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New York! Take two! Got onto the bus with Jess at night no dramas, said a sad goodbye to Toronto and endured 10 hours of leg cramps and interrupted sleep only to wake up in the city that never sleeps! Unfortunately it wasn’t snowing or covered in a dusting of ice like I’d hoped, but it’s still New York.

I didn’t rate it that much when I first came, but I was super excited to be back. We taxied to the hostel then set out to Soho to start the reason we’d come (shopping). Spent a good few hours (and dollars) there, saw Union Square then caught the subway back to Columbus Circle, did some more shopping then trekked to Times Square and (surprise surprise) shopped some more, then headed to the Hard Rock Cafe for an early dinner – were told that it would be an hour and a half wait – so crossed to Planet Hollywood (essentially the same thing), got greeting by another mile long line, told the staff that we were only going to the bar for a drink, skipped the line and ended up sea-gulling a table and ordering food. Winning!

We then headed back to the hostel for an early night – we were unfortunately in different rooms which made making plans to get up at the same time difficult.

Day 2:

We rose early and bumped into each other on the staircase (our body clocks are obviously synced), had a cheap brekky at the hostel then caught the subway to Soho again where we got a psychic reading done. I really wanted to do it even though I don’t usually believe in that stuff. The psychic was pretty right on with everything though and said some crazy stuff. Was a worthwhile experience. Then we headed to Tiffany’s to meet Lauren from exchange. We waited for a good half hour for her to show up, got too cold and so went inside to browse. I ended up buying a ring, which I love.

We tried street meat (me a yiros, Jess a falafel), it actually wasn’t bad. Then we trekked for ages trying to find a Starbucks (surprisingly difficult) for the free wifi. We finally found one and tried to Facebook Lauren to find out where she was, but had problems, so we arranged to meet her a little later at a Starbucks in Times Square. By this time it was starting to get dark so we hiked ot the Rockerfeller Centre to see the ice skating and big Christmas tree. It wasn’t as spectacular as I thought it would be, but it was very shiny and colourful. I bought a ticket to go to the top of the Rock, and couldn’t go up for another two and a half hours so we headed to Times Square to try and meet Lauren. We ended up getting confused again and so I left Jess to go to the Rock and she went off to find Lauren. The top of the Rock was pretty cool, but cold. It was awesome seeing New York at night and the Empire State was visible which was pretty.

After another saga we FINALLY met Lauren (by about 9ish) and trekked for ages ending up at a Japanese place where the food was quite good and we got free wine.

Day 3:

Got up early again to quickly pack and then check out. Met another girl from exchange in the bathrooms, seems everyone’s coming here for New Years! Then once we’d checked out we subwayed to Columbia University, which was amazing...kind of looked like ancient Rome. And then walked through Harlem. Harlem wasn’t as ghetto as I thought it’d be but it was still pretty intimidating for two young white girls. There were people dancing in the street and music playing everywhere – definitely different out there.

We then caught the subway to the Upper East side to meet Lauren again, and we all went for the ‘best pizza’ in New York. It basically tasted like other pizzas I’ve had over here but was still tasty.

Needing to burn that off we trekked to Central Park planning on ice skating. We ended up walking along the road from one side to the other because we couldn’t find the entrance. Fun times. We finally found it though and were all excited...until we saw the line. It was HUUUUUUUGE and by this time I needed to do a few things before leaving so we unfortunately didn’t get a chance to ice skate there. Devo.

So we walked to Times Square and I bought a new bag because my suitcase was overweight, and purchased a few souvies along with it. Said a quick goodbye to Lauren and headed to the Hostel to grab my things (did a quick shop before), hauled my stuff down the subway steps got told the subway was delayed (by this stage I was pushing for time) so lugged my stuff back up the stairs and hailed a taxi.

Got to see Zach at the bus station and said a goodbye to him and then boarded. I didn’t have time/forgot to pay for my extra baggage but luckily my naive acting paid off and the bus driver let me go without paying for it. Phew. The bus was chockers on the way to Syracuse then most people got off so I had two seats to spread out on.

Got into Toronto in the wee hours of the morning and was lucky enough to wait in the freezing cold (-2) for the airport transfer, and then was off to the airport ready to head to Vancouver!

The final stretch..

Once again the month has absolutely flown by. December was a whirl of exams, uni ending, goodbyes, well-wishes, tears and of course parties.

The Eaton Centre became very festive and put up a huge Christmas tree and ginormous reindeers all over the place. Store windows became a part of the ‘Winter Wonderland’ display where stores competed to have the most Christmassy looking windows. Lakes froze over and ice skating rinks popped up all over the place. Just down from our apartments what was a skate board park in Summer turned into an ice skating rink (which we ended up on many times before heading out). The Toronto Christmas markets opened and we were introduced to the Canadian world of Christmas. It rained almost non-stop and I had to come to the awful realization that not one pair of shoes I owned would keep my feet dry/were winter sensible.

Classes ending was quite sad. The beginning of the end in a way. I did quite well (2 A’s, 1 B and a C), and got an offer from my photojournalism prof to keep sending him my work and to keep in contact. My only exam was for Politics and it was multiple choice. Too easy.

One girl on exchange organized a flag signing for everyone, so we all have fun souvies to take home. We found out about Dancecave (a club/bar) and became frequenters there (or as much so as we could). Farewell parties started popping up and people started leaving either to go home or to start travelling. It became really hard to say goodbye to everyone though because so many things were going on at once.

Zach organized a music shoot for a girl on exchange who is a singer, and I got to do stills photography. It was great fun and kudos to Zach for organising everything, I’m sure the end product will look amazing.

