Student Protest against Tuition hikes

I still have the chants ringing in my ears. I've been in a number of protests over the last few weeks, what with the strike, but this one topped them all. Students were bussed in from across the province to protest Charest's proposed hikes in tuition fees. And despite the pouring rain, the numbers were impressive.

It started, at least for me, at the gates of McGill, where I've been picketing these last 11 weeks with MUNACA (McGill Non Academic staff union). Several thousand students joined MUNACA strikers and marched down McGill College, where they joined a bigger crowd of Concordians at St Catherines, and marched together toward Berri, and there joined the French Universities and all those that had been bussed in.

Anglo Uni's on St Catherines

If I'd thought there were a lot of students on the first march (more than the 2k strikers I've gotten used to), I was flabergasted by the sea of people in the park at Berri. People spilled onto the surrounding streets, watched carefully by squads of police on bikes, and a section of mounted police. I'd lost my pack of strikers at the beginning, so I wandered about getting photos.

After ducking into the bus station to answer nature's call, and thinking the march would head along de Maisonneuve, I headed towards the north end of the intersection at Berri and deMais... to find myself surrounded in news cameras and a large white banner. A quick question from one of those volounteers with a bright orange vest (there were also a large team of medics and organizers, also brightly identified in vests; the ones in orange traffic vests directed the flow of people) told me that we were heading north: I had accidentally wandered into just the right spot! Soon the orange vests organized us into a line, and I ended up just behind and on the right side of the white banner; In a spot perfectly visible to the news cameras that filmed us slowly matching forward. Oops (I'm not usually much of a fan of being in front of a camera).

I was standing (except for briefly in this pic) by the `Hausse = Sauce` sign

With the press of people, I was more or less stuck in that position as we marched up Berri, under the underpass, took the first left, then left again on Parc to Ontario. At Ontario I was finally able to shove myself free, and back to a position where I could be taking photos, instead of being the one photographed :) Not that I really minded being at the heart of the action.

As we marched by, all sorts of people were looking out their windows at us. Mostly we marched past offices, where people where standing by the windows in groups to see the sea of students flow by. I saw some people on balconies taking pictures. My favourite by far was the daycare, where an entire class of 3-4 year olds, cute as buttons, had their faces pressed up against the windows to see, and waved at us! The students and protesters joyfully returned the waves, full in the knowledge that we were marching for those children, and all the others in Quebec.

From Ontario, we merged onto de Maisonneuve, and marched back to McGill college, where the group massed again, and there were speeches. I'd run forward here to get shots of the final approach, so I found myself Right in front of the stage, and the massive amps were loud, even for me (being used to noisy picket lines and rallies with the strike) and my boots were leaking badly.

I pushed through the crowd and crossed Sherbrooke to the Roddick gates. As I did, the mounted police trotted up and formed a line to the side. They didn't stay long in formation, as they were soon needed to clear enough people from Sherbrooke for traffic to get through. From the north side, I finally spotted.my picket captain... on the south side. So I went to wait for the mouted police to stop letting traffic through, and form up two by two to block traffic so that the crowd could again spill across the street. I followed, ducked through a line of armoured cops (not the riot squad - helmets and truncheons only), and gleefully joined up with my picket line.

While we waited for more of our line to find us, we heard two gunshots, about a minute apart. Ingrid quickly decided to move us out of that vicinity to our original gathering place, where we heard another shot while signing out. I suppose I could have gone to investigate... but I was cold and squelching in my leaking boots and wanted very badly to be home and dry.

I'm hoping things stayed peaceful. As I was leaving, people were moving away from the rally in groups. The McGill students continued their march up McTavish, presumably to finish somewhere on campus. The police presence was huge, so I'm sure any minor problems were take care of as efficiently as the mounted police had taken control of the traffic.

Yours truly leading the pack