A Thousand Shades of Gray

Due to recent findings that various members of my family either already have, or will soon have LJ accounts, Ive decided to make this journal friends-only. I dont think very many people care anyways :-P, but if you want to read stuff, comment... ask on MSN... contact me somehow.

The day before I left Ontario, I wrote this: "By the time its time for me to come home... I know what Ill be leaving behind, but I know what Im comin home to. And that makes that better." It makes me laugh in a bitter kind of way :-P.

I dont think Elaine ever really liked me all that much. Or at least I never got that conenction with her other people seemed to have (at this point I was gonna list off names until I remembered something about confidentiality, oops). Maybe cuz I randomly show up a lot. I dont know how art group will be, I can see it having lots of random people Id never seen before, possibly will be a bit weird. Im bussing down with Mark though, havent seen that guy in a while. I should get my hair cut soon.

Shallyn called me and woke me up today, I wish I could see her soon. Shes tried various times before but its more like "come over to my house today" or "come to the mall... now :-P", we need to make plans more in advance, but Ill see her saturday at her party. And then sunday is carsons party. Then I can give him the last present for people I bought while I was in the philippines.

And today Im bussing over to where Michelle works to go paint some ceramic figurine thingies. Which is actually quite fun, and time consuming. The last time I did this was... when Conor was here the first time, which was a good year ago.

That song Hawaienne is still incredibly awesome.

Group was nice today. I sat around until... 6-ish. I found out that my pay from Quebec will be sent to me by mail, because my old job hadnt direct-deposited it yet into my bank account. *Sigh*. THis proves how evil they were.

My dad drove me down to group. He dropped me off at Richmond Hill library, I went in, timed 2 minutes in my watch before going out and heading for the church where group is held :-P. It was nice, it was the last art group before everyone leaving will go away for university.

We went out for ice cream and coffee afterwards, and I gave dave his present while we were in baskin robbins. Silver necklace chain thingy in a nice little box. Everyone happened to really like the box :-P. He liked it though, Im glad i picked a good one :-). Then this guy Matt drove me home cuz he lived in Newmarket, which was ncie, though I was looking forward to the bus ride home.

Today I woke up specially early, and my mom and sister and i drove Maxime to Union station so he can go back to Quebec. That was sad. Its like the exchange is actually officially over. Ill miss Maxime, tho I did only spend like a total of maybe 5 days with the guy. We took lots of pictures, and the Newmarket people plan a reuinion again at some point.

My quebec coordinator, Emilie, sent me a DVD with a whole bunch of videos and pictures and songs in French. I watched most of it, it brought back memories. I loved some of those crazy french songs... specifically, HAWAIENNE!

*sings*
J'aurais voulu que tu sois hawaienne!
J'aurais voulu que tu sois hawaienne!

Roughly translated... "Id wished you were Hawaiian". I think. LoL who cares, its the catchiest song ever. I can understand the Quebecois listening to english music that they dont understand now :-P, i hardly understand Hawaienne, but it rocks so much.

AFter that I went to see bryan :-), he came to get me and then we went to see the "Manchurian Candidate". The jetlag still bugs me, and it wasnt the most exciting movie in the world, so I started nodding off :-P. Last night I saw Collateral with Karina, and I sovled that problem by getting coffee from tim hortons while the movie was goin, but i ddint feel like it today. Instead, bryan and i went over to second cup after the movie. Ahh id missed him :-), i hadnt talked to him in ages. And i saw his computer, and am jealous of the screen. I missed seein movies :-).

HAWAIENNE! da da da da-da-da, HAWAIENNE!

I thought I was to hang out with maxime today, but hes off with my sister somewhere :-P, ah well. I had lunch with Michelle today, and she liked the thingy I got her, which was this bracelet thingy that came in this orange box that had a heart on it. Kind of weird, but meh. The waitress came by with our drinks as i was putting it on her, and she was like AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW DID HE JUST GIVE YOU A PRESENT? THATS SO SWEET! and apologized for barging in. It amused me.

