target years. How bizarre it all was! Has the State of Michigan made an exemption to marijuana use for museum curators?

The Annie Liebowitz exhibit was nice, although a bit too much. Every photograph had commentary from Annie, which you had to listen to through a heavy mace like handset. Each picture had a number which you dialed in. By the end, my right bicep was larger than my left, and I no longer cared why Annie decided to shoot a picture of Beck in his old Lincoln.

The DIA is not in a part of town that gives you a sense of feeling safe. Actually, there may be no such neighborhood in Detroit. Between our hotel along the river and the museum, we saw rows of abandoned houses and projects. The entire stretch, which we saw more than we expected of thanks to our clueless first cabbie, was desolate, with the exception of Wayne State University. The University seems to be the only institution in the city that isn't in decay. (Disclosure: The President of Wayne State University is a family friend.) Leaving the DIA, we saw nothing else in the area that we wanted to explore, especially with nightfall approaching. We decided to do the American thing and shop.

* * * * *

Melanie called the hotel to find out where the nearest shopping area was. Apparently, if you want to grease the wheels of commerce, you have to do so outside the Detroit city limits. The closest place was in the nearby suburb of Dearborn. Sigh, we would need another taxi.

We began walking down the street in the hopes of finding a taxi. This was probably not a smart decision--as we realized passing some shady characters. When we were about to give up and try to call a cab company, I saw one in the distance. We walked towards it and tried to flag it down. Along came Contestant #2 in our taxi misadventures.

The cab driver was a bit suspicious of us at first. Apparently, we were standing in front of the police precinct when he picked us up. We assured him that we were not coming out of the precinct. We sped on our way towards the shopping mall, running over the curb as he turned the corner--quite a feat since he was turning into the middle lane. For some reason, he chose not to pick up the pace as we drove past more housing projects. He explained that the police like to setup speed traps on this stretch of rode. We saw no police. It would have been nice if we had.

Most Detroit taxi drivers are more talkative than I'm used to. He asked where I was from, and I told him that I currently lived in Toronto. Everyone seems to have visited Toronto, but not recently, but it's a nice city, how do you like the winter. Taxi Driver #2 asked me if I knew the OPP. Melanie looked at me, since she only new the old song "You down with O.P.P.?" I said that I did know of the Ontario Provincial Police. He asked if the OPP were in Toronto. I said yes. He seemed surprised and asked why the O.P.P. were in Toronto. I explained that Toronto is in the Province of Ontario, where the O.P.P. work. I then began to wonder if he at some point had had cause to meet O.P.P. agents. Then he asked about the Mounties, and I surely hoped he had not met a Mounty.

"You ever meet Dudley Dooright?" he asked me.

"No, sir. He's never come to my door, and I hope he never does," I replied, thinking myself witty.

"Well I do believe that Dudley Dooright is a fictional character you see."

"Umm, yes, sir. He is indeed a fictional character."

I looked over, and Melanie was trying very hard not to laugh.

At that point, our taxi driver got on his cell phone and started telling his sister that she needs to eat more. We finally made it to the mall in Dearborn, and he dropped us off at Sears.

"We're not having very good luck with taxis," said Melanie.

* * * * *

The shopping mall in Dearborn is a bizarre place. Okay, all shopping malls are bizarre in terms of sociological diversity. But this one was particularly strange. The architects seemed to have completed the same graduate program as the curators of the DIA, because the mall was laid out in a way that made absolutely no sense. It has two-and-a-half levels, but it's not entirely clear how these levels are connected. There are ramps and stairs that go all over the place, and if you want to go from the first floor to the second floor, you have to hope that the ramps will take you where you want to go. You might get stuck on the half level in between, or you might go up half-way only to find your ramp descending again. Some ramps only went down part of the way before hitting a set of stairs. I'm not quite sure how people in wheelchairs were supposed to get around. We had enough trouble trying to figure out where we wanted to go.

Indeed, if you want a slice of life in a town, go to the mall, because there's always such a mix of people. The whole hip-hop culture of wearing pants at your thighs still makes no sense to me, especially when it's a six-year old kid clearly dress by his mother, who is wearing a miniskirt with no tights or hose in below-freezing weather. The Lebanese families were out in full force, doing their Christmas shopping in their head coverings. I guess a sale is a sale, Allah be Praised. The Starbucks had misspelled Christmas in their "Chrismas Blend" sign, to which Melanie said, "At least they wrote Pumpkin Spice Eggnog' in Arabic." I took her word that the scribble at the top said just that.

