Posts Tagged ‘kids’

Queen, Soho, Bulwer

Posted: July 14, 2016 in graffiti and street art, locations
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It’s good to see the ‘Hug Me!’ tree is still on Queen Street!

large tree stump with some of the large branches, painted an orangish brown colour with a face and the words 'hug me' on a downtown sidewalk inToronto (Queen Street West)

If you look closely in the background of the above photo, you can spot the reason I was exploring this section of Queen St West (near Soho St).  Along the wall by the parking lot is a new mural.

below:  Floating man, floating down the river with an photo from the past clutched in his hand.  “Tona as Marty McFly Disappearing Photos” by Elicser Elliott.  It is another of the Love Letter to the Great Lakes project murals.

mural of a man lying on his back in the water, words written in red Tona as Marty McFly

There were two other Love Letter murals that I came here to find.

below: If you look up as you walk along Queen Street West you might catch a glimpse of this mural by JAZ (Franco Fasoli).  Arms, or tentacles, seem to be reaching out of the water and strangling the fish.

mural on an upper storey wall, viewed from the street so you can't see the whole thing. A fish seems be strangled by tentacles in the water

below: The third mural is around the corner from the other two, on Bulwer Street.  It’s a large portrait of David Suzuki painted by Kevin Ledo.  The blue shapes on the right are outlines of fish (atlantic salmon apparently) but I cut their tails off when I took the picture.

a large mural with the centerpiece being a portrait of David Suzuki

below: I haven’t walked along Bulwer St for a while so it was nice to see that this (unsigned?) mural is still there even though someone has spray painted some words on it.

mural on the side of a building, kids playing

below: One last little find on Bulwer, a circuit board stikman

a little stikman covered with circuit board symbols, missing part of his head, on a door frame outside,

Other posts about the Love Letter to the Great Lakes project murals:

  1. love letters in paint
  2. seawalls and serpents
  3.  at the mouth of the Don

 

#seawallsTO | #pangeaseed | #loveletterprojects

Portugal Day Parade

Posted: June 13, 2016 in events, people
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Yesterday the Portuguese community in Toronto held their 29th annual Portugal Day parade.   It was a lively, happy occasion.  Hundreds of people lined Dundas Street West between Lansdowne and Trinity Bellwoods Park to watch the parade.  They showed their Portuguese colours with flags, banners, hats, soccer shirts, and lots of red clothes!  Young soccer players demonstrated their skills.  People of all ages wore traditional dress from different parts of Portugal as they walked and danced along the parade route.  There was music too – bagpipes, marching bands, and music to dance to.

A man pushes a cart from which he is selling popcorn, candy apples and cotton candy to people watching a parade. A black truck is behind him with a boy in the passenger side who is hold a banner out the window that says Portugal on it.

Two boys holding a red banner for a marching band in a parade. Lots of flag holders behind them, a Canadian flag, an Ontario flag, a Toronto flag and a Portuguese flag.

A young girl swirls her long skirt as she dances in a parade. Portugal Day parade on Dundas West, Little Portugal, in Toronto

A boy is wearing a Rinaldo soccer shirt, and sitting beside a Portuguese flag. His father is with him

men, members of a Labour Union, walk in a parade. They are wearing orange shirts with short blue sleeves that say Portugal Day on them.

Women dancers in traditional Portuguese dress, dancing in a parade. One of them pauses to look at the man selling cotton candy and popcorn froma cart.

On a street, Dundas West in Toronto, there is a parade, people on the sidewalk watching, and dancers performing in the parade. Portugal Day parade.

People in a parade, three people holding two flags, Portugal and Benfica. A man behind them is holding his arms up in the air.

Two girls in traditional Portuguese dresses are dancing in a parade, onlookers sitting on the sidewalk behind them.

A young woman is wearing a large tall hat in squares of the colours of the Portuguese flag. Beside her is a person draped in the Portuguese flag. They are watching a parade

Four kids sitting crossed legged at the side of a street watching a parade. They are holding Portuguese flags. The older boy has a red whistle in his mouth.

Two Toronto policemen in yellow safety vests watch a parade, women dancing past them.

members of the Cobourg Legion pipe and drum band, four bagpipers in their blue and red kilts marching in a parade

A float in a parade featuring the Portuguese Radio and TV stations, Camoes,

Close up shot of the hands of three men dancing in a parade. The faces of only 2 of them are visible. They are wearing white shirts, black vests, and black hats. Portugal Day parade

Spectators in a parade hold small Portuguese flags as they watch traditional dancers perform.

