Visiting Vancouver

I went to Vancouver on Wed, Aug 23rd and came back on Mon, Aug 28th to visit Phil and have a bit of a mini vacation.

I've been to Vancouver before, but I never really got a chance to explore it. After really getting to know the city in 5 short days, it is without a doubt my 2nd favorite city in Canada (after Montreal of course).

Things about Vancouver that I like:

• The Scenery. The Rocky Mountains, surrounding water, temperate climate... incredible.
  
• The People. Why is everyone so much nicer than Toronto?
  
• The Neighborhoods. Yaletown for the restaurants and young professionals, Robson for the shopping, Granville for the bars/clubs, Kitslano for the laid back beach atmosphere... all of them have their own unique character, and within a reasonable walk!... unlike Toronto...
• The Lifestyle. Working downtown, beaching in Kitslano, skiing/climbing in the mountains, golf everywhere... can it get any better?
  

The plans for the next 5 years of my life now include living and working in Vancouver at some point.

Funny that back in December, I always thought I'd never leave Toronto.


Eating Malaysian food after arriving: satay, roti, curry chicken, boiled chicken... and beer from singapore: Tiger


Exploring Vancouver: Waterfront Station


More exploring: Taking a break in Yaletown


The harbour near David Lam Park


More exploring: Lunch on Granville Island


BBQ ribs, pulled pork, rib ends, beef brisket, sausages, cornish hen, corn bread, potato salad, coleslaw, baked beans, and BBQ sauce


Taking a break from climbing Grouse Mountain... a 2.9 km hike!


On top of Grouse Mountain drinking Kokanee after the climb... 853 metres above sea level!!


Asian foam party at Plush. This is the only picture I can put on the internet.


Jericho Beach: Volleyball with a view of downtown Vancouver and the surrounding mountains. Way better than Ashbridges? HELL YES.


Golfing at Whistler Golf Club, Arnold Palmer's first Canadian design. Shot 95!


Flying home over the beautiful Rockies.

Moving Back

My empty living room in my (former) apartment in Montreal

I'm writing this blog from my condo in Toronto. I will write my final thoughts in the next blog... right now I'm still trying to take it all in.

My parents came up on Friday night to help me with the move. I sold most of my furniture via craigslist and it was all picked up by Sunday night. After packing everything in boxes, student movers came to load the U-Haul that we rented, leaving a completely empty apartment.



After a last dinner with the Hidalgo family, we retired for the night and got up at 5:30 AM for the drive to Toronto, locking the door and leaving my apartment for the last time at 6:45 AM.



The move was much easier than I expected. Now I just have to somehow fit 750 square feet worth of stuff from my Montreal apartment into the 150 square foot room in my condo.

I'm not feeling nostalgic right now. And I don't feel incredibly happy to be back in Toronto. It's kind of weird... almost a numb feeling.

My family is throwing a "welcome back" party for me tomorrow night. Then on Wednesday, I'm going to Vancouver to visit Mr. Choda. When I come back, hopefully I'll have some profound closing words on my Montreal experience.

My last day of work

Some days it seemed like this would never come. With as much a sense of relief as accomplishment, my time at the CSA finished today.

I've vented a lot of frustrations on this blog as well as to many of you over the past 8 months. But it's easy to forget that there were some good times here, most notably my presentation yesterday. Presenting some challenging recommendations to improve the departmental business process was a great way to end it off, because I was able to diplomatically part ways with the frustrations I experienced on a day-to-day basis.

(Thanks to Steve Jobs for the inspiration for my slides and presentation delivery.)

It's also easy to forget that this place gave me the opportunity to move to Montreal and experience new things. I've met some great people and some not-so-great people... done some interesting work and some, well, crappy work... but in the grand scheme of things, I'm really glad things worked out the way they did.

And although I'll never work for the government again, at least I know how to get a government contract... yeye.

So, after saying my last goodbyes to co-workers and friends, Kathleen and I got in her car to leave the CSA. We pulled out of the parking lot playing "Fix You", the same song I was listening to on the bus when I first came to work on that freezing cold day in January.

Lost in Translation

My last official visitor for my time in Montreal: TEAM JAPAN!! Another great weekend to spend time with someone from Toronto, as well as a good way to start my "goodbyes" to my new friends from Montreal.

So this is really it... it's starting to hit me. And after all the things I've done in the past 8 months, I still feel that I haven't taken full advantage of it. But given the circumstances, I think I've done the best I could. More on this in upcoming posts...


Team Philippines at Newtown!!! Can you believe that after 8 months, this is the first time we all went clubbing?! Looking back at my time, this is the one thing I really wish I had more: hang out with my adopted family. Come to Toronto... we'll do it BIG.


The obligatory post-clubbing Poutine at La Belle Province. Way better than anything Toronto has.


On top of Mont-Royal, with a view of the whole city.


Enjoying the garden at the lookout on top of Mont-Royal


She's home!! lol... one of my favorite clubs.


