I Love Our Family

Before JumpStart, I read the testimonials of all the students who went through the same program. Every one of them went on and on about how the friends they made in JumpStart persisted for years and were still their best friends three-four years later. I should have taken heed when each and every testimonial was saying the same thing, but at every passage I scoffed, "uh huh. Friends for life from a two-week program... yeah right."

Leap forward to today, 45 days from the beginning of JumpStart and I am with the exact same group of people. These same people lived together through the night Durfee almost went into a coma from alcohol, Eirik going to the hospital, crazy emotional nights, and more. 45 days and we consider each other family members. Take, for example, the most recent of events: This past week, Matt and Hannah both thought it would be a good idea to take a ~three day break from each other, because as everyone knows, living with the same people every single day can be hard. Actually, we have already experienced that; there have been cracks and issues in our "family" here and there, but we have put effort to try to fix it. So, Matt and Hannah's idea went by everyone great, everyone was on board. A break would be good.

It would start Wednesday at 17h45. I sat down to dinner with Hannah at 19h00. Oops.
Well, it was a pre-planned "llama" dinner... and we are both llamas. Damn. So we did what any civilized people in a pact would do. Not talk to each other. Directly. Instead we argued through Amy. A scene was caused.

Side note: I walked with Kris back to Totem last night, and he was not too keen on the splitting of our family, even if just for ~three days.

We found out Kris needed cheering up (wow, I am painting him as a Damsel in Distress. That was not the case, he was just feeling a bit down/sick). What would any normal, non-talking, civilized family do? Break the silence, make a card, run to him!

So, Hannah, Michelle, Emely, Adam, Milkshake, and I meet, make a card, and run over to Totem to meet Matt (to sign the card) before seeing Kris. Except, rather than showing up at Kris' room with everyone all happy and the card signed, we find Kris walking TO his room. Again, of course, we are the most sensible people. Hannah and I decide to run to the common room to find Matt, he is not there, we run past Kris again to q'ələχən and hide in his hallway. The rest of the group joins us before Kris can come. Assembling into a heart, we realize that none of us have the best human sculpting skills, but we pull it off. With the note to one end of the hallway. Kris came in through the other side...
A quick, non-chaulante passing of the note and turning our heart towards him, we greet Kris with "open arms".

See? None of us can properly make a heart...

We got a bit better...

We bummed around in his room for a bit and chilled... about six of us on his bed. It was intense.


The break officially lasted an hour and fifteen minutes.
Moral of the story: our family cannot take planned breaks.






PS - We determined that Kris is the father, Michelle is the mother.
I am the crazy uncle.






I think Dash says it perfectly in The Incredibles:
"I love our family!"

Why is it raining?

Anecdote of the night!


I sat down at my computer, ready to do homework looking at my blogs when all of a sudden I hear:

"WHY IS IT RAINING?!"

coming from outside of the building.

I mean, come on man, it has only been a month. Give it some time...

My neighbor is Socrates

In Arts One, my English, History, and Philosophy course, we were discussing Euthyphro and Socrates on Trial, two works about Socrates' life. The question posed to the class was: "What would it be like to talk to Socrates in a day and age where philosophers do not come up to you on the street to ask difficult questions?"
  I thought to myself...
  An interesting question...
  How would I feel...
  You know, I feel like I have had someon-
    *hand shoots up*

"My neighbor is Socrates."

I went on to explain...

etc... too tired right now

Move, Eat, Learn

I saw these videos maybe a week after I returned from my Europe adventure, and after everything I saw and did, they still blew my mind.







videos from Rick Mereki on Vimeo.

First Thunderbird (American) Football Game!

I am trying to start a "thing" where I take videos at interesting places showing the world around me. This video did not work. Sorry. I was rushed, the game was stupid, and ...well, I tried.

You might want to turn down the sound...it is a bit loud.

 

There is more after the break.

Put a blind-fold on it!

Mind you: no one was drunk.

Earlier last night, I put a blindfold on Hannah. Really, it was so she could not see the note I left her, but I challenged her to walk all the way to Totem from Vanier with it on.

It was hilarious.

Imagine a girl, walking down the street, arms outstretched, flailing about. People thought she was extremely wasted.
Being the cruel people we are, every few minutes, as Hannah stumbled around, we would yell, "step!" and watch as Hannah put out her leg in a way I can only describe as a confused horse (or what I would imagine a confused horse to be like), sticking out her leg straight and hitting the ground with her foot repeatedly, then sidestepping the next few steps.
It got funnier when Milkshake arrived and started screaming random appliances. Yes, appliances.

