P/S: I'm already at Montreal, this post was written on Wed 17 Dec, at 5+ pm, and is published late as there was no wireless network available.
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I'm at the Winnipeg International Airport now, writing this while sipping a mint chocolate latte and marvelling at the final Xmas cards and cookies received from our international friends and Laura's mum, who'd fetched us to the airport.
I quote Luyi, that life is indeed a journey that's homeward-bound. After being in this strangely foreign yet friendly place over the past 4 months, experiencing cold I never thought I'd survive, embarking on adventures and activities big and small alike, making the many close friends and reaching out to them, and reflecting and learning about life's little lessons - it's time to put a temporal resolution on it all and prepare for my final journey before heading back to warm and sunny island set in the sea.
My exchange experience had been wonderfully fulfilling, it's not easy penning my thoughts and summing up 4 months in a few paragraphs. I'm proud of myself for having stepped out of my comfort zone in many aspects, and for what I've learnt about myself during time. Prof Kong says she believes what one takes away from exchange is a direct result of what one puts in prior to the trip. Yes, I did not only study hard but also play hard as well, and Chris, I didn't mean to top my class for Small Business Management nor score 28/30 for my Personal Financial Planning project! Haha. I'm just glad I've balanced and cherished my time fully in Canada, and seek solace in that I'll be meeting some of my friends in Singapore again - Laura and Judy in SMU, Dylan in July, and possibly Julie and Lindsay in August. :)
My flight has been delayed for over an hour due to bad weather and icy-snowy conditions in Montreal, giving me the time to relax and catch up with myself for once after the rushed packing, thank-yous and goodbyes. There were so many people sending us off just now, people who'd come specially to see us for the final time before we meet somewhere again, sometime in the future. I will definitely miss my friends and the times spent with them. I'll miss Winnipeg too, no matter how cold and miserable it sometimes felt that I wished I were never here.. sigh.
Here's my travel itinerary for everyone's reference:
17 to 20 Dec - Montreal, Quebec province
20 to 22 Dec - Quebec City, Quebec province
23 to 24 Dec - Ottawa, Ontario province
25-28 Dec - Toronto, Ontario province
29 to 30 Dec - Niagara Falls (Canada), Ontario province
31 Dec to 2 Jan - Niagara Falls (U.S.), New York City
3 to 5 Jan - Vancouver, British Columbia province
A map of Canada if anyone'd like to picture my travel route
19 days before flying home, so I guess factoring in the time difference that'll be 19 to 20 days before touching down in Singapore! And Chris, you'd better be more excited receiving me than receiving Eric! Haha.. still can't believe we'll be on the same flight.. so cool! Heh. :)
last 3 nights in winnipeg 8:45 PMThe past few days had been a frenzy; it wasn't just the repeat episode of squeezing 4 months of memories into 2 suitcases. But yes, settling final travel itineraries, settling accommodation for Laura and Judy, tying up LTM admin issues for Prof and Edwin, calling home, writing Christmas cards and gifts too of course, for friends both here and back home.. all these kept me real busy after the exams. And I'm just glad I've managed to do it all, squeezing in some time to also catch up with everyone else before leaving home. So amidst all the adventures of getting lost downtown (and I got stranded yet again yesterday!), here's a summary of my last 3 nights in Winnipeg.
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Sun, 14 Dec - Christmas and farewell party at Laura's
Dinners at Laura's always entail tantalizing spreads and splendid decor, and what more for a double-occasion during this holiday season! Mr Fox started dinner off with a toast to all of us who were either going home or going away, and it was just heartwarming to have gathered together one final time in the heart of this festive cheer, soaking up the spirit of this season filled with love, friendships, joy and laughter. :)
I finally tried drinking egg nog for the first time in my life! Sweet, rich and creamy.. delicioso.
