It wouldn't be a race without naked protesters and riot police

If you haven't been paying attention, the students of Canada (either all of it or just in Montreal--I'm not sure) have been using civil disobedience as a way of protesting hikes in tuition.  Since the GP of Canada is a highly visible event, there was much activity last weekend.

My friends and I were sitting outside drinking margaritas (the making of which appears to be Montreal's Achilles heel) when ten thousand or so students shambled by, chanting and banging pots.  Adding to the fun, some of them chose to protest in some version of nudity.  This girl was wearing red panties and nothing much else.
















Honestly, how much fun is that?

Two nights later, things became a bit more serious.  The dark horizontal line in the background is actually a formation of riot police.  And we're really talking riot police--helmets with face masks, billy clubs and leg protection similar to what a baseball catcher wears.

In spite of all this (and I must say we saw zero actual violence and both sides seemed to behave with generally good intentions), and the fact that Lewis Hamilton won the thing going away (you'll remember that our mantra was "anybody but Hamilton"), I had a lovely time.


More on the race later.  I'm still a bit too upset from watching people roll by my boy Alonso like he was in the slow lane of the NY Thruway.