* * * * *

When we had had our fill of the various mall subcultures, we went to the exit and called a cab. Here we met Candidate #3 in the Mad, Mad Cab contest. He was another talker, but he was a bit more articulate than the previous two drivers. Here the contest came down to content, not just form.

Strangers seem to like to share their life story, and we learned about his days as a truck driver. He had been to Toronto, but it had been a while, but it's a nice city, but don't go there with a woman, because a woman will spend all your money and leave you with nothin', but Toronto's a nice city even though he hadn't been there in a while.

Somehow, our conversation took a political turn, beginning with the execution of all the Enron executives. Then we began talking about Saddam Hussein.

"He's smart. Too smart for all them lawyers. He's a master chess player, yes sir, and he's gonna get out of it, you just watch. They don't know what they're in for."

"You think they won't execute him."

"No, man. He's too smart. Like a master chess player. That don't mean that I like him. I'm just saying, you gotta recognize intelligence when you see it. And he's smart. Like Johnny Cochrane."

"Excuse me?"

"You know, a good defense, like Johnny Cochrane."

"You mean the glove?"

"That's right! 'If the glove don't fit, you must acquit.' And the glove don't fit!"

I looked at Melanie. She looked at me. Neither of us was sure what glove he was talking about, but there was no point in telling him that Melanie lives in the Middle East and I have a graduate degree in international policy.

The conversation turned to the Detroit economy. He was vague about whether he thought things were getting better, but he said that the Tigers playing in the playoffs was good for the city's economy. Then he gave us the rest of his analysis of Detroit's sporting economy. Finally, he told us about the attempt to make Detroit like New York.

"Yeah, man. They're trying to make an entertainment district like in parts of New York City. A little slice of New York. That's what I'm saying. You know, it looks a bit like New York."

He neglected to say which slice of New York City Detroit looked like. But we had made it back to our hotel.

"No more taxis in Detroit," declared Melanie.

* * * * *

Our hotel was as bizarre as the Dearborn mall. It's like a science fiction nightmare, a labyrinth from which there is no escape. That Renaissance Center doubles as the General Motors worldwide headquarters is a sad metaphor for the state of the world's largest automaker. It's a confusing mess that might have looked good on paper, but got screwed up in the execution.

Like the shopping mall, the interior is a confusing maze of ramps and escalators. It's organized around various rings, which may have seemed cool to the architect, perhaps a Dante or Wagner fan, but left me hoping he would spend an eternity in hell going in circles. The main ring is called the "circulation ring." Essentially, you go around and around in circles until you figure out which way you need to turn to go where you want to go. The lobby to the hotel is not on the first floor, but on the third. The first is not the first. The elevator from the first to the third is not the one to your room. And you can't get to one set of elevators directly from the other. If you enter the building from another side, you must navigate various rings and levels and escalators to get to the circulation ring, and then figure out how to get from there to the main elevator core, which is in turn divided into two sets of elevators: those going to floors 9 through 40 and those going from floors 40 through 70. Melanie and I spent many hours trying to get off the damn circulation ring.

The confusing design of the Renaissance Marriott is somewhat mitigated by its staff. These are some of the nicest hotel staff I've ever met. Every person was extremely helpful. Each employee was friendly, and we were greeted with hellos and welcomes from everyone we met, down to the janitors. The restaurant staff were also friendly and accommodating. It would be great if this were the standard for all Marriott hotels.

For dinner, we decided not to venture beyond the orbit of the hotel. We went to a restaurant inside the Renaissance Center called Seldom Blues. The hostess was nice enough to squeeze us in without a reservation. The restaurant has live music, and a nice, very upscale menu. Apparently, Seldom Blues is one of Detroit's happening places. The food and the service were quite good, although a bit pricey by my standards. The first performer was a jazz pianist who played a bunch of standards. She was an older black woman, completely decked out with an elegant black dress and a large and bizarre headpiece. If only she were a drag queen, the show would have been complete. She was followed by a jazz band led by Randy Scott. It was a very talented group. Randy plays a variety of saxophones. We enjoyed the show and the dinner.

* * * * *

Our second day in Detroit proved more of a disaster. After a nice breakfast buffet in the hotel, we went to the concierge for more suggestions.

"Have you tried the Detroit Institute of Arts?"

"Yeah, we did that yesterday."

