| It's about friggin time! |
So I obviously have trouble maintaining a blog let alone the journal I started the program with. I actually moved onto the "blog scene" because I never wrote anything in my journal but here we are with a new blog post after a few months and after a lot of pretty neat stuff.
In the last few weeks of Newmarket, my group went camping on Georgina Island, visited Niagara Falls, played pedophile in the Newmarket suburbs, attended a sweat lodge and... ya I think that's everything. Nonetheless, it was a pretty awesome end of the trimester! I won't bother going into details about everything simply because I don't have time nor the motivation to do so. I still have a few other things to talk about, or type, rather.
In Newmarket I was working on getting my schooling straightened out for when I return home in July and I got accepted into college! ...again. I had applied for the same set of programs last year but declined when I got accepted into Katimavik and so I had to apply again. But now my acceptance letter is in, my spot is reserved and the first fees are paid for. I'm gonna go into character creation for video games which is going to include conceptualizing, modeling, skinning, texturing, rigging and animating. I'm looking forward to it but I'm going to be taking a year of introductory art before specializing. I figure the practice will be good for me.
So one of our last activities with our PL, Nicole was a nice game of pedophile. :D
The way it works is you get a group of people to go hide in the opposite corner of a community from the "home base" and one person drives a van. The people hiding have to get back to home base without being seen by the driver. If the driver finds you, they honk the horn and you get into the van. Simple. If the people hiding manage to get a picture of the driver without the driver seeing them, the hider gets extra points.
For our game we were all tied together at the wrists, wearing foam animal hats that we used as part of one of our debriefing activities. So we were a group of 8 teens (2 20 yr.-olds) tied together, screaming bloody murder and hiding against fences in northern Toronto suburbia. We made it home with one good scare and a super blurry picture of the Katima-van and it only took us about an hour and a half. It was pretty sweet despite the fact that someone yanked the rope super tight around my wrist and cut off the circulation to one of my hands. But don't fret, I can still wiggle my fingers.
 So being the end of the trimester, we moved on with the program. We made it to Alma no problem, with no delays. In the Quebec airport, a few people who are underage in every other province took advantage of the lower drinking age and had a few beers in the airport bar.
Our new cluster is made up of 2 groups from my group's original (us and another group we were with in 1st trimester) and 2 groups from the cluster we just left. My group is pretty lucky in that we already know everyone in the cluster.
The new PL here is pretty awesome and I'm sure we're not going to have any trouble with her. :P We've already done a few activities here in 3rd trimester like visiting an old pulp factory turned museum, visited an old cheese museum, went to a zoo (I saw some monkeys, it was pretty ridiculously cool), volunteered at the farm I work at and a few other things I can't remember right now.
Like last trimester, I'm working at two places. I work Mon, Tues and Wed at La Petite Ferme du Coteau which is a tiny farm that is starting up a zootherapy program. And I work the other 2 days at Parenfant which is essentially a toy library. My main tasks at the farm is general groundskeeping and feeding the rabbits and the turtle. At Parenfant I'm in charge of planning and building a float for a parade that'll be in the summer and decorating the walls with paintings. I have one painting in the works and the float is all planned out.
We lucked out again with the house. For all 3 trimesters, my group has managed to get a big house. The one we have now still doesn't beat Vanderhoof's but I don't know of too many Katimavik houses that could outdo it. The house we have now is 2 stories tall and used to be a duplex. There's 2 kitchens, 2.5 bathrooms and 6 rooms apart from living areas, kitchen space, bathrooms, etc.
Because of the way the house is situated, my room is in the center of the maze. I share a bedroom with Jordan, right off of the second kitchen and we have our own full bathroom. The downside is that because our bathroom is so out of the way and because the only 2 people who use it are guys, none of the house managers agree to clean it. Oh well.
And now I don't have much more to report right now. I've pretty much expended my will to type so I'll end it here. All I can say is that I think this will be a pretty good trimester. |
posted by Tomas P. @ 6:24 PM  |
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| A New Paradigm |
So after talking with my PL I came across the idea that Katimavik might not be the time or place for DOING every new thing I want but rather a time to REALIZE what it is I want to do.