Feasting (our eyes and mouths) on the fascinating gifts and goodies that Mrs Fox'd specially prepared - the scroll-like thingy on the left is a Christmas cracker, something I've always wanted to see and have a go at popping! Haha.. I've wondered about them since I was young, when I was still in the age of Enid-Blyton fairytale short stories, heh. The cracker contained a Christmas joke, a pack of "Believe" xmas tissue paper and chocolate. The baby mitten held a Starbucks gift card from Mrs Fox as well. To the right is homemade dessert trifle and shortbread cookies, yummy!
The generational divide, haha - Laura's grandparents and Judy's mum and dad were at the party too
Left: A final picture with the Mexicans and Laura/Judy (before we meet again in January)
Right: The Fox Family, who has been superbly kind, hospitable and thoughtful in taking care of us. They'd integrated me into their family right from the very first time we met, and I'm just so thankful to have come to this very cold place with very warm people. :)
We'd gotten Mrs Fox a set of cute Christmas side plates as a token of appreciation, and in return we received lots of Christmas gifts from Judy and Laura's parents as well. Mrs Fox also gave me a special handmade snow-doll from a crafts shop, something she said will remind me of the cold weather and Winnipeg. :)
Christmas Riddles from the Christmas Crackers - scroll all the way to the end of the post for answers!
1) What do you call someone who's afraid of Santa Claus?
2) Which animal doesn't eat?
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Mon, 15 Dec - Exchange students' dinner at Earl's
Monday night we organized a final exchange students' get-together at Earl's on Pembina Highway, wasn't a very large gathering but uber fun all the same. For some of us, it was catching up in the longest time ever as everyone'd been caught up in the exam stress, and it was indeed a night of getting to know and re-know people better. :)
Chocolate lattes served in cups that looked like soup mugs
L-R: Sandy (Holland), Adriana (Mexican), Lindsay (AIMS vice-president ), Momo and Marcel (Germany)
Julie (France) and Ayumi (Japan), I wrote a letter to her entirely in Japanese!
Momo and Jin Wook (Korea), and all of us with the bubble-like decorations hanging overhead
An illegal Asian gangsters gathering at the AVM elevator landing, heh. Thereafter we hung out at the AVM Level 4 Lounge, chatting, making random videos and showing off judo/aikido moves, haha. :)
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Tue, 16 Dec - Farewell dinner at Natalie's, Get-together at Tavern
Tuesday started off quite horrid for JS and I actually. We were both seriously lacking in sleep due to the previous night, and had to stay up too to pack our luggages. It was all quite rushed as we'd planned to send a suitcase to Vancouver via Greyhound on Tuesday, but there just wasn't time to get started on packing. We'd needed to head to CIBC too to terminate our bank accounts and arrange for a wiring of the fund balance back home, so there were just too many things to settle in such a short period of time.
But yea, we kinda got stranded downtown, 2nd time for me in -48 conditions and strong winds, please try to imagine the 2 of us shivering in pain from frostbites and rolling our suitcases in snow. I think we looked really pitiful indeed.. bleah. Haha.. but yes, somehow we couldn't find the bus stop I'd searched on Navigo (supposed to take the cursed #55 bus which got me lost last Sunday and yet again)! ROAR. But yea, we decided to call for a cab while defrosting in MTS Centre, but cabs were all busy they couldn't get us one. Time was running out for us to meet Natalie back on-campus as well, bleah. Eventually I managed to call Laura to get Nat's number, and coincidentally/fortunately Nat was downtown so she came by to pick us up and fetched us to the Greyhound Terminal before heading to her place for dinner.
What a day, and what a saviour Nat was to have turned our mishap around! Haha. We had good homecooked dinner and desserts at her place, and a friendly chat with her parents too. Found out that she's half-Dutch, so I flaunted some of the Dutch words I've learnt, and amazingly her parents could understand what I said (Dutch phonetics are very hard to pronounce)!
After dinner we headed to Tavern's for drinks, the AIMS execs actually came specially to see the 2 of us, and we're just so touched they made time on our final night in Winnipeg.
