Accents, line drying, and paths Oh My!

Someone recently asked me what the main difference between England and Canada was, and it took me a while to find an answer. Because really, when you get right down to it there isn’t much of a difference. People speak differently, and it’s a generally accepted practice to hang your clothes up rather than use a dryer (very strange), and the outlets are different. But people are pretty much the same. So it took me a while to come up with an answer, but once I did it was fairly obvious: Asian food.

In England, there is a distinct lack of good Asian food. I had a California roll at a Japanese restaurant the other day, and what with it being primarily imitation crab and rice I was expecting a fairly low price. Not so. £5 for a low-quality roll, dear god. I may never eat sushi here again. (Okay, that’s probably a lie. I just won’t eat good sushi.)

Speaking of food, I’m having a bit of cognitive dissonance between “chips” and “crisps.” Also between “dollars” and “pounds,” although on that I’m getting slightly better. Half the time I notice it myself. Obviously, the other half I don’t. Oh well. (JP: I notice it the other half as well.)

And continuing my misadventures with toes, the other night I slammed my foot into a wooden staircase. In my defense, the steps are a lot smaller here than I'm used to. Also it was dark, and the wood was a hard wood, and also did I mention that it wasn’t my fault in any way? In any case, all that was required was a band-aid and not a trip to the emergency room to reset a broken toe, so I’m ahead so far.

Yesterday we took a trip into the unexpected dilapidated factory that was on our route to the store. (Note: the last half of that sentence should be read with sarcasm quotes.) What should have been a 30 minute trip was instead a two hour operation that involved a lot of prickly plants. It started out well enough, with a brilliant observation from the obviously smart one.

Me: “That path looks well trodden. What’s that way?”

The answer that sensible people would know is “Nowhere good.” From there it went downhill. My shoes got very muddy, and there was an unfortunate incident with my jeans and some kind of red dye. Luckily, we arrived home with the newspaper that we’d first set off to get.

The rest of the day’s adventures included being confused by quiche, tin foil, and ovens in general. I really think that I should be smarter than this, but when it comes to cooking we are sadly at a loss. The one good thing is that we are fairly alright at cooking things out of a freezer, in a very general and loose sense of the word “cook.” (As I was typing this I was handed a plate of food that JP made. While it did come from the freezer, it’s also very good. It contains vegetables! Seems like I’m the only one that is completely hopeless.)

One thing I’ve noticed is that television here seems to be primarily a mixture of Top Gear and Friends. Top Gear is interesting, in that I know nothing about cars except that I like them fast and that the challenges are amusing. This is really all I need out of TV. The Friends thing was surprising. It’s taken the schedule that Seinfeld always had in Canada, which is to say that it was always on some channel three times a day. Right now there’s some random show on that I cannot recall the name of, but it looks like a soap opera. The word “chav” springs to mind; now all I need is a better understanding of the term.

Quaint English (blank)

My first week in England is coming to a close, and so far it’s been a busy one. I arrived on Saturday, and then on Sunday walked around Ipswich for a few hours. On Monday JP and I went into London and did a few touristy things, one of which was exploring the British Museum. I’d never been, and I’ll need to go back a few dozen times to see everything. By which time they’ll have changed all the exhibits, and I get to do the whole thing over again. That same day I opened up a bank account with the chattiest banker I’ve ever experienced. It took an hour all in, and probably should have been only half that. Later on we walked across the Jubilee Bridge into South Bank, and saw the Globe Theatre. It was very cool.

Tuesday a few of us went crabbing up in Walberswick. In a technological feat of amazingness, we used string to catch them and bacon as bait. Surprisingly, it worked well. We also had High Tea, and I have been assured that this is a traditional Tuesday pastime. I have unreliable sources though, so I am reluctant to trust this information. On Wednesday I indulged in yet another traditional English pastime and watched the football. We were playing Slovenia and I was showing my English colours in an attempt to not get lynched before my first week was through. Also because it gave me a good starting point when I proceeded to play silly games on a phone instead of watching the game. Luckily the people I was watching with didn’t take my desertion to heart.

Thursday JP and I went into London again, this time to meet up with a few dearly missed friends. Highlights of the trip included a street of books, the British Library (Beowulf! The Magna Carta! Illuminated Manuscripts!), Billy Elliot, and to finish we had dinner at the Texas Embassy. There was a meat scare, but four hours later we’re fine so it’s probably nothing. (Hopefully.)

Lowlights included the hotel, the hotel staff, the hotel fire alarm, and the hotel breakfast. To cap off that visit, as we left the hotel we saw a police car in the car park.

On the whole there were quite a few police around, more than I’d seen in Vancouver on a typical day. Then again, there were more people on any main street in London than you’d see in the busiest part of Vancouver on a Friday night. So that was exciting.

I’m enjoying the quiet of tonight and the promised quiet of tomorrow. It’s been a busy week, and I plan to enjoy the peace while it lasts. In the coming days we’ll be travelling to Cambridge to see if we want to live there, and after that who knows?

The end?

So here I am. Back where I started. The Vancouver SWAP Office. At least this time I'm not panicking about finding a job, well not in this country anyway.

It is amazing to think that I have about 24 hours left in Canada. I've really not had time to think about it; despite not being at work the past week has probably been one of the busiest since I arrived. Heading down to Seattle, racing karts in Richmond (eventually; the place was, shall we say, hard to find), packing my frankly ridiculous amounts of stuff away, the list goes on. I genuinely can't believe I've managed to fit all of my stuff into two bags. I knew buying those night vision goggles was a mistake.

