North-West Rebellion (100 years later)

Winnipeg. Ah, that shining gem, firmly nestled in the crown of Canada, which, I guess, would be southern Manitoba.
Yeah, right.
Driving into Winnipeg is like driving into any other ugly modern city. But the deeper you get, the further back in time you go, until you're surrounded by ancient brick buildings, old tree-lined streets, and cheap, cheap rents, considering you're downtown in a town with almost half a million people.
Winnipeg, so they say, was the centre of Canada's railroad world in the early 1900s, exploding from a farmers' backyard and enveloping ... well, some large area, which is now almost entirely the same as it was in 1920. Cool old apartments, cool old office buildings, and, compared to the last time I was there, much more lively and less abandoned-looking.
I met up with one of my history-friends, Karyn. We met in Bamfield at a marine sciences station where we took the same marine invertebrates course. She suffered from boyfriend trouble the whole time; I cheered her up by making up stories where deep-sea octopods competed with this lame boyfriend for her attentions. Flash forward four years, and I can't make up an interesting story about octopuses to save my life. Can you? Try it! They have to be anthropomorphic octopuses for the story to count.
Anyway, it being Canada Day, we walked down to degenerate obese-looking Winnipeger Square (also known as the Forks, or something) to watch the fireworks. Karyn tries to keep away from various people she doesn't want to see, we get ditched by the girl we go there to meet, and end up walking back to a little Greek restaurant on the corner of Broadway and somethingorother, where the power of a single beer brings me back to the shores of Bamfield Inlet. It's so cool. As Karyn and I sit there and chat, the stream of memories becomes a flood as we talk about people I hadn't even thought of for years and years. All the odd characters, who really become dynamic and intriguing after six weeks in four-person dormitory cabins on the cliffs overlooking Slightly Polluted Bay, come back to life. "So and so found out she was pregnant the whole time," Karyn says. "And Joe Blow, he was diagnosed with this-and-that, after he left the course." And so on. I've forgotten most of it again already, thanks to the flush handle that somehow grew out the side of my memory, but it was still cool to relive a little bit of the time I spent there.
The next day, after Karyn so graciously gave up her bed and slept on the couch (with her cat bothering her the whole time, and me resting undisturbed) , we drove out to a weir over the Assiniboia River, where we talked about fishing, and watched the dog-sized catfish leap from the water, perhaps hoping to catch a giant pelican or small child. As the sun beat down on our heads, we took pictures of fish poachers, half-eaten barbecue dinners, innocent bystanders, and other stupid things nobody would ever bother taking pictures of if they weren't weird.
I thought it was fun.
With that, I proceeded to get lost on the way out of town, missing a turn (the only turn required before the border) less than two blocks from Karyn's house. But after a short tour of ugly and plain suburban Winnipeg, I was on my way, creeping towards the American border, trailer in tow.