This adds a whole new element to my thinking and I'm not too sure I'll be able to accept it wholly but it's definitely something big to think about.
As of this point I've been thinking of things my group can do together so we can all benefit from new experiences but there's things I would like to do that I know for sure no one else would agree with. For example, throwing myself onto the streets of Toronto for a few nights and see how I fare. I wasn't able to do it now, during Katimavik but should I still feel that way in a few months, I'll be able to do it without the inhibitions set in place by the program.
But with the new idea, I'll have to think of plausible activities and save the radical ones for later.
Anyway, it's just something new to think about.
I'll put together something much more elaborate for my trip to Toronto during this trimester's 72 hour break but I'm pressed for time and can't do it now.
...but it's coming. |
| posted by Tomas P. @ 7:30 PM |
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| Chalk? What?! |
I don't anticipate this post will be a real long one. It's more of an observation I guess; a sort of realization from the "real" world.
I graduated from highschool last year, and having come from a school district that put a huge emphasis on technology, I find it rather weird to be working on a school that uses traditional methods. I went through highschool with 3 available computer labs, a smartboard in every classroom and overhead speaker systems for the kids who are hard of hearing, although they were used mostly for presentations and movies and such.
 Being at Mazo, I'm placed a good 4-5 years in the past as far as classroom equipment goes. The school itself owns 3 smartboards but very few people know what they are, let alone being able to setup, implement and use them. They told me the very first day I went there that one of the big projects they want me to work on is to train a few of the students to troubleshoot the smartboards and put together a few lessons and activities to show the teachers how to use the smartboards in their classes.
I spent a bit of time over the past few days at the school just observing how things are done and noticed that every teacher in the school uses chalk boards to write on and VCR players to show movies. I knew that every other school in the region back home didn't have smartboards and I always thought that it was just too bad for them but I hadn't really seen how much of a difference it makes. Chalk is so archaic. I got chills when I heard the chalk scraping the chalk board and realized that was the first time in a few years I heard that noise.
I consider myself very lucky to have been able to use smartboards, video cameras, professional recording equipment, overhead speaker systems and fully equiped computer systems all through highschool. I found the potential for all these things early on and found my calling. I taught myself the ins and outs of computers and became one of the student tech leads in the school. I taught the Digital Technology teacher a lot of what she knows today and helped give a presentaion at Wilfred Laurier University on implementing technology into the classrooms.
I've gotten so used to working with all these tools that seeing all these old techniques is weirding me out. It's cool in a respect to see how things are going down and as an eye-opener, a new experience for me that most likely would not have come about if I wasn't in Katimavik.
My work has been set out for me though. I have to teach a lot of new faces how to play a VCR and use a smartboard.
Oh boy. |
| posted by Tomas P. @ 1:31 PM |
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| Whose Ear Did I Spit in? |
Second trimester has officially begun.
So now 4 days after having started work, I'm establishing another routine (whoopee). This past Monday was spent touring our last work placement and then interviewing with the other 10 employers. I wanted to work in a school or just somewhere where I would be able to interact with people. So basically school or Youth Recreation Center. As long as I didn't have to do physical labor for another 3 months.
I managed to get through 5 interviews within the allotted time and I felt they all went really well except the one I did for Mazo de la Roche school; my french wasn't as fluid as I'd hoped.
I interviewed with 3 schools, the ecology center and the rec center and I was thankfully placed with Mazo and the rec center.
I work at Mazo de la Roche every Tuesday and Thursday and the other 3 days, I work at the Rec center. So far I've worked at each place twice.
At Mazo I work with students in their classrooms, dealing with mostly 4-8th graders. So far, I've worked with 1st graders who were so nervous they could hardly hold their book straight when I read with them, an 8th grade class who likes to fart and another 8th grade class with a group of girls who are now "katima-groupies" for Mik and myself... they're a group of creepy little girls.
