Work Started!

Hey, guys! Sorry that it took a while to update, but here I am again!

So here is what I did every day and what I learnt thus far.

Sunday 13 September

So, I went back to Vancouver on the mainland of Canada. The ferry takes about 1,5 hour to get to the harbour there and then you take the bus to the centre of the city. The ferry was filled with BC Lion supporters, an American football club. It was funny because their colour was orange, so it almost felt like the Netherlands was playing. 

We went to a part of the town which was called Gas Town which had a gorgeous clock that ran on steam. We got there around the half hour mark, so we heard it chime, although it were the steam pipes blowing. 

We also took the sea bus to North Vancouver. It had me really confused, because it was actually a small ferry, so why was it called a bus? There was no real reason for this. It's just called that way.

In North Vancouver we went to this cute little indoor market where Leah bought a candy apple since I had never had one before. They were really sweet and sticky, but yum!

We went back with the sea bus again and we had a meal at the harbour. We then returned with the ferry to Nanaimo. However, on the ferry they made an announcement that killer whales were swimming near the ship, so Leah and I went outside to check. We didn't see anything, but we had tons of fun while outside. 

Also the BC Lions lost, so lots of disappointed supporters aboard the ship.

Thu 17 September 2015

This was the day when I actually started on my job in the coffee shop in the local hospital. The hospital is right across the street, so it's really easy to get there for me. 

Generally, I make the simple coffees and teas, but I can also grab the food for customers and clean tables. I work with at least one more person and they are all very kind and polite. 

Generally it is a very busy place with customers coming by every minute, but sometimes it calms down a bit and the customers take some time to have a chat with you. 

Fri 18 September 2015

My second day at the coffee shop. It was a fairly quiet day and I had a lot of time to have a chat with my co-worker. Going to concerts is quite difficult, because you have to drive quite a while to get to them. It's especially difficult when you live here on Vancouver Island, because the ferry to the mainland is really quite expensive, especially if you go by car.

Then in the afternoon I went to Ladysmith, a small town where Leah's mother lives, for the weekend. Her cats are the sweetest things and so, so soft! They live in an apartment building where the maintenance guy lives in the building, however no one really likes the guy. 

A thing I learnt about apartments and basically any place you live in and you rent it, you can be evicted whenever the landlord/lady sees fit. They told me about two guys, who kept burning their food and thus set off the fire alarm at least 5 times a week, got evicted. Even if you have a contract with living in a house with friends, they can throw you out any time of they need the space or whatever.

Sat 19 September 2015

We went to Chemainus, a very tiny town close to Ladysmith with beautiful murals. It's a bit of a touristy place, but it was very quiet when we arrived there. We went to the bead shop and bought some beads to make book markers and bracelets and such. 

There was also a shop dedicated to Christmas. There were all kinds of ornaments, snow globes, baubles, you name it. There were different themes of ornaments too, all handpicked by the owner of the shop. There were musical instruments, tons of angels, American-specific ones (ahem, miniature guns to put in your Christmas tree), and even mermaids! The owner of the shop goes all around the country and even goes to Europe and Asia to find new ornaments to sell.

Sun 20 September 2015

On this day we went to quite some places. Because Leah needed to find out more about the ecosystem of a place of her choice, we went to a forest next to Ladysmith. 

The path we walked on was called the Holland Creek Trail and the forest was absolutely gorgeous! Because Leah's mother was also with us, we couldn't walk the entire trail, so we will be going back there sometime. Leah had also wanted to take me up some very long and steep path to a place where we could oversee the town, but because there has been a bear sighting, the path was closed off. 

Leah's mother also took me to the Yellow Point Market. The market was held somewhere in a field in the middle of nowhere, but there was a lot to see. People just need a permit for the things they sell and then they can just set up a stall and sell their things. There was a lot of bread, cookies and veggies, but there were also some stalls that sold things like hats, candles and soap. 

Apparently squash (kalebas in Dutch) is something a lot of people eat here. When I first heard the word squash I was very confused as to what it was, even after Leah showed me a picture, but seeing the real thing I realised what it was since my grandfather used to cultivate them. 

Another thing they have there and use for decoration is corn. They have them in all sorts of colours like red, black, yellow and blue. 

In the evening Leah and I made something called Chocolate Bark. It's normally a Christmas desert. It's a layer of pure or milk chocolate with another layer of white chocolate on top. You add the dust of crushed peppermint candy canes to the white chocolate and then sprinkle the remainder of the candy canes on top of it. It's absolutely delicious!

Mon 21 September 2015

In the evening Will took me to the Nanaimo Inner Harbor. We simply took a walk around the place, next to the water. We also saw some seals and even sea otters! It was really nice to see those in the wild. 

We also walked through town for a bit. The shopping streets all go up- or downhill depending on which way you're going of course. Also about all the lampposts have flowers hanging from them, making the streets very beautiful. 

When we went back home, we drove by Dairy Queen. I had expected it to be ice cream only, but they had hamburgers and such as well. We bought some sundaes (I had caramel) and we drove home. 

Something that I noticed while we were driving around was the amount of drive-throughs. The obvious ones are MacDonald and KFC, but also Dairy Queen and Starbucks have one. Will told me that even the drugstore sometimes has one to pick up the drugs. 

Tue 22 September 2015

Today was the first day working at the other location. The hospital has two coffee shops. One in the actual hospital and one that's outside of it in a relatively new building just opposite of it. Since this one was generally less busy than the one in the hospital, I had a lot more responsibilities over here. I generally work at the till and take people's orders. I also make coffee and tea here, but also the difficult ones that require mixing and such. When it's less busy I can also clean tables and do the dishes (which I did today). During noon it gets quite busy, because the place also serves paninis and wraps, so people go there for lunch. When people are done eating, you're supposed to go to them and make some small talk before asking to take their plates away. 

Working at the till is still a bit overwhelming sometimes though, because there are many tabs with food, so you have to know where to find whatever they ordered. Also, since they have Canadian dollars, counting money is quite difficult too. They have 5, 10 and 25 cents and they are all the same colour. The 10 cents are the smallest, so they're easy to recognise, but the 25 and 5 cents look exactly the same. The 25 cents you can recognise by the moose on it though, so that helps. The actual numbers are very small on the coins, so it's difficult to see.

Also some cultural things I have learnt.

Terry Fox was a guy who had his leg amputated because of cancer, but still continued to run with an artificial leg. In 1980 he started a run called the Marathon of Hope, which was a cross-country run to raise money for cancer research. He ran for 143 days and managed to traverse 5,373 kilometres. However, he had to quite his run after the cancer spread to his lungs and ended his life. In commemoration of him, every year a Terry Fox Run is held. The earnings of this run goes to the Terry Fox Foundation for cancer research. This year was the 35th anniversary of the run. It is generally held around the 20th of September. 

9/11 is not commemorated like it is in the US, but on the day itself there will be television programs about it and people commemorate in their own ways. Some people hold a minute of silence or pray. 

To get your driver's licence in Canada, you have the choice to take lessons from your parents or from an instructor. Basically, anyone who is above the age of 25 and has a driving licence is allowed to teach a learner. When a learner is behind the wheel, the car will have a magnetic red L on the back of the car next to the licence plate for 1 and a half years. Also, there always has to be an experiences driver next to them. Theorie is something they have to pass and every 2 years they have to do a renewal if they haven't received their driving licence yet. When a learner has just received their driving licence they have to drive around with a magnetic green N on the back of the car next to the licence plate to show that they are a new driver so people can keep that in consideration. This one stays on for 2 years.