This picture was taken yesterday on the beach here in Malta (Golden Bay, again). It could have just as easily been taken in Toronto though — poking through iPhoto I’ve got similar shots taken at Ashbridges and Hanlans Point beaches (Lake Ontario really does get Mediterranean blue sometimes). The beach, in general, is a curiously organic use of public space — maybe as close to squatting as most of us will ever come. You arrive, pick an empty spot, then make it yours for a few hours. All it takes is a towel on the sand to mark your space, and it will generally be respected by everybody else, except the kids who run and kick up sand, or the dudes and their elaborately kicked soccer balls (I don’t know how this little island can contain so much testosterone). I feel unusually safe on a beach too, leaving things in and around my towel when I go in the water that I’d never leave alone in any other public space (keys, cards, digital cameras — semi-hidden of course, but still alone). Maybe stupid, but I noticed everybody else did it too. And sometimes I’ll fall asleep, which I can’t imagine doing anywhere else public.
I was using this old umbrella we have here — like many artifacts like it, nobody can remember where we got it, but it’s useful. Looking around at the other umbrellas, I realized they’ve all got a corporate name on them. Perhaps it’s ad-creep (it was good of the Heineken people to write their name both ways on the fringe, so you’ll always know the brand your projecting) but it helped make an even more formidably occupied space on the beach — my little house, albeit boozy looking. Some people, like the couple directly in front of me here, were listening to more of the omnipresent and generic Eurobeat that is everywhere here at an inconsiderate volume as they ate ice cream off of wooden sticks. It’s a matter of taste, sure, but if people must listen to amplified music on the beach they should stick to standards and classics (but not the lowest-common-denominator stuff), like the Swedish group behind me that sang along to Aretha Franklin in broken English. Even Bob Marley is tolerable at the beach. Life is too short, or something like that, for bad music.
Unless the internet is lying to me, Toronto will be 28 degrees today and sunny. If you are wondering what to do with a lazy Sunday you should head down to the ferry docks, go over to Hanlans Point, and squat for the afternoon on the sand. The water is a bit warmer here, and it’s easier to float in than fresh water lake Ontario, but the experience is just about the same and it will likely be full of hundreds of people confirming Toronto has a beach culture as healthy as anything over here in the overly mythologized Mediterranean.
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Or check out Cherry Beach, for the first Sunday afternoon Promise soundsystem gathering of the year, this time with permits for the first time ever 🙂
Good good. I wish they’d play more than just trance and the hippy side of techno though, cuz I’d go and tell other people to go (based on the few times I’ve been).
Nice little article here Shawn. There is another use of the beach that I take part in that unfortunately, (due to a lack of infrastructure)can be a little disruptive to others. What I’m talking about is the wonderful sport of Kiteboarding. There is a small community of kiteboarders in Toronto and most of our season takes place in spring and fall, because the beaches are less crowded. One of our favorite spots is cherry beach, but due to the small launching and landing area, it can be a little dangerous. I think it would be a wonderful move if the city, (or some organization) created a Toronto Kiteboarding club space that was a designated area for kiteboarding. Many other communities (such as squamish, BC) have done this which has made their launch sites safer, and has attracted people from all over to get together harness the winds and clean up the beaches too, taking glass and other objects out of the water. I think an ideal location in toronto would be the under developed tommy thompson park, which would allow kiteboarders to ride (safely) in any wind conditions. Kiteboarding is a really fun positive sport that really could be better accomidated by our beaches. Which in turn will give new kiteboarders a venue to ride, vs learning on dangerous packed public beaches.
In California we saw some kiteboarders that would hit a wave and be up in the air for 30 seconds, doing maybe 20 spins. It was frigid, and there were shark warnings (south of SF) but these guys were other-worldly, as if gravity didn’t matter.
I like falling asleep on park benches on hot days while the sun beats down on my heat and then waking up all sweaty. It might be bad public space etiquette though. I have a disdain for benches that stop people from lying down them.
I’ve seen the kite boarders many times out on Cherry Beach when I am sailing.
Give them windy day, some waves and a potential audience and they would draw a crowd for sure…
Too bad the inner harbour is so busy and therefore a bad spot for kite boarders….otherwise it would be a great show from Claude Cormier’s new Urban H2O beach.