It really doesn't feel like Christmas.

I cannot believe it's Christmas this week. It doesn't feel like it, but maybe that's because I don't have plans and am more looking forward to the New Year's celebrations we have organised, which will be a combined Christmas/New Year thing.

But I must backtrack a week. Last weekend I went to San Francisco to see my Aunty Gail and family friend Lee. I honestly can't remember the last time I saw them, it's probably been a good 4-5 months!! At first I wasn't so sure on the decision to go down, with this new job, but then thought, "screw it!". They're so close and I couldn't really pass up the opportunity to visit while they were on this side of the world.

So after a late night flight on the Friday I was back in San Fran. The last time I was there was in 2007 (!!!) and prior to that it would have been about 1995 or 1996. It seems to be a visit of every 10 years!! It is such a cool city and the people are so friendly. They rented an apartment near the Palace of Fine Arts and it was so nice being in a residential area, rather than the downtown or touristy area. The first day was a really nice day, we went to their local bakery for a decent coffee then walked to get a cable car. We stopped off at the Fairmont then looked at a church nearby. Following that we headed to downtown San Fran and watched the ice skaters, a very cool acapella group and tried to see how many people were dressed up in crazy Santa costumes because it happened to be Santacon that day. (where people just bar hop dressed as Santa.) We then headed back to their favourite French cafe that had the most delicious food and chai lattes. We ate there both days.

As the weather on the Sunday was predicted to be raining (great, I left Vancouver to go to SUNNY California) we decided to go for a walk down towards the Golden Gate Bridge. It was a lovely arvo and a beautiful sunset. Also there were surfers under the bridge!! Crazy! The following day was Gail's birthday so we went to our usual places and did a bit of shopping on another local street. Unfortunately it was a short day for me as I had to leave for the airport around 2.45pm. But stupid me, did not check the flights as my flight was delayed for 2 hours (!!) so I hung out at the airport when I could have had more time with them. Oh well. It was so good to see them and have that little piece of home over here. I guess it's hard at this time of year when you can't be with your family for the holidays.

Oh and in other news Miley Cyrus was on my flight to Vancouver!!! I tried to take a sneaky photo but it was so blurry. I could not make a living as a papparazzi!

Not a lot else happening, just going out really and hanging out with friends. Like I said, I think I won't be doing a lot for Christmas. I have 10 days off (yippee!) so will be chilling out. There is a plan to learn to ski, so hoping that'll happen next week. Might hit the Boxing Day sales and then before we know it 2016 will be here! Crazy!

I've only just realised that I haven't been home for Christmas for a few years so really missing the hot Aussie Christmas this year.

No doubt there'll be another update before the end of the year, so until then, Merry Christmas!

Homesickness and hockey.

The last couple of days I've really missed home. It’s such a strange feeling. It started a bit on the weekend when I didn’t feel like going out and doing anything.

Don’t get me wrong, I love being here but right now I’m really missing the familiarity of home and my friends and family. I guess perhaps it’s because I’ve been away for 2 months already and it’s been go, go, go since I left and I haven’t really had a chance to slow down. I don’t know it’s hard to explain! But in saying that it was about 2 months in when I was away previously that I felt homesick.

This visit to San Francisco this weekend couldn’t come at a better time. Right now I need to see someone from home and I’m glad I’m catching up with my family. Just need a bit of a recharge I think. Maybe it’s also because it’s so close to Christmas too.

In other news, my friend Jess and I went to the ice hockey and saw the Vancouver Canucks play the Boston Bruins on Saturday night. Jess scored free tickets through work! Apparently there’s a fierce rivalry that dates back to 2011 when there were riots after the hockey final and Boston beat Vancouver. Anyway, all I can say is thank goodness we didn’t pay for tickets, as the Bruins defeated the Canucks in a pretty big way…. 4-0. We ended up leaving before it finished to beat the crowds. We had no idea about the rules…just that they needed to get the puck into the net.

We were excited though as within the first minute there was a fight which led to a penalty for each team. Also later in the game one of the Canucks hit a Bruins player in the balls with his stick! (and it was his hockey stick for all you dirty minded people.) Unfortunately, we missed seeing this as I think this happened after we left. I read that the player was fined $5000 but he said he would do it again! Haha!

Sorry Jess, I’m throwing you under the bus (again!). As we have no idea about rules etc when the Bruins scored their first goal, Jess said “That was a good try”. Hahahaha! We both cracked it! It’s hockey Jess, not rugby league!! We’re really not sports watching people!!