"Ah. Ya'll done and gone done it all, then."

"What about the Motown Museum?"

"It's closed on Sunday."

"Oh."

"Maybe you want to go bowling?"

"I don't think so."

"I'm trying to think what I'd want to do. How about ice skating?"

"Probably not."

"Play pool?"

"Not really."

"Hmm."

"Is there anywhere to do some shopping downtown?"

"Naw. It's all closed on Sunday."

"I see."

"Sorry."

Melanie and I looked at each other. We decided to take a ride on the People Mover, an elevated train that makes a loop around downtown Detroit. Alas, the People Mover didn't open until noon on Sundays.

Melanie wanted to get a prescription filled, so we went back to the concierge.

"Well, you'll probably have to take a taxi, because the CVS near here is closed on Sundays. It's about a five minute cab ride."

Since we had nothing better to do, we figured we'd walk to the pharmacy. A five minute cab ride should be about a twenty minute walk, and after last night's dinner and this morning's breakfast, we needed to walk a bit.

In retrospect, taking a Sunday stroll around downtown Detroit was not the best of ideas. One block away from the Renaissance Center, and things went downhill quickly. We headed east on Jefferson Avenue. The further we went, the worse the surroundings got. There were more abandoned and derelict buildings. Not many cars passed by. Other pedestrians were definitely "salt of the earth." It was a cold morning, and the CVS seemed quite a bit further than twenty minutes walking. Across from the Detroit Academy for Arts and Sciences, we saw a worn down storefront that had a sign in the door, "No Loitring." Clearly, the owner hadn't finished the Detroit Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Finally, we made it to the pharmacy, but the whole trip was in vain. They wouldn't accept a prescription written by a Dubai-based physician. And so we headed back to the hotel.

* * * * *

After a few orbits around the circulation ring, we finally figured out where the People Mover was. We paid our 50-cent fare, and boarded the train. The only other passengers riding the People Mover were a lovey-dovey couple and a bum who stunk up half the car. The love-birds got off two stops later at Greektown, leaving us with the homeless man for half of the loop.

The People Mover seems to be a good idea gone bad, like so many urban renewal efforts. It's a great idea to have a means of transport for tourists. But it would be helpful if that transport actually had places to take tourists. The entire trip around downtown Detroit took about ten minutes. Six stops after the bum left us, we were back where we started.

The People Mover could be a great way to show off a city. But first you have to have things to show off. In fact, Detroit might be better off if the People Mover were underground. By being high up, it gives passengers a greater view of the city. I'm not sure that's a good thing. We had terrific views of gritty streets and abandoned buildings. Melanie, who's traveled all over the Middle East, commented, "It's like Beirut without the live shells." Indeed, our loop around Detroit was a depressing testament to a dying city.

After the first loop, we continued back to Greektown. It seemed to be the only part of downtown with any signs of activity whatsoever.

We walked through the entrance from the People Mover, and we were shocked to find a casino. I guess laws have changed, and any city can build a casino these days.

The real shocker was that the casino was packed! The streets of Detroit were empty, but on this Sunday afternoon, the gambling halls were filled. Some people were even in their Sunday finest, apparently following their church ablutions with the hopes that God might favor them with a cash bonanza at the Greektown Casino.

Melanie and I wandered the smoke-filled, people-filled casinos. It was much larger than we expected, and it was packed. It was quite a shocker.

Casinos are the death knell to urban development. It's what communities do when nothing else has worked, as is clearly the case in Detroit. And it's amazing how well casinos work. But you really have to question what benefit they will bring to the city. Tax revenues will go up, for sure. But the demographic that goes to these types of casinos are hardly high-rollers who can afford to spend their modest incomes on slots and roulette. There may be some job creation, but it's hardly a productive sector and the wages are unlikely to be very good. Casinos may also create jobs in secondary service sectors, such as restaurants and hotels, but these are also lower wage positions. Worst of all, as casinos proliferate in poor cities and Native American reservations, the marginal value of the casinos will also decrease because they will compete against each other more and more. It's really hard to imagine that Greektown, Detroit, such as it still survives, will contribute much to the city's long-term development.

* * * * *

As our twenty-four hours in Detroit came to a close, Melanie and I, somewhat bewildered, returned to the hotel. We grabbed my things so I could get to the bus between Detroit and Windsor. For some reason, the schedule we had was wrong, and we just missed the bus, leaving one last misadventure before I left.

