Nature, The Outdoors & Active Adventures In Beautiful BC...

So the past week took a turn towards a slightly more active lifestyle.. here's the details:


Grouse Grind

I've been out of the exercise game for a while and have been restricting what activities I do because of an annoying problem I have with my knee (this).  Bit having decided that I should simply forget about this problem and not let it stop me.  (Interestinly I've never let it stop me snowboarding...)  The Grouse Grind seemed like the perfect first challenge.  The Grind is very well known in Vancouver.  I've been aware of it for some time as my brother and sister both did it when they were here and spoke of it's toll and I've been looking forward to this Shaw family rite of passage..   So last Monday 8th, Amin, Sacha and I took off for Grouse Mountain in North Vancouver.  A bus, a sea bus, another bus, and we were there.

Grouse Stats:

Length: 2.9 kilometres
Elevation Gain: 853 metres
Base: 274 metres above sea level
Summit: 1,127 metres
Total Stairs: 2,830

The hike started off quite steep, then got steeper straight up with no relief, we walked until I was worried I wasn't going to be able to continue due to my knee, then we came across the 1/4 way mark. Oh crap.  Thankfully pride and stubborness lent their favour and I continued on.  Amin took to the task of keeping our pace at bay, and Sacha kept the ethusiasm up.  Breaks at 1/2 and 3/4 points (and some in between) we finally reach the top.. an enourmously satisfying relief.  After a celebratory couple of beers and a wander around the peak, we rode the gondola back down. 

Surprisingly I didn't feel that wiped the next day. My legs were actually not really sore at all which I found odd. He have plans to make the Grind a regular activity, and maybe start timing ourselves :)

Sacha leading the pack

Amin setting the pace


A silhouette of Amin, Sacha and I eating cherries at the top

Lynn Canyon

Two days later I found myself on the sea-bus to North Van with Sacha and Amin again, this time Sacha's work-friend Jo (another Aussie) joined us in our day trip to Lynn Canyon.  One of the hit attractions in Vancouver for tourists is the Capilano Suspension bridge. However an impressive a suspension bridge can be, I don't see how they can justify charging twentynine bucks for it!  Luckily Capilano suspension bridge's humbler little brother in Lynn Canyon provides a solution at no cost.  The bridge was pretty impressive, moved around a lot when walking across.  The views were typical of BCs insanely beautiful surroundings, the bridge itself crossing a rapid flowing creek at the bottom of a steep canyon with vibrant rich green and brown trees all around us

The Lynn Valley Suspension Bridge

God I love my bendy tripod going away gift from work



Crazy Natural Stairs

Another day we plan to go and hike from Lynn Canyon to Deep Cove (like this but not as direct...12kms) however this particular day we left it a little late and weren't really prepared for a proper hike (Sacha was wearing thongs/sandals/jandals/flipflops/pluggers whatever you want to call them) so we detoured, via Amin's superior navigational skills*, to a nearby road and after about 8 or 9 infuriating promises from Amin that it was only 500m further, arrived at the bus which took us to Deep Cove for lunch, beer and picturesque views.

click for a closer view

*Quote of the day from Amin:

"It's not that I don't trust my ninja senses. I just wanna double check." *pulls out iPhone with GPS*

Free Yoga, Pilates, Boot Camp

The following day, I recevie a text message from a friend Ben (Ben is part of a larger group of friends I met through Alana, he's a Kiwi and lives a block away) saying that he and Putu and Michelle are going to a free yoga session at Kits beach (200m from my house) so I head along with Amin to check it out.  On the grass under blue sky, overlooking the beach, the pool and a mountain backdrop, 70 people roll out their mats and commence an hour long yoga session with a great instructor all courtesy of yoga inspired clothing brand Lu Lu Lemon, this brand is an institution in Vancouver, it seems everyone wears it.. I think it's pretty overpriced stuff to be honest, but I'm happy to take their free classes :)  Turns out on top of the weekly yoga classes, there are free Pilates on Sunday mornings and BootCamps on monday evenings, and this is just the Kitsilano store.. with a little working of the system, one could have a full week of classes for free.  At this stage I think i'll stick to the yoga.