The rec center has had me do a lot of reading so far. The first day there was spent reading over health and safety policies and their confidentiality forms, etc. That day was also the first day I've ever really skateboarded. It hurt. I managed to bruise both hips and something weird was going on with a tendon in my hand so that's not too good. In any case, I had fun doing it.
For my second day there I was assigned to work on a computer that will be imaged onto a bunch of other of their computers in the lab. My assignment was to look over the computer, familiarize myself with it and put together a list of games and programs that kids might want on it.
The computers they have are well, not gaming computers in any stretch of the imagination but they will at least be able to handle Counter Strike 1.6, Need For Speed - Hot Pursuit 2, Sim City 4 and others and will hopefully have RPG Maker VX, Pivot animator, GIMP, Anvil Studio and a few other things (I don't have the list in front of me). And come Monday, a technician is going to come to the center and I'll be working with him for the day to get everything on the computer, image it and then install it on the other computers. Should be fun.
So far, I'm enjoying my work. I wanted to work in a school and the rec center because I felt those were the places where I could interact with people a lot and not be overwhelmed as I develop communication skills and try to get tasks done.
Oh, as far as this post's title goes, I got that quote from one of the kids at Mazo. I was sitting in the gym with Mik and as a group of kids walked past us, one of them asked his friend, "Whose ear did I spit in last time?"
And he was serious as he asked it. I chuckled.
So the next big event to look forward to is the upcoming 48-hour break. We're lucky to have a holiday on the Monday after our planned 48 so it is now a 72-hour break. My plans so far are set on a trip to Toronto. I'll update on it once I've planned it all.
So for now, that's all. |
| posted by Tomas P. @ 3:13 PM |
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| Whoa... |
...Cont.
When the cluster arrived at the Prince George airport, everyone swarmed the check-in counters, of which were about 6. From what I saw, Vanderhoof was the only group flying WestJet so we had 3 counters to ourselves which made the upcoming ordeal so much harder to coordinate.
Mik was the first to check-in and quickly found out that our flight was canceled. It turns out our plane went to Hawaii instead. To bad we couldn't have been on that flight. The way it was worked out was that the entire group, omiting 4, would take the next flight out to Vancouver which was later in the day. The other 4 were to fly at 7AM the next morning.
I went to check-in right after Mik at a different counter and when they told me something clicked. I lost all sense of humor and got into a strictly no-bullsh*t mode. I didn't expect it but it worked out well.
I had intended to stay behind for the next-morning flight and let the others fly that day but that idea was quickly kicked out when I remembered the story Tristan had told us about another group that went trough the same thing and the rising panic in some of the people in the group made me think they wouldn't be able to handle not having the entire group together.
The story Tristan told us was that the group whose flight was canceled was placed in a hotel overnight and was rescheduled for the next flight the following day. It was the exact same predicament and turned out to be the exact same solution.
After a while of waiting for vouchers to be printed, nerves to be somewhat settled and plans to be, for the most part, coordinated between us, we started saying our goodbyes to the rest of the cluster. We were all prepared to be one of the last groups to leave so goodbyes weren't something we had thought of and all of a sudden we were forced into it. It was odd to feel the energy in the atmosphere change. At least from my group anyway. Everyone went from excited to sad in an instant and we were then the first to leave.
We got to the hotel by taxi. Three of them, which was hardly enough. Even having one van, our luggage barely fit into the taxis. Some people packed a LOT of stuff!
Along with our taxi vouchers, we were given vouchers for our next three meals from Denny's which was attached to the hotel. It was weirdly amazing to be able to eat at a well-known restaurant again. It was so unlike Katimavik but we took full advantage of it and ate until we were completely full for all 3 meals. It was awesome!
For that whole day that were supposed to be on a plane, everyone in the group ate, slept, swam a little, ate, slept some more, pooped and just rested in general. After getting very little sleep at camp, a real bed was SO welcome.