It's been an incredible year. There really was nothing that could have gone better, and those tiny things that could were inconsequential. I'm not going to go through the highlights of the trip since that would be quite boring and also very lengthy. I thought I would go for a year and see somewhere different, experience new things and do something I'd never do again. And I did all that, but I also found somewhere I'd quite happily live for the rest of my life. Even if it does mean watching football at 9 o'clock in the bloody morning. Someone told me that I now call Canada 'home', which I disagreed with. It's not that it's my home, that will always be England, but it's that I connect more with the lifestyle here, I prefer the surroundings. And ultimately, I like it more. I'd love to come back and live one day, and with a bit of luck I will.

To everyone I've met in Vancouver; you're all awesome. I don't think I met anyone I didn't like and I will miss you all. Without all of you it would not have been the year it has and I hope I will see you all again very soon.

As for the future of the blog, I've sent Jen an invite to be an admin on the site. I may update it from time to time with travelling news so I doubt this will be my last entry. But Jen will be the first to admit that correspondence isn't her strong suit so if the frequency of her entries don't meet your expectations, you may want to lower your expectations.

Erm, yeah. That's it. Bye.

Decisions, decisions

This blog has been documenting my foreign affair for the last twelve months and it's been fun to write and on occasion, read back. I would say I've shared the good times and the bad times but there haven't really been any bad times. But as my last full week in Vancouver trundles into view it's soon going to be time where the adventure ends.

Or is it? I've not really considered what to do with the blog when I leave Canada so let's see what you think. So far the options I can see are:

- Keep writing it back in the UK. Not sure what it would be about though. Stuff that reminded me of Canada? "Hey I crossed the road in the right place today. Just like Vancouver".

- Stop writing. Interesting option, just keeping it as a record of my journey over the year. Kind of like a time capsule, only a really boring one.

- Use it as a holiday/travelling blog. Since I'm sure I'll do more of both it might be good to chronicle that stuff.

- Give it to Jen. Since she will be doing the same thing I did, except from Canada to the UK, it might be good to get a fresh perspective on British life.

So vote away my friends, vote away.

Another pointless day where I accomplish nothing

There's really nothing better than being in what is essentially a foreign city with time on your hands. I walked down a street downtown and I swear it was like I'd never been to Canada before today. The feeling of not having to be anywhere for a particular time is pretty good, I can tell you. Almost as good as going into work and smugging it up with your former co-workers about not having to be there any more.

I think I've found the quietest place in Vancouver. I wasn't sure of it before today but now I'm positive; it's Sears. I went to the one downtown yesterday and the North Vancouver location today and they are both mausoleums. The toy department looked like it hadn't seen a customer in months, even the Iron Man figures looked bored. The top floor is the discount department, otherwise known as Where Clothes Go To Die. Even the muzak couldn't make it up that far.

Contrary to the last paragraph I have done more exciting things than visit department stores. I've been finding out which hire car companies let you drive into the US (most of them), rediscovering the library, increasing my visits to Tim Horton's and unsuccessfully selling my stuff on Craigslist. Okay maybe not that much more exciting, but I refuse to mention going to see Prince of Persia because it was crap.

I promise it will get more interesting. Especially when I don't bother taking out the insurance on the hire car and drive into a fire hydrant in Burlington.

+1

So there is something I haven't yet shared on here, for a number of reasons, but I think the time has come. Some of you may remember a few months ago my blog entries mentioned how happy I was and despite the ranting I was saying what a good decision it was to come here. Well other than Vancouver being great there was another reason for that; her name is Jen.

To cut a long story short we've been going out for a few months, she is amazing and somehow I've managed to convince her that moving to the UK on a work visa would be a great idea. So 3 days after I arrive in the UK I will be heading back to the airport to pick up another immigrant (at 6:45am, thanks Jen).

As for where we will go and what we will do, we haven't honestly decided yet. Jen wants to see as much of the UK as possible, even though I've told her it's not like it is in Doctor Who. In fact it's especially not like Doctor Who, there are only so many quarries in Wales. Anyway I imagine there will be a fair amount of travel involved in the first few weeks before we do the boring stuff like get a job and place to live. Which is fine with me.

And yes, she likes Batman.

Funemployment

3 weeks until I leave and I think it's about time I made some plans for what to do with the time I have between finishing work and leaving on a jet plane. I know that if I don't do it now I will end up sitting on my sofa trying to find all the Gold Bolts in Ratchet & Clank. So far there are a few semi-definites:

- A trip to Seattle. It'd be a shame to be this close to the USA for a year and not go there at least once.

- Richmond Kart Track. It's been ages since I've been karting and now is definitely the time to go.

- Walk around the sea wall at Stanley Park again. I haven't done that in ages.

- Have the steak at Joey's again. It is seriously good steak. And the crispy mash is bloody awesome, and I'm not saying that just because Greg used to roll them. I never thought I'd know so much about crispy mash until I met that guy.

- Eat more Cheetos. Seriously, why haven't I been eating these before? They're amazing. Chester Cheetah was RIGHT.

- Pray for McDonald's dollar drink days to come around again. Come on!

Okay I'm straying into being stupid again so let's pull back. It's these freaking Cheetos man, they make me hyper.

Reading back over that there's a few things I'm doing again when I feel like I should be doing new stuff. Feel free to give me your ideas. Seriously, if you were in Vancouver for 2 weeks with money and time to spend, what would you do?