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!

x

27 days left and I just wish time would freeze..

First snowfall in Toronto today! As I sit here doing homework (kind of), the school across the park is covered in white and little flakes are falling. ITS SO PRETTY!!!! I got a phone call from Jess as she was on her way to uni and she was so excited it was snowing. So i raced down in my pjs and a jacket and we tasted our first Canadian snowflakes!

The excitement lasted a while and we headed across to the park (after putting on a few more layers), but the wind was super strong and turns out the pretty snow was actually painful in our eyes. My feet froze but other than that it was cooooool.

Only just realised I’ve been super slack and skipped out on a blog post for the whole of November. So here it goes, I’ll sum up the month in this post..

Uni started wrapping up (sad), and soon we’ll no longer be students of Ryerson. It was unseasonably warm this entire month and some nights we just wore light jackets and were fine! :o.

I headed to Zach’s shoot early in the month for a documentary to do some work for photojourn. Was super fun and cool to hang out with film students. It was on a musician, so we got to see him jamming and then playing at a gig. Loved it.

A bunch of us heard LMFAO were coming to town so of course we HAD to get tickets. The concert was short and there were a lot of fluro-clad sixteen year olds around us. But it was fun - and they played sexy and I know it...which was all I came to see.

A few days later, we headed off to see Jamie Oliver. Expecting him to cook up a storm I was suuuuuuuuuuuper disappointed when I realised I'd paid money to come see a Q&A sesh. We got his cook book though - not that it'll do me much good. Hey Mum! I found your present.. :)

Jess, Jon and I went to a Ryerson hockey game. Which was AWESOME. The crowd was a disappointment. But ohmygod! Hockey players are so tough! That night we headed out with other Australians to a place called the Mod club – good night that was.

The next week me, Zach and a whole bunch of exchangers went to a Marlies hockey game (team just below the Maple Leafs) which was pretty cool, and I could finally cross “must see hockey game” off my Canadian bucket list.

We also had an ABC party which was organised by RISExC (Anything But Clothes) in a hostel that is close by. I wore a garbage bag. Highlights include: stuffing a whole bunch of people into Jon and Camellia’s room for pre’s, Zach covering the washroom in paper towel, and losing costumes on the walk home.

Toronto also has a big outdoor ice skating rink set up, so the day after ABC we headed out on that. Turns out I’m not a natural ice skater. Who knew! That night there were also fireworks and carols, quite cute.

Last night we had a flag signing, which Eliza came up with. We all got together armed with Canadian flags and markers and signed away! It was such a good idea, but really helped to sink in that we are all leaving soon :(

The weeks have gone so fast here and it’s so hard to believe that I’ve only got 27 days left in this city! It’s so sad, and I’m definitely not ready to go back home :(

Halloweeeeeeeeeeeeeeen

We were told that Halloween (which actually fell on a Monday) would be a huge party right through from Friday – Monday night. So, us excited Aussies gathered together some cheap costumes and got scaried and fake blooded up on Friday night where we were heading to our first pumpkin carving and then out on the town.

At the pumpkin carving we were the only group dressed up (around 7 of us), which was slightly awkward, but shame on everyone else for not getting into the spirit. After some hectic pumpkin carving (we made ours into Harry Potter) we headed to some pre-drinks at Neill-Wycik and then most of us went the uni bar to get our festive on.

Again we were the only ones dressed up. SHAME ON YOU TORONTO. But we had a good time anyways.

Saturday we woke up nice and seedy and headed to all you can eat sushi...which kept us full for the rest of the day. That night I stayed in but the others headed to Neill-Wycik again for a party.

Sunday a group of exchangers headed to the Toronto Theme Park called Wonderland where they had a Halloween Haunt thing on. I don’t even know why I got tickets because it was the scariest thing EVER. I was terrified the whole time and couldn’t bring myself to do one of the haunted mazes they had set up. Although while we were waiting outside a clown maze, this freaky looking guy started eying us off and so we moved, then he started chasing us (the workers were all dressed up in costumes) it was the FUNNIEST thing. Camellia got chased and was screaming so bad hahaha hilarious!

