MERRY CHRISTMAS!

It's 8am Christmas morning in Nelson.
There's 15 cm's of fresh powder.
We're going skiing.....!
What are you doing?!


Hope Everyone had a great Christmas back in Oz!

Whistler

Here are a couple of pics from my 6 days up at Whistler.... I didn't actually take all that many, was too busy cutting up all that fresh powder. It just so happend that i was there for what locals were saying were the best 4 days in history! Constant snow, fresh tracks almost every run, a 50cm dump one night, and fresh powder and bright sunshine one day. Sooo good!

I'm off to Nelson tomorrow, i think we'll have internet where we're staying so i'll try to keep you all up to date on whats happening. Merry Christmas!

3.....and a bit Month Update

Exams are finally over, so i have time to let you all know whats going on. I'm sitting in the UBC Lodge at Whistler right now having arrived this afternoon. There's 4m of snow on the mountains and i can't wait to get up there tomorrow.

Exams went well, no real dramas at all - just all that boring study, i'm so glad to be done. The last few weeks were really uneventful, lots of assignments, and exam preparation so there is not much to report on.

The next few weeks however will be action packed, so hopefully i have time to keep you all updated whenever i can. This week i'm at Whistler, then next wednesday we leave for Nelson, followed by New Years in Vancouver and then Whistler again in the first week of the new year. Classes restart on the 8th of Jan with the first UBC ski club trip not long after that.

Anyways, my internet time is running out...
Talk to you soon.

SNOW!

The top pic is one of the bus loop at UBC with about 40cm's of snow on the oval in front of it.
The bottom pic is one of me at Whistler/Blackcomb, skiing Blackcomb mountain on the opening day!

2 Month Update

Hi Everyone,

Sorry about the lack of news in the past few weeks. The truth is that there hasn't been that much going on, at least stuff that is worth writing about. Its just been classes, assignments, the dreaded mid-term exams, and a few nights out here and there.

So it has been 2 months already. I can't believe how much time has passed already. We are in about week 9 of semester with 4 weeks to go till final exams. Here is a brief summary of a few things that stand out from the last few weeks.

--Cat Empire Concert, fantastic show, don't think i've seen a better one.
--Canadian Movie night. If you haven't seen 'Fubar'; Get it - absolute classic.
--Gomez Concert, another great band and great show.
--Hey Ocean/Five Alarm Funk Concert, a couple of local bands. Excellent music.
--Halloween, It's huge over here. The actual day is tomorrow, but the whole weekend was one huge party. Dress-ups galore!
--The snow has started falling on the mountains, Yay!
--Daylight savings ended on sunday and we got an extra hour of sleep!

Hopefully i have some more exciting news in the coming weeks. Christmas is fast approaching and we are just starting to think about what we'll be doing. At the moment it looks like we might head to Nelson (SE BC) for late Dec/xmas, and a whole lot of skiing! Not set in concrete yet, the other option is a trip further into the interior (Alberta somewhere). I'll keep you posted.

Good luck to all those who have exams in the coming weeks. Talk to you soon.

Wingin' It

Over here, 'Wings' ( Wiki Ref. ) are the biggest thing ever. They sell them everywhere. Pubs, pizza places, restaurants, take-away food places etc. you can even have wings delivered, just like pizza. When people get drunk and hungry, they go for wings! Wings have become so mainstream and popular that places around the city only sell wings and beer.
Anyway, there isn't just one type of wing, there seems to be an endless list of wing variations: Salt & Pepper, just pepper, mild, medium, hot, suicidal, teriaki, bbq, smokey bbq, hot bbq, honey bbq, honey mustard, honey garlic, plain garlic, sweet chilli, italian, the list goes on. Then you have to take into account all the different dipping sauces on top of that. The permutations and combinations are almost endless!
So the other night we went to a pub on 4th ave for wings and beer, Bimini's. As it was a wednesday, the wednesday special was 'wednesday wings'. 20c a wing, $4 for a plate of twenty. Not bad eh?! The place is packed with people and all they are doing is eating wings and drinking beer.
We order 1 plate of wings (for 5 guys) and a few beers and have a laugh at how we only had to pay 80c each for our wings....... 4 more plates later, and we're still laughing that we only had to pay $4 each for our wings. They are so good!
Before.........and..........after! Delicious.

Anyone for Coffee...?

No wonder Canadians talk like crazy, they're all so amped on the caffeine. Take a bus downtown and on every corner there is a coffee shop. People walk around with cups equivalent in size to a large coke at maccas, full of coffee.
On campus there is about 8 Starbucks, one Tim Hortons (another major coffee chain), and a smattering of various smaller chains and independent retailers (not counting the restaurants and pubs). With the average Canadian drinking about 2.6 cups a day, its no suprise that about one third of tap water is used to make coffee.

This photo is of a corner downtown on Robson St. On the opposite corner to the Starbucks, there is another starbucks, and about 3 or 4 doors down is another major coffee franchise. On one side of the street in one block there are about 6 coffee shops. Bloody ridiculous!