A woman holds a colourful banner in a parade

A woman from the crowd watching a parade, goes over to a float that has a live sheep and goat on it, she is hesitating to pat the sheep.

people watching kids kicking around a soccer ball as part of a parade. The kids are all in red uniforms.

A woman is giving out small portuguese flags to people watching a parade. She is wearing a t-shirt in support of local politician Anna Bailao,

Spectators at a parade, sitting on chairs, one of which has a Canadian flag on the back. Passing by is a marching band in dark pants and white shirts. Portugal Day parade on Dundas West.

kids and community, around Woodbine

Posted: June 7, 2016 in graffiti and street art, locations
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This post is about community involvement and the murals that result.  They aren’t great art and they weren’t meant to be.  They are about the stories we tell about ourselves and our communities.  They brighten our public spaces and enrich our neighbourhoods.

The first is a series of murals painted by Gledhill Public School students. There are murals by the graduating classes of 2008, 2009, 2010 and 2011 in a lane near the school.

Part of a mural in an alley painted by students from Gledhill Public school, graduating class of 2008, black silhouettes under tree branches, hand prints too

Part of a mural in an alley painted by students from Gledhill Public school, graduating class of 2009, black silhouette of the Toronto skyline with big colourful footprints, some roughly drawn people too , an airplane flies overhead

Part of a mural in an alley painted by students from Gledhill Public school, graduating class of 2009, black silhouette of the Toronto skyline with big colourful footprints, some roughly drawn people too

Part of a mural in an alley painted by students from Gledhill Public school, graduating class of 2010. A blue semi-circle

Part of a mural in an alley painted by students from Gledhill Public school, graduating class of 2011. 2011 in large numbers across the bottom with grey silhouettes of people, brightly coloured squares with faces across the top

Part of a mural in an alley painted by students from Gledhill Public school, graduating class of 2011. 2011 in large numbers across the bottom with grey silhouettes of people, brightly coloured squares with faces across the top

Just to the east, Woodbine subway station is undergoing much needed renovations and expansion.  Some of the hoardings around the construction site have been covered with three murals.   They were painted by:  Haley G., Sasha K.S., Francis H., Melika W., Tristan C., Savannah P., Adrina P. and Anna-Lisa A as well as Jim Bravo and Andrenne Finnikin as part of the ‘City on the Move, Young Artists in Transit’ mural project.

Looking across a street to a construction site around which a fence has been erected. There are three murals painted on the hoardings.

The first mural is a juxtaposition of past and present, people playing beside the creek. The creek, trees, and birds are all the same.  There is now a city in the distance and clothing we wear has changed, but we still enjoy the outdoors like our ancestors did.

1910 to 2013, mural of past and present along the creek. Kids playing on either side, the past on the left, the present on the right, bird watching, standing in the grass,

Above ground, a fair, an amusement on a summer day.   Below ground, the subway is being built.

mural depicting people at a fair. A child is licking a giant round lollipop, a girl is holding a doll, a ferris wheel is in the background.

And last, woodpeckers in the trees as well as a poem by George Elliott Clarke who was the Poet Laureate of Toronto 2012-15.  It describes the murals and is transcribed below.

mural painted on TTC construction hoardings, trees and birch trees with no leaves on them, with a couple of woodpeckers

The poem on the last mural:

Seeing Beauty, at Woodbine
 
Citizens, let’s pasture ourselves in parks
And gardens, so skyscrapers mingle with trees,
And we recover Native faith, Settler
Hope, to savour birds’ trills and swoops, fording
Creek and times past, to touch us, where we stand.
 
Once was pleasure in a street fair – ice cream
And lollipop, but also in strolling
Or rolling down to work, shirt-sleeves rolled up,
Dawn light unfolding, That’s what’s visible.
(Underground, a steel vein branches, roots, and throbs.)
 