In the meantime, I decided to upload three of the best pics from my philippines trip. The pics from the Quebec trip will be coming soon too, but these pictures are really nice. I love the mountain picture. It was the highlight of the trip definately, and it was away from the family members and from the hot, polluted city. Anyways, here:


This is the logo of the Greater Toronto Airport Authority. Its supposed to be planes taking off, but to me, it looks more like missiles being launched from the ground. It amused me greatly at the airport.

( MORE PICTURES, CLICK ME! )

So i got in yesterday at 10-ish pm, after a 25 hour flight. I dont really want to write about the flgiht, it was long and boring and I hate Air Canada because their planes suck cuz they dont have little video screens in each chair, and I dont like their flight attendants. But oh well. Im still fairly jet-lagged, but its going away rather quickly. I talked to michelle for a bit but we were interrupted, i havent seen her in a really long time and i get to see her tomorrow, i think. I talked to dave on the phone for a good hour or so :-P, and i get to see him monday, and i cant wait for that one. I missed talking to him and found out about various things thats happened while I was gone, as Ive been fairly talkative about stuff thats hapepned to me really. I went to bed at like, 4am cuz of the whole jetlag issue, but thats not my fault.

Today I woke up and did a lot of nothing for a while. Maxime came back at 4:00, i missed that guy too, i feel bad for all the exchange kids that never got to meet their quebec twins. I got to hang out wth him today, we went to the goodbye bbq for the french kids in Newmarket, and that was cool, the french kids are reeally nice. And we had a bonfire and all, and everyone told stories. It made me regret leaving quebec even more, but thats alright. After that, Maxime came with me to liz's house. The sleepiness started hitting me sometime after that, thought it was awesome to see liz and carson and jesse and kim and them again. Carsons birthday party was moved to the 22nd, and shallyn has a party on the 21st. Woot. Though I felt bad for maxime. He understood when people talked to him, cuz they listened to me when I said "talk slow when talking to him", but i dont think he could understand people when they talked to each other, cuz that happened in normal-speed english. Cant be helped, though its still blah :-P.

Tomorrow is maximes last day here, my parents are wondering what to do with him. Im sure theyll come up with something crazy. An idea to drive to Darien Lake in NY was already shot down :-P. Oh crazy parents.

Its nice to be home, and sleep in my bed, with my blankets again. And shower in my shower. And not ahve to rush in the bathroom while getting ready. And... having a phone. *Sighs*

Something I wanted to say, before i leave. Ive spent the vast majority of my life, as far as I can remember, surrounded by white people. Here, while a good half (or more) of billboard advertisements and TV commercials have white people in them, Im surrounded by filipino people. Ive always felt slightly self-concious about certain things about being of filipino descent while living in Canada. While I consider myself Canadian first and Filipino second, its something else that shows skin-color wise. And its something where... Ive been different, and its always been different in a weird way thats not exactly good or bad, but... just different. And here, I can be... average looking. Or be better than average because I was able to afford nicer stuff, and can speak unbroken english (which people seem to think makes someone "superior"), and am taller than most people because most Asians are really really short. I dont have to stand out and be Asian cuz this is an Asian culture. And while I dont feel that this is MY culture (I feel much safer and more comfortable in Canadian culture), its an interesting feeling...

So I leave on thsurday at 7am and get in on thursday at 8pm. Its nto a 13 hour flight, its just crazy issues with crossing various time zones and the international date line. Theres this one crazy island country that made a bump on the date line because they wanted to be the first island to see the year 2000 four years ago so they switched over to the other side. How crazy are they :-P. Just wrote the first private entry i ahve gotten to write snice leaving Ontario, I feel better!

Its six in the morning, where IS everyone :-P, you should all be awake as I found an internet cafe with a webcam. Oh well.

