I got an East Vancouver welcome on the weekend. Even though it was a punch (almost too light to even be writing on it) to the face for not having any cigarettes available for the homeless man, I will definitely be back. I had a great time on Jamye Lee's birthday.
I didn't sign up for an Arctic freeze nor for a job without Lara around. Seriously Vancouver, you were so nice last year with little rain and no snow, why do you have to give us such extreme and uncalled for weather like this? Sure Korea softened me to harsh winters but a damp minus ten is seriously cold, especially when your workplace isn't built for heat. I used to make fun of Korean building that weren't insulated or heated and yet I find myself in one. I also seem to have found myself in a Korean like run business where managers do odd things.
Everything took an unexpected turn at work when I got a text message from Lara (the amazing lady who brought me over to CET) saying the director fired her. Just like that he let her go. He gave no reason, no explanation and no chance to right whatever she did wrong, which from what I can see was nothing. It was so random and out of the blue that the rest of the staff and I have no idea what is going on.
As for the director he said little to me about what happened and I told him I am there to teach and that's what I'll do. He asked me to do some extra curriculum development and while I could do what he is asking I'm nowhere near qualified like Lara is to do it, besides it's just too strange for me to commit just now. I want to know that the school will be around for me to put in the effort. I also want to go wherever Lara finally ends up. Until then I'm stuck in a freezing building topped off with the figuratively cold work environment and on Monday we had a three hour fire alarm continuously ring.
The television warned of freezing pipes and in a rare moment of truth they were right. The sprinkler system in our building froze and tripped off the fire alarm into a three hour ringing session on Monday. It was the start of one long, bland week that has sucked in more ways than one. I can't wait for tomorrow to be finished.
On a more important note, summed up so well by Leoni earlier this week,
"Dear Kim Jong Il,Fuck off please.Ok bye"
I'm almost 100 percent sure nobody comes here anymore but will try to get back to posting. I know I have said that before just like I have said I'd jog again. But in my defense, it's been two weeks straight of jogging so why not some posts? Life here in Vancouver is all good. I have a great job, great friends and have an even greater time watching the local news panick about the weather. (Yes this is a weather post but don't judge me...I'll never post pictures of cats.)
For the last week, the big news has been about an up coming snow storm. As I type, the rain is coming down as "snow" but seriously it's not snow. Watching the Seattle news they are "warning" people to buy big sized beer cozies for their exposed pipes to avoid freezing yet all that is expected is minus three weather. Yes that freezes but come on, it's nowhere near the minus 20 something weather mom and dad were talking about earlier. I'm acting all tough but five minutes ago I did put on my winter jacket to see if it was good to go, turns out it isn't as there's a big stain on the front of it. I guess I'll go with layers tomorrow.
The writers for Miss Britney Spears obviously knew a lot about blogging. It's been a while and I blame nobody but myself. Things here are all good, still teaching ESL students and have a great story told to me by one of my favorite students. I teach Woori (aka Ann) after my regular gig and she cracks me up. The first time I met her she said she hated Canada because she is so much more funny in Korea. I don't believe it.
She told me a story about how she went to Victoria a few weeks ago and noticed a sign in the hotel bathroom that said "watch your step". She is Korean so she wears sandals into the bathroom. Her sandals had some dirt on them and when you add that to the drops of water on the floor you get marks. In her mind "watch your step" translated into clean up after yourself and so she did. The whole weekend long. It wasn't until she came back to Vancouver and boarded a bus that had the same sign on the stairs that she figured out exactly what "watch your step" meant. Cheers to anybody who takes on English as a second language it can be confusing.
Two free tickets to Eat Vancouver fell into our laps so we headed out to the new Convention Centre (thank you Olympics) on Sunday for lunch. The restaurants there had samples of their goods that you had to buy coupons for to test. The average cost per sample was about $2.50 - luckily Saejin though 5 coupons was five dollars so he ignored his hunger because the sample were tiny compared to the imaginary 5 dollars he thought they cost. Another problem was that the lines were insane in this section but with clever line cutting and ignorance we survived. The best had to be the blue cheese macaroni and meat balls from some restaurant (did I mention the lines were insane so I missed getting the restaurants name - not good for them or me because I'll never find it here in Vancouver.)
We ended up coming home with four litres of soup stock and the way too many samples of packaged goods helped replenish the cupboards. For free it was definitely worth checking out. We also got to see the soup Nazi from Seinfeld fame who is now making a living working food conventions and living off of fictional soup that he makes as a demonstration.
