During my one-year sojourn there, it treated me kindly: I attended one of its fine universities; found a well-paying part-time job; enjoyed its ethnic cuisine, its world-class museums and other cultural institutions; and took advantage of its efficient public transit system.
Its streets were clean, its residents polite, and its public amenities were in perfect order. Nonetheless, I wouldn't care if I ever laid eyes on the place again. Toronto, you see, is like the one-night stand of Canadian cities. Many who visit for work or pleasure leave it with a feeling not of intense like or dislike, but merely a sort of benign indifference. It is ethnically diverse, safe, well-governed, and eminently liveable. Famed travel writer Jan Morris aptly damned it with faint praise a decade ago, writing that living in Toronto was like "capturing second place in the lotteria of life".
Put another way, in a country culturally disinclined to use or inspire superlatives, except in reference to its geography, Toronto is the least superlative of all.
Why this is the case is a puzzling matter. Toronto's power should at least earn it respect, if not affection. Despite the phenomenal growth of Western cities like Calgary, or the highly Pacific Rim-influenced Vancouver, Toronto still has the edge as the social, economic, and political centre of Canada. Numbering 5 million people in the Greater Toronto Area, or the GTA, as its municipal officials so snappily call it, it is far and away Canada's largest city.
Its geographic location is ideal, squarely in the middle of the country in prosperous Southern Ontario, practically flying abreast of the American eagle just below, and only a couple hours' drive away from the capital of Ottawa, which it so often overshadows. Like a great sucking wound, it has the tendency of drawing Canadians in, lured by its resources, large universities, and job opportunities.