Anyways. A lot has happened since last update. I dont efel like writing it all down. Went to some crazy mountain resort town thing... it rains everyday still... I wont miss my cousins as much as I should but thats alright. I really dont feel much of a connection to my family here, and I still meet people that I dont think id ever met before and apparently theyre my family too. I feel paraded and showed-off. And I hate looking so foreign. But I cant help that :-P. I want Thursday to be tomorrow.

So I found the net cafe again, and I have 51 minutes of non-chatting time cuz its 1:33am in Canada and most people are asleep. Its time for comparisons and rants. Whenever I talk in dollars I mean Canadian dollars cuz people dont know the exchange rate to filipino pesos (which is... 40 pesos = 1 dollar).

There are some things which are interesting here:
- After eating at the food court, you're supposed to leave all your garbage on your table, and it will be cleaned for you.
- There is no toilet paper in the washrooms, nor is there soap and paper towels/hand dryers.
- Washrooms are called "C.R.'s", aka Comfort Rooms. Ironic because I dont find them comfy :-P.
- I asked what the minimum wage was, and was told it was 280 pesos (7 dollars). I didnt think it was that bad till I found out that its 7 dollars per day, not per hour.
- Seatbelt laws have yet to actually be entrenched here. Which is scary considering the traffic situation. And holy shit, pollution. This is the only place id ever actually found it hard to breathe outside. People walk around with handkercheifs over their faces.
- I have seen the biggest cockroaches I have ever seen, and will probably ever see, in my life.
- Its the rainy season, and so it rains for several hours each day, at least. And its the kind of rain where if you stand in it for like 5 seconds, you'll be completely drenched. Tropical torrential rains.
- Roads flood quite easily. And then the people who live in the random slums will go out and splash around in the flood water. Which is slgihtly gross because some of that water is spilled-over sewage water.
- Newspaper stories in the past few days haev included rumblings of a nearby volcano, efforts of a local government to fight cholera and denge fever, and some rebel fighting goign on somewhere to the South.

Theres a bunch more to say I cant think of at the moment anyways. I feel kind of... weird... that I spend all my time in these big fancy malls and in my hotel when like a five minute walk down the street, there are the slums. Along the rivers and along the railroad tracks. The kind of things you see on the WorldVision commercials but never really imagine confronting until you see it. One of my uncles doesnt own a fridge, and therefore has to buy the food everyday to cook for my cousins.

I dont see how the government can possibly build fancy tourist-related things like massive bright christmas-light-ish streetlights on some fancy tourist-ish area roads, and at the same time have all these poverty problems. Like, you can say the same thing in Canada, but the slum issue is nowhere near as bad or as obvious.

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Now to me stories... hmmm. Yesterday I bought four shirts for 23$. That averages to... like less than 6 dollars per shirt. Im sick of karaokes cuz everyones obsessed with them. Though I can say a lot of people here like, cant sing at all. Im happy abuot the food situation. A lot of filipino food is very yummy, and filipino desserts, and I ahvent had a lot of em very often.

Is it really wrong to think the people here that are supposed to be my family arent much more to me than some acquaintances i already haev. Like, theyre family, but i havent seen them for years, I hardly remember some of them, and I will most liekly never see them again, nor do I realy want to form some knid of bonding relationship with most of them. So most of the time Im with them, while I try to join in conversations, and join in when they play cards and stuff, Im not really into it. And Ive amstered the nap. I nap a lot because I get like 6 hours of sleep at night cuz everyone in my family makes a lot of noise going to sleep and my parents wake up early cuz of matthew. So in taxis and at my cousins' houses, I sleep :-P. It works.

Alright so, flgiht to the philippines. Ive been here a good week now. Found an internet cafe and am writing like crazy and catchin up with people in my absense. People i havent seen since like... the start of the summer. Gah.

I feel scared here. Like, not a safe country i dont think. There were random security people (the SWAT team?) on the street near the hotel with assault rifles just standing there. The driving of everyone is just crazy. nobody really follows the lines on the road. And... there arent really stop signs or anything in smoe of the minor intersections. And since there are erally high walls and stuff, the taxis just kind of beep their horns before they drive by the intersection to let people know that theyre there. And... *sigh* im just told a lot to watch my wallet. Im not used to this. And they tell me to speak filipino as much as possible to make it less obvious im a foreigner but i dont care about that one, my accent will make it obvious enuf anyways.