With no other option for me to catch my train, Melanie put me on a taxi, which would take me across the border for $55! And I thought we were done with taxis!

Candidate #4 for Detroit's craziest cab driver was a religious man. He had three crosses and a "Jesus loves you!" sign hanging from his rear-view mirror. An open bible lay across the dash. I prayed that he wouldn't look for inspiration while driving. Cabbie-for-Christ drove with the heat turned on high, the windows closed, and a cigarette in a holder hanging out his mouth.

"Where you headed to from Windsor?"

"Toronto."

"Oh, Toronto. That's a nice city. I haven't been there in a long time, but it's a nice city, pretty cold right now, but it's been a while since I've been there, but it's pretty nice, right?"

He then proceeded to tell me that he needed to get back to the hotel because he was waiting for another fare. This was apparently some guy who had paid him in advance. The gentleman was also an alcoholic who had already drunk a case of beer. I thanked the reverend for the information.

When we got to the Canadian checkpoint, the cabbie decided to share this information with the immigration agent. Unfortunately, not much of what the taxi driver had to say was very coherent, and all the agent heard was "He's got a case of beer."

"What's that about a case of beer?" he asked, looking a bit alarmed. Then he looked at me sternly.

"He drunk a whole case of beer, I tell you!"

Mortified, I told the agent that he's talking about another fare, not me. Confused, the agent waved us through, and the cabbie sped through Windsor to get me to the train station. I guess he had faith in a higher power, because his driving almost got us killed.

My friend Ejiro, a Detroit loyalist, will once again scold me, saying that twenty-four hours isn't enough to judge her hometown. But it was more than enough for me.

We drove along the river front, and I looked out at the skyline of Detroit. Part of me felt sad for the Windsorians who had to spend glum winter days looking at the decrepit city. On the other hand, I thought, it doesn't look so bad from a distance, separated by a river and a national border. Perhaps that's how Detroit should be experienced...in small doses and from a distance...quite a distance. .

I boarded my train and happily sped away, away from Detroit back to Toronto. A nice city, a good city, one in which I hadn't been in for just over twenty four hours, but it felt like years. Ahh, it'll be good to be back, I thought, and relaxed as the train put more distance between me and Detroit.

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Toronto goes by several nicknames, one of which is Toronto the Good. The city is definitely a nice one. It has a vibrant downtown that is relatively clean and relatively safe. And the people seem to be nice. Don't get me wrong. But the good people of Toronto are also among the most closed I have ever encountered, especially in an urban metropolis. As someone who has lived on three continents, in four countries and nearly a dozen cities, I feel that I have some perspective on the matter. That's why "Toronto the Closed" seems a more apt moniker for this city.

There is quite a bit of irony in all this. Toronto is one of the most multicultural cities in the world. Probably half the population is comprised of immigrants from other countries, speaking nearly a hundred different languges. You would think that such diversity would spawn openness and acceptance and, most importantly, empathy for what it means to be a stranger in a strange land.

Toronto is the largest city in Canada and it fancies itself the economic center of the country. Bay Street is a little cousin to Wall Street. All the banks have their headquarters here, as do the majority of large Canadian and multinational firms operating in Canada. Toronto is also the media hub for Canada, with most of the major networks, cable channels, movie studios and print media based here.

So, in the eyes of many Torontonians, at least so it seems to me, their fair city is the booming metropolis at the center of the world of Canadiana. In a way, it's a bizarre type of provincialism. Sure, New Yorkers also think they are the center of the world, but then again, they are, aren't they? New York is truly a global city, matched perhaps only by London. Toronto, on the other hand, is large only by Canadian standards. Three to four million people in an expansive nation of 33 million is large. But by American standards, it's somewhere between Minneapolis-St. Paul and Atlanta, with "Minnesota nice" surpassing "Toronto goodness" in terms of openness.

I hate to knock on the good folk of Toronto. I've certainly met plenty of nice people. Nevertheless, I can't quite comprehend the closed nature of the social world here. My friend Sharon Tennison, president of CCI in San Francisco, likes to talk about pods to refer to the small, closed social groups that people isolate themselves within. But for her, pods talk about interactions between Russians, a notoriously closed people. Russians can be rather suspicious of people they don't know well, but they have historically justified reasons for not trusting strangers. And once you have earned their trust, Russians are among the warmest people in the world, willing to give you the shirt off their back.