Kayaking Adventure

After the yoga class Amin and I joined Ben, Putu, Michelle, Ewan and Lilith for an impromptu dinner at Ben's.  During which, the topic of a weekend camping trip was brought up.  A camping trip that involved the hiring of kayaks and kayking to one of many marine only access camping grounds along the Indian Arm.  I haven't worked for a little while and although I'm on the verge of landing a sweet contract *touches wood* I was a little concerned about spending too much of my limited money on this, but then thought about the degree of probability of awesomeness that this plan contained and slapped myself back into sense.  After talking to the others it seemed the kayak hire company they had contacted only had 3 doubles left and we needed 4...  So I did some googling and discovered another company I wont name with a decent website, and being assured on the phone that their kayaks were "much better than the other guys" and a seemingly arbitrary quote of "yeah ok um hows $360 for 4 doubles" it seemed like a convincing alternative and we went with it.

Arriving at the address on the website we find ourselves outside a residential house and after hearing one lady ask "Should I get the forms?" and the response "Nah it's alright", we hand over the money, not giving our names (even verbally), nor a deposit, nor signing any form of documentation in the slightest, were instructed to follow the truck parked out front with 4 kayaks loaded. We followed to what seemed like, and turned out was in fact, a private launch spot with no one around.  The guys got out and went into some house for 5 minutes, only to return with the news that it was "too busy", still not sure what happened there.  But we continue onto another spot that seemed much more appropriate and unloaded.  After a 120 second lesson on how to escape from the kayak in case of capsizing the two guys vanished and we were left to our own devices.  There was a fair amount of experience in our group so nothing to worry about, but not that they really inquired about that!  As unprofessional as I'm making these guys out to be, really it was refreshing to have this form of relaxed attitude from such a company.  They know there's not a lot to worry about, they're covered by insurance - why bother stressing about it?  Seems to be a common vibe in Vancouver. 

Kayaks can store an amazing amount of stuff! I brough two bags, a sleeping mat, a tent, a sleeping bag, a bunch of alcohol etc, as did most people and we still had room left over! We packed them, decided on teams of able paddlers and set off down the Indian Arm with no particular destination in mind.  With a fantastic tailwind we cruised down rather fast stopping to rest a few times and then for lunch at a rocky beach.  A few of us wanted to stay at this first stop as it was isolated and had a big firepit, but it was early and we decided to continue on. All up I'd say we paddled for about 3.5 hrs plus breaks.  Reaching the end of the arm, we came to Granite Falls, an impressive waterfall and campsite, with toilets and apparently fires were allowed tolerated.  Score! We set up camp for the night and enjoyed dinner and drinks around the fire with music by the waterside. Bliss.

The next morning we were packed up and headed off by 10:30am as Lilith had to return for work at 4pm.  In hindsight this was a pretty serious underestimation of just how much the wind affects your kayaking speed.  Stronger than the day before, it took us twice as long to reach our first break spot. With about an hour of well deserved and required breaks we returned to our departure point at 5:30pm, all feeling severely battered and damaged from the journey, but at the same time extremely satisfied with the effort. Here is the entire route we took which gives a very accurate length of 14.2 kms at the bottom.  On the way there I'd estimate the wind made the length equivalent of about 9 kms and on the way back more like 21 kms...

the crew before deptarture


one of many waterfalls

ben and me


my view with all the kayaks in sight (click)


behold my whiteness


misty mountains


late evening view from our camp spot

Finally getting home and slamming down a huge meal, I passed out almost immediately, sleeping through til morning.  As I write this the following day I can say that although I feel very tight in my neck and forearms, the overwhelming feeling is enjoyable.  I dont remember strenuous physical activity being this rewarding in the past. I'm not sure whether the difference is the location or my attitude towards it.  In anycase, outdoor activity certainly seems to be laying itself down on the path in front of me, and I'm looking forward to what else is in store!


