Being Back

Well I’ve now been back in England for a couple of days. As soon as I knew I had a relatively long Christmas break I knew that I would be spending it at home.

I left my residence around 10:30 AM (Canadian Eastern Time) on Saturday (16th Dec) and I wasn’t back in my home until around 2:30 PM (GMT) on Sunday (17th Dec). It was certainly a very long day! Though somewhat surprisingly I managed to not feel too jet lagged. The lack of jet lag surprised me as it lasted for days when I arrived in Canada but returning to England it just didn’t happen.

I have really enjoyed my first semester in Canada. I made some really good friends out there who I have enjoyed spending time with. I had some really good new experiences. Amongst the highlights are the Pep Rally, Niagara Falls, Toronto and Thanksgiving. All of these were unlike anything I have experienced in England and I made some great memories.

To my surprise I didn’t really experience any culture shock or home sickness. Literally all the pre-departure information I received said that at some point you will experience culture shock or home sickness but for me that just was not the case. Maybe it was because I was having a good time that even though I missed certain things about being home it never became overwhelming. Or maybe I’m just more resilient than I realised.

I really enjoyed my first semester out in Canada. I am so glad that I opted to do a full year as that means I have another semester to look forward to. But for now I am going to enjoy Christmas break. 

I Went To Toronto!

I’ve been saying for a while that I am going to go to Toronto as it’s pretty close to the university where I’m studying. Yesterday was Homecoming Day, this involves sports and lots of drinking two things that I am not keen on. So therefore I decided that I wanted to just get off campus, and what better way to get off campus than to head out for a big city day!

I travelled via Greyhound which is new to me and a really good way to travel. We don’t really have anything like the Greyhound service in England. Not only was it a relatively quick journey but it was also a very comfortable journey, the Greyhound buses have a lot of leg room.

When I arrived I started in the Eaton Centre Mall, this is a really big mall with some great shops. It was good to wander around. I tried to restrain myself as I need to keep remembering that anything I buy over here is ultimately going to have to come back with me to England somehow but still I bought some stuff. (Of course I did!) I decided to have lunch in the Eaton Centre, I went to a Greek place in the food court which was really good value.

After I had lunch I walked over to the AGO (Art Gallery of Toronto). Over the years I have been to a lot of art galleries but I honestly think that the AGO is the best one that I have ever been to. It had such a good range of stuff on display. From paintings to sculptures to installations. The AGO has lots of ‘name’ artists like Picasso, Monet, Turner, Van Gogh, Brancusi, Matisse, Miró and Modigliani. Then alongside the classical artists there’s modern works that are both thought provoking and celebrating Canada’s First Nations Communities and the black community. I spent quite a while wandering around the AGO.

Afterwards I decided to walk down to the waterfront. It turned out it was a longer walk than I had anticipated. Although I found navigating Toronto on foot to be fairly easy, beforehand someone had hold me that everyone walks around Downtown Toronto and I can definitely see why. The waterfront is a really nice area. Had I not been conscious of the walk and the fact that I was going to have to do it again in order to get back to the bus station I could have spent a long time there.

Toronto is a great city, it is a busy city but it didn’t feel intimidating for someone on their own going there for the first time. I’d say that Toronto is fairly similar to New York in a lot of ways. However when I went to New York I found it to be dirty, bustling and a bit unwelcoming on the other hand I found Toronto to have more of a chilled vibe in comparison, once more Canadians prove the stereotype that they are generally genuinely nice people!

I really enjoyed my day in Toronto and I want to go again sometime. (Although even if I hadn’t enjoyed it I would definitely be going to Toronto again given DC are going to be filming there!) I kind of think of yesterday as a getting to know Toronto trip, it’s a big city and I only really begun to scratch the surface of it. I definitely want to go again so that I can get to know the city even better. 

Probably The Last Study Abroad Post Before I Set Off

Well the title says it all, this is probably going to be the last post about me studying abroad before I set off for Canada.

So, what’s happening right now? Well as far as I know I have now got more or less everything I needed to do in the UK before I set off done. I wouldn’t be surprised if it turns out that something unforeseen comes up in the next few days, but hopefully not. The whole process from right back when it started seems to have involved not much happening and then suddenly loads of things to do at once!

At the moment the main thing I’m feeling is that I am just ready to go. It’s like when you’ve been revising heavily for an exam and you get to that point a day or two beforehand when you feel like there’s not really much more you can do and you just want to get on with it.

I have previously talked about what I’m looking forward to doing once I’m there so I won’t go over that again. It’s just going to be a really interesting experience.

I will continue to blog once I am out in Canada actually finally doing it. There’s probably going to be lots of posts about me getting used to cultural differences! However I think this is probably going to be the last post before I fly out on Tuesday.

Study Abroad – Two Weeks To Go…

In two weeks’ time I am going to be heading out to Canada where I will be studying abroad for the 2017/18 academic year. It’s very nearly here!

So, here’s a few thoughts and feelings about where I am right now in the process of doing a year abroad...

·         August seems to be flying by. It really doesn’t feel like it can be two weeks since I was writing about it being a month to go.

·         By this point I’m pretty sure I have everything I need to do sorted. I’m sure there might be something else that comes up but right now I am on top of everything.

·         I plan to be using holidays, breaks and weekends to travel about in Canada and America.

·         I’m really looking forward to experiencing a proper Canadian winter. I might not be saying that in January 2018 but right now I’m excited about proper snow!

·         One of the things I’m looking forward to is finding out about various cultural differences. Not just the big obvious stuff but the little everyday things too.

·         I also want to experience holidays and events that I’m familiar with (like Christmas and Halloween) in another country to see how they differ.

·         There’s going to be a lot of differences, even in the stuff I’m studying. I decided to use having a year abroad to take a different selection of modules to what I usually do.

I think overall I still feel excited more than anything else. There’s some nervousness but that’s always the case whenever I try something new. Studying abroad for a full academic year is a really exciting prospect and I’m looking forward to living in a different country!