The End of my Time Here In 2019 (With New Adventures in 2020)

On Wednesday, I returned to Nando's for a treat!

 

The weather has officially taken a turn for the chillier here, and December has revealed itself as a true winter month. There's not much snow on the ground here -- that was absolute hell back over the Remembrance Day weekend -- and moreso ice.

Unfortunately, later that Wednesday, I grappled with very tough emotions, to the point that I did not even go to the lab on Thursday. Thursday was not a pleasant or productive day for me. There was some good parts though: 1) I sought out the emotional support of my RA, having an hour long conversation with him (which is something I usually am scared to do) and 2) my dad got back to me about my lit review draft and he gave me helpful advice on it.

Friday I of course went to the lab! I had some meetings and work to take care of. There were still successes this week: My prof gave me permission to submit my literature review draft this coming Monday. And my dad told me the draft was actually quite good. This review is so important to me *because* it is my first concrete deliverable during my Fulbright.

On Friday, however, I headed (rushed?) back to my place -- after the very short departmental holiday party -- feeling this horrible quick heart rate and experiencing a widespread sweating feeling. The excessive warmth enveloped my body, so I felt *forced* to go outside. Even though this Friday is maybe the coldest day I've experienced here. I know that the drop in temperature and my evil experience Wednesday evening contributed heavily to this situation. The heart rate, to be clear, was probably 150 bpm or higher, which is dramatic EVEN FOR AN ANXIETY ATTACK. (My resting heart rate tends to be around 90-100 bpm.) Somehow this was worse. It was not because of exercise but some physiological reaction. My stress was, somehow, just that high. (I am 'fine' now but will 100% tell my cardiologist this coming Friday.)

Actually, I had planned to visit the Victoria Park, but my heart troubles and the cold weather discouraged me from going. It was simply too cold to be outside for more than 15 minutes at a time, so a park was completely out of the question. It would probably take 15 minutes *Just to get there*, which did not sound fun.

Thankfully, the park was near the government buildings.

I chose to visit the government 'plaza' that is downstairs, north of the river. The train station fortunately led directly inside. Many images are below but I do not have the energy to comment on them too much. Just some general impressions: the buildings had a lot more emphasis on accessibility than I expected. Ramps were always just as visible as stairs, which made me happy, even for seemingly older buildings. Signage was generally good as well. Paths outside were cleared. Generally better than the rest of the city, including THE AREA NEAR THE GOVERNMENT BUILDINGS.

Personally, I would like to come up with a community engagement reason to return to these buildings.

I must admit-- I laughed when I saw that this area was called a park.

Unfortunately, one elevator stopped working at the train station; it took nearly 30 minutes to locate the other elevator to let me to the train station. And a couple strangers helped me but they were...weird. I was really relieved to not see them again, being totally honest.

Maybe I should not have gone out again -- because Friday was a cold day, and I was feeling great emotional stress, which maybe led to physical stress-- but I wanted to go to Jollibee. I've heard of it but never had a real opportunity to go. I had seen it in passing while seeing the city with my parents (back in August).

However, the bus 304 in this city deserves an outright callout; this stop was absolutely awful because of the snow and the lack of curb cuts. I should not be punished for taking my scooter, but I felt punished.

 Jollibee itself was priced well and the staff were very kind -- they offered to bring me things because I was in my scooter. The yumburger itself had a really pleasant, light beef taste that reminded me more of keema than of hamburgers. I would like to go again sometime~

But I had issues because THE SAME BUS was the only bus I could take back to the train station. I could not get to that bus stop and missed the bus. In fact, I tried to get the bus's attention from the side, but they just honked at me and went on. (What a rude person.) In possibly the coldest weather I have experienced so far. I had to make my way to another bus stop and wait probably 15 minutes, and this is not including all the backtracking! For some reason, this particular area especially hates anyone with mobility limitations.