Outdoor Activities are really fun :)

To check out a bunch more panoramic shots I've taken click here:

More BC Panoramas

A Pretty Amazing Week

Recording Studio Experience
Last week I was invited by some friends Shireen and Joclyn to go to a recording studio at the school where another friend Simon studies audio engineering.  They wanted to sing and record Hallelujah (by Leonard Cohen then covered by Jeff Buckley) and asked me to play guitar for them.  Lucky they chose this song because it happens to be one of my favorites on guitar and can play it all quite confidently.  The two girls sang, doing harmonies for eachother while another girl Erin played grand piano and added a 3rd harmony to the vocals.  It really was such a novel experience being in a proper recording studio, all the controls were hooked up to these remote boxes, so I could control the mix i was hearing in my ears (such as turning up my guitar and turning down the piano so I could concentrate).  I also recorded a vocal track, that was pretty nerve wracking.. I've been trying to sing while playing guitar a bit here but still pretty self-conscious about it.. so singing in a recording studio being recorded while people listened was a little out of the comfort zone but a great experience!

The most amazing thing was that we absolutely nailed it first take!  Two takes following were sub-par with me screwing up the 16 bar solo in the middle.. It's being mastered at the moment..  if I ever get my hands on it i'll try and post it somewhere.  Hopefully there'll be some more time there to do other stuff in the studio.  I'd love to record something with Sacha! Will need lots of practice beforehand..


Hot Tub Time Machine
Friday night just passed I went and did the movie 'extras' gig, brushing up with John Cusack. Pretty exciting stuff!  Being on a movie set is lots of fun... I'm sure it'd wear off pretty quickly but very novel right now.  The call time was 5pm, and we worked throught to 4.30am, it was pretty much just like the show "The Extras" - there was a tent full of food (like donuts and all kinds of awesome food) which you could eat as much as you want.  They are required to serve a hot meal after 6 hrs and if you dont get it you're paid like double or triple time after that.   About 70% of the time is spent in the Extras Holding Area which for this scene was about 300 full, so there's lots of socialising and meeting new people.  I quickly made friends with the guy who had the idea of bringing a guitar (totally doing that next time) and there was lots of singing and talking and laughing to pass the time.

We had a big scene where we're all partying at a Poison concert set at Winterfest '86  (yes Poison, the totally awesome 80s glam rock band who were my first
ever purchased 'cassingle' from 1989 or close with such hits as Unskinny Bop and Every Rose Has Its Thorn..)  was given a task of mingling through the crowd and giving random high fives (READ: I was paid to mingle around and give high fives) There were some extremely weird people there too.. people who wanted to be actor(ess)s and yeah.. haha very entertaining at the least!  Then there was another scene where I had to walk behind John and some guy having a conversation. there were about 15 takes where they did it differently each time, but on the first one I had to do they finished the dialog early and had to run off in my direction which i wasnt expecting and had to remain casual and not flinch.  Turns out John Cusack is like 6ft3! never would have thought that.. he is also a very nervous type, constantly chewing on his nails.. that kinda makes sense tho.

I also discovered that there's about 6 different agencies  and apparently I'm with one of the worst.. So I'll be switching soon, and I was advised to shave the beard for my profile pic as apparently its easy to picture people older but harder to picture them younger and theres a lot more work for younger.

Verdict:  All round thumb of approval to that method of earning money! Unfortunately it isnt consistent enough to rely on..

Great week!

Regarding Hacky Sack...

I'm not the biggest sports fan around by far but there's something that really attracts me to what I like to refer to as "primal sports", sports that involve the simplest of testosterone inspired challenges... For instance, the proposition  "I bet I can roll this ball closer to that ball than you can" is all it took to create the entire game of lawn bowls... or "I bet i can hit this ball into that hole in less tries than you" created golf..  Of course there are too many sports like this to list but I think I'm slowly working out the less competition involved and the more communal attitude towards simply enjoying the time spent participating the more I like the game.