Torrential leaves stacked up towers, now fallen,
Last Fall, Birds tap into the standing logs
Winter planted.  Spring rain well refreshes
The city.  Now, young artists tap dreams –
Drafting Beauty – to which all say, “Bravo!”
 
by George Elliott Clarke

inside Leslie Barns

Posted: June 6, 2016 in events, locations, transportation
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As you all know, the TTC is replacing their older streetcars with new longer Bombardier streetcars.   Or at least they are trying to 🙂  Because they are longer, they don’t fit into existing “garages”, hence the new Leslie Barns facility.  Located on Leslie St., south of Queen, it is the new streetcar “home”.  It is where streetcars are parked, maintained and repaired.  It has been in operation since Nov 2015 but the first chance the public got to peak inside the finished complex was at Doors Open on the 28th of May.

below: While waiting for a streetcar at the corner of Queen and Broadview on the way to visit the Leslie Barns, I saw this renovated TTC streetcar from the 1950’s.

An old restored TTC streetcar, maroon and yellow, on Queen St. East

below:  The streetcar tour involved riding a new streetcar through a maintenance bay in the building and then around the parking lot out back.

People at Doors Open in TOronto, at the TTC LEslie Barns streetcar facitlity, lining up for , or just getting off of, streetcar tours, riding the new streetcars around Leslie Barns

A group of people inside Leslie Barns streetcar facility, standing aside to make way for a new streetcar that is taking other people on a tour.

people riding in a new streetcar, photo taken from the outside, most of them are waving

A man in black T-shirt and black cap is taking a picture of people riding in the new streetcar, inside Leslie Barns at Doors Open

below: Exterior, parking space for at least 100 streetcars

the massive concrete parking lot for streetcars with all the overhead wires. The building that houses the workshops and cleaning and office for the ttc is in the background.

below: Special bays have been constructed with space for workers to access both the underneath and the top of the streetcars.  Because the cars have been designed to ride low, a lot of their workings such as the HVAC and propulsion systems are built into the roof of the car.

the back of a new streetcar as it passes through interior of Leslie Barns streetcar facility, a large, tall interior space with lots of pipes

A streetcar sits in a repair bay of the Leslie Barns, space underneath the streetcar for workers to go down and work on the underside of the streetcar.

below: It’s a big space!  …. 17,510 square metres (188,500 sq ft) in fact.

interior of Leslie Barns streetcar facility, a large, tall interior space with lots of pipes

below: A spic and span shiny paint room

interior of the paint room at Leslie Barns, where streetcars go to get painted.

below: A myriad of colour coded pipes

A myriad of pipes running up walls and across the ceiling, blue, pink, red, grey, all colour coded, interior, Leslie Barns

below: There were renovated vintage streetcars on display.  On the left is a 1921 Peter Witt streetcar and next to it is a PCC streetcar from the early 1950’s.

a number of people waiting to go inside old renovated vintage TTC streetcars

below: Interior of a refurbished Peter Witt streetcar with its wood trim.  The Witt cars were built for the newly formed TTC in 1921.  They entered service on Broadview in October of that year.  By 1923 they were operating on seven routes.  The last Witt streetcar was retired in 1963.

A young boy stands in the back of an old restored ttc streetcar. A black and white picture of an old street scene has been put across the back window to show you what the view out the window might have looked like at the time the streetcar was functional. Old ads on the upper part of the interior, wood trim

below: Looking out the window of a PCC streetcar built in 1951.  PCC stands for Presidents’ Conference Committee, which was a group of operators from the USA and Canada  who got together in 1938 to design a new electric railway car.  By the late 1950s, the TTC owned the largest fleet of PCC’s in the world.  The last one was retired in 1995.

A young boy wearing a hat looks out the window of an old restored streetcar while his father takes a picture out the window

below: Streetcar wire maintenance truck.

a special TTC truck sits outside Leslie Barns TTC facility on Doors Open day, the truck is designed to run on streetcar tracks and is used to repair tracks and wires. There are people looking at the truck

#DOT16 | #TTC

dancing in the square

Posted: June 4, 2016 in events
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Sharing Dance
Organized by the National Ballet School,
the 3rd annual Sharing Dance event was held at Yonge Dundas Square.

A chance to laugh a little and learn a few moves.

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - a woman in a tie dyed T-shirt and orange cap dances on her own while others watch

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - kids

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - one little girl is facing the opposite direction from the others

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - a middle aged couple

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - a kick line of 5 or 6 young women

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - a younger woman helps an older woman with a walker to lift her knees in ballet moves

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - 5 young women with the arms in the air

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - hands in the air

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - running in a circle

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - a couple dancing together

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - young women in blue t-shirts, arms linked, kicking

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - one knee up

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance

people dancing at Yonge Dundas Square as a group, part of an event called Sharing Dance - a mother is taking a photo of her daughter for instagram

#sharingdance

tower building and more!

