Tony

As I already told you in my last entry, the people here in Halifax (and probably in whole Nova Scotia) are very, very friendly. It’s really amazing. Everyday there are people talking to me: concerning my DSLR camera, my rain jacket or just asking how it’s goin‘. „How are you doing?“ is just normal here to say if you meet anyone, doesn’t matter if you know him or not. One of those nice guys I met is Tony. I met him here at my hostel where we were then talking about his way of living here in Halifax, where he comes from. The story of his life fascinated me that much so I decided to tell you about him in a seperate entry.

Today I kept on walking through the city. From the very north, where I visited Fairview Lawn Cemetery (the grave site of the Titanic victims), to the very south, where I visited Point Pleasant Park (left picture) and took some photos of the Atlantic Ocean. On this south side of the city, just a bit outside from Halifax, in the bay which guides all the ships to the ports of Halifax and Dartmouth (Halifax is on the one side of the bay, Dartmouth on the other), there are two islands. The bigger one of that islands (sized about 5×2 kilometers) is Tony’s home. He is living there with three other residents. The island is full of forest, at least as far as I could see it (look at the picture below, it’s that one on the left side).

Now imagine: Tony lives there and the only way to come to the downtown of Halifax is to use a boat! And he has two of these: a sailing boat and a speed boat. As he told me he needs about 25 minutes to get to downtown by sailing boat and about three minutes with his speed boat. On his island he has electricity, heat, cable and even internet (wireless) and a telephone (cellphone). Isn’t that fantastic?!

When I sat with him in front of my hostel, where we were talking, there was another thing I was wondering about. Every few minutes there was somebody coming around and starting a small talk to Tony, because he is known by such many people. Surely Halifax is not that big city, but there are still over 300.000 people living here. But he said that is just normal for people who grew up here. The city is such a kind of relaxed, there really seems to be no stress and all people seem to live the same kind of relaxed life. Tony’s profession is to be an artist, what is for sure supporting the calmness he is definitely exuding.

I promise again to put some photos on as soon as possible respectively when I find the time to get the photos on my laptop and sort them a bit. I think I will then add them to the entries afterwards, so you should come again and have a look if they are already on. But right now I’m completely pooped and need to get some sleep. After all I was walking about 15 kilometers today. However I attached you the GoogleMap of Halifax and the islands I was talking about. The one on which Tony lives is called Macnabs Island (it’s the bigger one, as I already mentioned).