Anyhoo. There was a lot of "me" stuff to write in here. Ive missed people a lot. I was home for two days only, between Quebec and the Philippines. There were lots of people to see and i only saw like, one person i wanted to see, but t'was worth it and i ran into other people I wanted to see who I saw by acident (woot Brian!). And also bryan :-P. My family (aunts, cousins) keep asking me about girls. LoL so annoying.

My lesbian aunt is nearby too :-) I need to ask her questions about my family and dealig with that issue. Ive been quite tempted to come out to my dad out of spite altey just cuz hes eben so annoyig, and maybe i could get sent home. Hes slightly peeved that I spent the two days I wasnt at home much the two days i was in Newarket and went to visit dave and youth group.

The prices here are AWESOME. I can get like a complete combo meal for less than 2$. I can get from one end of Manila to the other for like 3-4$. I can buy tw pairs of pants for 20$... silver chain necklace for 10-15$... wow :-P. I wish i brought more money.

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PS. Mango overload! The good thing abou this place is like, its mango central. TONS of mangoes EVERYWHERE. Mango shakes, mango juice, mango mango! Ive had ltos of mango-related things here, I love mangoes :-). If there was a God, the epitome of his creation would be the Mango.

So I flew in yesterday, from montreal to Toronto. The flight took an hour, the train took 6. I was amazed. As soon as I got into toronto we went to the passport office to get the passports. So basically from 5:00am till 6:30pm i was travelling around Central Canada and waiting around the passport office for them to process things. 13 hours of boredom. The flgiht was COOL though. Like, COOL. I rode in a boeing 737 :-).

Most of yesterday was poop though. I was mostly sad and frustrated for msot of the day. Sad I left my host family and cried when my Quebec coordinator surprisingly visited me at the Drummondville train station.

But I got to see Davey yesterday at group :-) and I surprised Brian at group. Brian and i walked to starbucks after group, so I got home pretty late. But thats alright. I got to talk to Conor last night, miss him lots :-).

Today, I went early in the mornin and bussed down to see... DAVEY! Like, thats one of few good things thats come from my having to return from Drummondville, but... its a big good thing :-) Because yesterday wasnt enough :-P. So we watched some gay commercials and stuff, and watched some movie about mormons called Latter Days until we had to stop cuz his parents came home. I went to swiss chalet for dinner with hsi family, his parents are awful nice. I was all sad again at goodbye, and I suck at goodbyes, so Im glad that one was fairly quick at least cuz his parents just dropped me off at the bus stop. I will miss him lots.

At least like... in Drummondville I was able to call a bunch of times. And I had internet access. In the philippines there will be none of that, Im guessing. And, its much more unstable. There are no terrorists in Drummondville :-P, there are some in the philippines. Im scared of this trip. But Ill keep in mind words of advice davey gave me, which were... "dont get mugged".

I leave tomorrow at 7am.

Hmm. I had an awesome weekend. Which Id write about but for some news thats come up.

My parents called me today and told my my grandfather (on my dads side) has died. They ask if Im able to go to the philippines with them and I say yes. They will be going in the next few days. That means, that I may be having to take the train tomorrow, home. I can be in toronto, tomorrow. Tomorrow.

This is incredibly sudden. Ive been babbling about how homesick I was :-p, but now that going home like... tomorrow... is a possibility, i dont know if i do. Like, I had a fun weekend in Quebec City. Next weekend is Montreal, and if i go home ill miss out on rafting and I may NEVER see the exchange kids AGAIN. Ever. And I want to say goodbye at least. *sigh*. And if I go Ill be in the philippines for 2-3 weeks, meaning, i wont be able to go back here. I thought it would be for like... a week or something. Hmmm... I feel torn.