The Torontonians I've encountered also seem to be like pod-people. Many of the people I've been introduced to in the past eight months are quite nice individuals. But beyond initial meetings over lunch or coffee, things don't go much further. It's as if they've achieved a comfortable equilibrium in their lives--they've balanced the social equation--and they don't want to introduce another variable to upset the balance.

The odd thing is that the pod-people pop up in the oddest places. I've recently become more active in professional networking organizations--the express purpose of which should be to meet new people and expand your social network, right? But even at these events, I find it slow-going. At first I thought it was me. My introverted nature makes it difficult for me to do the small-talk thing at networking events. But when needed, I can definitely put on the charm and work a room. Unfortunately, at most of these so-called networking events, the room seems unworkable. It's like a high school dance, where people stand around in the cliques of people they already know, wary of newcomers. When you try to introduce yourself and engage people in conversation, they don't hold up their end of the banter. Small talk is a game, after all, and it takes two to play.

Why do my serves across the small-talk court always seem to default? What is it about Torontonians that makes them so closed-off to new relationships? If at first I thought it was just me--maybe my bad hair or geeky demeanor--it turns out that I'm not the only outsider to have experienced the Toronto cold shoulder. One of my new friends, also an American, who is far more gregarious and charming than I, told me that he has had similar frustrations here. And he's lived here for nearly five years!

I'm not sure what the sociology or social psychology at play here is. It could be several factors. Canadians themselves are quite a bit less mobile than Americans. Over the course of a lifetime, they are less likely to move around, to live, and to work in different locales as Americans. They may travel the world, but being a tourist is not the same as living in a new, strange place.

In my experience as a highly transient person (I haven't lived in one place for more than three years in the past eleven years!), people who have moved around have a very different perspective on things. First, they have a broader view of the world, because they have seen firsthand that the world is bigger than the little corner you live in. Second, they have been outsiders. Whenever you move to a new place, you have to struggle with a sense of not belonging because you have lost the tribal connections of the place you grew up in.You have no pod, as it were. That means you don't have the immediate support of your family or school friends. Initially, you struggle with the isolation, but you also seek out new connections and you make new friends.

My take on it is that this mobility makes your more empathetic to others who might be in the same situation. And just as you had to reach out when you were a newcomer, you respond to the reaching out of others. This makes for a more vibrant process of networking. And sure as hell makes for better small talk. Communities with a higher proportion of mobile individuals have better and faster opportunities for social networking. Just look at universities, where nearly everybody is an outsider. And I'm not just talking about students. Growing up, my father, a university professor, would always invite new faculty or international students to our house for dinner to help them feel more a part of the community. This is a value that I guess previously took for granted.

(Side note: Of course, here's another peculiarity of Toronto. Supposedly, Canada's leading institution of higher education, the University of Toronto is remarkably provincial. Forty four percent of living graduates still live in Toronto. A full 82 percent live in Ontario, mostly in the area surrounding Toronto. And nearly 80 percent of the undergraduate population is from Toronto. So, instead of creating a dynamic, geographically diverse social network, the institution of the U of T is essentially a very large pod, a good-old-boys club of well-established and conservative social links. I would imagine that other institutions, such as Ryerson, are similar in their geographic (though not socio-economic) homogeneity.)

Let's take a look at another great, multicultural city: San Francisco. I recently read that three-quarters of San Franciscans are originally from outside California. It's a city of newcomers. Indeed, San Francisco is a gold-rush city, and to this day has that peculiar California energy of new opportunities, of new potential, of ever-broadening frontiers. People in San Francisco are great networkers. Perhaps that's why so many people fall in love with the city.

Not surprisingly, the strongest relationships I've built since moving to Toronto have been with people who themselves are not from Toronto. Among Canadians, these are people who only recently moved to the city and also are struggling with making a new life in Toronto the Closed. And the warmest reception has come from non-Canadians. Strangely enough, we received two invitations for Canadian Thanksgiving Dinner. Both invitations came from American transplants now living in Toronto. Maybe they understand better what it's like to be new to a city. And I am very thankful to them both for warmly opening up their pods to us.

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Why should I? In thirty years, I've managed to do quite a bit. I've lived and traveled around the world--Japan, Russia, China, Italy, Canada. I spent three years in the Peace Corps trying to do my bit to make the world a better place. I earned two master's degrees. And I not only found somebody to love and be loved by, but I've even managed to be able to live with him. As the sun rises and fills our 25th floor apartment with light and warmth, I can't help but think that this is a good place to be at thirty.

