All good things must come to an end

As I wrap up my two years in London, I am amazed at how quickly it all went by. I have had a wonderful time and cannot recommend this experience enough. As I’ve said before, I think it’s something everyone should do; not only because it’s fun, but because it allows for personal growth (developing problem-solving skills and forcing us to become comfortable outside of our comfort zone), for professional growth (varied work experience and a new source of answers for interviews for example) and it makes you a stronger and more well-rounded person no matter where life takes you. I know I feel more confident and I have accomplished on of my lifelong dreams which is a wonderful feeling.

Before I cap things off for the final time, here are a few of the things I’ve been up to over the last few months:

In September I finally visited the Tate Gallery and the Tate Modern. I was very impressed by the Tate Gallery (Turners and Constables being some of my favourites) but the Tate Modern was a bit over the top for me. I’m not sure I can fully appreciate modern art. That said, the Tate Modern’s gift shop was much more fun!

In October I went to an ITV event for a new show called Jekyll and Hyde. The show itself is fine but the event was outstanding! There were mad scientist bartenders, dress-up photo ops and it was all hosted in The Vaults, a cool and creepy underground venue. It was a really different and fun night out.

In October I also went for afternoon tea at The Ritz. This was a fantastic experience. The Palm Court is grand, the sandwiches, crumpets, cakes and tea were delicious and I loved every minute of it. While it’s not cheap at about £50/person, it’s definitely a treat that I will remember for a very long time.

For Dan’s birthday we went to see The Book of Mormon. While the show is highly offensive, it was also very funny and I found myself humming a few of the tunes days later. If you’re not overly sensitive and looking for a fun show to see in London, then I recommend it.

Being away from home for the holidays can be difficult but, luckily, the London ExpatCanadian Meetup Group organized a Canadian Thanksgiving meal in a pub. The turkey was delicious and we loved it so much that a group of us decided to recreate it ourselves a month later, cranberry sauce and all! I’m sorry, turkeys, but you shouldn’t be so delicious!

Speaking of holidays, Christmas has snuck up on me and it’s almost time to head back to Canada to celebrate Christmas with my family. Before I do though, I made a couple of visits to London’s Winter Wonderland in Hyde Park. I discovered this last year and have been semi-obsessed ever since. It’s basically a Christmas-themed Octoberfest with rides, beer tents (serving mulled wine and cider too), Christmas markets and all kinds of other fun and games. I had a blast once again and will definitely be back!

It’s now time to thank you for reading my blog and following me on this amazing adventure. I’ve had a blast sharing it with those who read it and hope it has been helpful and/or entertaining. I'd also like to thank everybody who encouraged and supported me along the way. I'm not sure I would have had the courage to do it without you and I am eternally grateful. I went into this a very shy and nervous person and I have come out more outgoing and confident. I'm even engaged! I can't believe how lucky I am to have had this opportunity.

As always, I will cap things off with a quote but first, I will wish you all a Merry Christmas (or Happy Christmas as they say here) and a very Happy 2016!

"Good night, and good luck."

Edward R. Murrow 

A Fitting End to the Summer

As of September 1st, all of the leaves on the campus where I worked suddenly fell to the ground and declared that autumn had arrived. I do love autumn. It’s a bit cooler, I can start wearing cute coats and sweaters and the trees look so nice and colourful (though admittedly not as nice and colourful as they do in Canada in autumn). This does mean that summer is over however and I was still waiting for it to really start!  