If I end up back in Newmarket by tomorrow, there are people I must see before I leave for the Philippines again. But if I go then Ill be back from the philippines sooner than when Id be back from Quebec.

My coordinator visited my work today for a meeting with my boss, and I didnt really learn anything new. It was just something to do today. Everything she told me was stuff id already been doing. So works still fairly boring, theres not much to do. And when theres not much to do i get nostalgic and homesick :-P so boo-urns to that.

And I feel pretty helpless sometimes. Like when this kid was running around being crazy and the other kids were like `il dois prendre Ritalin`... I didnt know what to do... I stood there and tried to keep saying `arrete le`. He forgot his ritalin at home or something, I just called over the other counsellors. Bah.

Anyways the other Ontario girl I work with got transferred today, because my boss didnt like her. What the hell :-P. She thinks she doesnt smile enuf or whatever. Like... I dont like my boss, or my job, *I* want to get transferred to another place, apparently the way to do that is to start sucking at my job. I dont want to suck.

I also caused SO much trouble yesterday and I felt really reaaaally bad. I miss being more independent than this. Being like `going downtown, be back at 2` or like `going to art group, be back at 10`. I caused lots of trouble and none of it was really intentional. And nobody seems to care anymore, but... still... like, guh.

We saw a french movie today. The Quebecois are weird, I didnt get the movie at all. It seemed random. I got the basic plot but it wasnt really plotty. It swore an awful lot. And... kind of gross at some points.

Its sad that its 10:09 right now but Im going to bed soon.

Melissa (the girl who used to work with me but got moved) gave me a hug when I found out she was leaving, but its not the same :-P. When I signed up for this I had NO idea how long six weeks was. Still have more than a month left to go.

I miss people. I miss hugs. I used to get lots in each week, Ive been deprived for like two weeks now. And good hugs. Homesickness is supposed to come early in the trip isnt it :-P.

I blame my boss though, shes still evil.

The weekend was FUN though. I miss weekends already. I went kayaking yesterday. Kayaks are SO much fun, i love it and didnt wanna get out. Slightly scared at first that i would tip over, but meh, got over that quickly. The stupid paddle gave me four blisters on my right hand though, maybe i wasnt paddling properly or something but hey, it was my first time kayaking.

Today some little girl came up to me and asked if i was chinese. I said no. She said something about me being brown, and then asked if i was chinese. I said nope. She said something like `but you`re brown`, and walked off somewhere. Poor un-exposed children...

And... thank you for commenting, those who comment :-p. I do not have the time to respond to each one like usual, but I read them, and I am grateful for them :-). Thanks!

Ah so much has happened. My boss is evil. Thats a long story I will talk about sometime, but shes just really evil. I talked to my co-ordinator, Emilie, about my boss, and she`ll visit me at work on Monday or Tuesday to talk to my boss. The girl I work wiht, Melissa, thinks shes evil too. Shes VERY evil. Diabolical really.

We think she might be workin for the FLQ. You never know...

Hier soir et aujourd`hui nous avons alle a le festival Mondial de Cultures dans Drummondville. Its a really reaaally big festival, like, half the town must be there in the evenings. Drummondville is a pretty little town, the downtown is pretty quaint and ahs this humungously massive church with bells that ding pretty loudly.

I went shopping with my host mom the other day, its not the same as shopping with friends. I felt bad trying on clothes that I had to buy for work, so I didnt even bother looking at stuff I wanted for myself. The stores are mostly in french! And there are brands id never heard of. U`d think i was in another country :-P.

Ive spent too much money. At least 20$ today just on food. *sigh*. I get paid 500$ at the end of this week though. At least. I look forward to that. And I have to buy more disposable cameras... theyre convenient but expensive when u have to buy like one a week. And pay for developing stuff :-P. Bah.

