Don’t get me wrong- I love Frosh. What better way to start off the new academic year than to get magnificently intoxicated on lower field with thousands of your closest drinking buddies? Frosh is more than just a spectacle of drunken bliss; the organized drinking orgy certainly contains its moments of glory: sampling of a first years’ first beer (mmm…Boréale), the blasting sound of megaphones heard from miles away, creative cheers (more beeeeer, more beer, more beer…) and the competitive spirit amongst the faculties. But, all good parties must eventually come to an end and, unfortunately, so does Frosh. With the onset of the fall semester, the giant balloons on lower field have deflated, and the smell of beer has (for the most part) subsided. Still feeling hungover? Or, even worse, feeling bored? If you’re experiencing frosh withdrawal symptoms, don’t despair! Classes have resumed, but that doesn’t mean the fun is over. Montreal is one of the liveliest cities in the world. To help you recover from Post-Frosh Syndrome, Features has come up with a list of things to do in Montreal before midterms kick in.

1. Tam Tams. If the sweet aroma of weed, grass (real grass) and dust isn’t enough to lure you to Parc Mont Royal on Sunday afternoons, then the sight of dancing hippies and groovy musicians ought to do it. 2. Go to Brunch. Roll down to Chez Cora on Avenue du Parc between Milton and Prince Arthur in pajama bottoms and last night’s eyeliner or meet friends in heels and Lacoste polos at Cafeteria on St-Laurent. Brunch in Montreal is more than just a meal; it is an event. 3. Sit in a cafe while sipping coffee and feeling extremely chic. Not into the commercial atmosphere of Second Cup? Try Cafe Imagination on the corner of Parc and Sherbrooke. With a quirky staff, mellow music in the background and a giant ladle on the wall, this cozy little haunt is so relaxing that you will actually want to come back and study. 4. Take up a new and random hobby. This is particularly useful if you’re bored and low on cash. Need a new outfit? Try knitting. Just moved in and looking for furniture? Garage sales are the way to go. 5. Ride the metro. All day. Imagine the people-watching possibilities. 6. Lounge on lower field: get a tan, gawk at shirtless frosh-men and avoid skin cancer and/or jail … if you can. 7. Have a picnic or a barbeque. Raining? No worries-bring an umbrella and hold an “under the sea” themed party. After enough booze, people will stop complaining. 8. Go to the AMC and see one movie after another. The more juxtaposition, the better the experience. Watching How to Eat Fried Worms after Beerfest is definitely an intriguing way to relive happy Frosh memories. 9. It’s still nice out! Visit Parc Lafontaine or Parc Maisonneuve. Play frisbee, fly a kite or, if you’re feeling particularly adventurous, climb a tree. 10. Check out some new venues: go hear some bands that you’ve never heard of before. Extra points if they play a style of music that you’ve never heard of. 11. Get cultured. Montreal has tons of museums and art galleries. The Musée des Beaux Arts always has an interesting exhibit. Currently on display: a collection of Inuit art. Been there, done that? Try exploring some of the galleries on Sherbrooke Street. You never know just what you’ll find a sculpture of. 12. Rollerblade in Old Port. Okay, maybe cobblestone isn’t exactly the ideal pavement for rollerblading, but once you get used to the wobbling, the experience will be a thrill and a half. 13. Go to an Allouettes game; if they lose, you can still get trashed. 14. Check out the street fairs. On Sept. 9, head over to the 10th Annual Santropol Roulant Bazaar [& Street Fair], where all proceeds from the sales go to the youth-driven, meals-on-wheels organization. What can be better than buying some chochkes and donating to a charity at the same time? 15. Go see a play. For Anglophone productions, traipse down to the Centaur theatre at 453 St. Francoise-Xavier in the Old Port. The first show of the season, Candela´s Table opens Oct. 5. 16. Listen to jazz concerts. The jam sessions at Upstairs and Grumpy’s will perk you up better than a red bull with vodka.

17. Go shopping! It’s the perfect time to wander around the Jean Talon and Atwater markets. You can always use another bottle of expensive foreign olive oil. 18. Six Flags La Ronde. There’s more to this amusement park than just roller coasters-it’s the perfect post-Frosh getaway. Mad at your friend for hooking up with your Frosh soul mate? Take out your aggression on him or her in the bumper cart rink. 19. Visit the casino. Now that Frosh is over, you’re well on your way to becoming addicted to watered-down beer and random make-out sessions. Well, now you can add gambling to your list of vices. Bored on a Saturday night? Call some friends and meet up at the Casino de Montreal.

Frosh may be over, but the school year has just begun. As of right now, there is no snow, no midterms and minimal stress. You can still keep yourself thoroughly entertained now that your plastic neon bracelet is in the trashcan.