I think if the Canucks played better it might have been more enjoyable. They’re good anyway, Jess and I don’t skate (I don’t know about Jess but I’ve never ice skated before!) so we were impressed with their skating skills and the way they control the puck. But because they had no chance of a comeback there was no point in seeing the rest of the game. It was a good night!

December...where is the year going?

The weeks are just flying by!

I’m going to try and write about my weekends/weeks regularly as the weekends have been so much fun lately and I feel it’s important to record them. :)

Anyway, as of last Friday night/Saturday morning I had absolutely no plans on the weekend. Except to go out on Saturday night. So I thought I would be good and go to the gym. A couple of the girls that I see regularly at the gym said they go on Saturday mornings because one of the really good instructors, Mariette, takes both the Pump and Attack classes. (I never miss Mariette’s Tuesday night Attack classes if I can’t help it).

I get to the class and just before it starts, the same 2 girls invite me to go to brunch afterwards. Sweet! That is just what I need, especially after 2 hours of exercise! (1 hour weights and 1 hour cardio and 845 calories burned!). We went to this awesome little café on Hemlock and 7^th called Slickity Jim’s. If you’re in Vancouver, go now! The brunch is amazing!

By the time we left there I had got a text from my friend Olivier to say that he and some others were going to Granville Island and would I like to meet up! Couldn’t say no. After a quick shower and change I was out the door again. I love my area as I’m within walking distance of Granville Island…but on the way I walked down the shopping precinct of Granville St (only 10 min walk from my place) and did a spot of “Black Friday” shopping. Bought a couple of awesome jumpers from Roots. Thank you Canada for adopting the Black Friday sales.

Anyway, new clothes in hand, I met up with the guys at Granville. We wandered around a bit and looked at the shops and bought some food for dinner – tuna steaks and salad. Olivier had this awesome recipe from his hometown – Montreal. It was delicious. Oh I can’t forget the oysters we had for an entrée (or as they call it here an appetizer) . Fancy!

Side note for the Aussies if you haven’t been to the States/Canada before: entrée = appetizer, main = entrée and dessert = dessert. The entrée thing still confuses me. I don’t understand why the main meal is called an entrée…anyway!!

We had a great night, awesome dinner and thanks to Adam and Ali, I learned how to play Cribbage. It took a while but got the hang of it in the end! Dinner was amazing and the company was good too. After getting home, it was 10pm and I was still planning on going out to meet some other friends! Although Nanna Nicole was starting to rear her ugly head, I sucked it up and went out. Had an awesome night just catching up and hanging out. Next minute it’s 3am and the bar is turning on the lights, a signal to kick us out. We had some sustenance (ie kebabs) and all headed home around 4am. Thank goodness there are night busses that go near my place although I still had to walk 10 minutes to get home and the temperatures would have easily been below 0!

After a nice sleep in till about 11am, it took a while to get up and get going. It’s not the hangover that affects me it’s the lack of sleep! (Actually I didn’t really have a hangover! Woot!) I had made plans to meet up with my previous landlords, Sue and Jeff for coffee. I lived in their basement for pretty much the whole time I was in Vancouver last time so it was great to catch up again. They still had a bag of my old clothes that were supposed to go to charity that they gave back to me. It was like an early Christmas! (although some clothes will still be going to charity!!).

I then met up with my friend Jess to go to the movies, we saw “Secret in their Eyes”. It was ok. It had Julia Roberts, Nicole Kidman and the actor from “12 years a slave”. I wouldn’t rush out to see it.

Nek minute. Weekend is over. How does that happen???

But…that’s not the only excitement that happened this week. A group of 12 of us booked to see the Cirque du Soleil show that’s currently in town, called Kooza. It was fantastic. Some of the acts had us all on the edge of our seat. It was a brilliant night. I’ve been lucky enough to see 5 Cirque shows now and each one is so different. You can’t compare them!

Phew. What a week. Who knows what this weekend will bring? Wait, plans have already started to be made! Catching up for sushi with friends tomorrow night and Jess scored free tickets from her work to the Canucks game on Saturday night. Should be a ball as we have no idea what the rules are!!

Next weekend I’m off to San Fran to catch up with my Aunty Gail and family friend Rosalie. They got an awesome flight deal from Aus and are there for 3 weeks! Too bad I can’t take any more time off work but I can’t wait to see them as I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye before I left.  Then it’s one weekend then Christmas. CRAZY!!!