"Toaster oven!"

"AAAHH!" *stops, inches forward with both of her legs going and her arms flailing, and then realizes that having a toaster oven in her immediate path is probably not the most common of items*

Thank you Michelle for taking a video of all this. The funnier parts are about halfway-on until the end.

The third ring...

I guess this just shouts, "Welcome to University!"

I walked from another Totem Park building to my own, freezing my pants off (oh, hello Fall), sat down in my room, began a nice conversation with my roommate, Sebastian, when we are greeted, once again, with...
EEEEEEEEEEEEE  EEEEEEEEEEEEEE  EEEEEEEEEEEEEE...

The Kwakiutl/Shuswap house fire alarm had been pulled again. For the third time in two weeks.

We all filed out of the building orderly; there was no real hassle by this point. It did, however, bring back memories of the first alarm:

That night, my roommate stumbled in quite drunk at about 1h00; I was already asleep. The alarm woke us me up at 2h30. Groggy, I walked over to Sebastian to try to get him up, and the conversation went something like this:
"Sebastian..."
*nudges*
"Sebastian..."

"...no"

"Sebastian..."

"...no"

"Sebastian, there is a fire alarm, we have to go."
"no."

It went on like that for about 3-4 minutes. When I finally did get him out of bed, he stumbled around for a few seconds before heading for the door. In nothing but his boxers. What I said next has almost gone down in the books. "Sebastian...pants!"
It was an interesting night all around.

Then when second alarm went off, I happened to be sleeping over in Vanier (yes!).

So far, tonight has been interesting.

–––––––––––––––––––––

Je suppose que cela crie, « Bienvenue à l'Université »

J'ai marché entre un bâtiment de Totem Park et mienne, très, très froid (salut l'automne), me suis assis dans mon chaise, commence un conversation agréable avec mon colocataire, Sebastian, quand nous sommes accueillis, encore une fois, avec...
EEEEEEEEEEEEE  EEEEEEEEEEEEEE  EEEEEEEEEEEEEE...

L'alarme feu Kwakiutl/Shuswap avait été tiré encore. Pour le troisième fois en deux semaines.

Tous parts de le bâtiment; il n'y avait pas de tracas. Il m'ai rappelé des souvenirs de le première alarme.

Cette nuit, mon colocataire est venu au 1h00; je dormais déjà. L'alarme nous m'a reveillé à 2h30. Fatiguée, j'ai marché au Sebastian pour essayer réveiller-lui, et le conversation a sonné quelque chose comme ça:

« Sebastian... »

*poussais*

« Sebastian... »

« ...non »

« Sebastian... »

« ...non »

« Sebastian, il y a une alarme feu, nous devons partir. »

« non. »

Il continuait comme cette de 3 à 4 minutes. Quand je réveillais finalement, il marchait pour une couple des momentes avant allait à la porte. En rien, mais ses boxeurs. Que j'ai dit prochain est devenue célèbre. « Sebastian...pantalons! »

C'était un nuit intéressant.

Puis, quand l'alarme seconde a sonné, j'étais en Vanier (oui!).

Jusqu'à présent, ce nuit a été ... amusante.

Video @ Cliffs

The Cliffs

Sunset over the bay.

Our adventure to the cliffs...
narrated by photos!

Below, one will see the cliff face, the beautiful area, friends, crazy moments, and BLACKBERRIES! [We have a weird love for blackberries (which are everywhere) here.]

Welcome/Bienvenue

Well, this is my first blog post... on a real blog.

Umm... yes.

I guess to begin, I am successful in making my title true [An Ex-Pat in the Making]: I left Southern California on 16 August, 2011 for Vancouver, British Columbia.
I am in university, I have left the States, and I am happy. Success!

(Oh, and in true, Canadian fashion, this will be in French and English. That and it is another study technique for my French 122 class)
–––––––––
Bon, c'est mon premiere poste de blog... sur un blog vrai.

Uhh... oui.

À commencer, je réussis à faire une vrai titre [Un Ex-Patriote dans la Fabrication]: J'ai parti Californie du Sud sur le 16 août, 2011 pour Vancouver, Colombie-Britannique.
Je suis en université, j'ai parti les états-unis, et je suis heureux. Succès!

(Oh, et en style vrai canadienne, cel-ci sera en français et anglais. Cette et il est une autre technique pour étudier pour ma classe français 122)