Growing up in Los Angeles, I found it difficult to envision life in Montreal. It’s similar to how my fellow Canadians who haven’t been to Southern California imagine Hollywood as a strictly glamorous haunt, with California girls gallivanting in their bikinis while Abercrombie models surf to class. This is not to say that I ever believed the prevalent Great White North clichés: the snow-shrouded expanse where Canadians guzzle beer, worship hockey, and tout “a-boot” and “eh” all day long. I suppose my father, a native Montrealer himself, dispelled me of such nonsense by exposing me to the real stuff, such as Leonard Cohen, Gordon Lightfoot, Coffee Crisp and of course, Schwartz’s brisket. I’m illegally forced to sneak this hunk of meat in my suitcase every time I fly home, along with stashes of 222s – or else I am literally not welcomed back in the house.

Still, I couldn’t help but let my own expectations run wild. Clad in stylish white winter boots, a matching coyote-ruffed Snow Goose parka and a darling pink tutu, I saw myself skating down a bustling downtown street with my hair billowing in a light winter breeze. Perhaps, on my way to meet a pal for coffee, a bus would scurry by and splash me with muddy slush (sound HBO familiar?) while cute boys pelted me with snowballs. In this dream, not only did I have a Québécois boyfriend, but our romantic escapades contributed to my immediate fluency in French.

Upon arriving in Montreal, though, I learned that I would have to overcome any number of obstacles before becoming Miss Montreal. One of the first and most formidable, for me, was the need to grapple with a foreign public transportation system, an otherwise mundane task that has triggered the same bouts of anxiety that my mom suffered after arriving from Israel, when she found it necessary to make her way along six-lane freeways and four-level interchanges.

Back in sunny California, there is a definite divide between those who drive and those who must bus, bike, or (shudder) walk. Where I lived, the only other reason people walked was to lose weight or indulge the dog. Public transportation, which usually involves a route with one bus an hour that runs late and takes too long to get anywhere worth going, is strictly for the unwashed. Better-heeled Angelenos, in contrast, will pile into the family Lexus for a jaunt to the corner supermarket, organize intricate carpools in platoon-sized Hummers to schlep their kids to endless after-school enrichment activities, or simply hire expensive babysitters to chauffer their precious progeny to acting workshops and auditions.

In Montreal, my Ottawa-bred cousin, who also attends McGill, invited me to check out her apartment in the Plateau. She couldn’t help but notice my reluctance to board a public bus. “Who does this prima donna cabbing from the Ghetto think she is?” must have been coursing through her mind. She was stunned to learn that I simply felt unsafe jumping on the Number 80 down Avenue Du Parc.

After my second semester at McGill, I felt more attuned to my new surroundings. Riding the metro now invokes pleasant memories of riding roller coasters in Southern California’s Six Flags Magic Mountain. In fact, it’s probably a whole lot safer: the Magic Mountain parking lot, in recent years, has been the staging ground for various gang shootings and stabbings. Moreover, I decided that I’ve had it with the manager at Press Café giving me lip for not ordering my latte en Francais. I understand you need to speak French to work with the public in this city, but why do I need it to get a latte? Isn’t “café latte” French enough? Anyway, French kissing certainly doesn’t seem to be improving my linguistic prospects, so I’m signed up for Beginner’s French on campus. It seems that, for me, becoming Miss Montreal continually means that I must plunge myself into new and alien situations… ready or not.

It would only have taken a single spark on the wooden fire escape for an entire block in downtown Sackville, New Brunswick, to go up in flames. A primarily student-inhabited apartment building near Mount Allison, Canada’s leading liberal-arts University, burned for over 24 hours on Friday, Aug 11, 2006.

The building where the fire began was a popular housing choice among upper-year students because it offered low rent and close proximity to campus, but its age and condition had worried many residents for years. A graduate of Mount Allison, Adam Reid, explains: “We all thought it was just a matter of time before something like this happened – the building was in rough shape. It was very lucky that no one got hurt.” Mount Allison University has since called for more thorough health and safety inspections of off-campus housing properties.

According to Mallory Baxter, the school’s vice-president external and a resident of the building affected, the situation could have been prevented by proper inspection and adherence to safety codes. “Students must be made aware of their landlord’s responsibilities and need to take an active role in ensuring the safety and upkeep of their residences,” she insists.Last year in Montreal, when a fire alarm went off in an off-campus housing building on Avenue des Pins in the middle of the night, tenants were shocked when no fire trucks appeared after an hour and their superintendent was nowhere to be found. As it turned out, the building had not even been connected to the fire department’s system.

University students have the same rights to basic safety standards as any other tenants. The unfortunate reality, though, is that student accommodations often fail to meet even minimal safety requirements. Student housing in the McGill ghetto is no exception.

A hovel to call your ownPrimarily student-dominated housing is notorious for poor conditions. Students are often attracted to the lower prices, while sacrifices made in quality and safety are frequently overlooked. “There should not be a trade-off between safety and affordability,” Baxter comments, emphasizing that this is a nation-wide epidemic, not an isolated problem at universities. “Apartments today are overcrowded. A lot of apartments that would normally be rented to two or three people are being rented to four or five. This is a problem that has become synonymous with students in post-secondary institutions in Canada.”

With the knowledge that repairs will only need to last until the new students move in, it is not surprising that superintendents sometimes cut corners in their building maintenance and upkeep. “Students are much more destructive than other tenants,” Mallory Dash, a U3 political science major observes. “I mean, what incentive is there for their landlords to invest in the conditions of apartments that will likely be poorly maintained by their inhabitants?”.