Settling in.

Far out. 3 weeks since the last blog post. Sorry! Been busy working and socialising.

Still have remnants of my cold. This cough is sticking around but that hasn’t stopped me from going to the gym, hiking and catching up with friends. I have only had one quiet weekend at home so far, so that was nice. Although in saying that, I did do the Grouse Grind that weekend and I’m so glad I did as it has since closed. The weather has been quite nice, very cold and it’s supposed to get colder this weekend!

The weekend that just went I did 2 hikes, one to Crystal Falls in Coquitlam and the other to Norvan Falls in North Vancouver. Both were fun!

The hike to Crystal Falls wasn’t that hard (it was only about a 6km return trip), however we made it hard by climbing up the hills near the waterfall. Almost reminded me of the Grouse Grind! It was a great day, we even saw deer! Excitement plus. We finished the day by chilling out in the pool and hot tub. To me it’s so weird swimming in winter but I guess that’s because our pool back home is outside and we only go in when it’s hot.

The next day, the same group of us (minus one who had to work) went to Norvan Falls in North Vancouver. We did this one in such good time considering the signs said it would take 6 hours as it was a 14km return hike. We did it in about 3.5 hours including having time to stop at the waterfall. We were taking advantage while it’s sunny. It’s pretty cold though!

Both these hikes were very beautiful and different from each other.  I love that you can just drive half an hour and go for a hike with such beautiful scenery. I think I would hike every weekend if I could!

On Saturday night I caught up with my friends Rangolie and Rolie. I have known them for about 14 years now. It’s absolutely crazy that we have managed to stay in touch and see each other, despite the distances. May as well tell you the story of how we met.

Way back when, in 2001, Mum and I were heading to Vietnam for a holiday and we had a stopover in Bangkok. We chose these rows of seats to sit and wait and this Indian family, Mum, Dad and twin girls sat opposite us. We started chatting to them and it turned out the girls were around my age!  They were heading to India for the first time since they moved to Canada. I don’t know how long our stopover was but talking to them made it go so quickly. We even have a photo of our first meeting (it’s somewhere back at home and it’s never seeing the light of day!) and we kept in touch ever since. We’ve written letters, emails, had MSN chats etc etc. When I came to Vancouver in 2007 for a week we caught up and then when I moved here in 2013 we caught up off and on during the time I lived here. It’s so lovely having friends that no matter the distance or how long it has been since you’ve seen them that nothing changes. I’m so lucky to count both Rolie and Rangolie as these types of friends. I really hope we can catch up more this time around.  

After a very full on weekend, I caught up with my other friend Alice who wanted to see the new James Bond movie. Why not? So I went along. It was great! Very action packed and enjoyable.

Last night (Tuesday) I was invited to go see the final instalment of The Hunger Games. Not one to miss out on an opportunity to catch up with friends I accepted…even though I had never seen any of the movies before! Honestly, I really didn’t think they would be that good, however with the knowledge that I would probably go to the movies, my task on Monday was to completely catch up! Luckily I live really close to work and I usually go home at lunch, so in my lunch break I started the first movie. Then I also happened to finish work early so went straight home and finished the marathon. More than 6 hours of Hunger Games later I was caught up! I’m so glad I saw them before seeing the final movie as I would not have had a clue. I do recommend the series. I should probably read the books now!

Oh, speaking of wildlife (not really) on my way downtown last night I saw 2 raccoons! I was really worried they were going to get hit by a car as they kept going on to the road, but I didn’t know how to approach them to get them away from the road or even if you should? Apparently they have rabies? Snakes, spiders, lizard, toads, I know how to deal with but raccoons? No. I walked past them and they darted into the bushes. Thank god. I really hope when I walk back down the same street tonight that I don’t see dead raccoons on the road. They’re pretty cute with their little eye masks.

Animal count so far this trip: squirrels – tick, skunk – tick, deer – tick, raccoons – tick. Need to see a few more scarier ones…like moose and bears. Maybe in the summer.

Not a lot else to update, who knows what this weekend will bring, but I know that it’ll be bloody cold!

(almost) 3 weeks in.

Cannot believe I've been here for 3 weeks already. So much has happened!

I have survived my first week of work (yay!) but I have also had a cold for the whole week too (boo!).

