Canada Experiences

Monday, Aug 15:

my first working day at the farm in pemberton „Ice Cap Organics“.
I got up at 6 am, ate breakfast (delicous joghurt with fruits and oats), brushed my teeth and just got ready for work.
During the day, i had to weed harvest vegetables like salad, carotts, potatoes, kale and swiss chard. I work with two girls called Marget, a permanent employe, and Claudie, an other WWOOFer from Quebec. =)
At noon we had lunch: delicious salad, tomatoe soup, crackers with butter and cheese as wella as almonds and some tea =) you got definitely full.
In order to get my accomodation and food for free, I have to work 6 hours on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday. If i work 2 hours more on each of these days, i get these additonal hours paid with 12 dollars/hour. So I make almost 100 bugs this week =) Its a really nice offer which I liked to accept ;)
In this way work ende at 4 pm. After that I got ready to discover the surrounding area ;) For today I decided to go to the nearby river (Lillouet River). It was a awesome walk there, along the mountains and through Canadians wilderness ;) =) I enjoyed the view of the river, sitting on a tree trunk at the small beach, eating some delicous fruits =D
On my way back I discoverd a deer. Unfortunately there was no encounter with a bear =/ =P even though, i was equipped with a bear spray, which i got from my „host father“ Delaney. His wife Alisha was today off to Vancouver out of personal reasons, by the way. And they have got a son called Aira; about one year old and really cute =)
My tour ended already at about 6 pm, cause i was quite tired and wanted to spare my powers for the next days. Tomorrow I'll probably go to Pemberton town with the bike and on Wednesday I'll visit Whistler =)
I got a shower which i was longing for all day xD and i had dinner with Claudia: Tortillas, filled with vegetables, and salad =)
I am excited how the following days will look like and i think already now that it is a pity that i can stay only a week. But it IS a week after all =)

Aug 14, Sunday:

The day has come when I was about to travel to that farm in Pemberton, which is in the north of BC.
I was looking forward to that day quite a lot. Finally I will leave Vancouver and see a bit more of BC. Even though its only for a week, so far.
I got up at about 9 am and finished packing rather quickly. After some breakfast I relax a bit, surfing in the internet, updating that blog and stuff like that ;)
As soon as I had my lunch and skyped for a while with Jana (lots of greetings especially to her!!! =D ) I set off at about 1 pm. I took the skytrain till Granville Station and then bus #14 to a station near the Kitsilano Farmer Market. I took me a while to find the right busstation as Granville Street was closed for the granville summer, but finally i managed to get there ;) only a 5-minute-walk to the market and i was there at about 2.30 pm =)
I helped Alisha and Delaney to pack all their stuff in their van and was already rewarded with delicous cherries and plums =D =) oh, i love fruits!! =)
At 3 pm we set off to the farm; the car-ride was awesome, as we drove a beautiful street along, with the beach and mountains on the sides. We had to cross Squamish and finally Whistler, where we stopped to do some shopping. I got some choclate and joghurt and apples and things =)
After another break at the gas station, we covered the last distance very quickly and arrived at about 06.30 pm at the farm. I explored my new home – a van next to the house – with lots of fields and patches around. Their are also some hens with their chicks and ohne rooster.
And i experienced the first rain here in Canada today. I hope the weather will get better in the next days. Tomorrow I have to get up at 6 am to start work at 7 am. The works lasts till lunch and continues for about an hour after lunch. Then its my freetime =) probably i will explore pemerton a bit more, using the bycicle they have for me =D
I think work will be exhausting, but still i think, that this week will be brillant =)

I already got up at about 8 am to get ready for the White Water Rafting Tour in Chilliwack today. I arrived in front of the SWAP office at 09.30 am and met Tanja there in order to give her her sleeping bag and some my food.
The bus was supposed to depart at 10.00 am – if there would have been a bus to depart xD So the day started already with a mishap:

The 1st mishap: The bus arrived over 1 ½ hours to late. Somewhen around 11.45 am. When we finally got on the bus, the second mishap followed.