Here’s a look at what I was up to for the second half of the summer. First, I should share some news: Dan and I are engaged! To celebrate we travelled to Strasbourg, France. The location was chosen a bit randomly (Ryanair had a sale where flights to Strasbourg were £7 per person – can’t pass that up!) but we ended up absolutely loving it and hope to go back soon. Strasbourg is a lovely medieval city on the French/German border in a region called Alsace. Because of its location, it’s a wonderful mix of French and German foods, German and Belgian beers (the best, in my opinion) and all kinds of delightful architecture. Amazingly it wasn’t destroyed during the war and all of the old buildings still stand today. They also do Christmas markets in November/December which I think would be really beautiful and somewhat magical. Plans for future travel! Here’s a look at a few of the places we visited:

Clockwise, starting at the top left, 1) we took a boat tour of the city which I definitely recommend; 2) we had a caricature done, great fun!; 3) a pretty bakery; 4) Maison Kammerzell, we had dinner there on our last night and saw that many famous people (e.g., Putin, Robert Downey Jr, famous French people) have eaten there. It’s an old restaurant hotel dating back to 1427, it was fancy, delicious and beautiful inside; 5) a restaurant by the water where we tried (and loved) Munster cheese; 6) cathedral seen from the boat; 6) amazing giraffe-man statue; and 7) the “ancienne douane” also seen from the boat.

Neither Dan nor I are big fans of visiting churches but we did take the time to visit the cathedral in Strasbourg. It is truly an architectural masterpiece. Unfortunately none of the pictures I took inside came out very well but here are a few from the outside:

While we were in Strasbourg, we ventured on a day trip to the town of Colmar. It is a lovely small town about a half hour away from Strasbourg by train. There isn’t much to do in Colmar, I think half a day is definitely enough, but it is very cute and worth a quick visit. In Colmar we took a touristy little train ride (I couldn’t pass up a miniature train!) through the town and then had a really good lunch and wandered around taking pictures of a town that very much reminded me of Beauty and the Beast.

Now, for the best part of our trip, the food & drink! What you see here is only a sampling (we must have each gained at least 10 pounds from this trip but it was so worth it!). Pictured are pork knuckle braised in beer sauce, Munster cheese with potato pancake, choucroute (or “meat mountain with sauerkraut”!), pâté, flammenkueche (a type of really thin German pizza with creamy cheese and bacon), Dan in front of the world’s largest cheese dome at La Cloche à Fromage (it’s actually the world’s largest cheese dome, it holds the record – it was very impressive), an obligatory black forest gateau, Bugles (I thought these were extinct!), the world’s best charcuterie plate in Colmar and some vol-au-vent, the raclette cheese (melted tableside) with pickled vegetables, charcuterie and potatoes and what I consider to be the best “café gourmand” I’ve ever had. All this was washed down with amazing beers, delicious sweet German wines like Gewurztraminer and Riesling and a local drink called “Crémant” which is like a prosecco/champagne hybrid often drank with a shot of fruit liqueur which we really enjoyed.

If I couldn’t convince you to visit Alsace because of the architecture and loveliness of the cities and towns, I hope that the pictures of mouth-watering food and drink may have helped!

Once we got back and start to eat tasteless healthy food, we resumed normal life in London. We were visited by foxes in our backyard again which I find very exciting every time it happens, we went to London’s Chinatown where we watched little fish cakes being made and I randomly found a memorial to William Wallace near the place where he died.

We also went to Hyper Japan once again which is a convention of all things Japan (food, travel, anime, cosplay, videogames, etc.) where we tried Okonomiyaki (a Japanese pancake/omelette filled with vegetables and cheese), we saw really weird things for sale – golden poo!? and we got to play with the latest videogames from Nintendo (and got nifty hats to take home).

Lastly, the last weekend in August, our neighbourhood was host to the Notting Hill Carnival. It is Europe’s largest street party and attracts around 1 million visitors! It’s basically a celebration of all things Caribbean and there is a parade that goes on throughout the day with amazing costumes, music and food. We got some amazing jerk chicken from “Mr T” and his enormous BBQ and it was so delicious. While the carnival can be a bit overwhelming due to the sheer size of it, it is good fun and, I think, a lot safer than it gets credit for. I have to say though that living 2 streets off of the parade route, I will be going away for Carnival weekend next year – the level noise was unreal and the revelling goes on until the wee hours of the morning (on a school night).