Enter: "Lets see how long we can keep this ball from touching the ground"

I've played a LOT of hacky sack in my time.. from killing an hour most lunchtimes throughout high school to killing a three hour break at university to killing a half hour meal break working at the supermarket to.. well you get my drift...  Pretty much every summer from the age of fifteen has involved copius amounts of the socially orientated pastime that serves as both a focus of activity or a distraction from boredom depending on the moment it's pulled out of your pocket. 

Over the years I had come to feel pretty good about my skills and abilities - until I hit Vancouver... WOW Pretty much any day the sun is shining I can (and do) just wander down to Kits beach (sorta like Elwood or St Kilda beach) find a circle and jump in.  But instead of feeling like I'm helping hold things together in the group, I feel like I'm the weakest link in the chain! For a city where it rains 9 months of the year it's hard to understand where the practice was taking place.. maybe there's some kind of academy I'm not aware of... *googles* nope...

It's good to be pushed :)

Music, Bonfires, Interesting Work & Camping

It looks like this blog updating is not happening as regularly as I thought it would.. it's been over a month since the last post and again there's bound to be a bunch of entertaining things happened that I have forgotten to note down.. perhaps i'll try and do smaller posts more often from now on.. cos this one is going to be realy long..


Guitar, Jamming, and Musical Awesomeness
I FINALLY got myself a guitar to use. My lovely friend Lucy actually offered this guitar when I first arrived but she said it was pretty terrible and I felt it was too early in the friendship to take something like that. Two months later however, I was CRAVING guitar so i took it. It was in pretty bad shape! The strings were a good 15mm off the fretboard up at the 12th fret and the tuning and intonation were completely off.. so i pulled the strings off, adjusted the neck truss, sanded the bridge down maybe 7mm and put some new super light strings on - WOW a playable guitar! YAY! Some friends of mine are pretty regular jammers, one friend Aimee had a birthday party with heaps of people playing instruments.. it doesnt work too well with too many drunken people, but other smaller sessions have been really fun. I haven't had that much experience playing music collaboratively, so it's a great learning experience. I love it. Focusing really hard on learning my scales now.

Another friend new Mariana leaving for Mexico had a going away bonfire at a secluded beach which was amazing, about 40 people were there in the end including homeless people who just drifted along with instruments, half naked loud drunken jock to entertain people, lots of djembe's and even a muted trumpet player. We ended up having a REALLY nice music session that lasted for quite a while. a GREAT night.

The Bonfire



View of West Van from bonfire

Vancouver 420 Day
420 is a term used in North America to refer to weed. A lot of people think this is a reference to a police code for possesion or something ("we've got a possible 420 here", etc) but it's actually a term coined by a group of highschool potheads referring to the time of day after school that they'd meet up and get high. In Vancouver, or i think BC in general, peaceful drug use is tolerated, police here have made it policy not to arrest people who are really not harming anyone, or if anyone - themselves. As far as I'm aware this also applies to harder drugs, people caught injecting will be taken to a safe injecting room rather than a police lockup. "420 Day" falls unsurprisingly on April 20 and celebrates not only this liberty but raises awareness and peaceful protest of marijuana prohibition. Held at the arts centre downtown (with big lawns and steps etc), thousands of people gather to celebrate this day, culminating at 4:20pm.

Wow, i've never seen ANYTHING like this. there were literally thousands of people all just hanging out smoking weed, playing hacky sack, listening to awesome tunes and pretty much just chilling. For the entire time i was there, i saw ONE person of authority, a solitary police officer concerned that some people were getting a little close to the traffic and ushering them to safety in a very friendly manner. I understand the police tollerance on peaceful use.. but there were stalls here literally SELLING weed.. I really dont understand that one.. some guy bought $260 worth of infused butter to cook with. hahaha outrageous!

