During a summer of intense global heatwaves, this particular day stood out. It was hot. Really hot. Here in Ottawa, Canada's capital city of 1.1 million people, the thermometer surpassed 41 degrees centigrade with the humidex. That's hot. So it was on this scorching August day that I thought I would take my three-year-old daughter on a transit trip to the Rideau Centre. It's a large mall in the downtown core. After all, the buses, subway, and mall were all nicely air-conditioned. OC Transpo, Ottawa's transit authority, had different ideas. I quickly realized that Canada has a serious transit crisis. Because it's summer, my kids are out of school. We took my daughter out of daycare because face it, that's too expensive (a completely different issue I'll tackle another time). Thankfully we put our son in a day camp for two weeks. My wife was working full-time for the feds. It was just my daughter and I. Daddy and daughter time! We spent the week hanging out.
Author and award-winning journalist from Canada.