The Buskers Festival 2009 @ Halifax

The heat is just starting to sizzle for the summer with loads of festivals coming up before the season ends as it awaits the coming of Autumn. Like always, we were ready to head out and bear witness to any (if not all of the) festivities. One of which was the Buskers Festival 2009 that took place down by the waterfront here in Downtown Halifax.

Buskers are people or folks who performs the act of busking. Busking is the practice of performing in public places for tips and gratuities. People engaging in this practice are called buskers or street performers. Busking performances can be just about anything that people find entertaining. Buskers may do acrobatics, animal tricks, balloon twisting, card tricks, clowning, comedy, contortions & escapes, dance, fire eating, fortune-telling, juggling, magic, mime and a mime variation where the artist performs as a living statue, musical performance, puppeteering, snake charming, storytelling or recite poetry or prose as a bard, street art (sketching and painting, etc.), street theatre, sword swallowing, or even present a flea circus.

We witness 3 performances before we decided to head home. But our favourite was the performance by the group the called themselves, USA Breakdancers. Managed to catch some clips and photos of them in their act.

Tall Ship 09

Over the weekend we went to Halifax waterfront to catch a glimpse of the many tall ships that we docked at the harbour for the Nova Scotia Tall Ship 2009 event.

Fortunately it was a sunny day and the weather was cooling.

We took lots of shots and including vids of the event and here are some of them I've selected to be shared.

The view of Georges Island from the waterfront. The weather was great which resulted in a good shot it.




Here's a view of Georges Island from a distance (we'll definitely plan a trip there later...)

View Larger Map

Of course we took shots of the many ships that were there. There were big, medium and even small ones.












Having said that, I can't resist taking shots of monuments and interesting signboards.







Here's one of Sir Samuel Cunard a famous figure in world history (so to speak and apparently a Halagonion).






Here's one I took of a crew reenacting a royal soldier carrying a cannon.






I've captured it on vid as you'll see below later.

And the Mrs captured a pic of a sailor as he ushered visitors into a ship.


While here's a pic of a crew hoarding up supplies to a ship.


And of course with such an event expecting a huge crowd would definitely need a huge number of "loos" aka toilet. And here's a pic of all the blue little johns staked up in a line.


Here are some of the vids we have.






This final one is where the crew explains the preparation of the cannon and also firing it.

Atlantic Jazz Festival

Some photos taken from our short stop at the free Atlantic Jazz Festival tent last week.









Sorry folks, I took this from the handphone which is why the sound is distorted. Need real vid cam for that.

Mid Week July Update

Another 1and half week to go before we head to Toronto & Niagara Falls. We've already book a room there in Niagara. We've borrowed books from the Spring Garden Library, both on Toronto and Niagara region to help us plan our trip.

While we were at the library, we made a pit stop at Atlantic Jazz Festival's free screening tent. We've got some videos and pictures but I've yet to upload them. Stay tune. Music lovers would love this event! Its a great place for amatuers and budding musicians to pit their talents for others to see. There's also paid shows which obviously we didn't go to. But overall its an event that one can go to when in Halifax during the Summer. Its also an event that the city is proud of and promotes very much (apart from Pride Festival - which is the festival organized to promote tolerance for gay folks - that's coming up soon). Someone I met once said that he wish he has a remote control to the whole city on pause except for the event he wants to go to so that he doesn't miss anything. Yup, there's so many running all at once during this peak season. Another event that is a must go is the Tall ships which is a the waterfront.

Also, another great leap for us here in our home away from home - I've finally got my first hair cut in Canada.

Lebanese Festival 2009

Here are the shots we took at the Lebanese Festival. Was not much as we were really tired from traveling all over downtown and walking from Citadel Hill to the festival. Also got a video of the first dance performed by the Lebanese children.

It wasn't really a big event. But I suppose it was an effort by the Lebanese (christian) community in Halifax.











Here are some of the food we ordered.


some sort of rolled up popiah using grape leaves.


like a coleslaw their version.


So far this was the better one. Not sure what it was but has beef and lots of veg in it rolled with some kind of flat bread.

Just Finished Demo

Well, its been a tough week. Finally we've delivered the demo and presented it. There's a sudden relief and a sense of freedom (at least for now). Hopefully this weekend there won't be any rain, cause we got tickets to Nova Scotia Sea Food Festival. Looking forward to sinking my teeth into some good seafood. Mmmm Mmmm Mmmmm.... Atlantic Lobster, Snow Crab, Oyster, Haddock, Scallops and John Dorry, etc and what else there is that we haven't eaten yet. hehehe.... (laughing out loud)...

The Weekend

So we lost count of how many weekends we've been away from home. Its really not our fault. I guess that's because the number just got bigger and its easier to count based on the months now because that's a smaller number. I would say give another 8 more days and we're officially been away from home for 2 months.

The spring season is officially over this week. Starting next week it summer. However, we're going to experience alot of rain this weekend. Our friendly CBC weather man, Peter, has forcasted a soggy Saturday noon till Sunday and most likely till next week onwards....



Hopefully it will clear up for the following weekend as we already got our tickets for the Nova Scotia seafood festival.

Seafood Festival

Its been awfully quiet lately, partly because we've been busy with our lab reading. As for me, I've been updating the look and feel of the blog. However there's a short period where the Google Analytics javascript code didn't work -- in plain English, I wasn't able to track my visitors for about 2 days due to this problem. After tweaking and debugging the code, I believe I got it fix. How do I know :)

Well you guys of course! I was able to see the usual people coming in to visit our page and see our progress. Do leave a comment or two from time to time. If need to, create a dummy account but personally email us to let us know who you are.

On another note, we just bought 2 tickets to attend the Nova Scotia Seafood Festival which will be held next weekend just round the corner near our place.



View Larger Map

It cost CAD 8 per ticket but we get to go in and sample the food there at discounted prices. It would be an interesting and gastronomic experience (we hope). Definitely something we look forward to, to learn more about the local food here and probably get an idea or two on how to cook some of the stuffs available. We'll bring along our camera and probably do some recording or two to be posted here. Meanwhile, hope you guys stay clear of the outside - heard that Malaysia is experiencing a bad spell of haze again (especially Cheras). Drink lots and lots of water and safe water too - (there's a likelihood that there won't be much going around very soon)....