It's interesting to note the contrast between this and the police policy on public drinking. I've heard stories of cops on the beach walk past a group of people smoking weed to confiscate the solitary beers 2 guys nearby were consuming. I guess on the bigger scale it makes sense, a group of people smoking for a duration on the beach is statistically going to be a lot less trouble than a group of people drinking.. It's a shame tho, a cold beer on a hot day at the beach is quite enjoyable.. at least we have an alternative!

Anzac Day
Some Australian friends of mine informed me that there was an ANZAC Day party being held, turned out it was 1 block away from my house (score!) It was pretty much as to be expected, footy, rugby, loud drunken aussies, quiet insecure kiwis (haha jk), lamingtons, anzac biscuits, damper with vegemite, meat pies, bbq, meat fest, meat tray auction, turkey raffle, burgers with the lot. Most of which my extremely unaustralian vegetarianism didnt really take to. But the company and beer was great. Apparently there were competitions to recite "Six Pieces of Fish and Chips" in the thuckist frishist NZ accent, and the best pub joke told in the worst ocker accent. Missed it... Spewin' ;)

Hahaha stupid tiny Aussie flag..

Work!!!!
So I've had some work come my way, the temp agency I signed up with to do office and clerical crap finally called but what they had to offer was a little different to that... they initially told me it involved the following: me and some other guy dressed up in tuxedos in a booth at an expo promoting tiffany. This was cringworthy enough - however, not exactly what went down... I get there and after introductions with Steph the organiser for some lukemia organisation (not Tifanny), I find that i'm actually on my own, in a tux and wandering around the crowds with a silver platter of empty Tiffany boxes luring unsuspecting women and sending them BACK to the booth where Steph was.. This was at the signup marquee for the Vancouver Marathon, the idea is there's a Marathon in San Francisco where anyone who completes the race gets a Tifanny necklace and medalion presented to them by firemen dressed in tuxedos who apparantly I was supposed to be representing.. FAIL. On top of this. there was no changing rooms. so I had to trek to some port-a-loo's to get dressed... *sigh*... look, I'm not that vain a guy but if I'm going to be donned up as psuedo eye-candy for an afternoon I wouldn't mind a mirror just to check if things are looking ok.. maybe straighten the bowtie.. anyway the first hour was a bit unnerving but after I relaxed and realised that like 90% of women go gaga when they see a tiffany box and dont really care what you say, it was all smooth sailing. After 4 hours I was done.. easy money.

Since then I've done some work at another charity organisation in a hospital, no tuxedos this time. Pretty boring data entry stuff.. i think if i'm going to be doing crap jobs i'd much prefer them to be manual labour.. at least you keep active and fit that way.. sedintary work where you're not evening utilising your brain is seriously soul destroying.

About a month ago I signed up with Hollywood North Extras, an agency for background work in films, and got my first gig this coming friday! It is in one of the most ridicuously titled films of all time - "Hot Tub Time Machine" with John Cusack. No it's not a porno. It's up on Mt. Seymour at night, i'm in an 80s scene at a rock concert. I think my actual role would be Rock Concert Atendee #209 ahahaha its the part I was born to play, baby.




Some Other Notable Things
I went with Sacha and Amin to see Ozomatli in downtown Vancouver, fantastic gig as always, however they have dropped their horns section for some reason?!? They used to have these 2 or 3 guys with tumpet trumbone sax etc who would dance around and put on a great show.. nonetheless a thoroughly entertaining evening of funky latin hiphop. One highlight being an extremely drunken nearly 7ft tall man trying for about 5 minutes (very unsucessfully) to roll a joint in front of me, when he lifted it to his mouth and tried to light what looked like a scrunched up piece of paper with weed falling everywhere I offered my assistance, to which he responded by shoving his entire stash in my hand and saying "fine, you do it" so i did it, but by the time i had finished (about 45 seconds later) he had disapeared, and was never to be seen again for the remainder of the evening. Oops.