Off sailing tomorrow. Should be fun. Off to bed now :-)

Today at work wasnt that much more fun than yesterday, but again, improvement with the frenchspeaking kids. And more realizations. After like a few minutes of playin tag with the little kids i was all out of breath and tired, it didnt seem like anyone else was :-P. This is better for my health. And, random fact, I lost half a poud since saturday :-P. Not that I care. Just interesting. I guess thats what happens when I get paid to like... play games with kids, and then do tons of running around doing sporty stuff afterwards.

I miss everyone. I called davey on the phone on Tuesday, and I called Michelle and Bryan today, and Michelle was awesome but I had to go cuz the bowling was sstarting, and I couldnt talk to bryan long cuz he was with greg or somethin. Must call moooore.

Today we went booowlin. Me and the other exchange student kids. Nice to see them again, and ncei to speak english again. I wanted to pass 100, but I didnt, cuz I suck :-P, but thats ok. I need to figure out how to say `I suck` in french :-P. The kids keep asking me to play soccer and field hockey and stuff at work, and I can only respond with `je ne suis pas un bon joueur.` They make me play anyways :-P.

On saturday we go to the beach. Im not so excited considering there is a beachw here i work and im kind of sick of staring at the kids playing in it all day :-P, but oh well.

I get back on the 14th of August, Maxime leaves my house on the 15th, after that, I have my freedom again :-)

At work things went better. The kids that I talked to at least talked back to me today. Well, they went and talked to me today. AND i did a better job understanding them. We did more fun stuff today, and I didnt have to get wet because instead of spraying the kids, I went and swept instead. Which was slightly anti-social but i do not care :-). Work was not so boring today. It can only get better from here.

After work I had so much fun. I met people my age :-). Turns out the 13 year old neighbor has 17 and 19 year old sisters, and they have boyfriends and cousins that I met. Theyre awesomely cool, we played beach volleyball in their backyard, and then trampolined :-P. Its insane that there is nothing here to do BUT sporty stuff and I hardly ever did sporty stuff in newmarket.

But ive learned a lot here, and not justr french. Ive learned how to volley and bump a volleyball now :-p, and how to stop on a trampoline and stuff. its cool. And everyones all tan and hardly anyones overweight. Thats also cool :-P. And the past two nights we`ve roasted marshmallows. These things I *NEVER* get to do in Newmarket... not the beach volleyball or the trampolines or the marshmallow roasting... i think it will get better from here.

My first day of work :-).

J`ai me reveille a 7h ce matin. My parents drove me over and they packed me the biggest lunch ever involving like... a sandwich, a thing of pudding, yogurt, carrots, granola bar, and two boxes of juice. I ate all of it :-P.

When I got there, i was very very confused. It seemed like total chaos with kids running around the camp. I was introduced to my `helper` person, the camp counsellor id be sticking with. She didnt really help me much... but her name is Bidule.

I started at 9 and all of what I did from 9 till 12 was... stand around. Or sit around :-P. They played some games but I didnt know what games they were playin until they started playing it, they started a story-telling time but i couldnt understand any of the stories at all because they all spoke so fast. Little kids speak FAST.

After lunch, i decide to ask someone `as-tu besoin d`aider`. So, soon after, i was helping spray people`s feet wiht water at the entrance to the water play area. There were water guns at the water play area, and at first it was all well and good until one kid sprayed me with the water gun and i sprayed back. Soon, like 6 kids with water guns are attacking me and the other exchange student kid who was standing with me, and we`re both trying to shoot back but i got soaked. I wasnt PLANNING on getting soaked, i only brought one shirt, so I took off my shirt and just dealt with it that way but it started to rain and ym shirt got wet anyways :-P. gah.

I find it awesome that my `brother`and i play golf on their lawn :-P.

Im off now. Hopefully, the week gets better from here. Work kinda sucks but everything else is rocking. I understand my family most of the time now, and... my first instinct is getting to be to respond in french when people talk to me. THats always a good sign :-)

Je suis ici en Quebec...

Heehee, my first instinct was to type in frenhc, Im definately makin progress with learning this crazy language.