There are some things that have left me depressed over the past couple of months. Not having a job is the first and foremost problem. After seven months, my professional fortunes in Toronto have not changed. It's a bit disheartening to look at my friends and classmates who at my age already have well-established careers, houses and even children--and then to think that I'm still just starting. This makes me a youthful 30, I suppose, since until now I'd felt like the perpetual student. But, dammit, I'm ready to grow up!

What is encouraging now is the definite change in fortunes that seems to be occurring in Toronto. This has been an unusually hard city for us to break into. People are friendly but closed, making it difficult to meet new friends. But since mid-August, we have slowly started to develop a network of friends (almost all of whom are not native to Toronto), and that has been probably the best birthday gift of all. Hitting thirty with no one to share a cake with is not much fun. Luckily, we had at least a couple of people who gave me the gift of eating cake on my birthday.

So another day, another Monday, another Jewish New Year, and it's time to move forward so that this decade will be even better than the last.

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And on one last note: God Bless Canada! I've noticed that Canadians have a tendency to bemoan their government bureaucracy, but I am repeatedly convinced that the opposite is true: Canada has one of the fairest, most objective and most streamlined government bureaucracies I've ever encountered. Is it perfect? Of course, not. But their policies are clear and rational. Their requirements are reasonable. Processes are straightforward. Most importantly, Canada is one of the few countries that recognizes the legitimacy of our relationship, thereby offering me the opportunity to receive this work permit.

Now I just need to figure out what I want to be when I grow up!

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It should have been a film that embarrassed me to admit I liked. I usually pass on movies with comedic actors like Jack Black in the leading role. Like the many bad Will Farrell or Jim Carrey movies out there, stupid comedies have a knack for catching up with me, whether I want to see them or not. I still cringe at the memory of being subjected to Anchorman on an airplane--a flop that has found a place on my list of worst movies of all time.

So I am a bit surprised that on Saturday night I not only saw Nacho Libre, I not only paid to see it, but I paid full ticket price to do so. And the strangest thing of all is that I really liked it.

The movie tells the story of a misplaced Mexican monk who toils away in an impoverished orphanage. But despite his vows, he longs to fulfill his dream of becoming a "Luchador"--a professional wrestler. The plot is fairly simple, with the expected twists and even an unrequited love interest in the person of a nun. Our erstwhile friar acquires an unwilling sidekick to help him become a great wrestler. The trappings of the Luchador life distract them from what's really important in life. Only when they focus on helping the orphans do their fortunes improve.

The movie is simple, and some of the humor is typically crass. (Flatulence plays a large role.) What makes the film stand out is that, despite the slapstick and the toilet jokes, it is nonetheless subdued. Unlike School of Rock, for example, Nacho Libre does not try to fill every moment with humor. Nor are the jokes always handed to you on a plate. Jared Hess, the director and co-author of the screenplay, keeps Jack Black in control throughout the movie. We all know that Black can be outrageous, but he is far funnier when he's not. It's this carefully subtlety that makes Nacho Libre stand out. My friend Micah says that "subdued" humor is in style these days. I never saw Napoleon Dynamite, Hess' previous movie, and I can't really testify to the prevalence of subdued humor, since I tend to avoid most comedies targeted to young adult audiences. But if this is the trend, and if filmmakers can maintain this level of quality, I'm all for it.

Jack Black is well complemented by the Mexican cast of Nacho Libre. Esqueleto, Nacho's sidekick, is a very well-crafted character played superbly by Héctor Jiménez. Hess' decision to film in Mexico and use a Mexican cast adds integrity to the film. Apparently, some people find Nacho Libre racist, but I think such criticisms reveal over-sensitive political correctness that could do with a good ideological root canal. Showing ethnic idiosyncrasies does not make a film racist, and Nacho Libre never pretends to represent "Mexicans" as inherently this or that. These quirks are part of the flavor of cultures, and there would be nothing worthwhile about a film with a bunch white-washed "Latino" actors playing well-rehearsed lines with the only thing Mexican about the film being the colors of the set on the stage and the ethnicity of the players and a mariachi band on the soundtrack. Once we start going down the path of over-sensitivity, all that is left to art is bland sameness which can never be art because it never addresses the differences and without differences what do we have to learn from each other?

