exerpts from an email sent to my fellow dlinkies

(because it was way too long to re-type)

its midterm season already. can you believe it?! luckily i dont have any, but i do have a bunch of projects and presentations coming up. grad school is pretty different from undergrad in terms of the type and quality of work you do, but i dont mind because we can pick all of our topics. right now im working on a presentation about social work interventions to survivors of FGM, a presentation explaining a project in Scotland targeting Johns to deter prostitution and human trafficking, and a reserach proposal for a comparative social policy analysis surrounding the laws of prostitution. fun stuff!

i started my internship yesterday! i chose the one at IBCR (the one I really wanted from the time I heard about it in ny). im nervous about it though, mostly because of the schedule. my uni suggests an internship during the year for 2 days a week or one full time for the summer only. they require you do it full time for 4 months, starting yesterday. so i have NO idea how ill work full time and manage full time courses, but the internship is PERFECT for what I want to do so the risk is worth it. it will end at the end of february, which i realized yesterday means ill be swamped for the whole ski season =[

...and a little about my first day. boring, of course. a lot of listening and reading to learn about what ill be getting involved in. its a small office, about 5 staff and 5 interns. the interns were all really nice and i ate with them and we went for a walk. they all speak french and you could tell they didnt really want to speak english, but they did for me. its more motivation to learn faster, i guess! my projects are county profiles on the MENA region (North Africa and Middle East), basically helping each county to produce reports about themselves and how they've implemented the UN's convention on the rights of the child. I think I'll do a lot of editing (they think if they put a report in google translate its acceptable english. i returned one to egypt yesterday and said its not even editable - have an english speaker there work on it first.) ill also do fact checking and when the reports are done at the end of January Ill spend the next month analyzing them and trying to establish best practices for the other surrounding countries to adopt. pretty awesome stuff. my other project is about child soldiers. im not really sure what work ill do for that project yet, but i was told to memorize all related international/humanitarian law about it this weekend! fun!

also im getting a vibe that the office, or at least the boss, is really weird. its set up in an old high school gym (i cant escape!) so the sound echoes a lot, so NO ONE SPEAKS! all day. all. day. if you have a question you have to walk over to the person and whisper to them. its SO weird. and at lunch everyone has great personalities! i wish i could make a little conversation to keep the day moving. also, apparently the boss FLIPS if youre even 5 mins late, which i always am. so im really nervous about staying punctual every day for 4 months. and i had to ask YESTERDAY for approval for one day off for thanksgiving, and i may not get it. he wasnt there yesterday but he sounds wacko.

i dont hang out with people as much as id like to. i called my few friends a few times and they were always busy, so i dropped it figuring they just dont want to hang out. so i was getting bored and lonley but im really hopeful about the other interns at work. theyre young, social, and they already invited me to two different things yesterday. yayyy!

um.. im having a halloween party (with all 2 of my friends, lol) next weekend. im wearing what i wore to rococco last year, lar.

next week is mine and daves 6 year anniversary. whooooooooooooooooooooooah! i went home for his birthday last weekend and i cried when i had to come back. it was so nice to be comfortable and around people im familiar with. i am determined to get more out of montreal, though. theyre having an occupy montreal thing today i was considering going to, actually. have you guys participated in any of the protests?
(side note: i didn't go, but i followed the live feed from nyc for hours yesterday. crazy stuff is happening. crazy.)

sorry that was really long. i miss you bungholes. stuff reminds me of you guys all the time. i talk about you a lot. anyho, love and smd.
<3

someone broke into my car last night..

but the gps they stole doesn't really work anymore and they left my painting for tanzania. fail.