Posted: May 13, 2016 in events, people
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I am still trying to get caught up with the photos that I took at Science Rendezvous last weekend.  There was so much happening!  Lots of people were involved and engaged in the various activities that were available both at Yonge Dundas Square and on St. George street.

below: On the stage at Yonge Dundas square:  Start with three identical piles of building blocks and three teams, put ten minutes on the clock and see what towers result.   The challenge was to
build the strongest, tallest, or most awesome tower.

competition to build the highest, strongest tower out of hard styrofoam blocks, children and adults working together.

below: Teamwork!

competition to build the highest, strongest tower out of hard styrofoam blocks, children and adults working together.

competition to build the highest, strongest tower out of hard styrofoam blocks, children and adults working together.

below: How do you test the strength of a tower?
By giving one exuberant girl a big orange ball of course!

A young girl throws a large orange ball at a tower of polysyrene blocks in an attempt to knock it over, an activity at Science Rendezvous on the stage at Dundas Square.

below: At the end of the competition, all three teams came together to build the tallest tower that they could.  It didn’t quite reach the stage roof, but it was close!

competition to build the highest, strongest tower out of hard styrofoam blocks, children and adults working together to see how tall they can make the tower

… more great activities…..

below: Question: How long does it take the light from the Sun to travel to the Earth?
Answer: sunlight travels at the speed of light (rounded to 300,000 km/s) and it has to cover a distance of 150 million km on average to reach Earth.  With a bit of math, the answer is 500 seconds, or 8 minutes and 18 seconds.

A sign stands in the street with information about the sun on it. Behind it is a second sign, this time with information about Mercury. Behind that are people at Science Rendezvous on St. George street

below: making paper

a young girl is making paper. she is sponging the paper dry over a piece of mesh in a frame

below: robots

A group of students is sitting on a sidewalk. One of them has a laptop and he is controlling a robot machine with wheels that is moving around on the street.

below: How unique are you? Test yourself for various phenotypes (the product of your genes)… Can you curl your tongue? Can you smell freesias? Is your thumb bent?  From answers to these and five other questions you can determine if you are 1/10 (you share similarities to many people) or 1/1000 (you are more unique)… or something in between.  Apparently I’m 1/45 and if you’re curious, my thumb is straight, I can’t curl my tongue and I can smell freesias.

Two students are conducting a genetic phenotype test on a couple of volunteers. They are looking to see if they can smell fresias or taste coriander.

below: St. George street.

looking up St. George street on the downtown University of Toronto campus. A white tent is set up on the street and under the tent are students running science demonstrations.

below: A demonstration using acids, bases, and pH indicators.  Technically, pH is a measure of the concentration of hydrogen ions.  In practice, it indicates how acidic or basic a substance is.  Water, with a pH of 7 is neutral.  Acids have a pH less than 7 while bases have a pH greater than 7.  A pH indicator is a chemical that changes colour depending on the pH.

Three students behind a table doing a demonstration about acids and bases in chemistry. One of the women is adding a strong acid to a solution that is a strong base. The pH indicator is changing from yellolw to purple

below: How much energy is a gummi bear? Find out by heating a little bit of of potassium chlorate in a test tube.  Once it is liquid, add a gummi bear.  Smoke and flames ensue.  When the potassium chlorate is heated, it produces oxygen gas which ignites if there is combustible material, such as sugar, available.

A student is doing a chemistry experiment to show how much energy is in gummi bear candy. He has lit one on fire and burned it to show the release of energy. It was done in a test tube.

below: Design and construction with K’nex

Two young Asian boys are building small structures with the building toy k'nex.

below:  Tetris players

Three young man are playing a tetris game on a large computer board.

below: programmable Lego vehicles

Two kids are playing with a programmable Lego car.

below:  Watch out!  Scientists on the loose!

Two young kids have been dressed up as mad scientists and their father is taking their picture. They had rubber gloves on, eye protection and a lab coat. They both have pipettes.

below:  The little boxes used in this activity have a marble inside them.  When placed on an inclined surface, the boxes tumble to the bottom.  Sandpaper prevents the boxes from slipping.

A woman and a girl are racing objects that they made. Inside small rectangular boxes are marbles that make the boxes tumble down an incline.