Went to a downtown bowling alley and it was a bit strange. Instead of 10pin bowling, they have 6 pin!? the pins are smaller, the ball is smaller with no finger holes, and apparently each pin has a different amount of points? i dont get it.. we didnt play that night as the lanes were full, but i guess i'll try one day. Instead we went to the foosball tables, shortly after we started playing these two guys rocked up and pulled out their own grip, of course this resulted in a challenge from Amin and Aaron, two of the most average mexican foosball players to ever have graced the table. Here is a video of the match.. there really isnt enough frames per second to capture just how quickly they were shooting for goal.

I was sick for nearly 4 weeks straight.. sucked a lot just cold stuff but it stopped me from doing things like applying for jobs interviews etc, i think the broken rib stopped me from coughing enough.. anyway i went to this local free clinic (yes it is totally free, you just take a number and see a perfectly qualified doctor for nothing no medicare no nothing, they also have giant tubs filled with condoms which they encourage you to stock up on - for free) . While I was waiting, there was a couple nearby arguing, I wasnt really listening but the following line grabbed my attention so i wrote it down to share with you, the girl exclaims "are you kidding me? do you really think that i want to cook you and your useless friends food while you play world of warcraft?? you are completely delusional!" ahahaha it was hard not to laugh!!

Sacha and I went to a houseparty, which was funny because essentially Sacha knew a guy who knew a guy who wasn't going to this party and that was our in. it really didnt matter, this was your classic house party, not just any house either, but in the middle of the cbd.. imagine walking down say.. william street in melbourne and having a break in the corporate buildings only to have a solitary 3 story house standing there - that's where we were partying. it was crazy. at least 100 people must have come through the place. with a keg, an army of police out the front and many spontaneous chants of Go Canucks Go! it was a true true canadian house party..

Speaking of Canucks, for those who dont know they're the Vancouver Ice Hockey team. Something we dont experience in melbourne (in addition to ice hockey) is having a sport that is suported by a large percentage of the poplation with a single team for the city, what this means is everyone is united which is refreshing... They lost the first round of playoffs but I happened to be downtown when they won a game and the whole city was going off, cars just driving around with horns blaring etc. actually i guess its kinda like world cup fever in melbourne.. but more enthusiastic :)

I went camping this weekend just passed, to Squamish, BC. We had one tent between 5 of us that fit 4 cramped, Amin slept in the car. The only issue was that we dont really have any camping gear like stoves, lights, chairs, etc.. which normally wouldnt be too much of a problem except that the ground we stayed in didnt allow fires at all. nor had any bbqs. But we only went for one night and survived on crap food, some candles and the trusty guitar to keep us company. BC is SOOOOOO beautiful!! So green, like the richest most vibrant greens i've ever seen.. Camilo Pau and Amin's friend Meriyam did a hike on the sunday evening, but Amin and I relaxed and waited til the next day and we all did a short hike to Shannon Falls, check out some pics below. VERY inspired to do more camping over the summer.

On the way there...

Entrance to campsite & The Chief in the background

Needs no description

Also needs no description

Thus ends a glimps of another active month for me.. Hopefully will be getting more work soon so i can keep this up... But at the same time, it's good learning how to have a lot of fun with very little money :) Again, I'll attempt to make the next post sooner and shorter..

Til then...

Some Reminders:
Sacha - Australian girl who was friends with my sister Alana and arrived shortly after Alana left, now friends with me.
Amin, Camilo, Pau - Housemates

Goodbye Lani, Hello Chaos...

Wow really? The roadtrip was that long ago?? Ok so much catching up to do..