Left to right: Julie, Chantale, Dylan, Natalie
The Singaporean gang, as we proudly and affectionately call ourselves
Thereafter Julie surprised me by delivering IQ's hot choc to my room in the middle of the night. IQ's is a place where we'd hung out quite often to read, study and chill, so her gesture was utmost significant. Her message on the cup was uber sweet and heartfelt too - "You really change my way of considering people and especially friends".. aww. Tuva me manque!
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Answers for Christmas Riddles
1) A claustrophobic
2) Turkey, cos it's always stuffed!
Heh.. Merry Christmas and Happy 2009 to all of you back home in advance! I'm coming home soon..! :)
I've had quite an adventure over my final weekend in Winnipeg. Apart from tobogganing, I had my first extreme love-hate relationship with Winnipeg on Sunday, when I got helplessly lost and stranded in an all-time low of -48 degC and 40km/h winds. So here goes, presenting my survival recount..
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It was the coldest day of the year, Sunday that is (although for the next 2 weeks every day will probably be a new coldest day, haha). Anyway I was supposed to have met Ron downtown as he'd agreed to go skiing with me - again, it was a crazy idea to have wanted to attempt skiing but I figured there won't be time to do that while travelling! So yes, according to Winnipeg Transit's Navigo system (akin to Singapore's gothere.sg which tells you what bus to take from your origin to destination), I could transfer to another bus downtown and meet Ron on board itself. But bus stops in Winnipeg ain't very obvious (most of the time there's just a pole sticking out to indicate its existence), and coupled with the weather it was horrible to just walk around trying to find my way.
Winds deadlier than temperature, cold that can kill
I didn't know if it was the cold piercing my eyes, or that I was just too upset and miserable that I teared uncontrollably. Really, I don't know how to put it into words cos the cold's just simply unimaginable. Ice crystals were attacking my face, no matter how wrapped up it was with my scarf, and the winds just kept piercing through right to the bones it was intensely painful. At that point in time, there and then, I hated myself for having come to Winnipeg.
I eventually found the right bus-stop, but upon boarding the driver horribly said his bus-route didn't travel to where I wanted to go! Worse still, he'd never heard of the place before, the Windsor Park Nordic Centre. TADANG. I felt seriously battered by everything - a foreigner who was cold, lost (and hungry, like the matchstick girl, haha), and I didn't quite know what to do. The driver called transit headquarters and they deduced that Navigo'd conveyed the wrong info, so yea.. instead of going with the flow and getting even more lost, I decided to return to U of M (but first for a soothing cuppa). The bus driver really empathized with me though, and I was indeed thankful that he was nice and tried to help.
After coffee I headed back to AVM, and to my horror and/or surprise JS exclaimed that Ron'd facebooked him, saying he was coming to AVM soon and was worried about me. Seriously I didn't know what was happening either, but here's a summary - He apparently tried looking for me downtown and looped back on the bus, while doing so he coincidentally bumped into the previous kind bus driver! Haha.. it was quite hilarious cos the driver said "I know who you're looking for, the girl! She went back to U of M!" and Ron tried to take the same bus that I did, only to run after it and see me aboard - go, going, gone. He took the next bus (30 min later) and because I'd chosen to go to Julie's room before coming up to mine, he'd heard from JS that I wasn't home and therefore got uber worried. He even searched the coffee hangouts on-campus to look for me, and said he'd have felt seriously guilty if I were to be lost and missing in my last 4 days in Winnipeg. Haha.. but yea, apparently the bus driver hadn't known of that place cos it's only called "Nordic Centre" in winter, but normally everyone refers to it as Windsor Park Golf Course, wth. Haha.. we had a good laugh over this whole adventure, though it really wasn't funny getting lost downtown at 8.30am in such weather. And I almost got blown away while walking on uneven snow (ice) by the way! :(
Skiing at long last
Weather forecast for today, haha.