Raining and Skiing

Today.....

This:



looks like this:



It's absolutely pissing down. This is what they mean when they talk about the rain.
On the bright side, today i joined the UBC Ski and Board Club. It's going to be a great year! They have some amazing trips planned, heaps of activites and a truck load of deals and discounts. Now all we need is some snow.
I am definitely coming home with no money!

Party Weekend

In the last week it has become noticably cooler, it has been cloudy and it has been raining, and apparently it will only get worse. All that is green is slowly turning red and yellow, and will soon fall to the ground. This kind of weather seems to be enjoyed by the people here in Vancouver - it gives them an excuse to stay at the pub longer!
Anyways, it appears the season of outdoor parties is over, and what better way to celebrate the incoming shitty weather than throw a party! Winter weather does mean snow, and thats something definitely worth celebrating :)

Last Friday, we had around 40 people (of which i knew about 10) at our place, and we did our best to bring in the rain with style.
Good times.
Then saturday night, me and a few other Aussie exchange students, and a few random internationals headed out to another house party, of a friend of a friend. Anyways when we got there around 10.30 the cops were already there and weren't letting anyone in. They really crack down on parties here, its very lame compared to home. So we just found the nearest pub and made the most of the night!
It was quite a big weekend - i did manage to get my homework done on sunday too!

My first Canadian hangover

Not that a Canadian hangover is different to any other hangover, anywhere in the world.
This one however, originated exclusively from Canadian beer, and it's my first here in Canada. I've been out plenty of times since i arrived, but didn't have memorably large nights!

A quiet meeting at International House between current Aus and NZ exchange students, and UBC students who just returned from Aus and NZ, turned into a massive night down at Koerner's Pub here on campus. 16 different BC and Canadian beers on tap, bbq in the beer garden, pool, shuffleboard (more on that later). What a night. What a hangover. It's a gem!
Trust me....

First Week

So the first week of uni is over. It wasn't too stressfull, i found my way around campus ok and made it to all my classes!
I have what i think will be some really interesting subjects, and the lecturers are so much better than at home. They are willing/keen/eager to help you out with anything, and the lectures they give are not boring (so far!). I heard that students here can 'grade' their lecturers, and the grade reflects, to some extent, how much they are paid. Fantastic system i think - we should have it implemented back home.

Downtown??

The way they say it: "Lets go downtown" or "It's downtown" or just "Downtown" is enough to confuse any Aussie who is used to "the city" and "the country".

When i first arrived i thought "downtown" was applied this way: "we are going downtown to ........." or "It's downtown in ......." but its actually a place. Downtown is Downtown Vancouver. I guess its roughly equivalent to the Melbourne CBD. But in Australia you don't say "Lets go CBD" or "It's City".

Anyways, i went downtown the other day. One of my room mates took me to Robson St which is the main street here in Vancouver - kinda like Bourke St in Melbourne. We had some lunch at a korean restaurant, it was delicious. For $20CAN ($24AU) we had enough food for the two of us for lunch, and we took half of it home with us for dinner! Whats more, my room mate was complaining about how expensive it was! You can get a good meal here for $6 ($7AU).

Robson St is nothing special really, just shops and malls etc, except i hardly recognise any of the brand names.
Stanley park however, our next stop, is something else. 1000 acres of pristine park and forest right next to the city. It's amazing. So big that i'm sure it will take several trips there to see all the cool stuff. We went to the Vancouver Aquarium which is in Stanley Park. Saw all the local marine life, and dolphins, otters, seals and the white Beluga whales. They are the fat bastards of the ocean! You can see the blubber sloshing around as they swim!
I haven't been downtown since then - been busy with international orientation and all that, but there is heaps to do downtown.
Here are a few pics of my first trip downtown. Two from the sea wall at Stanley Park, and one at the Aquarium. Downtown.....

Check out the view!

Hi Everyone.
Arrived in Vancouver safe and sound. The flight had a stop-over in Honalulu but it was midnight local time so i couldn't see anything!
Anyway, my room at UBC is pretty standard for an on campus room except for the view...Check it out!
I look out over the Georgia Strait, the body of water between the mainland and Vancouver Island and a bit further to the right is the entrance to the harbour.
Not bad eh!

The Adventure Begins.....

So the time has come for this intrepid traveller to leave the pulchritudinous country of Australia and head to the similarly characterised shores of Canada. About bloody time too!
Its been over a year since first applying, and i can't wait to get on the plane.
Tomorrow morning at 3.45 am we'll be leaving Ballarat for the airport to catch the 6.30 to Sydney and then the 10am to Vancouver via Honalulu, arriving in Vancouver at exactly the same time I leave Sydney, 10am monday!
Thanks for all the Bon Voyages and support. I'll try to stay in touch as much as possible.
Talk to you from the other side of the world!
Simo.