I got on the train at 11:00 yesterday morning. It was an awesomely cool train ride, i dont ride the train often except for the subway. I got into Montreal at... 6:00 or something... we had to wait there for an hour before transferring to a train that goes to Drummondville and we were tehre by 8. I wasnt really scared on the train... it didnt hit me that iw as going to some alien country until I got off the train and saw my new `parents`. Oh yea, the food on the train really really sucked. Booo.

My parents are cool. They spoke to me in french as soon as i got off the train and it hit me. oopsies. LoL i understood most of what they were saying but there were a lot of times where I had nothing to say cuz i didnt understand them and i just... was silent... and it was awkward. They took me out for ice cream my first night. That was nice of them.

I unpacked and all. That was boring...

Today. I woke up at 10 and they fed me a massive breakfast involving eggs and bacon and rice and... potatoes and milk and juice and coffee... lol apparently they have a BIG breakfast every sunday. Ils ont un gros dejeuner chaque dimanche (awesome i can speak this :-D).

Le frere de Maxime s`appelle Yannick. Nous avons jouer de golf, de pistolet a eau, et je il regarde jouer tennis. Oh, nous avons jouer soccer aussi. I was actually kind of bored, not much else to do but sports around here :-P We went to a picnic at my work, Camp Kounack. The other students from Ontario went too so I was like YES! I can speak english. Mwahahaha. We played beach volleyball... I suck, but thats ok, a lot of people did :-).

Oh geez, this is such a rural town. Very few people around speak ANY english at all. The nearest town is not even a town... Id say its like what Kesiwck is to Newmarket. ANd St Cyrille (my town) is Keswick and Drummondville is Nemwarket. And Montreal is Toronto. lol I dont mind though. FOr one thing, its quiet... the street is so quiet. They have a huge backyard and a huuuuge lawn, and they have a VERY nice house. Its cool. C`est cool.

I start work tomorrow. My `parents` will drive me to work and back. Which is really nice of em, i dont have to take the bus, and out here in the rural areas the busses cant possibly be all that close, or convenient. One of my exchange student buddies has to take the bus to the same place I work, I feel bad for her. Oh well :-P.

I have to now though. It is time for bed. Je commencerai travailler demain a 8h30. Im kind of looking forward to it and dreading it at the same time. Oh wellz.

Today I woke up fairly early to help my parents clean up for Max's arrival. I miss when they were gone, and my house was quiet, and nboody was around except me. Oh well.

We drove down to Union station to get Max. His train was scheduled to come at 3:00. We were told it was delayed 45 minutes. Then, people started coming, and people came for like a half hour before people stopped coming, and my group's twins hadnt come yet. At which point we found out the train was actually delayed until 5:00. So 5:00 comes and goes... its 5:45 or so by the time we see a crowd of kids come out that head towards us. I did NOT recognize Max at all, I just kinda guessed it was the guy that was heading towards me and smiling, and guessed it was him because he was fairly short at 5'4.

It was awkward at first and I didnt know what to say to him and my mom kept trying to talk to him and I felt bad for the guy because he couldnt understand a lot of what she was saying. Oh well.

He got to my house and I gave him a small tour thing, and... we went for a walk around the suburbs. Let me talk to him for a while without pressure to really come up with anything for us to do. Talkin to him got easier, when he talks to me in French I can understand him only if he is like "Tu. As. Fait. ____" etcetera and he can understand me if i enunciate clearly and emphasize the spaces after each word. Kinda cool.

He is cute and adorable and he cant speak english well and his accent is so cute and adorable and its just like awwwwwwww.

Bryan came by and we went to Wendy's to talk for a while, and I said my goodbyes to him. He wrote his note in my yearbook booklet thingy, and it was a very sweet note, thank you Bryan :-). It was nice to talk to him before I left.

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This is most likely my last post in Ontario. Ill miss so many people. And I am deathly scared... so scared... so very scared of meeting my host family. Im scared of not knowing what to say. Ill manage.

Max has a computer with internet access in his room :-) that rocks. I will be able to be online more often than i thought :-)