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Sunday, August 31, 2008
Everyone was pretty tired after yesterday's trip and all the travelling we've been doing ever since we got here, so today was kinda a free day for us to do whatever we wanted. I slept in later today and decided that I should really go what the Canadians do on weekends. A senior from the school recommended High Park as a good place to go on a quiet after stroll, so, I checked up maps, googled, and was on my way! Walking alone down the streets in a foreign land's a little scary, but it gives a great sense of independence and excitement just to be exploring the world alone. You can do whatever you want, stop for photos wherever you want, read and eat when you want. And it is really refreshing to be away from city life in Singapore, away from the hustle and bustle, to enjy a quiet day of greenery, soaking in nature, and spending time with yourself. On times like this, I wish I didn't have to go back to Singapore.. Heh. Do pardon the self-shots huh :P
The fields were kinda filled, so I sat on a bench, under a tree and started reading my magazine. Went back to catch dinner with the gang! I'm super tired now!! But I had fun today, will explore another part of town the next time. Tata!
5:00 PM
30 September 2008 You can't really blame us city dwellers for getting all excited and crazily snapping photographs of Mother Nature on Centre Island. The fascinating flora and fauna, blue skies, blue sea was simply captivating and new! It was a lovely day to be out on an excursion with other international students and I really fell in love with the place. It's like every corner you turn, every other second, there's a postcard-ish, photo worthy moment! The following are just the highlights, carefully handpicked from the 375 photos I took just that day. I have to add that the photographs really do no justice to the beauty of the island. ------------ The day started bright and early.. and us Singaporeans were kinda excited because we are finally going to be taking one of those yellow school buses that we always see on TV!   I made loads of new friends, from all over the world, but I didn't get a chance to take photos with all of them! Anyways, here's Misako from Japan( she's studying liberal studies! cool!) , and Grace from Australia at the ferry terminal. And gosh, it was crowded!! There were a lot of people giving freebies there! Just in 10 minutes you could get shampoo,   I think we probably got exited over everything there! Diviya for one, was excited that the lake was sparkling, while I was excited that the water was actually a pretty sky blue.. If only East Coast Beach had clear blue water!   We had some ice-breakers at the island and played some random games before we were left on our own to explore what the island had to offer :)   Oh, and this is May! She's on a Malaysian govt scholarship to study Music composing! Isn't that cool! We were saying maybe she'll compose a new Malaysian national anthem! Heh!  After walking for about 2 hours, we decided to rent one of these cool quadri-cycles to explore the island. It takes a lot of leg muscle from all of us to actually move this thing and by the end, we were moving at snail pace cos we were all exhausted!  Anyways, here's presenting the beautiful pictures I took of the gorgeous and charming island!                  Aren't the pictures pretty? People here picnic a , sun-tan on fields, read under trees a, go out as a family a lot. Ithink i'll go back to centre island soon, just to read a book under a tree :) don't really get to do that in Singapore.. I think I'll be infested with crawling red ants in Singapore.. -_- And people would think I'm weird..Then the gang of us went to walk around the harbourfront before heading back to nurse our aching feet! Been walking so much here from place to place everyday.. Kinda eases the guilt from eating fried stuff (just cos the stores only sell fried stuff!)... And did I mention the portions here are monstrous? I think I could eat breakfast and da-bao the rest for breakfast and dinner! I felt so guilty for eating fried stuff I put on my running shoes and had an evening jog that night! It was freezing!!!     Let me end with the picture of the day..  We see a lot of these things scrurrying around our roads and paths here in Toronto. Initially, all of us Singaporeans were screaming "squirrel squirrel!"... Then a local came to tell us that it was a chipmunk! haha! :P But look at this highly athletic chipmunk! :) It froze in this position for a while, while so many of us whipped out our cameras!Alrights, I'll go for an evening walk now.. just to digest the dinner! I wrote this entry while watching the sunset. I get to watch the beautiful sunset from my room, and planes fly past every few minutes cos my uni's kinda near the airport. I feel like screaming "EVERYTHING HERE'S SO COOL" now!!! :)
2:45 PM
Friday, August 29, 2008
26th August 2008 Here's a picture of my apartment in School- 90 Atkinson Road.. I'm sharing a unit with a fellow Singaporean, Geraldine, but she's only getting here tomorrow. We have our separate bedrooms though :)  My photo wall's up! Finally!And yes, I brought the clique photo over, even though my bag was overweight! haha!  My accessories table. Really mimimal, but enough to get me through 4 months! I bought the small mirror for like 4 bucks at Wal-Mart! I still don't have a bigger one in my apartment, which makes coordinating outfits difficult, but I'll manage!    Initially, i was really irritated at this white box at the corner in my room! I mean, it's not visually pretty. Then I realised.. it's an air-con!!  Initially, I was excited! I mean, who knew that box was the air-con. Then I turned it on! It barely took 1 minute before I realised I'll never ever switch that thing on during my stay here.  IT'S FREEZING! I have no use for the air-con. Give me a heater, anytime. ---------- Me and Diviya settled some admin matters today, opened our bank account .... and finally, we have some time to really explore Toronto! Had lunch at York Lanes, which is the nearest eatery to my aparment (15 minutes away maybe?)   And along the way you'll pass by a field of geese (haha!). How often can you say " a field of geese" ! Super cool. And like they always show on TV, people really do sit under trees with a book and read, amongst the geese!    The maps here are really confusing.. so THANKS DADDY! for printing out the campus map for me! I use it everytime I go out!
 TADAH! just like on TV! Subway's pretty nice! It's never really crowded even during peak hours. And buses here come every 5 minutes, so there's a really high probability your ride would be nice and comfortable.    Our stop today was YorkDale, which was the nearest shopping centre to our university. And it was HUGE! Like 4 times the size of Vivocity. So you can't really blame us for getting tired after like 2, 3 hours of walking around! Had a bunch of high-end stores like ZARA, Mango... (sale stuff are cheap!) Couldn't really find any food or drinks along the way though.   And not forgetting the legendary H & M! Don't worry daddy mummy, I didn't spend all my money here! merely bought some socks ;)  Went back to school to have dinner at York Lanes. We eat a lot here because we have this student card with value inside, so we don't pay cash here when we eat. Did I mention that the servings here are huge? I need more fruits! I ordered this chicken because it comes with RICE. the rice tastes really funny though. like someone poured salt water all over it. And i found bubble tea! it tastes weird though. haha! And pearls here is called "tapioca!" We always end up in our rooms exhausted at the end of the day. Must be the immense amount of walking we do everyday. Diviya's phone actually has a step counter to track how many calories we've burnt for the day! Shall end this entry with a picture of the sunset as seen from my room. Got to run for lunch now! 
5:04 AM
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Anyways, on a side note, the "field of geese" are scaring me now! I have to wait for the whole "fleet" of them to cross before I dare to go pass. This is traumatising!
So blur us took the TTC bus to Downsview Subway station, which cost us CAN$ 2.75 each. But the good thing was that, we don't have to pay for the subway! Being law-abiding citizens of Singapore, we went around checking, asking if we still need tickets, but people looked at us with a weird look and said we don't. haha!