Whistler Take One
After getting back from Nelson, Alana, Kathy and I had a couple of days off before jumping on a bus to Whistler in the afternoon on St. Pats Day (unplanned). Staying there the night at the university hostel to get up and ride the next day.  We got there a day after 45cm of snowfall in 48 hours. So i was pretty damn exctited, but I just cannot say I was particularly impressed.. not with the snow anyway..  the mountain was completely tracked out and there was no fresh snow to be found anywhere.. Dont get me wrong it is a SERIOUSLY impressive mountain.. well actually 2 mountains. there's Whistler and Blackcomb, and they actually have a gondola called Peak2Peak which connects them together. THAT was impressive! The place is just enormous. At the end of the day I did a run from the top to Whistler Creek which is sort've off to the side and it took me about 20 minutes. the run just never ended, well at 4pm it certainly felt like it... a few beers at the mountain bar and we were back on the bus to Vancouver

Bye Lani!
Alana and Kathy departed on the 23rd March. I'm sure a bunch of stuff happened between heading to whistler and Alana leaving but nothing i can recall from this far back!! I got slack...  So Alana leaving was kinda bittersweet.. I am extremely gratefull for the soft landing that she provided for me in Vancouver.  Not only did she help me establish myself and provide support and enouragement for everything i needed to get done establishing a life, she also introduced me to a large amount of awesome people :)  I was sorry to see her go, but at the same time there was so much positivity around it it was hard to be too upset.  She's heading off for a once in a lifetime experience cruising around Europe, and her departure was the commencement of my independance here in Vancouver. Almost win-win! ;) 

After seeing Alana off at the airport, I bumped into a random Aussie called Russell from townsville way. But I'll detail that story a little later in the piece..

Settling In At Home
When we were in Nelson we went to WalMart and bought some hanging drawers for my closet and a dual lamp, but at this stage I was sleeping on an airbed which continuously went flat, relegating me to the couch.  Searching the local classifieds I found someone moving to Montreal and selling up all their stuff. I managed to get two sets of vertical shelves, a bed and matress all for $100! Whoop! However, upon attempting to construct said bed, I discovered that there were only 2 out of 8 nuts to screw the screws into.. turns out the girl had just placed the screws in the holes and hoped for the best.. clearly this bed didnt get much action or it would have most certainly fallen to pieces..  So i trekked to the local "Bunnings" style hardware store known as Canadian Tire and after struggling to determine whether metric or imperial was more appropriate (side note: Canada is extremely conflicted over which system to use.  As far as I can tell they want to use metric but are held back by imports coming from US.. Speed is in kph, Height and length is in feet and inches, temperature is in celcius, weight is in pounds.. annoying), I finally got the bed sturdy and for the first time in 5 weeks started to feel like I had a home to live in.. This made things much more comfortable, here is my room as it stands now.  The big empty wall is just dying to be filled with something arty.  I have a few ideas but cant afford them just yet so I'll hold off.

I've also been getting along great with my roommates Camilo and Amin and their extended crew of friends. Mostly Mexican i'm virtually immersed in a spanish speaking environment... :) Both guys are heavily into paintball and have their own gear (plus spares!) and play in unofficial playing fields, virtually only paying for paint they buy online @ $40 for 2000 rounds!!   One field they currently frequent is an abandoned womens penitentiary which sounds like sooooo much fun. I've held off joining them as I want to get some income going before I get addicted :)



Russell + Whistler Again + Insanity
Alighting the shuttle bus from the airport terminal to the bus station after seeing Alana off, I hear an Aussie voice questioning how to get to a specific hostel.  I tell him I'm heading his way and to follow me.  Then I jumped on the bus going in the wrong direction.. hahah nevertheless I met Russell.  Aussie guy from up Townsville way who had rough plans to stop in Vancouver for a few days before moving east and ultimately down to South America for one hell of a journey.  Two nights later we head to the bar below his downtown hostel for some drinks and there is a Kokanee Beer Promotion going on with a bunch of Glacier Girls running the show.  All of us there enter the comp which involved sophisticated challenges such as putting on underwear and a wig in the fastest time possible. Cut to the chase: Russ wins.  We're thinkin' yay some free beer or something.. no.. instead? An all expenses paid trip to Whistler for the Kokanee Whiteout Party a week later. 