Perfect Montréal Afternoon

I am having a perfect Montréal afternoon. I have lots of reading to do so I decided to instead explore St. Denis, one of the main streets of Montréal only a few blocks from my apartment. I found the perfect paper supply store, which is fantastic because I've been looking for one for about two weeks. I got some beautiful things that will soon become beautiful cards =] I wandered through some other stores selling homewares, kitchen goods, and a 10,000 villages, each of which were filled with things so lovely I was just walking around smiling to myself. At 10,000 villages I was approached to consider being a store volunteer. I need to look into it more, but it could be a great way to meet more locals interested in social justice while staying busy. I'll definitely consider it. The icing on the cake is that I am now in a really cool coffee/tea shop where you can stay foreverr with fabulous fair trade coffees and a delicious tiramisu. They even have a tea pot I've been dreaming about for over a year but was never able to find. Now all I need is $50...

Photo Post

Tam Tams

Every Sunday at Parc Jeanne-Mance (on the lower slope of Mont Royal) there is a gathering of hand drummers and fans. The tradition began in the 70's when it was started by a group of community members. It is not sponsored or endorsed by the city, although the police now walk through from time to time because the group gets rather large. It's really interesting because it's a large group of drummers, and anyone is welcome to participate. The song is constantly changing and there is no conductor, although after going only a few times I recognize leaders within the group. People dance in the circle created by the drummers, and there are large crowds of spectators watching close by and listening from around the hill. Although I love the collective aspect of tam-tams, the most interesting part to me is the diversity of the group. There are so many different types of people.. African men, white college kids, lots of hippies, lots of homeless (looking) men and women, tourists, old people, families with babies and young children.. a really eclectic group. I find this especially interesting because smoking pot seems to be a central aspect of tam-tams. There are always people rolling and smoking openly in this large group, and you can smell the pot throughout the whole area. The police do walk through the group from time to time, but I've never seen them stop anyone for anything. It seems like most of the people who dance are stoned, although you never know. The old man for instance didn't seem to take any smoke breaks but he was dancing with the best of them!

 

Islam

 

old man & stoned chick

 

this guy was too out of it to support his own drum. he was punching it with his fist at one point.

 

Tourist + little child + dude smoking up.

 

Me and Thea

 

Islam and I

 

crazy dreads/beard combo

Street Art

I know lots of cities like to pride themselves on their street art, but Montreal is on a whole other level. In additional to artistic graffiti lots of buildings have multi-level murals of all different styles. These pictures are some I saw on a walk down just one block. One block out of a whole city and I saw all these awesome things. So cool.

 

I think this picture is a great representation of Montreal. Cool street art, a bixi station, and greenery. Perfect.

 

MUNACA Strike

A few pictures I took at the MUNACA rally on Friday across from the uni.

 

Our first (blurry) roommate picture!

 

At the Atwater Farmer's Market

I didn't get any great pictures because my camera is broken (hence all the blurry pictures) and also because I feel weird going up to people working and taking pictures of their stuff without buying anything. I think all the colors, especially colors within one type of produce, are really beautiful.

Things are.. fine?

Whenever I make a move, or start a new job, or do something really awesome I always hype up how great it's going to be. I also always ignore many of the realities involved and am then surprised when I get there and things aren't magical and wonderful. And now, exhibit A: Montreal.

I was going to come here "pick up some French" and automatically have a big group of friends that I'd met at school or work. Things would be so similar to the US there'd be no adjustments and I'd be happy as a clam a few days in. Ding dong, you're wrong.

My apartment is good. It is the smallest place I've ever had, although I have everything I need. Storage is an issue though -  I have bins of things in my car (still) and every time I try to get something out of the fridge or pantry something else falls. I'm convinced that this is a result of poor organization, and I've already started working on the closet. The issue, of course, is that almost nothing in there is mine and I don't want to step on any toes so early in the year.
The money thing is thankfully old news, but it was a major stress on me for about two weeks.

School, it seems, is still "getting started". At least that's what everyone says when I talk about it. But come on people, it's been 3 weeks!!#$ The issues I have with school are mostly that the topics are boring (beginning of the year theory lectures), some of my classmates are annoying (self-righteous or overly anxious) , there are new standards (our biggest grade for two classes is to make a poster?!?@$! and yet it seems everyone is a crazy smart intellectual), and I still don't have an internship. Because I don't have an internship I only attend school for 9 hours a week, and that is my only obligation. The rest of the time I do a lot of nothing.