 The next day, we packed 3 more taxis full of stuff and headed for the airport again. We got on the plane with no trouble and started our trip. We flew from Prince George to Vancouver to Toronto, taking up the entire day. We landed in Toronto at around 4:30-5-ish and the only thing that went wrong was that Jazmin forgot her iPod on the PG-Vancouver plane.
Once we got our luggage back, we scrambled to figure out our transportation to the Newmarket house and a few minutes later, we were presented with a mini-bus limo. Another Katima-odd if you will.
 We just barely managed to fit our luggage into the thing and we all settled into the pimped-out interior of our chariot. The seats were placed in a semi-circle around the bus with a table in the middle and toward the back. String lights were strung around the ceiling, the stereo was blaring out tunes, and the water cooler was open. It was the most comfortable travel vehicle I've been on in a long while.
When we arrived at the house there was another moment of pandemonium, similar to the one at the Vanderhoof house. We all rushed off the limo, quickly grabbed our bags and ran into the house. I claimed my bed right away and then explored the house, and said hi to our new PL, Nicole, of course. The house is slightly smaller than the Vanderhoof house and much more complex as far as layout goes. The Vanderhoof house was really predictable with evenly spaced rooms and perfect boxes for rooms. This new house has unaligned walls and rooms of different sizes. It makes navigating it interesting, or at least as interesting as navigating through a house can be. (Lame, I know)
And now I'm basically caught up on my blog. Everyone here is settling in very well and very quickly. Nicole is turning out to be pretty cool; she likes knowing we talk about farting and pooping and even pulled out the Everyone Poops book the first night we were here. I remember reading that book when I was little.
Anyway, I'll update my posts with pictures once I find a usb cable and continue to post once something new comes up. |
| posted by Tomas P. @ 11:18 AM |
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| Oh The Bittersweet |
I have a good amount to write about tonight so this one post will be about 2 or 3 days worth of goodness. Prepare yourself.
So I'll start from two days ago.
I got up early Monday morning to see the sunrise for the last time in Vanderhoof and to check my email for any new updates for anything. There weren't any.
Anyway, I returned to my room afterword and managed to stuff all the clothes I had previously packed the night before into my little suitcase. I hadn't bought much extras over the past 3 months but that little I had took up valuable space. You know, things like a cd, 2 shirts, and a paper cup full of change sure are demanding. I managed to get all packed up and cleaned the room in about 2 hours time.
Throughout the day, we also painted our third of the table that we've been eating off of through the whole rotation. Tristan, from what I understand had built the table by hand and had told us from the beginning that we would be able to claim one third of the table and paint whatever the hell we want on it. It only took an entire trimester to get it done, granted, it made the perfect going away activity.
When the bus arrived the house exploded in pandemonium! The girls started screaming, the guys started mimicking the screams, somewhat sarcastically until you could hear nothing but shrill noise. Tristan ran downstairs, passed me and we gave each other raised-eyebrow looks, knowing full well we were both saying "hooooly sh*t!" in our heads.
 We packed our stuff, said our goodbyes to Tristan, got on the bus, took our seats and waited. As the bus started moving we all watched as Tristan walked over onto the steps of the house, leaned forward on the railing and watched us leave. We won't be able to contact him again for 30 days as Katimavik won't allow it so we all knew that would be the last time we saw him... for a long while and it was as much a bittersweet moment as the term's definition can allow. We had to say bye to an awesome friend but we were also saying hello to a whole butt-load of new experiences.
I'm sure that sight was nagging at all of the Hoofs' minds throughout the next few days.
Rotation Camp
There weren't too many exciting things going on over the next few days at rotation camp. We drove over to Camp Friendship, about an hour outside of Prince George and settled in after hauling our luggage down a path trough the woods to our cabins. (I was one of the few lucky ones who stayed in the heated cabin. The others had to tend their own fires to keep warm.)
Throughout our stay we (our cluster) did a few little reflection activities like listing our favorite experiences from first trimester as well as a few expectation activities like writing letters to ourselves describing the experience we're expecting and a newscast from our next placement.
There were funny moments for sure but nothing real spectacular; no one wanted to be there, we all wanted to travel to our new homes.
