First Month, IN ENGLISH

From now on I will start writing my blog in English. It will be harder for me and I will probably make a lot of mistakes during my writing, but it will be a good exercise and this makes it possible for all my new (and old of course) international friends to read the blog as well.

The first month has been wonderful. I’ve met so many people and I’ve seen a lot of things. It was a bit of a hustle to get all my courses sorted out, but finally after a lot of effort it worked out. I’ve arranged a nice spectrum of courses, that in my opinion will all contribute of being an engineer. They are not only very interesting but some courses are really fun! Because I could choose every single course myself and even had the possibility to switch courses if they turned out to be different than I expected, I am really motivated of completing all these courses and getting the most out of it.

The courses(for the people that I haven’t told yet) I participate in are:

• -        Green Entrepreneurship ( changed from Venture creation and Entrepreneurship)
• -        Industrial Ecology(changed from field ecology)
• -        Social Psychology
• -        Physiological Psychology
• -        Expressive Drawing

The field ecology seemed very interesting but I noticed in the first lecture that it wasn’t quite what I was looking for. You could compare it with biology from secondary school. The level was a bit too low and it wasn’t orientated to industry at all. Every week there was a Lab session. Here you would have to recognise trees, plant seeds and that sort of stuff :P Very interesting of course, when you want to be “the dad” one day, and know all the names of the trees and plants(which is actually quite cool if you could) but I think it would not give a real contribute to my purpose why I am here.

All the other courses were very interesting but different than the courses I’m used to in Delft. The course Venture creation and Entrepreneurship wasn’t possible to do because it was an online course. This was a bit of a turn off because I really looked forward to participate in this course. Eventually I found the replacing course, Green Entrepreneurship. The problem was that at this time the course was already full, so I had to ask permission from the prof.

After a bit of a search I found his office, knocked nervously on the door and on the inside I was praying that he would approve. There was not really a good replacement or anything like this course that would not have interfered with my schedule or that would contain the same contents. He turned out to be a great guy with a very enthusiastic response that he couldn’t refuse a Dutch international student, because his wife was Dutch. I regretted that I didn’t bring one of my traditional Dutch souvenirs but I was really glad that I was enrolled J

The first weeks were really intensive. Finding out about all the new things: Cheap groceries, all the lectures, all the required books and tools, sporting facilities and maybe joining one of the 1000 clubs. Apparently they have a club for everything.

Now I’m settled and getting more used to the Canadian culture and also taking some of the accent(they pronounce the “ou” more like “oo” or in Dutch”oe”, you hear it especially with words like about or out). The weather has been great so far, I was expecting it to be very cold now, but I can still wear my shorts and I’m still walking around on my flip flops. J The housing reminds me a lot of my backpacking experience through Australia. The kitchen is horrible and sharing a room with someone else makes the feeling complete. The sharing of the room however, is less worse than I was expecting. My roommate is a cool guy, we have been drinking beers several times and it is actually quite cosy. It’s also really useful because we share some food and usually eat together.  The kitchen is a real nightmare, compared to this kitchen the one in the JVB(my student house) is like heaven. I gave up after cooking the first meal. I had to turn off the fire alarm 5 times(not because my food was burning!!) and there wasn’t any cutlery. Luckily the kitchen from the second floor is much better. It’s clean and has more the feeling of a living room. We have been cooking there ever since. To make friends I just ended up cooking for everyone. We started some cooking groups where we all take turns to cook.

Although the housing isn’t so good, I am really happy I’ve managed to get a room here. I think I would never have made so many friends in such a short time as I did now. It’s like a big community with international students. There are a lot of nice activities and every night there is an opportunity to party or hang out. This is much better than living in a private and bigger room, but be lonely. The location is also very good, it is right next to campus and I’ve been walking everywhere ever since.  Only for groceries I took the bus. Tomorrow I can pick up my bicycle! I was thinking about buying a longboard but i’m afraid that I am not able to use it after next month because of rainy or snowy weather. I couldn’t find any second hand bike. But after hearing that a friend got one when he asked at the office of the housekeeper, he just got one. Now i’m going to get one, and hopefully it will fit my long Dutch legs :P

