By Michael Baginski/ I first met Canadian travel industry legend Pat Dineen on a press trip to Greece in the early 1990s. We got to know each other sipping ouzo in a harbour café in a postcard-perfect Greek fishing village, moon overhead, the strains of bouzouki in the air, and Pat was talking about… sumo.
I’d soon learn that the Japanese form of wrestling he was passionate about was just one line item on a lengthy and varied checklist of interests that uniquely qualified the long-time editor of Travelweek Bulletin – the Blue Rag, as it was more commonly called back then – as both cultured and common.
Unassuming (he’d hate being called a “legend”), but immediately interesting, Pat loved football/soccer – his favourite teams were Inter Milan and unfancied Luton Town in the U.K, but he could also instantly inform, for example, where the obscure Swiss team Grasshoppers happened to be sitting in the standings at the moment. Yet, he also knew who was performing at the renowned La Scala opera house that season.
Beer or fine wine, all good.
A memorable story of mine includes travelling on a small group trip in Britain with Pat and a snobbish American college professor (not sure how he got on the excursion) who annoyed everyone to the point of exclusion. After a couple of days, Pat stepped in and saved us, happy to exclusively engage with the fellow on the coach and at meals for the rest of the week, easily and knowledgeably delving into art, opera, history, fine cuisine, and other interests the two shared.
At the same time, one of Pat’s prized stories was about being hosted at a football match in Glasgow with best friend Paul Vickers and having their names emblazoned on the scoreboard and later receiving a game ball.
He once went to Australia just for the weekend to see an Aussie rules match. And he was a runner who had competed in the Boston Marathon.
Over the years, Pat and I travelled together many times – where, to my astonishment, he never carried a camera, instead trusting the memories of a remarkable 45-year globetrotting career (which concluded with his retirement in 2015 after 27 years at Travelweek) to his expansive brain.
We were colleagues and competitors but rarely discussed business.
We talked football and sports; he talked sumo. We shared a love of beer and British pub culture. Once, after stumbling out of a Bloor Street establishment in Toronto, we witnessed a pedestrian get hit (but not substantially hurt) by a car that ran a crosswalk. The cop who arrived is still probably laughing at our inebriated recollection of the incident.
As reported by Travelweek, Pat passed last week at age 80 after a series of health issues that culminated in a cardiac arrest. But he was playing with house money: there was family history of heart disease and in 2002 he had a massive heart attack while dining in a Toronto restaurant, which he said he only survived because a doctor happened to be there and an ambulance was also in the immediate vicinity.
To be sure, like me, everyone who knew Pat is grateful for those additional years, and the years that went before.