The one thing that really stood out for me was going on a hike outside of the camp into the hills overlooking the forests. I was carrying my djembe around with me in hopes of finding someplace in the camp where I could just sit and play. As I started putting my boots on and walked toward the door, a small group of people approached me and asked if I wanted to take a hike to go see the mountains. I had originally planned to go by the lake and play there but I figured I'd go along with them.
We followed the road out to the entrance of the camp, started down the logging road, and turned off onto a logging trail. From there we went "off-roading" and blazed our own trail through the knee-high snow. It took us a few minutes of trudging before we couldn't even see the logging road anymore, even having walked up a hill. Some of the others were wearing shoes or had boots and hadn't tucked them in and they started complaining about their ankles burning from the snow. But we continued.
 We eventually got to a large pile of logs where we took a little rest so the others could shake the snow out of their shoes. I think I was the only one who didn't have that problem, thankfully. Once everyone was ready to go on I decided I'd stay back cause the view from the log pile was enough to inspire me. The others went on and I sat on the log pile, took my djembe out of its sack and slapped away.
After a few minutes I couldn't hear the group's voices anymore and that brought on an awesome feeling of freedom and independence. We weren't too far from Camp Friendship; it was maybe a 30 minute walk from where I was perched so there wasn't the feeling of fear. Plus, in the unlikely event that the others abandoned me and I, for some reason couldn't find my way back, I had everything I needed to survive the night. I could short-circuit the batteries in my camera and light up the rope that was the strap for my djembe and I was surrounded by wood so I could keep a fire going. I was dressed in only a hoodie so there would be no way I would sleep real well considering the cold but digging a hole in the snow would provide me enough shelter to fight the cold. I was prepared but I didn't have to resort to any of it.
I looked around as I was playing and in front of me was a line of mountains in the distance, shrouded with blue atmosphere, capped with a white-orange from the fading sunset. And to my right and far into the sky was the sliver of moon rising higher into the swarm of stars. The skies were clear and being so far away from civilization meant there were no lights so every single star in the sky was visible.
Not long after that, I started hearing voices from the direction the group had gone off in. They were coming back and I started packing up my djembe. They came back to the wood pile and we continued our trip back to camp leaving us with another half-hour of free time before supper.
Now if I remember correctly, it was the next morning that we woke up at 5AM to get ready for our bus ride to the Prince George airport.
To be continued... |
| posted by Tomas P. @ 12:59 AM |
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| Goobyes |
Today we hosted another party at our house. It wasn't to meet the billet families this though. No, we had a going away party.
My group will be leaving Vanderhoof this coming Monday and we threw a going away party for ourselves :D I was in charge of supper today and instead of making the Sweet Chili Tofu Stir-fry that had been originally planned but switched, I made Mulligatawny Soup (aka. Tomas' Soup) which seems to be a random assortment of ingredients. It tunred out great but what made it fun to make was that Iwas also trying to monitor the rice pot and mix together the mix for Maria Biscuits for my lime dessert (that everyone in the house loves) which is made of:
- Maria Biscuits
- Sweetened Condesned Milk
- Evaporated Milk
Anyway, I was kept busy cooking throughout the afternoon.
During the day, Mikael, Tristan and I tidied up the house to make it look "presentable". Nothing interesting happened... apart from blaring extreme metal music throughout the house.
Most of the work partners came to the party as well as some of our billet families. What set our party apart from your "standard" poluck was that the group had to present our final presentation for the trimester to everyone. It basically consisted of a slideshow showcasing alot of activities we've done throughout the trimester.
Goodbyes were said, songs were sung, gifts were given and after everything was said and done people went home and that was that.
I'm not really in a mood to be writing which explains the dryness of this post. But I did manage to finish the template design... or at least get a working version up. I'm sure there's still bugs and whatnot that I'll fix soon enough.
Anyway, that's all I care to come up with for tonight. |
| posted by Tomas P. @ 1:29 AM |
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| About Me |
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Name: Tomas P.
Home: Miramichi, NB, Canada
About Me:
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