Speaking of food, the one thing I am really struggling with being back here is that chicken breasts have morphed into giant double DDs since I remember last seeing them. In Korea chicken breasts are half the size and cheaper than any other part of the chicken. I liked them that way and I have yet to buy any chicken breasts here because I think that
A...they are pumped way too big with water.
B...how many steroids were these caged creatures pumped with and why don't their legs match their breast...they are barbie chickens.
And c...I can't find (or afford) free range chicken. Besides I don't really miss chicken that much when steroid fed, penned in beef is so cheap and plentiful.
Had a job interview today which went great. It's at a school that pays a lot more money but the only trouble being I'd have to go on a sub list for the time being and next month (as in July) I would probably slip into a full time position. Not exactly sure what I will do but the lady doing the interview was great (she actually had questions I had to think about - she liked my answers and said she'd never hear a few of my answers before but said they'd work out great in a class) and she told me to contact her after next week when I finish my contract with the other school.
Tonight I'm off for some real Chinese food. My TESOL practicum partner teacher is finishing up her classes with the new immigrants I taught a few weeks ago and they are heading out for dinner. The class wanted her to invite me along. Not sure what kinds of Chinese food I'll be having but seeing as they are all new immigrants here I'm sure it will be amazing real Chinese food. Another one of the benefits of living in a city where almost 50 percent of the population has ties to China - great, cheap Chinese food. Pictures to follow if we end up eating anything mysterious.
I'm on an ill timed holiday this week. (I'll explain more about this later) All day today I'll be sticking around home doing all the laundry I have ignored for the past week. Yesterday it was nice and sunny (you can't tell by the pictures but this is sunny in Vancouver) so we went for a walk across Burrard bridge. Since arriving in September this bridge (and Granville bridge) sit jut outside the apartment in clear view from the balcony and the only times we've crossed them have been at night coming back from friend's houses. 
The bridge here with an upper truss so big boats can make it into False Creek. FYI...False Creek news from the past few weeks...a whale was spotted and chased out of here a few weeks ago. It was searching for some food on it's trek back to Alaska after fasting in Mexico for the winter. Scientists were worried it had become lost and would die if it stayed put around town. Another sighting was of Zach Effron of High School musical fame who sadly wasn't also chased out of town for starving people ofdecent movies. 
(An older picture to show how high we were.) 
View of the False creek Ferry stop at the Aqua centre to head over to Granville Island or Vanier Park. 
Final shot before the camera died. English bay with the Westend in the background. Vancouver definitely deserves its reputation as a beautiful city. I'm very lucky to be living here.
Late Saturday afternoon Shane came by to pick us up and we finally made it over to North Vancouver. Destination, Lynn Canyon for a lupper picnic. Seeing as none of us had ever been there it was a little strange walking from the car to the Canyon with lots of groceries but luckily there were more than just serious hikers and lots empty tables to eat at. 
The view from the suspension bridge. 
We made it to the other side. A feat when you consider we all had our own personal handicaps. Mine were my tread less sandals, Shanes was the bag of left over food, Youn Jung (Shane's wife) hiked in high heels and Saejin couldn't handle the suspension bridge bouncing. 
Saejin with some Canadian wildlife. 
Chllin on a stump to show saejin that camping could be an option this summer. He said he would go if he could stay in a hotel while the rest of us slummed it up in tents. 
The view of the bridge. 
More posing with nature. 
Korean Hiking gear. 
Lion's Gate bridge and Stanley Park from North Vancouver where we stopped of for some more views of Vancouver after we drove up some of the Sea to sky highway. 
Shane saw some kids tossing rocks into the ocean and he decided to join them. Little did he know that big rocks weigh a lot.
Testing, testing...anyone remember me? It looks like things are slowly falling into place for me and life back here in Canada. Not sure where to start with the updates but the most important one is I'm finally finished my TESOL and can legally teach in real language schools here. To get the TESOL, I was doing night classes three times a week for three months and then had to do a practicum but now it' all done with. (The practicum ended last week during my first week at my new job. Those days sucked as I was going from 8 am all the way until 9:30 at night. Sucky times for sure but now its good. My practicum supervisor was amazing and helped me out a lot and possibly we will wok together in the future.)
The school I'm at is alright but it's just for a one month contract which they may or may not extend (depending on how I do and if student numbers remain high...no pig flu please Mexico). I am still looking for something more secure and should be able to get at least two interviews (I have connections now) for some possible jobs. Anyway I have nights off for a change so I can start jogging again and loving life in Vancouver even more. Will post more soon. (This time I mean it.)
