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----------------------- 04.10.03 - 04.16.03 This is the tour Diary of Vadim, Yarah Bravo, First Rate & Gez. Location: USA and Canada Welcome to the 9th and final Diary of our tour. This week we've been joined by Sixtoo. And we've made it till the end.....Like the cartoon says - that's it folks! Thursday, April, 10th - Quebec City After a great show last night in Toronto, we had another mammoth drive of 9 hours all the way to Quebec city. Sixtoo left straight after last nights gig but he only managed to go like 3 hours before he had to stop and sleep! We just had to get up at 8 am after going to bed at 4 for a lovely drive. We have never been to Quebec city but it is known as a very pretty small city with a kind of castle/fortress and historic city walls, cathedrals etc.... and they talk just French. A little bit of a European feel. The weather had improved 180 degrees from snowy cold Toronto to a very warm spring Quebec. We were excited about the club cos it is named after a region in India - Kashmir(and not as the woolen material to make jumpers!) so we thought there might be great Indian food to be had! But we ended up having amazing crepes instead. For the show, not that many people turned up - perhaps just over 130, but then again the club did no visible promotion of any kind. However of the 130 people who did come, they were the loudest most hyped, amped 130 people we have ever seen. Perhaps its a French thing? Cause in France we get really good crowd response but we get big audiences as well. In fact France is right one of the best places for the Russian percussion to play in the world. Sixtoo rocked his set as well, he1s a great guy... At the end of the evening Firstrate was getting a lesson in French kissing from a local with a thing growing on her eye! ummmm Friday, April, 11th - Ottawa Before leaving Quebec city we went down town to have another crepe, they1re so delicious. And Yarah bought a pair of wicked classic shell toes. Pink with cracked leather, they will be worth some good money in the future. Then we headed back south and to the capitol of Canada, Ottawa. The club Babylon is a nice spot where everyone seems to have played from the Arsonists, Herbaliser, Beatnuts, The liks, X men, Z trip, Triple threat, A - trak, Craze, Non Phixion, Cardinal Official, Atmosphere and even Looptroop from Sweden. So we were in great company. Unfortunately the turnout was a bit wack but the people who made it were great. We met the biggest Ninja Tune fan. He had the Ninja logo tattooed on his arm. And we signed our names underneath it... and guess what, the next day he tattooed the names in. He sent us a photo and all. Now he has Dj Vadim, Yarah Bravo and First rate tattooed on his arm... quite crazy hey!! Saturday, April, 12th - Montreal The home and natural stomping ground of Ninja tune, North America. A beautiful city and very cosmopolitan with a French flair. We were all exited to be here. Especially Yarah since she has a lot of relatives here. The show was wicked!! Sixtoo and Blu Rum 13 opened up for us. Blu rum is so sick, I reckon he is one of the most slept on MCs out there. One of the best free style MCs i have ever met or heard but also ill with the written all done with conviction in a style of his own!!!! His set was tight as was Sixtoo's. P-love helped him out with some extra cuts etc and that was nice. Then we just had to rip it. Amazing response and standing ovation to a virtual capacity crowd. The whole Ninja fam came down to the show and so did Yarah's relatives. And what was great was that everyone stayed after the show and got down on the dance floor to cap off a good tour. It was off the hook!! This should of been the very last show but like we mentioned in diary no.1, we couldn't get into USA to do the Burlington show at the beginning of the tour. so we had one more show to go. Sunday, April, 13th - Montreal (Day Off) We slept all day! in the evening we chilled with Yarah's relatives, they are the sweetest. we went to the cinema... and chilled some more. Montreal is a great city... Monday, April, 14th - Burlinton - Vermont When we booked the tour, the idea was to have a couple days off at the end of the tour to relax and chill in Montreal. However in practise because of the US visa issue we missed the first show and our off day became a show day. We had driven throught Burlington and vermont on several occasions but never stopped untill this day! Its supposed to be a student town with quite a few hippies. Well it definetly felt like that except we met a really right wing nutter downtown who told us the evils of 'protesting' and the morality of 'fighting'... all we wanted to know was where a local indian restaurant was! Well the show turned out pretty good actually. A small club with an ok turnout especially in the light we drew as many people as Dj Spinna did on a friday and KRS 1 supposedly only had 200 people at his show and Kid Koala only 40 at his. The manager was very excitable trying to get us drunk and take all kinds of substances!. Drugs are baaaad - in our very best carson south park accent. We rocked the show though...Then we drove back to Montreal. Tuesday, April, 15th - Montreal (Day Off) Slept in till 3 pm and then we had to rush around like blue ass flies, cleaning, emptying, repairing (all the scrathes, scars, torn bits of trim etc...) on our hired van and returning it with an extra whopping 22000 km on top of what we were allowed. Lucky they didnt see the chip in the windscreen! We chilled some more, did some business at the Ninja Office... Met up with some people. Said bye to everyone.... We left loads of records, books etc at the Ninja office to ship back to England. Cause there1s no way we would be able to bring everything on the plane, yet carry it. Wednesday, April 15th - Flying Home! We hate this day simply cause its the day of waiting and carrying bags and no sleep. We have so much lugggage to put together, carry, argue at check in , pay exceess, wait 2 hours to board a plane, and then sit 7 hours. Air canada is one of the worst carriers we have been on. If you fly transatlantic- dont fly them unless you have too. Go Virgin or British Airways, Singapore Air... but never air canada, canada 3000, United, TWA, american ... they are all so ghetto. From the food, patronising service, leg room in economy (no we ain1t big pimping to fly business!), quality of food to the most important thing - entertainment. it sucks!! Well we got back safe to London...and had a massive group hug at the airport. Saying 3WE MADE IT2...We feel dizzy just thinking about what we've just done... 50 shows back to back with practically no days off... And we1ll do it again any day. Thanks to everyone that have followed our mission, that have come to our show, have spread our vibration and showing us nothing but love. You make it worthwhile... -- PEACE
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