The 2nd mishap: Either a car accident or some building lot – both things caused traffic jams and made us arriving in Chilliwack even later. Instead of arriving at 11.30 am, we arrived at 13.00 pm xD =D
This led to even more chaos: We had to hurry up with filling in some forms, eating lunch in rush and then heading towards the „Dungeons“ to get the bathing gear. So while i was eating my lunch, I took on my bathing gear and tried to take some picutres at the same time... woah xD =D
One of the guides explained that there are to possibilities of a White Water Rafting Tour – either the one for beginners („classic tour“) or the one for advanced („canyoning tour“). For the start we decided of course for the classic tour ;)
So the whole group was devided into two smaller ones.
Afterwards everyone got a paddle and we got onto the bus, bringing us to the spot we were supposed to set off for the tour.

The 3rd mishap: when we arrived at that spot, somehow it turned to be too less rafts for to many people. No idea why. Either they did not count properly or the people didnt show properly whether they want to do the classic or the advanced tour. No matter what reason was the right one, we had to wait for more boats coming. Again waiting xD. And I already found it a pity that i was not able to take my camera with me. Already now the surrounding view was so awesome. Hardly possible to describe.
I have no idea how long we waited, when finally a car with more rafts arrived. At least I and four others from the SWAP-group got our raft and after some more time our guide – calles Sam – was present as well. =) So the raft could start at last! =D
It was like in a picture book, when we were floating down the river, the sun glistening on the water and mountains rising high in to the air in the background. Water splashed in our faces, when it was extremely rough. It was fun, ideed, and i hoped that i would not fall into the water. Even though, this would have been some experience as well. xD

The 4th mishap: At the start of the raft a young woman took a photo of us, taking some more during the raft. Our boat came to a hold in a calm pool, as we wanted to walk to a waterfall. Everyone came to halt, as well, including this young lady. And then it turned out that she did a huge mistake... she forgot to close the zipper of the water-proof bag, containing the camera. As she even fell out once into the water, the camera was completely wet now. Broken. Later she and the other guides realized that even the SD-card was useless. That mean altogether that there are no picuters at all af the rafting tour! Yippie! xD =D It is definetely a pity, but i wont forget this tour, anyway. These experiences are saved as memories in my mind ;) Its only quite hard to share them with you. But well, perhaps i am able to repeat that somewhen. =P

So we didnt only walk to the water, but we walked through it. Cold mountain water was pouring down on my quite hard, leaving me totally soaked behind xD
Then the tour could go on.

The 5th mishap: It was really an adventure to raft down the river – for some others it was probably to much of an adventure... a boat behind us got stuck on a rock. While some of this team could remain in the boat, two of them saved themselves on this very rock. And they didnot dare to move themselves... their raft in the meantime was floating down the river without them.
My team stopped its raft as well. Our guide Sam tried to help the two on the rock and finally – after a while – they got rescued by an other raft. During this action we waited on a nearby shell, eating oranges which were brought by the save boat =D
After everything was arranged again, the tour could continue once more...

The 6th mishap: As the river and its nature is almost without human influence, there are many rocks and trees blocking the way from time to time. One time it happened that one tree lay across the river and we had to use a different way. And that means walking and carrying the boat over lots of slippery rocks in the water.
Thenceforward no more mishaps happened. Except for me forgetting a spare pair of shoes …

So altogether the tour was absolutely an adventure. Probably it wasnt a usual tour at all, but at least my firat white water rafting looked like this and i will keep it in mind like this ;) as i said, there are now unfortunately no pictures at all of the tour itself. I can just recommend to you to do water rafting yourself one time =)

We we were back at the water-rafting-office at about 6.30 pm. We changed our clothes and got finally rid of this disgusting and wet bathing gear =D On our way back home we had a break to buy some dinner. Everyone was quite finihed after that tour and i myself dozed a bit during our journey back to vancouver.
As i had no dry shoes with me, i had again to put on my soaking wet shoes. But putting them in the washing mashine and in the dryer afterwards made them look like new once more =P
I did my laundry and started packing for the other, but fell into bed around midnight, quickly asleep (and completely alone in the three-bed- room, by the way ;) )