As we realized we only had a week left here, we decided to finally do the CN tower climb on one of the sparse sunny days. It felt good to accomplish something we had been meaning to do since day one.

Christmas was spent with those left at Primrose. One the 24^th we had a traditional Danish Christmas and two Danes cooked for everyone which was lovely. On the 25^th we headed back there after doing a small Kris Kringle with Jess, Zach and I and had an Aussie Christmas complete with ham, turkey and chicken. It was great.

Then the 26^th we finalized packing and got booted out of our little homes at midday. Spent the day bumming around Toronto, got one last feed of all you can eat sushi then headed to the bus station to head to New York!

Parlez-vous anglais?

Zach, Jess and I left for Montreal on the bus at around midnight hoping to get there in the early hours of the morning. We got to the bus terminal no dramas after a few quick goodbyes to those we hoped to see later in New York and boarded after a small saga with not having the reference numbers for our tickets. I was lucky enough to draw the short straw and sit next to a stranger (didn’t call shotgun fast enough) but it was fine. We got to the middle of nowhere and the bus started making beeping noises. The driver pulled over and no one really knew what was going on. The driver decided to keep going but pulled over a short while later, turned on the lights and informed everyone that at 2am our bus had overheated, we were 2 hours away from help and would have to wait on the bus (it was too dangerous to go outside – I’m assuming bears) until a new one came. Most passengers decided to do the sensible thing and sleep (as annoying as the situation was, it wasn’t anyone’s fault) but a few lovely Canadians decided to moan and complain for the entire time. Good times.

We got on the road again at about 4am and got to Ottawa with no dramas. There we had a quick stop (where we spent the entire time lining up for the next bus) and then we were on our way again this time to Montreal.

We touched down at about 10ish and were completely exhausted. None of us had gotten much sleep but after a few wrong turns, a meal and a subway ride we got to the hostel but were too early to check in so we explored the main street (Sainte-Catherine), came back later for a quick nap, headed out again for some quick dinner and to buy some snacks (after heading back to where we had dinner because Jess left her bag there – luckily it hadn’t been stolen) for an intense game of Monopoly later on.

The whole city is beautiful, freezing (average -10 degrees) and it’s surreal being somewhere that looks completely European but is in the middle of Canada. The first language is French, so everyone talks to you in French until you give them a funny look and then they speak stilted English.

Day 2:

Woke up early and headed out to explore Old Montreal. The weather was below freezing so we got excited by the frozen puddles and lakes. We walked through the Christmas markets, headed to the waterfront, to a few stores and then to the Notre Dame. It was much better than the one in Paris – not so commercialized. It was absolutely stunning. After a quick break and defrost at the hostel we headed to some of the (apparently) best poutine in Montreal. It actually was quite good but the concept is still filthy (cheese curds and gravy on French fries). The restaurant gave us paper placemats and crayons so we entertained ourselves until the food came. Later on we went on a bar crawl the hostel organized and there ended up being other aussies we were on exchange with in Toronto on it too, but because it was a Tuesday the bar was pretty dead and the drinks were expensive.

Day 3:

Our last morning brought the delightful news that the city was completely out of water, so showers and toilet use were a no. Grumpy and discouraged we plonked ourselves at Starbucks and cheered up a bit after some hot chocs and food. We then started the hike up to Mont Royal for a view of the city. Again we were excited by the amount of snow and ice so it took a bit to get up. The top was a great view of the whole city covered in a hazy layer of fog and ice. After playing around up there we hiked back down and headed to the main strip for a wander. After a late lunch we were all exhausted again so headed back to the hostel for another game of Monopoly and then got some dinner and went to the bus station. We got there super early so we could get good seats, waited for around an hour and a half, the bus arrived...and we were in the wrong line. Ended up all sitting separately after finding the right bus. Unlucky. After another stop in Ottawa though we got to sit next to each other on the next transfer.

Arrived back in TO at around 5am, caught a taxi and collapsed into bed. A great trip overall but absolutely exhausting.

If only the good things in life lasted so much longer than they actually do..

And if only we didn’t have to say goodbye. These past four months have absolutely flown by and I can’t believe it’s all come to an end. Although I’m devastated to leave, there are definitely some things I won’t miss about Toronto:

·         Navigating through Chinatown everyday to get to uni

·         Bad customer service in retail shops

·         Realising that dress isn’t as cheap as we first thought because we didn’t add tax

·         Craving junk food only to open up my cupboards and find nothing remotely tasty there

·         The crazy lady at reception

·         The crazy cat lady asking for a quarter every time we go to Shoppers

·         Tipping

·         The cold

·         The constant smell of weed

·         Spelling things with a ‘z’

But of course, those things are outweighed by what I will miss:

·         The people

·         The city

·         The Toronto crazies

·         Ryerson

·         The Canadian accent

·         Living in my little hair infested room

·         Thursday student nights

·         Awesome profs at Ryerson who have had amazing work experience and actually care about how well I do

·         Canada

·         Travelling for a few hours to New York, Mexico, Montreal and Vancouver

·         The snow

·         Ice skating

·         Queen Street

·         “Believe in the Lord” Man at Dundas Square -> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=un2X_zqH79E&feature=related

·         Poutine

I can’t believe that soon I’ll be back in little old Adelaide, with all the same people who said bye to me just over 5 months ago. This has been the best decision of my life to come out here and I’m so thankful to my parents who made it possible. Posts about my last month here as well as my trip to Montreal will come soon, just thought this little reflection deserved a place.

See you all soon!

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