Russ crashed on the couch until the weekend and we were away.  It is pretty hard to describe just what the weekend was like.. but 'surreal' is a handy adjective.. We were put up in a swishy hotel with free breakfast and dinners.  First night we got there they announced a Toga themed pub-crawl through Whistler Village, they werent allowed to give us free alcohol so instead they gave us cash to spend on kokanee beer, which we promptly took to the local bottle shop and spent on spirits.   Saturday we had a chance to go snowboarding for the morning, which was quite a struggle given the night before, but we managed. 

The main even for the weekend was the Whiteout Party, which was located up the gondola to the top of the mountain - very exciting. The party was pretty wild with kokanee prmo girls all over the place and all these other girls (i'm guessing crowd filler) known as Fun Police, a foam pit, a breakdancing show, great beats and just all round enthusiasm from everyone to enjoy the night.. Hard to go wrong really. Sunday morning was extremely rough.. but luckily nothing was expected of us at all as we boarded the bus back to van.  A good few days recovery and I was back to normal.  An all round fantastic weekend!

Sidenote: I somehow cracked a rib falling on a failed 360 landing on my chunky-oldschool-mp3Player which was in my breast pocket at the time.. It's somewhat plaguing me, and will for another 3-4 weeks.. not terrible tho, been boarding twice since..

Making It Happen
If I may turn a little more reflective, one thing I've been focusing a lot on here is not trying too hard to make things happen, but simply allowing them too.  Going with gut feeling about everything really does pay off.  The house i'm in, the people I meet.  It's all just felt as though it was written...  A friend of mine Lucy, who is a beautiful, wise, down to earth soul, lent me a book called The 7 Spiritual Laws of Success by Deepak Chopra.  This book draws on Vedantic roots and presents knowledge about manifesting what you want from life.  There are many many less graceful presentations of similar knowledge.. one many people know as The Secret...  which is given from a very very superficial angle that is laughable and really almost purposely misses the point in order be more appealing and hence reach to a wider audience.  However ridiculous information like this may be presented doesn't take from the essence of truth behind them.  This book is in particular is very humble in its approach.  It explains the link between detachment and manifestation, how giving and receiving are exactly the same thing, and most importantly how to become open to receiving. I highly recommend checking it out.

NonEmployment
Unfortunately, I havent quite got manifestation of a job down yet... There are a number of things in the pipeline, all potentials... but nothing solid.  I feel this is because I really dont have a clear idea of what i actually want to do here.. I want to utilise my programming skills but the thought of getting another 9-5 desk job is really really really unappealing... (The gut feeling is clear on this one)..  So in the mean time, I've signed up for a temp agency that has some work for me but not regular and not immediately.  I've also signed up to do extra work on films which is a huge industry in Vancouver and should be picking up over the next month as it starts to warm up.  That should be interesting :) But i'm really trying to focus and work out what i want to do so I can start moving towards it.

Other Than That
-Life has been very very busy..
-I've aquired a lot of friends, many of who are separate to many others so there is a lot of things to do all the time.
-Last night I went out to a bar called Whine-O's who do $6.50 pitchers (~1.5 aussie jugs), this will probably be a regular Tuesday affair.
-I'm currently learning a new programming language (PHP) to help me find work.
-I've been walking the 5 min journey to my local beach daily for minimum 30 mins of meditation with a mountain backdrop.
-I've been to the Hare Krsna temple a few times here but it's quite a mission.. the round trip including eating is about 3 hours and they dont serve dinner until 8pm for some reason.. I'm going this Sunday for sure.
-More panoramas from around Vancouver here!!
-I will attempt to update this a little more frequently if stuff is happening.. ;)

Bye for now!  *hugs to all*


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