My hands and feet felt so chilly that they became numb and stung. (Admittedly, my gloves and shoes were not good for the occasion.) This was because of the cold but also because of the excessive amount of time I had to be outside. And I had to be outside for so long because of the poor accessibility. When I got home, I felt absolutely relieved, but I knew that this day had probably been far too much for me.

Readers, you are probably hoping there is a good story somewhere here. But unfortunately, I ended up getting so lost -- after walking to the right place and not realizing it -- that I had to take an Uber. And the uber cost me $40 just to get back to the right place. I was pretty angry but I knew I should still take a look. There was a big problem with how Uber and Google Maps read addresses here. There's also Ave vs St here too. But I found myself especially upset with how addresses are written and read here. I had never had this experience in my 4 months here! This was a rough learning experience, but I made it through. That's the main good outcome here.

So I went to the market mentioned below.

 For a free event, this was pretty alright. I was still quite angry with myself and with the city. So the event could not have been truly "worth it", but at least I got some nice pictures.

 

After the Market, I finally had an easy journey and made my way to the library, my real goal for today. 

Okay, I lied. 

I had to take an Uber because of the bus wait times, and I even had to figure out a credit card issue. (Not exactly the most fun Saturday.) But getting to the library, dropping off my two books, and heading back home felt relieving. However, I felt tired for the rest of the day.

What's left for me while here? In these like two days lol. Today (Sunday) I am working on packing, organizing, cleaning, and laundry. And I also have DnD today. Tomorrow (Monday) I will wrap up cleaning, submit my literature review, and just relax before I leave for the airport (early on Tuesday morning).

How has it been 4 months?

Just Another Week

Monday to Monday isn't a week, you protest! Well okay, that's fair. But it was still somehow filled with many things to see. This city is filled with so many sights to see! It is honestly exhausting.

The most exhausting event was on Monday the 2nd -- the Resistance Town Hall, held at MacEwan University. The campus is riddled with stairs disguised as ramps, posing adversity for myself (using my mobility scooter). The layout is absolutely confusing -- somehow Building 6 is not clearly connected to Building 7, meaning that I arrived just in time for the event. Despite arriving probably 15 minutes early. Then in the room itself we had to take in chairs from outside.

It was absolutely worth it to see the Town Hall -- to understand the anger and frustration people in Alberta face over extensive (perhaps even historic) budget cuts. To see in full detail those cuts. To see why exactly people were so frustrated. Unfortunately, the event focused less on data and charts and more on the frustration part. This was a rally after all. But for me, the great benefit was understanding the political landscape of this city and province. (May or may not ever go to one of these again, though.)

 On Tuesday I spent over an hour cooking for the Toastmasters end of the year potluck just the next year. Chicken curry again. But this time I labored over the curry element, adding oil, spices, and tomatoes to buffer its strength. It felt like a type of curry my mom would make (except I *really* need a pot lol).

Simultaneously, I signed up to give a speech for Toastmasters! It was a half meeting and we had hoped to do one speech before the potluck. The planned speaker backed out and I saw my opportunity!

I actually finished the curry and rice ahead of time, and put it away. But I did not decide what to do for Toastmasters yet....

The day of the meeting (Wednesday the 4th)
, in the afternoon actually, I got my food ready to go and picked out a blog post of mine for sharing (http://nighttrail.blogspot.com/2017/12/yona-in-blush-of-dawn.html) with the club. I was very nervous because of the high fantasy elements, but I badly needed something to present.

My nerves were at an all time high as I recited the story. I read from my laptop, while trying to act out some scenes, add vocal emphasis, and exclude unnecessary parts. (The original story was definitely written for a native English audience.) I was wondering if this was even a good pick. I started nervously sweating.

Because this speech was a little different than normal, we changed our approach to the evaluation. Instead of a single evaluator, we had a group evaluation focused on my vocal variety and on the themes of my story. Perhaps a bit like English class!