Tuesday, Aug 9

I got up at 8 am and had the spontaneous decision to have breakfast at the same sun again =D My appointment at the bank was at 10 am. It took about half an hour to settle everything with my new bank account with already 20 CAD on it xD =D i have to have some reserve money on it in order to be able to pay the monthly fee of 4 CAD. In this way I have 10 transactions for free. Otherwise I always would have to pay 1 CAD for each transaction... everything costs sth. in Canada! ^^
(In the evening I checked my internet banking and everything works fortunately =) ).
I dropped in to the SWAP office shortly to read some information about UNICEF ( the organization i will fundraise for when i got the job at Public Outreach). The farm near Whistler and the one on Vancouver Island have still offered to host me, by the way. That's why I had some difficulties to make a decision, as I had now 3 possibilities for the future time (fundraising job in Vancouver, farm near Whistler for a week, farm on V. I. For a longer time). I decided to try to postpone the fundraiser job in vancouver a bit.
The training at noon was quite nice and was pretty alike the one of the Bund Naturschutz in Germany. I learned lots about UNICEF and communication tools.
I talked to the manager whether it is possible to postpone the training for about a month and he said that its only possible for a week. So that means altogether, that i will work on the farm near whistler for a week and then come back for the fundraiser job in vancouver. At least i could combine two things of three =) =D But i still hope that i can go to that other farm on V. I. Someday.
I met Stefan again for a while, eating my first crepe with maple sirup, but we both went home quite early, as we were both quite tired =D I did some other stuff, like writing the blog and some postcards, until i finally went to bed – NOW =D

Monday, Aug 8

The next day I got an e-mail by the farm near whistler, where i wanted to stay the next week, saying that it might be that their current wwoofer stays longer than expected. That made me feel a bit uneasy again, as it seemed that everything turns out to be not working in the end. But well, trying to be still confident, i went to downtown vancouver by skytrain.
I dropped in a few more stores and shops my resume and i visited the address i was given by a fundraiser last week. I introduced myself at that office/company called Public Outreach, dropped my resume and they invited me at once to an interview at 01.30 pm. So untill it started some time was left and i went to a restaurant called “Soup Zone”; it was advertised on the internet that they might hire people. I found out that i am supposed to have a certificate for serving food. So again something i have not expected to be confronted with. Still i left my resume there and returned to Public Outreach for the interview.
It was an interview in a group of 4 and it was quite ok. I could use my experiences with the Bund Naturschutz job pretty good, so i hoped that it might work this time.
After the interview i met Stefan shortly untill i got called by the manger of soup zone to come along again for an interview. So i went there again. The summary of that interview is that he said that he actually has got a job for me, but i have to stay for 10 month at least. Well, that was a bit controversial, for i wanted the job of course, but couldnt lie to him that ill stay that long if i will not.
So i was honest and said that i will not stay 10 months, but rather 2 or 3. It was clear that i did not have any chance anymore – he said that he might keep me in mind for a part time job, indeed, but i dont think that he will call me again.
So i had to hurry a little bit to get to the 3rd interview near my new hostel at 5 pm. In the meantime I got called by Public Outreach, inviting me to the first training session at the next day at noon.
So that was the first start of getting my first job. Still i went to the 3rd interview of course, which passed by similarly like the one at Soup Zone.
Before heading downtown again, I made an appointment at the TD-Bank for the day in order to open a bank account. I met Stefan at the Same sun and we went out to the Chinese Garden. Of course, it was already closed. Instead we watched some people playing professional Frisbee (in fact, there are Frisbee games) and went to the movies at around 8.15 pm. We watched the movie “Super 8”, which was funny and weird at the same time xD It ended at around 10.30 pm – time to go home and recover from the exhausting interviews ;) =)

Sunday, Aug 7

Well, on Sunday i took the chance to sleep a bit longer than the last days. Still settled a few things, applied for more jobs and recovered from the previous days ;) =D
In the afternoon I met the other Germans (Steffi, Tanja, Karsten and Stefan) at Granville Station to go to the beach (Sunset Beach) with them. Due to the windy weather and as well due to my bruises =P I did not go swimming this time. The most time we were lying in the last sun rays or played frisbee (at least the others; i was too lazy =P ).
As one is not allowed to drink alcohol in public in Canada, we decided to go to “The Beaver” the Samesun hostel to enjoy some alcoholic drinks ;) I got to know a new dish, by the way: Samosa with chutney (delicious =D ).
So in the evening we were hanging around in this kind of bar, chatting with each other and drinking some “ladies cocktails” (Malibu, Vodka, cranberry and pineapple juice). This time the taxes were included, but the tips werent – the Canadians really always find a way to let you pay more than it was labelled xD =P and i learned that there is a law in BC that says that you are not allowed to drink only, but you have to order a meal as well during your stay. Never heard of that before; again a little bit weird ^^ I went home at around 11 pm and went to bed almost at once =)