Some of the CSA boys after they waited 45 mins for a drink.


Team CSA (+ Team Japan)!!!! Again, can you believe that this was the first time that we ALL made it to a club together? Another thing I wish I could change if I were to do it all again. Thanks for a fun night... sad to think that it probably won't happen again under the same circumstances.


Sake/Chocolate shots at Suite 88 Chocolatier

Thanks to Roki for making the trip, and for the Sake! My previous post talked about the advantages of doing things alone... but this weekend reminded me that having company can be just as fun, if not better.

Table for one

Before starting my working from home day, I decided to have breakfast somewhere in the Plateau. After some walking on Mont-Royal Ave, I ended up at St-Viateur Bagel and got a salami, ham, and provolone bagel sandwich with pasta salad (sundried tomato pesto... does that sound familiar? lol)

A quick breakfast turned into a 1.5-hour-newspaper-reading-4-cups-of-coffee-drinking meal. I was suprised at how much I enjoyed it... able to just read the paper, people watch, and let the time pass.

Another thing about living alone: it forces you to get out there by yourself. This is something I'd never do in Toronto, where I'd opt to stay in and waste the day.

When I get back to Toronto, I'm definately gonna take this part of Montreal back with me: not being afraid to explore on my own.

"Great f*cking night." - Johnny Drama

It's the last of the group visits to Montreal, and how better to finish in style than with Amit, Ray, and Mike.

Before they came, it didn't really hit me that my time in Montreal is almost up. But the reality hit home: I'll be home in 2 weeks and this will all be a distant memory. Kind of sad...

Way too many funny things this weekend:

• Jigaboo
  
• Pervert Ray and the laughing taxi cab driver
• "Call me when you're in bed"
  
• Flying Camel, Abraham Lincoln, Bucking Bronco
• Entourage theme song... ohhh YEAH... ohhh YEAH
• Portuguese chicken
  
• crazy night at 737
• crazier night at Living
• walking into a really humid apartment due to a running shower and a wet black shirt
• Audrey and the questionable stench at the crap table
• Mike vehemently refusing certain services in a fine establishment on Ste-Catherine... and then enjoying every minute of it
• Ray walking away from the cab with a huge smile as it drives away with me slouched in the front seat
• "Gentlemen, the table is yours."
  
• Leaving the casino at 4 am
• constantly re-affirming that Montreal is wayyyyy better than Toronto
  

Haven't partied this hard since first year. Leave it up to these guys to bring out the best in me, a.k.a. the worst.

And now for the pics...


Enjoying the patio at 737


"Yeah, I'm Vinnie Chase's agent. He's over there enjoying the patio."


Terrasse on St-Denis for some pizza


Kaluha chocolate shots with Grand Marnier chocolate "chasers" from Suite 88 Chocolatier


Casino!! HARD 4!!!!


Looks who's at Living!


Mike rising to the occasion and drinking responsibly.


Tokyo with the birthday boy.

Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal

In the spirit of trying new things, after work today I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art. A lot of the art is very modern, and most of the artists exhibited are still alive today. Very modern usually equals very weird, and this was no exception.

The best thing they had was an exhibit called "Music Video" (original, eh?) which showed 26 of the best music videos of the last 20 or so years, with "Bohemian Rhapsody" being the first. It was really interesting to see how the video has evolved. The cool thing about it was the setup: a huge screen in an large, pitch dark, empty room with only a few directors' chairs set up. Very minimalistic.

One weird thing was the tour guide: she was maybe 25-28, French, but gave the tour in English. She said her in-laws were from England. This explained a lot of things, cause while she had a bit of a Quebecois accent, for the most part she had a distinct British accent (like when she said "New York"). Never heard that before... very interesting. Oh ya, and she was hot. Like, HOT... 1234 HOT. Yay Montreal.

Unfortunately, I couldn't take any pictures, so I'll do my best to explain some of the coolest things I saw:

• 2 large miniature rooms made of a wood frame and insulation each rotating on their central axis. Each of these rooms had windows that you could look in and see an empty room with white walls, light fixtures, and a dirty blue carpet. The artist, Samuel Roy-Bois, wants to show how architecture governs our entire lives, and how it forces us down certain paths in our travels (a.k.a. psycho).
• Air Jordans cut up and formed into 23 "masks" that resemble First Nations art. This was really cool since they some had human hair, and each mask had it's own "personality." The artist, Brian Jungen, is apparently fascinated with commercial consuption and misperception... hence the Air Jordans and the stereotypes attached to First Nations people.
• 3 whale skeletons made completely of plastic lawn chairs. Jungen likes to use regular every day things in his art. Also, since plastic is made from petrolium, and oil essentially comes from whale fossils (or that's what the exhibit said), it's supposed to show some sort of weird connection between the two.

Overall it was a great visit and I really enjoyed trying something new. Being alone, it was also a nice break from everything, and it gave me a good opportunity to take my time and really get the most out of it.


The Museum with the Wilfrid-Pelletier theatre behind it.