And so it begins

I can’t believe that I’m finally writing my first Canadian post... but here I am, sitting in a hostel full of Aussies (mainly) fighting over pretty slow internet. Ash has already posted about our trip over and the stress I had at the airport. Needless to say, once we got on the plane it all disappeared. And the views were amazing over the mountains.

The first few days were a total blur, but I can’t believe how beautiful Vancouver is. Stanley Park is amazing, and I love being in a city where you can see the mountains between the traffic. Granville Street (where the hostel is) is a bit too neon for my taste, but I think it’s a good place to find our feet.

We’ve had a good couple of days, and attended our induction at the SWAP office which was pretty helpful. We’ve sent off for our Social Security numbers and had a good intro into where to look to live. We realised that we accidentally walked through the rough bit of Downtown on our second day here. Today we went through it on the bus and it was pretty unpleasant...lots of drugs, prostitutes etc. Rent’s cheap though. What a surprise.

We’ve started our mammoth apartment search which started really well, with a lovely woman near Commercial Drive (the lesbian area). She was really sweet and the house was nice, but the room’s a bit small so we’re keeping it as a back-up. The search took a massive turn into Weirdsville today however.  We were shown a set of houses with dirty mattresses in the living room and empty rooms with live wires...and a woman off-work with depression, a filthy apartment and a morbidly obese cat. Needless to say we’re still looking. We’re planning on heading to Ash’s family friends on Thursday so it’d be really good to have it sorted by then.

On a brighter note, we managed to get our Canadian phones today, with free international texts so we can keep in touch with people at home. We also got our Canadian bank accounts so we can get paid when we get jobs (although we did then leave our new phone chargers at the bank so not totally successful).

      Moving on... it won’t come as much surprise that I am loving all the new food over here. I keep making Ash take photos of me with it. Anyway, I wanted to share my initial food-and-drink related observations with you ( I fear this may become a regular feature):

      1.Subway tastes better at home. Weird to say it, but it totally does.

      2. All the chocolate bars seem to contain peanut butter. This does not please Ash. I am working my way through all of them.

      3. The ‘double Big Mac’ is on my list of ‘Things to conquer whilst I’m in Canada’. 

      4. The giant steamed pork dumplings were just as good as I wanted them to be. 

      5. Vancouver folk love real ale, which is great news. 

      6. You can buy Burritos that are red. From a chain imaginatively called Red Burrito. They nearly killed Ash.

      7. Most restaurants in the lesbian area are vegan and serve loads of tofu and herbal tea. I think this is a worldwide observation of lesbian restaurants.

      8. Bubble Tea (ie. Iced tea with balls of tapioca starch, which look like tadpoles) is massive over here. And it’s totally weird. 

I hope to continue my observations without putting on 4 stone. For now, it’s back to Craigslist to trawl the apartment listings. Fingers crossed for no more obese pets (fatty manx). 

Stella x