DandNHill

Just been reading on BBC that Google will be moving to Toronto.

Will other IT companies leave Kitchener too?

The future plans sound interesting though...

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-41665670

dbd33

I don't read it as "moving to Toronto" but as "building something else in Toronto" so, no, I don't suppose it will lead to companies leaving Kitchener.

DandNHill

I must have misread. Thought it said they were moving their Canadian headquarters to Toronto.
Reread... Google will move its Canadian headquarters to the redeveloped area, and Sidewalk Labs has committed $50m (£37m) to kick off the project.

dbd33

Oh, well then yes, Kitchener could be back to being all bratwurst and giant steins.

DandNHill

Oops. My boss is just about to move us all from Orangeville to Kitchener.

I suppose it'll be a while before anything happens!!

Shard

How is that KW Octoberfest event..any good? I generally find North America versions of European festivals a bit naff...but I could be wrong?

Interestingly, I've noticed a UK supermarket starting to do Octoberfest type beer promotions. The globalization of culture seems well underway!

Shard

Nice idea, but $50 million is a drop in the lake by Toronto standards.

dbd33

Last time I went it involved alcohol at the, then, longest stand up bar in the world. The bar was called Lulu's and was an old K-Mart store. There was a band, a local attraction, name forgotten now. I left my brand new wooly jumper there and had to sneak out and buy an identical one so my then wife didn't find out. I've lost the jumper along the way, Lulu's is gone and I haven't subsequently felt the need to go back to Octoberfest. We do go to the Christmas market with skating and mulled wine though, that's engagingly Germanic; lots of mechanical things.

dbd33

On that note, when did Diwali and Guy Fawkes Day blend together? They were separate events when I left. Now there seems to be a good number of Diwali/Bonfire events at home. Even the **** had a combined celebration on the weekend.

Shard

Haven't noticed it blended but will look out for that...sounds like a good idea! Certainly Diwali has become quite mainstream in the sense that most people know about it.

Partially discharged

I went to university in Waterloo so I've been. As dbd mentioned big events were held at Lulu's which was a former Kmart if you can imagine any place more dreary to drink Labatt's Blue than in a closed department store.

Most events are indoors due to the weather.

I do recall going to the Kitchener Auditorium one night during Octoberfest when it was 'university night'. Students bused in from all over Ontario as far away as Windsor, London and Kingston.

At the end of the night, a drunken obnoxious student from Queen's university in Kingston asked a group of other students which way it was to the bus heading back to Queen's. The helpful students pointed him to a bus labelled 'Western' (i.e London, Ontario) and he got on the bus none the wiser. Waking up in London Ontario wasn't on his bucket list I"m sure.

The connections to Germany seemed very loose when I went in the 80's. It was just an excuse to drink swill and do the birdy dance in a mass setting from what I remember.

Shard

Not exactly Marienplatz then.

dbd33

There are Diwali treats all over the office here today. I wondered if I should have brought in a Thatcher effigy and set fire to it, as one does on November 5th.

scilly

Kitchener does have a very strong German background to its history ..............

it was originally called Berlin from its founding in the mid-19th century. It was renamed Kitchener in 1916

No prizes for guessing why!


We visited there years ago, and enjoyed the area. I gather the first immigrants there were German Mennonites who moved up from the US around 1800. later immigrants came from Germany, Switzerland, etc.

DandNHill

That's interesting.