So that wraps up summer 2015 for me. It was a good summer and I’m looking forward to what the fall brings and to coming home to Ottawa for Christmas. It will be Dan’s first visit to Canada and in winter no less, it should be fun. So until next time, a quote:

“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower”

Albert Camus 

The few and the many

On this 70^th anniversary of VE (Victory in Europe) Day, I felt it was appropriate to write about recent developments in my life and, more to the point, my recent travels.

First, I’m happy to report that the tough times are over and that Dan and I are still happily living in our flat in Notting Hill and that we are now both employed! I think it might be good to note for future Swappers or anyone planning to move to the UK that the norm is to be paid monthly, usually at the end of the month. You do learn to adjust to this even if, like me, you were used to being paid every two weeks; however, it’s good to keep in mind that when you start a new job, you may not get paid for a month or even longer depending on what time of the month you start your job. This is just another reason why having savings (more than you think you’ll need) is very useful and maybe even necessary! It did take a long time for Dan to find this job (about 3 months) but this isn’t uncommon. While there are obviously a lot of jobs in a big city like London, there is also a lot of competition! I found that it is important not to get discouraged and to keep trying and adapting your applications to suit what employers are asking for. It’s always good to ask for feedback when you get rejected and ask how you can improve. I think this was a good strategy for Dan and he succeeded in finding a job he really enjoys.

Second, my dad and his girlfriend came to London for a visit last week and then we all travelled to France. While we did take the time to enjoy some tasty French food and wine along the way, we spent the majority of our time in Normandy visiting WWI and WWII sites such as Vimy Ridge, Juno Beach, Ste Mere Eglise & the Airborne Museum and some military cemeteries. The majority of our visit was very solemn and I think we all developed a deeper-than-ever respect for the men and women who selflessly fought for the freedoms, rights and liberties we enjoy every day and who helped shape our world into what is it today. I am grateful than ever and am remembering them today, on this anniversary of VE Day.

In London, we visited the usual suspects like Big Ben, Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London but we also visited the lesser known Churchill War Rooms. This is one of my favourite museums in London. Essentially, the bunker was sealed at the end of WWII and only reopened as a museum in the 1980s. This means that everything is as it was on the day the war ended; think coffee cups, cigars, litter but also, more interestingly, maps where Allied and German positions were marked based on best guesses. Here are a few pictures from London and the war rooms:

In Normandy, we started our visit at Vimy Ridge (I encourage everyone to read about Vimy Ridge if you don’t know the full story, it is fascinating), a WWI site of great importance to Canadians as it is the first time that Canadians fought together as one and defeated the Germans in a very difficult battle. We were fortunate to see the stunning and enormous monument and then we went for a (free!) guided tour of the trenches, underground bunkers and tunnels/subway systems. Here are a few pictures from Vimy Ridge:

We also stopped by a lovely fishing town called Honfleur for lunch. It had a wonderful Normandy small-town vibe and could only have been improved by better weather. I would definitely recommend stopping here if you find yourself in Normandy.

We then travelled west and stationed ourselves in Caen from where, over the next couple of days, we visited Juno Beach, the Canadian beach on D-Day. We also visited Ste Mere Eglise (of Band of Brothers fame) which was the first French town liberated during the Battle of Normandy.

And we visited a Canadian WWI war cemetery, a German WWII war cemetery and a Commonwealth (mostly Britiish) WWII war cemetery. IT was emotional to see the amount of graves in each cemetery and to read the personal messages on some of them. Personally, I was touched by the grave of a 21 year old Canadian soldier from Ottawa.

I think visiting significant historical sites such as the ones above is something everyone should do at least once in their life. It puts things in perspective and makes us appreciate what we have, which we sometimes forget to do. In closing, I leave one of my favourite war-time quotes:

“Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”

Winston Churchill

Highs and Lows

In order for this blog to be as realistic and truthful as possible, I realised that it's important for me to write about all the good times (as I have been doing) but also about the more challenging ones. The last month has been a bit of a nightmare and I thought I should post about it.