We went on a lot of scary adrenaline rides though, which I loved so that was fun. It was cool to be there at night though.

Monday we dressed up again and headed to a parade on Church St (the gay district) to see some trannies and what not dressed up, then we went to Primrose where everyone was having a party and then heading out for a guys birthday. The four of us who live at the Alexandra didn’t go out after Primrose but. We headed home after getting a bite to eat and then crashed into bed. Turns out the 31^st wasn’t such a big party after all.

....but what if we get attacked by a bear??

One mention of Algonquin National Park by Shauna a few days before the weekend and we were off on a spontaneous road trip to the outskirts of Ontario. Kudos to Jess for being 21 and driving on the wrong side of the road for 5 plus hours!

It’s basically a nature park in the middle of nowhere that people head to to see the fall colours. We couldn’t leave food out or in the tents or anything because of bears!!! :o

It was freezing, we camped, we built a bonfire (well, the boys did anyways), we ate cold food, it rained, it was pretty, we didn’t see a moose, we didn’t see a bear. Pretty much sums up the whole trip. We went there to see the fall colours. It was amazing. Much time was spent bonding in the tents and around the fire.

Highlights include: cranking the Biebs through the park to make our presence known, Jess unknowingly running into the boys toilets because she was so busting to pee and taking a random detour to a country fair and finding a field of pumpkins!!

Hola Mexico!

So Thursday night we didn’t sleep as we had to be up at 2am for a flight to Mexico! (via North Carolina) We got to the airport at some crazy hour, then were told that our flight had been delayed by 2 hours. The first thing to go wrong for the trip. Had to go through US customs in Toronto, so we spent 3 hours of our lives that we’ll never get back lining up for line after line to get through customs. We made it eventually and slept on the trip to NC.

North Carolina was...interesting. We flew into Charlotte and the southern drawl was so bad. Think ‘Hey yaaaaaa’ll wanna get some fooood?’ At that airport I invested in a travel pillow and a blanket. Best. Decision. Ever.

Our flight to Cancun was cruisey. Jess slept most of the way, I was too excited. We got in and it was HOT. So nice. Although we felt out of place in our jeans and cardis.

We got through Mexican customs with ease and then found our shuttle and were headed to our resort with some loud Americans. 

Our resort was amazing. We met up with 7 other Australian girls, had a few drinks, went to the beach and had some sushi for dinner. LUXURY. Our deal was all inclusive so everything was free. Amazing.

On day 2 we had a tour planned to do adventure stuff and see some ruins, so we planned to get up at 6am. Plan fail. My alarm went off an hour early (time difference), so I turned it off thinking Jess’ would go off. Turns out her phone had gone dead. So we woke up to a phone call from the front desk at 7.25am telling us our tour was there. We were supposed to leave at 7.15am. Whoops. We ran around pulling on any clothes we could find and flew down the stairs. We made it in time regardless. Just weren’t winning any friends that day.

Despite that mishap, the tour was so awesome. We drove about 3 hours to the jungle and went abseiling. We then hiked for a bit and went zip-lining through all the trees. After that we headed to a river and did some kayaking, then hiked again through the jungle. We were told to look out for cougars and tarantulas. WHAT!! We arrived at an underwater cave where we were blessed by an old Mexican man, then headed underground. The water was beautiful and not that cold, surprisingly. Apparently it is some people’s drinking water though. Gross. After that we headed off to have a traditional Mexican lunch. The food was beautiful and made by cute little Mexican women.

We then headed off to see some ruins, which were amazing. They’ve been standing for thousands of years and there was a human sacrifice bench and everything. We saw where they used to play ball games and our tour guide explained how the loser of the game was fed to the lions. We walked through the jungle to see a famous ruin (or could catch a bike taxi for $10) but we got lost and so had to turn around and walk back.

We headed back to the hotel and had our first dinner with the girls, then showered and headed back down to have our second dinner. Lol. We were hungry okay!! That night we had a few drinks at the resort bar, which had an acrobat spinning around in the air. Was quite cool. We ordered room service that night just for fun as well. We asked for everything on the menu but they said ‘No no! That too much!’ Damn.