Canada’s nature is breathtaking, literally. The first big road trip we(team Holland and a German guy who loves Tim Hortens) made, took us to Bruce Peninsula, one of the local recommendations . It was really gorgeous. It started with the long scenic drive. Everybody was really excited and we’ve had a wonderful day. When we came to our first view of one of the big lakes, we all just stopped talking. It was completely quiet. The water was crystal clear and had a beautiful blue colour. The trees were still very clean and we had chosen a wonderful day with a clear blue sky. For pictures, see facebook. The drive took us a bit longer than expected, and without a place to stay, we were forced to drive back on the same day. We did a couple of hikes through the rough nature of Canada and finally my hunger for nature was fulfilled. Our last hike we almost had to run to be back before all the light was gone. It was unfortunate that we only had such a small amount of time to spend there because I could have stayed there forever. The walk back in the dark was a little tense because they told us there was a bear around. One half of my body wanted to see this amazing creature, but the other half would prefer to see the bear from a safe place.... just from the car or something :p Eventually we only scared each other with some good, really good jokes but we didn’t encounter any bears.

The weekend after we drove down to one of the biggest national parks in Ontario, Algonquin Park. Now with a bit of a different crew, (French guy, 2 Aussies, Dutch girl and me J) we hit the road again. The drive was much longer (6-7 hrs) but now we could spend the night camping. The drive was a bit rough because of all the rain. When we arrived the rain stopped magically. I mentioned that we should start setting up the tent ASAP before it would start raining. Unfortunately I didn’t knock off(afkloppen? Haha), because it immediately started raining again. Camping is great, but setting up a tent in the dark and in the rain is quite hardcore. After having some beers everybody fell asleep because we were so exhausted. The next day we hiked the longest trail so we had the biggest chance on seeing some wildlife. We heard that the Moose are in rutting(mating) season and could be very dangerous. I was convinced we would encounter a moose on our long hike. We tried to call them with our moose call, which just sounds like: MOOOOOOSEEEEEE!!!! But no moose replied and they all left us without any memories of seeing this great animal. The entire day it continued with raining. We cut ourselves some really nice design poncho’s from plastic bags. Now I think about it, this might be the reason we didn’t see any moose, you could see those fluorescent blue bags from miles away! The second night was a lot more comfy and we all had a really good sleep. The next day we did a short hike to a stunning lookout. Again, for pictures check facebook!

The third trip was to one of the world’s most impressive wonders: The Niagara Falls. The trip was arranged by the Federation for students and included a winery tour. The weather was beautiful again and after a two hour bus ride it was time for some serious wine tasting! First they told about how the wine was made and the history from the winery. The most impressive fact was the temperature that is required to harvest (with hand) the frozen grapes from midnight till 5 a.m. This ice wine takes 10 times more grapes than regular wine and therefore is also around 50-100$. After all this new information I got really thirsty and luckily the tasting was about to begin. We first started with a nice white wine and this was followed by a good merlot. We finished with, of course, the ice wine. I was so curious about this well priced product. It was really sweet and felt like silk when swallowed. I would not spend so much money for this kind of dessert wine but it was great to have a taste. After we went inside and I managed to taste some more.

After tasting all these delicious wines, the day was even more beautiful. We had to drive another 30 minutes to get to the falls. We were dropped off in a “Las Vegas like” town. Everywhere you turn your head, you see touristic attraction, fancy hotels and casinos. After a short walk we started to get to the fall area. There was a white mist rising above the edge and I felt a rush of goose bumps when I came closer and closer. I looked over the edge and there it was! It was even more beautiful than I could have ever imagined. The overwhelming amount of water was again: breathtaking. When you see the small guys next to it you realize again how small humans are. We could join our international group that was just entering the famous boat: Maid of the Mist. This was, just like all the other touristic stuff, a money machine. But the money machine was more than worth its 15$. I will never forget the local rain that you feel when you get close to the fall. This is made from all the water that is splashing down on the rocks. With all my friends we really encountered and felt the Falls! After we spend the day just walking around the fall and taking pictures, pictures and MORE pictures. I think my camera never shot so many pictures in one day. Once the screen began with: “We have already over a 100 pictures of the same waterfall, would you wish to continue?”.  When we had only 40 minutes left, we decided to try to get on top of one of the fancy hotels. We sneaked in on one of the casino’s and tried our way into the hotel. First we encountered a door that required a “guest card” which we didn’t had. We continued our mission and found some stairs. We walked up to the second floor and found ourselves in a big congress hall and looked for a sign with: “elevator”. These activities gave me a déjà vu when I was with my friend Gilmee in Singapore. This time we didn’t manage to get to the roof but we did end up on a lovely balcony with a beautiful view over the falls. This was the best ending of one of the best days in Canada so far.

So far, my first English blog.

I hope you guys enjoyed it! Please leave a comment.

Cheers!

Iori