 

below: Corn starch and water makes a wonderful substance.  It’s not liquid and it’s not solid.  If you are fast enough you run on top of it but if you stop moving, you sink into it!

A boy is running barefoot along a course that is filled with corn starch and water. Onlookers are cheering him on.

A girl is running barefoot along a course that is filled with corn starch and water. Onlookers are cheering him on.

An older man is running through corn starch and water with his arms held up

it’s all about the DNA

Posted: May 10, 2016 in events, people
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Did you know that we share 50% of our DNA with a banana?  Bananas don’t have DNA that codes for eye colour and we probably don’t any genes that produce yellow peels.   What we share is similar basic biochemistry, such things as DNA replication, cell metabolism, and regulation of cell growth, to name a few.  One thing that you can do with banana DNA is easily extract it.  We all know that cells are too small to see and that DNA is even smaller,  BUT if you mash a whole a banana, you can produce enough DNA to make a small clump.   That was one of the activities at Science Rendezvous this past Saturday.

Two young girls are performing an science experiment using beakers and a graduated cylinder. One of them is pouring liquid into the cylinder while the younger one watches.

Science Rendezvous is science outreach festival that occurs across Canada, a day when science hits the streets.  This year it was May 7th.  In Toronto, there were information booths, demonstrations, and activities by students from Ryerson (at Yonge Dundas Square) and students from U of T (St. George Street).

“There’s no place like GenHome” is a project by Ryerson students to break a Guinness World Record by building the longest DNA model.    DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid,  is a double helix.  Although it is a complex molecule, it can be broken down into components called nucleotides.  Nucleotides consist three parts – deoxyribose which is a sugar molecule, phosphate, and an organic base.  At the risk of being too simplistic (because the chemistry of DNA is way beyond the scope of this blog), the sugar and phosphate of the nucleotides form the backbone of the double helices.  The organic bases are in the space between the two backbones and if they are ordered properly, the bases hold the double helix together.

A couple more things you need to know about DNA.  First, there are four bases, adenine (A), thymine (T), cytosine (C), and guanine (G).  And second, bases come in pairs and only certain pairs can exist if the double helix is to form properly.  Adenine has to pair with thymine and cytosine has to pair with guanine, i.e. A with T and C with G and nothing else.

How would you build a DNA model?  The Ryerson University students wanted to get people involved in the project and if you were at Science Rendezvous, you could have become part of their DNA model.

below: Bases need partners and so do you !  Find a partner and take a spin.
Are the two of you A & T or G & C?

A young woman is standing beside a spinner with AT and GC being the possible landing places. She is talking to a couple who have spun and landed on GC

below: Next, have your picture taken with your base letter.

A young woman has her picture taken with a large orange letter A on a blue square.

A few moments later your picture is printed and ready to attach to the DNA model.

below: My partner for the activity adds his G (toe to toe with my C).

People making a DNA model using photos that volunteers have had taken of themselves with one of the letter of DNA. The four letters are A, C, T, and G. They are the nucleosides that make up DNA

I don’t know how long the DNA model is at this point.  I was hoping that there would be some information online but nothing has shown up yet.

Also, If you want to try extracting the DNA from a banana, the instructions are online at numerous sites including Scientific American.  You will need a banana, water, salt, detergent, rubbing alcohol, and a coffee filter.  Have fun!

 

***  a little breather after all that molecular biology ***

below:  At Science Rendezvous they were walking together until she saw my camera and then she tried to get away.  Hmmm…. Mr. Scientist Creature (mutant science rodent?!), maybe she was embarrassed? 🙂

A person dressed in a costume that looks like an animal - squirrel? fox? that is wearing a lab coat. An Asian woman who was walking with him before the photo was taken is shyly turning away, she is also laughing

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sackville Street murals

Posted: April 6, 2016 in graffiti and street art, locations
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Sackville Street, just south of Dundas, is right in the midst of the Regent Park renewal project.  It is also the site of two murals.  First, there is bright and colourful mural which is painted on the side of a new apartment building.

mural painted by Shalak Attack and Bruno Smoky in Regent park Toronto, showing a brightly coloured woman;s face, with a flower in her hair and her body (from the shoulders up) made of buildings in a jumble as well as a blue owl (large bird) in flight, passing in front of the sun that is represented by circles of orange and red radiating out from the bright yellow center. A green hand is reaching up towards the sun