The next day we spent lazing around at the beach (BEAUTIFUL!) and in the pool. Which had a swim up bar! We met a few Americans there and one guy from Toronto. Crazy! Then one American came up to us and said he could tell we were from Adelaide by our accents. Now THAT was weird.

We had another free lunch and then headed to the shops to find some souvies. It was a cool little outdoor mall with a river running through it. We then headed to dinner with two of the other girls, we planned to go out into the city but chicken out so stayed at the resort bar. It was so dead but we made friends with the bar tenders so it ended up being fun.

Got up early to have a huge brekky then say goodbye L. It was so hard to leave the beautiful, warm beach. But we go to our shuttle right on time (thought it was later than it actually was) and our flight out of Mexico was all good. UNTIL. We flew into North Carolina needing to connect to Philedelphia before heading back to Toronto and because the US is crap at life, we had to go through customs (even though we were in transit). That took FOREVER. Heaps of flights came in at once so we were waiting for the good part of 2 hours. Anyways, it took so long that we missed our connecting flight and the only one we could get put on was for 9am the next morning. This was at 2 in the after noon. SO we were told we wouldn’t get accommodation because the delay wasn’t the airlines fault, but because we are poor we couldn’t afford anything ourselves, so night at the airport it was! We were starving and so ordered pizza to the airport, then bundled up (thankgod for the travel pillow and blanket) and camped out.

Our flight out the next day was one time, thankfully. And we finally got into Toronto and home. We missed classes and lost marks for not handing up assignments though, so thankyou US Airways. I will not be flying with you again.

2 months in and it feels like 2 weeks..

26^th Sept - 2^nd October

ANOTHER WEEK GONE! Crazy.

Monday – Nothing of quality. Mondays are boring in Toronto. I have my photojournalism class. Again, I sat in the wrong seat and was picked to be the model for the day. Good times. I had a DSLR right up in my grill for half the class while my T.A (teacher) took pictures to blow up on the big screen. Awesome.

Tuesday – Feature writing day! For this class I have to do an assignment on a place and interview people etc. I had SO much trouble getting the rights to access a homeless shelter so ended up changing my idea last minute. We have assignments due every week for it, so that was slightly stressful. I feel like they have more of an idea how to make sure students don’t leave assignments to the last minute here. Like, they have progress reports. I think it’s really effective. Met Shauna for lunch today because she was a bum and missed the lecture. It’s a good thing she came to keep me company otherwise I would’ve been a loooooooner.

Kickboxing was tonight as well! We paired up and used the hand things that you punch. My knuckles were a bit bruised after, but it was fun.

Wednesday – Critical Issues day. We formed groups for an assignment that’s due soon. We have to plan a documentary for an issue in journalism. Too much work for my liking but fun all the same.

Thursday – Thursday is usually the day we go out but this week it just wasn’t meant to be. After class we bummed around in Camellia and Jon’s room watching 16 and pregnant. It made us sleepy and hungry so we stayed in haha.

Friday – At night Zach made the trek over and the five of us pre-drank in Jess’ room, played kings and bantered. Around 11ish we headed over to Shoeless Joe’s (a sports bar) – IT WAS FREEZING! There we met the other exchangers and a million other Aussies to watch the grand final! It was so weird having so many Australian accents around, made me definitely not want to come home – I just love the Canadian accent too much! We bailed before the end of the match, got some poutine and went home. Clearly we are not true Australians.

Saturday – I spent the morning tracking people down for interviews for my feature story. I got a few and only got rejected once. Success! At night we prepared for an event called Nuit Blanche, which is an art festival where a whole section of the city gets shut down and various art pieces are displayed. It literally runs from 7pm until dawn and the art pieces are big walk through things. The coolest thing I saw was a pre-recorded 90’s sitcom thing was being shown on a wall outside and inside they were filming and one person was playing the part of the dad and it really looked like they were actually part of the show. It was freezing and by 1.30am we headed home just to de-frost. BUT it was amazing to see.

Sunday – Laaaaaazy day. Spent the majority of the day at the gym and shopping lol. The weather is SO COLD. Feels strange to think that under two months ago I was in 45C heat. Miss it.

Oh and! Happy 20^th  for today (Sunday) Evie! xxx