The flat I moved into in October was always meant to be a temporary flat since my boyfriend was moving to London to be with me in January and we were going to get our own place. To keep a long story short, my landlady decided that Dan and I had to be out of the flat by the end of January (when it was supposed to be the end of February). Flat hunting in London is extremely competitive and stressful enough as it is but with this short a timeframe it became even worse than we expected. We also kept getting rejected by landlords because they kept telling us that they would prefer to have a single tenant versus a couple (despite their ads stating that they were fine with having a couple rent a room) which was incredibly frustrating. As the weeks flew by, we became increasingly stressed and worried that we wouldn't find a flat in time. After lowering our standards and widening our search area, we finally found a place to live in Notting Hill. We have been living here for a few week now and we couldn't be happier. 

As a funny story, when I first moved to London in January 2014, I visited a flat in Notting Hill that was right above a fish mongers and smelled awful. There were also 7 other people living in the flat, which hadn't been expressed in the ad. Needless to say I didn't move there. But, believe it or not, when Dan and I were visiting flats a few weeks ago, we went into this building in Notting Hill right above a fish mongers and as I was starting to get flashbacks of January 2014, I realised that we were visiting the exact same flat I saw a year ago! Again, this isn't where we moved but I found it really funny that I have now seen this horrible flat twice!

I think the best advice I can give for anyone looking for a flat in London (which I will remind myself of if I need to search for a flat/room again) is:

1. Rent from an agency or make sure that you have an official contract with your landlord so that they can't just evict you without a reason - it protects both you and the landlord and is definitely the way to go (despite occasional agency fees).
2. Expand your search beyond what you know. I hadn't looked for flats in this area before because I didn't know the area but it's actually a wonderful, lively and quirky neighbourhood and I like it more than any of my previous ones.
3. Websites like Spareroom are great and definitely help with the search. There were a few ads on the site that I thought were a bit too good to be true and sure enough, Spareroom emailed me after I tried to respond to the ads to let me know that they had determined it was a scam. It helps to know that they are taking safety seriously.

Now that the stressor of finding a flat is gone, we can focus on enjoying our new neighbourhood. We have already found a few wonderful pubs and gastropubs in the area and even some that serve Sunday roasts - I'm definitely happy about that!

All that's left on our to-do list at the moment is for Dan to find a job. Almost exactly like flat hunting, job searching in London is extremely competitive. He had to leave his job in Portsmouth when he moved to London and, now that we're not homeless, he's looking for a job in London. It has been difficult for him and I remember being in the same position a year ago when I moved here. I think that the best strategy is to cast a wide net and apply to all kinds of jobs, any that you are qualified for basically and see what comes of it. I have always said that it's easiest to find a job when you already have one. It’s also good to manage your expectations; for example, one job that Dan applied for had 11,000 other applicants! We know what the competition is like so we’re putting as much effort as possible into each application and now we’re keeping our fingers crossed that he finds a job soon and that it will be a job he enjoys!

Now, as if flat hunting and looking for jobs wasn't enough, my grandmother passed away a week ago. I decided I wanted to go home for her funeral and I wanted to be with my family so I travelled back to Ottawa in very cold February (it was -45!). The flight was outrageously priced but it was worth going home and I am happy that I was able to do so. I had heard that there were discounts/refunds on flights when you are travelling for bereavement reasons but I did not get any support from Air Canada when I phoned them. This is something that had been brought up a lot on the Canadians in the UK Facebook page so I had built up an expectation but it looks like there’s no such thing. I suppose that, for this reason, it’s probably wise to keep some savings (even though it’s tempting to spend a lot in a city like London) for unforeseen events like this one. It’s hard enough to deal with the death of a relative but doing so when you’re living abroad can make it more difficult. I feel that if you are able to go home at a time like this, you probably should. In an effort to bring a little happiness to my Ottawa visit, I did go to Winterlude with my dad and had a tasty beavertail, I lost when playing Roll up the Rim at Tim Horton’s, I ate some delicious poutine (a must!) and I spent some time with my family, remembering my amazing grandparents. Here are a few pictures of my Ottawa visit:

My mom always says that bad things come in threes. I think with (1) horrible flat hunting, (2) a very daunting job search and (3) a funeral, we've covered all three! Now bring on the happy and fun times!  So now we will focus on exploring Notting Hill, getting to know our new flatmates (it's a very international house with two Italians, two Spaniards, a Canadian and a Brit!) and enjoying living together in London.

