Unplanned stop on the tour: Your blogging correspondent had the privilege of being briefly detained by the Toronto Police for suspicious photographic activity at the security perimeter of the G20 meeting area.
As an engineer and awed by the logistical and construction challenges of such a massive temporary security infrastructure, yours truly was wandering around the city, curiously and innocently documenting the dichotomous landscape, taking pictures of beautiful Toronto landmarks with so much concrete and steel in the foreground.
According to the detaining officer, the "eye in the sky" had spotted suspicious activity and, after being followed for an undetermined amount of time and detained in a hotel lobby restroom, the suspect was searched, questioned, identified, verified, and enjoyed a suspect-officer picture sharing session of all content on the digital camera in question. The suspect's story was then verified with the other members of the traveling party after which it was decided that, yes, tourists tend to take pictures of interesting things. And, as the officer stated that the police were operating under the War Measures Act with due process temporarily suspended, more photographic prudence would be wise.
But to be fair, the officers involved were quite friendly and our dinner was only delayed by about fifteen minutes. And dinner was delicious -- freedom never tasted so good.
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