Basically my job is a program assistant for the second year medical students. So this involves program coordination including generating the student timetables, obtaining learning materials from the lecturers, posting it online, organising the print of materials and more. It's a bit hard to explain. It doesn't sound like much but it's a lot of planning ahead and being organised! I can tell you I have been busy every day!!

Hopefully the next week will be better as I start to settle in more. I'm so glad I moved after I found the job because (no joke) it is literally a 3-4 minute walk to work. If I get another job down the track I won't know what to do with myself in terms of commuting! It's brilliant as I've been able to come home during my break some days and I'm able to get chores done! Like today I totally got all my washing done so I don't have to do it on the weekend!! (Really exciting adult stuff!)

In between, I've been going out some nights - to the gym and out with friends - but then realised if I want to get better that I should stay home. So last night and tonight are quiet nights at home...although in saying that I have now fixed my room to a state where it's liveable!

I did a lot of cleaning and sorting tonight, but now things have a place! I just need to buy a couple more things (like a set of drawers) and I'm set. Feels so good and smells good too. (It was a bit musty before.)

Anyway, now I can sleep in tomorrow, try and get my voice back (it's nice and husky) get these drawers and get ready to party with my friends tomorrow night! Life is pretty good right now!

I have a home!

Well, things seemed to have happened pretty quickly!

After finding out that I had got the job last night, my aim for the rest of this week was to find a place. As rentals here go by the first of the month and it was already the 26th I was determined to try and find a place pretty quickly. It only left me 5 days to find a place!

Honestly, I was freaking out a bit. I think I was a bit too chilled about it last week, only sending a couple of emails per day, but then realised after talking to the aussie couple whose place I checked out last week where they said they received hundreds of emails, I realised it was time to step up the game!

Knowing that I have a job though really helps, especially in terms of my budget and where to live. So I concentrated on the area around the hospital which is the area I'm staying in right now and the area that I'm familiar with as I lived not to far from here previously.

Today, was a beautiful day but I stayed in, determined to send as many emails as possible!  I have no idea how many I sent - maybe 10-15? It doesn't sound like much, but when you have to read through every ad that peaks your interest and then decide whether or not to email them it's very time consuming. I also got a bit desperate and put my own ad up on Craigslist!!

However, I heard back from 2 girls who I contacted after seeing their ad, both of whom had a 2 bed apartment and both were a 5 minute walk from where I'm going to work!

The first one, would be sharing with an Irish girl. She initially said she had someone but then later emailed to say it had fallen through and could I go and see the place. Of course I agreed!

The second one would be sharing with a girl from Vancouver Island. She sounded really cool but the thing that kinda put me off was that it cost a little bit more and you have to pay to use the washer and dryer. One of my personal checklists is to have an in suite washer/dryer. Kinda important when you sweat it out regularly at the gym.

Anyway, I had agreed to meet with both.

The first one was the Irish girl. It's a decent size, 2 bed apartment. "My" room was already partly furnished and has a queen size bed. She is so chilled and seems like she'll be really easy to get along with. What can I say though? Irish in general are very cool people. :)  She mentioned she had a younger girl who was also interested but she wasn't so keen on renting it to her. So right then and there I decided this was the place for me! It works for both of us! We're around the same age and I think it'll work out well.

I then emailed the other chick and said I have taken a room. I think sometimes you have to go with your gut and I think this will be a good place to live. Not only is it a 5 minute walk to work, it's a 10 minute walk to the gym and Zoe and Matthew (who I'm currently staying with) have already advised of many good places to check out around there.

I feel good about it and move in on Friday. It is such a relief to have found somewhere. I honestly wasn't expecting to find a place today but I'm glad I did!

Now I can enjoy the rest of the week and buy a few necessities before I move in. Looking forward to making the room my own!

Oh and if you happen to visit Vancouver there is a sofa bed (apparently it's a bit uncomfortable) or there'll be enough room in my room for a blow up bed! So come visit!!

By the way, my ad on Craigslist? I received about 10 or more emails responding to it! Honestly, I didn't think I would get any response, but Craigslist is a bit of a strange place. I can happily say, that I've now deleted that ad so I don't get any more emails!

I got the job!!

YIPPEE!!

It's time to celebrate! After the interview I went to this morning, I found out tonight that I got the job! It's a program assistant for the students who are in second year at the faculty of medicine at the University of British Columbia.

I start next week and can't wait to be busy again and earning a wage!

Now all I need is a place to live and I'm set. That will be my main aim for the rest of the week. Although I should enjoy my freedom while I can.