Truly battered from the cold - frost all over and ice on eyes (click to enlarge and you'll see the icicles on my frozen eyelashes..!) One of the worst things I've ever experienced thus far cos you really can't open your eyes nor do anything about them, and rubbing will just cut your lids and worsen the frostbite.
I confess that I did fall down once while skiing, but it wasn't cos I'd slipped. In fact I was trying to shift onto the trail and stepped onto my own ski, and momentarily lost balance, hahaha.
Taking a break and warming up, using the Singaporean-essential heat packs. I've heard that only Singaporeans bring such stuff to cold countries, heh. I only opened my heat packs recently (yes I am that accustomed to anywhere above -30)! And my local friends are all very fascinated by them, though they really don't seem useful at all under -40 conditions.
Below was what I consoled myself with in the morning after getting lost and deciding to head home..
Second Cup's mint-chocolate latte and blueberry muffin, your essentials for a cold winter morning (note the ear muffs and gloves behind). I'm just so glad I survived, phew. :)
P/S: Again, you can watch my slightly-unglam skiing video on Facebook, hehe. That was a result of going against very strong winds and getting slightly over-confident with my skills! Judo helps in balance I think.. but I hit against a hard piece of ice or something, bleah. Remember to listen for the howling winds.. :)
tobogganing - rollin' tumblin' fun! 5:10 PMThe weather was crazy over the weekend, and unfortunately will continue to be. It was an unbelievably -42 degC (-26 plus windchill!), and weather forecasts are now filled with multiple warnings, cautioning everyone against severe windchills.
Click on these and try to imagine what I'm experiencing..!
Yet despite the weather, we were gung-ho enough to attempt tobogganing last Saturday. Dylan brought us to Crescent Drive Park near his place; there was a slide ready for use so we didn't have to toboggan along some random hilly slope, haha. No seriously, that'd have been uber fun too, but not when most surface snow actually freezes and hardens into solid ice in this extreme cold. Imagine the bumps and bruises we'll suffer! Yikes. And actually I do have a blue-black on my lower back/butt area right now, haha. :(
Notice the bits of frost that actually stay on our toques, scarves and jackets; some were undoubtedly snowflakes caused by the constant rollin' and tumblin', but most were actually random ice crystals drifting in the strong winds! I think Dylan seemed more wrapped up than we were anyway, and he looks like a lion with bits of frost on his furry hood, haha.
We also tried 3-man tobogganing, squeezing onto the 2 blue "sleds", huddling one another's legs and sliding down simultaneously. HAHA. Damn fun, although the front person suffered the most cos of the huge amount of snow that gushed right onto us upon landing and numbed our faces. Heh.. but we all had a go at being the first, and it was just plain silly and hilarious when we tumbled all over (or maybe we were seriously numbed by the cold; our hands, feet and faces so sore it no longer mattered anymore).
Me at the bottom, with a W for whee and woots! Haha. Check out my tobogganing vids on Facebook!
I like the picture on the left, heh. This red mat thingy gives you more speed and thrill; so you end up sliding further than you normally would! The blanket of snow was soo thick (and fluffy if you find the right patch) that it was just nice rolling in it, hehe. (P/S: Yes Chris, I know you're jealous!)
The sign sounded so dangerous! So yep.. what weather to go tobogganing! But it was undeniably exciting just screaming down the slides and rolling, hehe. Thereafter we had liquer hot chocolate at Dylan's, a perfect way to soothe and calm down after getting cold feet (literally), sore toes and fingers. Ahhh.. :)
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Farewell gathering
Later in the night we had a lil' drinking session in our room with some of the AIMS execs and exchange students. I received the hockey stick above as a xmas present by Ayumi (Japan), and she kinda left the "I Love Winni" sticking out of the bag, so I initially thought it was customized for me! Bleah.. it turned out to be Winnipeg of course, haha.