Dude, where’s my landlord?Many students face the problem of absentee landlords who have little or no involvement with their tenants outside of collecting rent. “Getting things done quickly is difficult,” says Katie Crossley, a U2 sociology student whose St. Famille landlord lives off of the island. “Especially when it can take up to a week for him to get back to you in the first place, much less make the journey into the city,” she adds. With many landlords owning more than one residence, even those that live in the building can be difficult to reach in an emergency.

While McGill students often snag beautiful apartments with hardwood floors and built-in window seats, student housing in Montreal can also mean neglected buildings and missing landlords. For example, Eve, a U3 international development student, lived in a building on Milton and Durocher. Her apartment’s heating broke in the middle of the winter and it was weeks before her landlord finally came in to make repairs.

The Pa-rental unitsAlthough most parents would consider themselves vigilant about their son or daughter’s living quarters, the truth is that they rarely take even a second look at anything above the visual appeal and convenience of the location. While parents usually pay the rent, the sheer distance that often exists between them and the institution can prevent Mom and Dad from having a more active role. “Parents need to start being more skeptical of their children’s living arrangements,” insists U2 economics major, Lindsay. “Second-year students are in that stage where responsibilities are being transferred out of their parent’s hands, and many make the mistake of assuming that their children have a good handle on their housing arrangements. More often than not, they don’t.”

Régie du loge…what?Students are a particularly vulnerable group in this situation as many are first-time renters and have little knowledge of their rights as tenants. First-timers often don’t know what questions to ask, or who to go to when problems arise in their living quarters.

“We spend a lot of time educating students on how to make their own homes secure,” explains Janice Johnson, McGill’s Student Housing office manager. “Challenging strangers when they walk into buildings… meeting the pizza delivery person at the front instead of buzzing them up, so that they don’t have to wander around the building, you know, sensible stuff that students are going to need to take out to take into the real world.”

For problems with housing, the McGill Off-Campus Housing Office is a useful resource for students. Although it is conveniently located near the corner of University and Pins, many students are not aware of its existence. And, if a problem becomes serious enough, it seems that an even smaller number of students know to report it to the Quebec housing board, better known as Le Bureau de la Régie du Logement du Québec.

A foremost concern among many first-year students in Rez is, besides getting used to the awkwardness of peeing in co-ed bathrooms, the safety of their living facility. Freshmen at McGill, many of whom are away from home for the first time in their lives, often need an extra hand at keeping threats to their safety at bay.

For the administrative staff that handles campus residence security, the students’ experience in rez is the main concern. “Good security means that you’re concerned about the students,” says James Guthrie, New Residence Hall Rez Life Supervisor. New Rez, which has two 24-hour security guards patrolling the building and handling visitation issues, offers a different security system from the other McGill residences. “Security here [in New Rez] has a contract with the McGill Security Department,” informs Guthrie.

Upper Rez, RVC and the other McGill residences, however, have their own personal security staff that is unaffiliated with contracted security. Is this a disadvantage for those students who don’t live in a hotel with a uniformed security guard? Pierre Barbarie, Assistant Manager of McGill Security Services, asserts that while “there is a distinct difference between New Rez and Upper Rez security administration,” all of the residences are perfectly safe. “I wouldn’t say that any residence is more vulnerable than another,” adds Janice Johnson, Student Housing Office Manager.

The students agree. “Everywhere you go, you see a security guard,” says Iwan Davies, U0, Mechanical Engineering student and proud Molson resident. “We’re satisfied [with the security] here,” adds his neighbour Gabrielle Chaillat, U0 Management. “The atmosphere is relaxed, but safe.” The balance between safety and comfort is definitely a concern that residence staff encounters, a balance that is particularly difficult to come by at an urban university such as McGill. “We live in downtown Montreal. There’s always stuff [to worry about],” notes Johnson. “We have had problems with random strangers in the buildings. … I’m sure we’ve had unsavory people sleeping in lobbies, the same thing as any downtown residence would experience.” Yet while safety is the main concern, Johnson insists that the residence staff does not want to “hermetically seal” the students. “We want the students to feel comfortable,” says Johnson.

The students’ level of security is judged best by, well, the students. “I haven’t heard any complaints from students. That’s the most important part,” says Barbarie. “If the students aren’t happy with how it [the security] works, then obviously changes can be done, and they are. Their voices are definitely heard.” That theory translates into action. “A few years ago we changed the lighting in Douglas Hall because we found that there were some dark corners that were making people uneasy,” recounts Johnson. When it comes to residence safety, the students have the final word.

While McGill security staff works to provide a great deal of assistance, students ultimately play the most important role in residence safety. “We spend a lot of time educating students on making their own homes secure… [and] challenging strangers when they walk into buildings,” says Johnson. “We’re concerned with sensible stuff that students are going to need to take out to take into the real world,” adds Johson. “Our floor fellow talked to us about fire safety and theft,” says New Rez tenant Rachel Hartman, U0, Electrical Engineering. “I definitely feel secure here.”