All the adversity I've had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me... You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.

Walt Disney

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

It’s been a while since I last wrote and fall has come and gone in London. While this typically means more rain (and then lots more for winter!), it was still wonderful to see the fall colours around the city. Here are a few pictures of autumn:

What have I been up to these past few months? Well, September was a busy month as my friend Jen visited and we went out exploring quite a bit. First, we went for fancy afternoon tea at Brown’s Hotel. It was very luxurious and everything tasted amazing – definitely worth the expense.

Second, we went on a day trip to Oxford, Stratford (where we visited the house Shakespeare grew up in) and Warwick Castle. It was great to get out of London for a day and see the English countryside. I think living in London has made me forget that there is so much to see and do outside the city.

Third, we travelled to Munich, Germany for Oktoberfest. That was quite an adventure and great fun. I definitely recommend everyone go at least once in their life. It’s a rich cultural event and not only about the drinking (although the delicious beer and food are a big part of it). We also had an opportunity to visit the former Dachau Concentration Camp while we were there and that was a very solemn and somewhat overwhelming experience. Again, this is something that everyone should do. We all learn about war and other atrocities in school but it’s quite a different thing to see it in person. It definitely made me realize how lucky I am to have been born in Canada and made me appreciate even more the rights and liberties that come along with it (I love you Charter of Rights and Freedoms!). On a happier note, this was my first trip organized through BritBound and I was very impressed. Everything was very well organized and we had a blast. I will definitely be participating in future BritBound travels (including the trip to Bruges in December!).

October was a bit of an emotional month for me as there was a tragedy in Ottawa which made international news; a soldier who was guarding the war memorial was shot and killed and the gunman then terrorized the city for hours while he hid in the Parliament. I was glued to the news for a couple of days as I watched the events unfold and it was difficult to be far away from home when something like that was happening only a couple of blocks away from where I used to live and work. I’m happy and grateful my family and friends are all safe and hope that something like this never happens again. I saw this the day after the shooting and just have to share it because I think it’s simply amazing:

In October I also moved into my new flat and I’m happy to say that it’s going great. Here are a few pictures of my new neighbourhood: Finsbury Park. I definitely find it more “British” than where I used to live. As a side note, it is unbelievable the amount of stuff I have managed to gather (hoard?) in my short time here. I’m also including a picture of Dan looking less than impressed at all the stuff he has to help me move (this is only some of it!).

November has really flown by. A quick yet quick visit from my friend Breanne

and I also had a chance to see the poppies at the Tower of London which was a great experience. This was in honour of the 100^th anniversary of WWI.

The fact that winter is coming (insert corny Game of Thrones joke here) means that Christmas isn’t far off either! I love Christmas and I am especially excited for Christmas this year as it means that my mom, my brother and his girlfriend are visiting and we are going to Scotland. While snow isn’t very common in London, there is a (small) chance that there will be snow in the Scottish Highlands for Christmas. I have to say, I will be a little disappointed if there is no snow on Christmas eve/Christmas morning. Speaking of snow, it snowed for a whole 2 minutes this week. Like all of the other people on the street, I snapped a picture as quick as I could (after I stopped squealing with delight and running around like a person who’s never seen snow before). While we got a few flurries here, people were quick to send me pictures of what it looked like back home – I definitely don’t miss that!

My next post will likely be after Christmas since I will have pictures of the Bruges Christmas Markets and Scotland to share. London has already started to “Christmasize” which is getting me really excited. The smell of hot cider and mulled wine is in the air and there was even a real reindeer in Covent Garden the other day!

So, for those of you reading this: Merry Christmas and thanks for reading along as I wrap up a wonderful first year living in the UK. It has been an amazing year and I look forward to another great year ahead. As always, here is a quote to end the blog post:

Ho Ho Ho

Kris Kringle