To my great surprise, people enjoyed my story's themes around flight and disability -- I was told it was relatable while being eye-opening. Funnily enough, I also helped people learn about different models of disability (the oldest being of disability as being a straight up curse). People did point out that my laptop got in the way and that I need to work on my breathing control....which are very fair points. My evaluators also let me know that they appreciated the great risk I took in completely deviating from the normal speech structure. It was tough...but it was worth it.

After that we talked about various things and ate food. I was the only person who brought a dinner item -- so I was worried no one would eat it. But people tried and enjoyed my chicken curry, even though it was cold and with the chicken and rice separately. (Unfortunately, without a spoon no one could add curry onto the rice to unify the dish.)

For me, this meant that two big risks -- the cooking and the speech -- had paid off well and I finally felt a sense of moving on.


The next day, the 5th, we had a dorm event where we made holiday snowglobes. As luck would have it, they had hot cocoa there too! (What a festive event!) Thanks to the excessive glitter I placed in my snowglobe, it turned purple, probably from the purple glitter's color rubbing off. None of the other glitter had this issue! It's incredible that each color of glitter could have slightly different physical properties. There's glitter of all colors in here. But it only turned *purple*.

The next day, out of kindness, I gave it to the PhD student who spends so much time putting up with me and teaching me. (He had previously asked me about how people make snowglobes so it was a natural fit.) 

This was also the day of the JCC holiday party. (Wow it's incredible how many holiday parties I attend, huh?) The first 2 hrs were the combined conversational club party -- we played Kahoot and Werewolf, which felt very lively. Unfortunately, though I know quite a few people in the JCC now....I did not feel comfortable joining any groups of people. I asked the club president what group to join -- and he told me to join any. So I just picked a group based on someone catching my eye -- they had talked to the club president and seemed friendly. So I joined that group. Turns out they were friendly! The friend they sat with was very friendly too! Thanks to joining this group, I was even able to connect with another person over potential in-person DnD games. (Lately, my online DnD group has not been meeting much...sometimes we pass 2 weeks without any progress of any kind. These are supposed to be all Sunday long! )

There was a group photo too! I joined a few people in squatting, including the aforementioned two people in my group. Afterwards, I asked to take a selfie with these two because we're close to the same height. (Especially interesting as one of the two is a pretty tall girl!) Usually, I'm far too shy to do things like that -- but it was fun!

Afterwards, there was an after party at a ramen place. Unfortunately, there was less to say here, as I spent much of the time on my phone.

But the vegeterian ramen (so I did not have to have pork broth) was quite delicious! One first for me was eating tofu (which apparently is much more enjoyable in ramen than on its own). The broth had a great spiciness to it that satisfied the Indian part of me. I was impressed by how much of it I consumed before giving up and getting the remaining broth as leftovers.

I never said this before -- but I had leftovers from the Toastmasters party AND I got this ramen leftover. So naturally this past Saturday I combined the two and had fun enjoying the two very different flavors together. (I also added some spaghetti noodles to try to replicate the ramen experience.) It was far from perfect but it was fun! (I truly must be my mom's child with how I like to reuse leftovers.)

There was a small Christmas Carnival of sorts in the dorm on the 7th (this past Saturday). Just snacks and making cards. I talked to my sister during the event, on the phone, and that inspired me to make the below card. It's a very basic card! But it was a fun gesture.

This past sunday was a boring day where I did not get much done....Except I streamed some anime for online friends, and vice versa. And inbetween those two streams...I received an email from the professor giving me lots of feedback on my literature paper! ...Which I still need to work on. Whoops.

Hopefully I'm alive with my next post to tell you all about the paper!

 One last item: I had a pleasant surprise with Indian style chicken manchurian. It ended up being my lunch AND dinner yesterday (December 9th). There was a sufficient level of spice and overall flavor that kept me enticed. This was all from a fast food-y place! So it was a good shock.

Until next time, take care!