I would not go so far as to label Nacho Libre as "social commentary." There is no deeper message than the simple truth that the things worth fighting for are the things that are bigger than you. But it is a nice film, good for some laughs and a refreshing take on a tired genre.

Tags: Nacho LIbre, film, movies, Jack Black, Jared Hess, Hector Jimenez

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Mikhail Gorbachev still doesn't enjoy much popularity among his countrymen. The first, last and therefore only president of the U.S.S.R. will long have his name associated with the collapse of the Soviet Union and, accordingly, the collapse of order in Russia. I understand the resentment, but in my opinion, it's misdirected. Yeltsin did far more to ruin Russia. Gorby is still tops in my book, which is why I listen with interest when he decides to speak out.

Johnson's Russia List for June 4, 2006 (#129), carried the full text of Mr. Gorbachev's recent comments at a Carnegie Endowment roundtable about Russia and the West in Moscow. Although I tend to maintain a healthy dose of skepticism about much of Carnegie's work in Russia, I was happy to see Gorbachev included. His comments were rather disjointed, but I can picture him standing there just speaking off the top of his head. The septuagenerian has earned the right. Most importantly, he has nothing to lose and nothing to gain. There is little reason not to take his comments at face value.

Here are some highlights.

Commenting on so-called "experts":

"Some people are going so far as to say that a new Cold War is on. I think this is alarmism which borders on panic. I don't think this is so. And secondly, some people -- this conference is organized by the Carnegie Foundation and I have read the contributions by Trenin and by a professor from the Hoover and Stanford universities, only he writes in Nezavisimaya Gazeta I think, and their judgments are something like this: what is Russia up to? It should understand where it is today and calm down. Very deep judgments indeed, bordering on stupidity."

On Russia's historical baggage and present accomplishments:

"We in Russia want them [governments of other countries] to understand our problems better, to understand who we are, where we come from, with our thousand years of history, what has happened to us, especially in the 20th century, in the past quarter of a century. That is known, and I have to say that once this is known, it is hardly worth expanding on that. I just have to say that what has happened in Russia over the past 20 years of the reform -- in historic terms, this is not much, 20 years, and big changes have been accomplished. If we compare the scale of changes having occurred in the country with the burden of the past, one should rather be surprised not by the fact that some things Russians wanted to implement have not been implemented -- this explains our problems, our losses. One should rather be surprised at what a leap Russia has made over two decades."

On the West's paradoxical attitude towards Russia:

But the main thing that worried me, and I would like to share it with you, was the paradox that I witnessed. Particularly in those years when that was all happening to Russia, Russia itself and the regime that existed at the time were not criticized by the West. On the contrary, the West -- as I could see and I have spent much time in the West, meeting with all kinds of people, perhaps, more than many of those present here -- was pleased to see the country lay prostrate. Russian citizens then had doubts about the West's position already. Citizens were displeased with the Yeltsin regime and the headway of reform, the way the ownership problem was dealt with, but the West was pleased.

Now, under President Putin, certain stability has been reached, manageability has been established. Measures have been taken aimed at improving the social status of the population. Now that Russia has started rising, gaining strength, which naturally has had effect on its domestic and foreign policies, its Western partners have increasingly criticized it.

On the United States' role in international relations:

I think the events in the first years of the 21st century have clearly showed that unilateral moves even by such a powerful country as the United States can only yield the results contrary to the desirable results. I think that in terms of understanding of the profound changes in the world, the United States has been lagging behind, having stuck to old approaches. This is the root of what we have seen in the moves by our counterparts.

On the emerging new arms race:

One cannot fail to notice the growing process of militarization in the United States. Today it has to be mentioned. The war budget has already outstripped the budget in the times of the Cold War. Who is threatening the United State? Terrorism? Yes. But what has that to do with guns, missiles, the improvement of nuclear weapons, and a change of doctrine which again stresses a first-strike nuclear weapon, etc. Russia is not to be outdone and next to the United States puts forward its own doctrine: also a first-strike weapon that can be used preemptively. And so things go on. Again a race is starting. A race in pursuit of what? A chimera. Are we going to overlook this and start regarding each other with suspicion again?

On United States militarization:

I think the process of militarization -- and I would like to use this term -- is due to the fact that American policy sees military might as the chief instrument in creating a Pax Americana. I remember the famous words pronounced by President Kennedy in 1963 when he said that it will be a world for all, and not only for the Americans.

Tags: Russia, Mikhail Gorbachev, Carnegie, Johnson's Russia List

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