A man with a dog an a leash is walking by a mural of a brightly coloured woman;s face, with a flower in her hair and her body (from the shoulders up) made of buildings in a jumble. Painted by Shalak Attack in Regent Park

close up of a mural by Shalak Attack and Bruno Smoky of a blue owl (large bird) in flight, passing in front of the sun that is represented by circles of orange and red radiating out from the bright yellow center. A green hand is reaching up towards the sun

The other mural is a painting by elicser on hoardings around a building under construction.

a long mural by elicser painted on hoardings around a building under construction. People flying past in the mural

below: With the ubiquitous Timmie’s cup on the ground.

the end of a mural, a man is sideways, arm above his head, painted on a mural, a large orange concrete block is in front of the wall, an empty Tim Hortons cup (Timmies cup) is on the ground.
part of a mural of flying people by elicser, a woman in a light purple dress and head scarf as well s a boy in beige Tshirt and blue shorts

Two people painted flying sideways on a mural, a brown man with no shirt on and a much smaller person below him with a yellow T-shirt. An orange concrete block is on the sidewalk in front of the mural along with an orange and white traffic cone

people flying sideways on a mural by elicser, including a girl in a pink dress

people flying sideways on a mural by elicser, including a woman in a blue dress and a man with a red hat.

flying people mural by elicser

the words Regent Park are written in pink paint on a light blue background, painted on wooden hoardings around a construction site.

pillow fight!

Posted: April 4, 2016 in events, people
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Pillow Fight at Nathan Phillips Square
in celebration of International Pillow Fight Day 2016

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - 2 asian women hit each other with pillows while other people watch

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a young man with two yellow pillows looks intensely at a man with a pillow raised over his head

feathers go flying as pillows break during a pillow fight amongst a crowd of people

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a man wearing a suit and dark sunglasses participates in the pillow fight

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a number of young people laughing

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a boy closes his eyes and ducks his head as two pillows come his way

two young women leaping at each other as they try to hit each other with pillows

two young boys swing pillows at each other - people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a young girl swings a pillow

young people participating in a large outdoor pillow fight

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

a woman holds her hands up by her head defensively to ward off pillows being swung by two girls

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a young man with earmuffs and a woman wearing a face mask

young men swinging pillows at each other in a large pillow fight

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

people at Nathan Phillips square on a cold day watching a pillow fight, spectators,

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - an Asian woman swings a pink pillow at a man wearing a ski mask

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a woman with long red hair hides under her pillow as she walks through a crowd

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a young woman is on the shoulders of a man as they pass through a crowd during a pillow fight

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day - a woman in a pink and blue striped hat smiles at a man as she readies to through a pillow at him

a person in a bear costume waves to the camera as a boy in pyjamas holds a pillow

people, adults and kids, swinging pillows at each other in a large pillow fight

people in the midst of a large pillow fight at Nathan Phillips square in celebration of international pillow fight day -

asian young man in suit and tie and glasses is laughing and smiling as he swings a pillow in a pillow fight outdoors with many people

a young woman holding a pillow and screaming at another young woman

blog_little_kids_pillow_fight

an asian woman with her hair dyed auburn has a pillow over her head as she emerges from a crowd at a pillow fight

#pillowfight | #pillowfighttoronto

two minutes of silence

Posted: November 14, 2015 in events
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Nathan Phillips Square, 14 Nov 2015
A quiet gathering in support of Paris

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looking through the end O of the 3D Toronto sign towards the main part of Nathan Phillips Square where a large number of people have gathered

The event started with a few speeches.   French Consul General Mr. Marc Trouyet spoke first, followed by Carolyn Bennett, Liberal MP and then Toronto mayor John Tory.

Carolyn Bennett, Liberal MP, speaks at a gathering at Nathan Phillips Square that pays tribute to the city of Paris. A lineup of other people waiting to talk, including John Tory, mayor, is standing behind her.

A woman in a white beret and red scarf is holding a lit candle and a small French flag

The official part of the event ended with two minutes of silence.

A crowd of people standing at Nathan Phillips Square listening to speeches. Some people hold two large French flags.

A sign on a backpack that says Toronto est Paris. Written in blue, white and red

Three people standing in front of the 3D Toronto sign, holding a French flag and a large sign that says "Pas Feur, no fear"

A young man with a French flag draped over his shoulders is being interviewed for TV

#parisisaboutlife

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