I don't speak French. Everyone else does. I'm trying, using Rosetta Stone and my language classes begin soon, but I always feel dumb or have moments of terror before ordering food or asking a sales person for help. Some people here refuse to speak English and are really rude about it (but I haven't encountered it yet on this trip).

Food here is very expensive. It is also very fattening. It's rained almost every day. My cell phone sucks. Communication with Dave is hard. We're long distance for the second year in a row, and he can't call me because of phone stuff. My phone quality is bad so I can only call him from the land line (land line!). I don't know what stores to go to for random things. I went to four places yesterday looking for some curtain rods, and they cost $8 each!

I know I'm whining a lot. My roommates are great - really kind and social, I live in a nice place, everything is new and exciting and I'm getting the cultural experience I wanted. It's just that when you go somewhere with such great expectations and then reality sets in.. well, it's not always the way you hope it will be.

This Week

I -rode my bike to school with the brakes stuck on. I walked it home.
  -had a class interrupted by the EMS looking for the person about whom a suicide attempt had been reported
  -made a friend (I hope!)
  -got my loan money! and my ATM cards!!
  -got my parking permit!!!
  -had a day full of NYC-homesickness

Melt Down

True to form, I made it about one week in my new home before having a slightly exaggerated crisis. A few days ago I was boppin along, thinking about how wonderful Montreal is. How nice everyone is, how pretty it is, how lucky I am, yanno. So I'm just gonna bop along over to the neighborhood (as opposed to the big box) grocery store for some dinner ingredients. I get everything rung up at the register and they don't take my type of card. The cashier sends me to an ATM across the street to get some cash. I begrudgingly agree (my card is debit and credit!) but I get to the ATM and I'm denied. I know I have money, so I try again. Denied again. Frustrated and slightly embarrassed I call customer service. I forgot to call and tell them I'm abroad, but the man promises that now it should work just fine. I try again and am denied. Undeterred, I walk decently far to a Scotia Bank where they have an agreement/partnership with my bank. I put the card in but not only am I denied but the machine keeps my card?!#$!? Now I am really upset. I call again, I'm shuffled through customer service, and I finally get a very kind woman who is sympathetic to me. No food and no money in a foreign county after business hours.. I mean, I was sounding a bit pathetic. So she and are are on the phone for a little more than half an hour, with her fielding possible solutions that are impossible because of this or that bullshit reason. By this point I'm sitting on the floor in the corner of the ATM area crying and snotting all over myself while people come in and out to make their successful ATM transactions. (I would like to mention that although everyone I've met so far has been wonderfully nice to me, no one in the ATM stopped to see if I was ok or even wanted a tissue. What's up with that, Montreal?!). Anyway, we the bank lady and I figure the only thing that can be done for me instantly is to call someone and ask for a money wire. I find this extremely embarrassing but call my aunt who isn't home. I then give up and return home, a pathetic blubbering mess.

Now, if I had taken the time to be calm and rational I could have realized that all I needed was to order a new ATM card. It's not like I had nothing to eat at home, I would just have to eat cereal or something for dinner. And of course I have roommates who wouldn't let me starve in front of them. Also I do have money in a bank account here, I just need to wait until business hours to access it because my new card is coming in the mail. But none of this was going through my head at the time. All I could think was 'no food, no money, no way to get these things' in loop. How silly. I got home and Laurene, seeing I was upset, immediately began comforting me and offering to lend me cash over and over again. I kept saying no thank you, I can get it tomorrow, so then instead she went out and got some beer for us to share and offered anything that was hers in the fridge to eat. I knew she'd be nice, so why was I so consumed in this useless train of thought? I'll chalk it up to lots of stress coming from the move. It is my pattern, I've realized by now: have a superstar first week in a new place, followed by one big, overexaggerated meltdown from the built up stress, and then return to life as normal. Well, I'm glad that's over with.