The Myspace Effect

First of all I need to apologize for not posting a video blog this week but we had some technical difficulties. I now have my laptop, thanks to a my aunts in Guelph and I was ready to start blogging but unfortunately in my first week here our group maxed out are downloading capacity that our internet provider (damn you BELL) allows. People were playing too may games and watching too many films so our internet has been cut until the first of May. Thus I find myself in Jessica's and Shoshana's room on the right side of the couch (because the signal is weaker on the left side) trying to steal an wireless internet connection from our neighbor. A video blog is in the works and will be up shortly.

Anyways onto the picture of the week. On Thursday our house managers decided to have a theme dinner. I suggested (half jokingly) that we have a tribal dinner and the idea stuck. Shoshana and Fred decorated our eating room with snakes, trees and a colorful jungle-esque background. Our job was to come up with our costumes. My costume consisted of body paint,sting, home made paper and saran wrap.....that is all! I couldn't just pick one picture so I selected a few for this weeks viewing. Enjoy :)



This was the centerpiece to our madness!



Group shot one (Not everyone was in the picture...or looking the right way)



Group shot two! The whole gang in action!



If you were wondering why I called this blog the Myspace effect well I feel that pictures become more epic if they are take from an above angle....even if it means one can see my extremely skinny arms, random air vent and our bathroom floor that desperately needs some attention...

P.S Today is our 200th day in the program! I made a Chocolate cake with my Project Leadr Émilie...it was kinda special!

Chip & Dale

C'est la première fois que j'essaie d'écrire un blog en français donc soyez patients. Si vous ne pouvez pas comprendre.........APPRENEZ COMMENT LIRE LE FRANÇAIS. Néanmoins, aujourd'hui j'ai envie de parler d’une famille qui est proche de notre cœur, ici dans notre maison Katimavik. À Vanderhoof, nous avons rencontré Denver. Sans parents et tout seul, nous l’avons accepté dans notre maison et nos vies comme un membre de notre famille. Nous ne l’avons pas jugé quand il nous avons dit qu'il était asexuel ni quand ses deux pères sont arrivés à notre porte à Newmarket. Comme Denver, Chip et Dale étaient l’fun et gentils. C’était mignon de voir Chip et Dale vraiment en amour, mais c'était un peu étrange d’entendre les sons qu’ils faisaient quand ils étaient ensemble.

Récemment, j'ai passé du temps seul avec Dale quand j'ai pris un congé du programme. Il est venu avec moi à London pour visiter ma famille et il a voyagé avec moi à Québec. Quand la femme de la sécurité a pris mon sac pour être sûre que je n’avais pas de choses illégales, Dale n’a pas pu rester silencieux et il a crié. (C'était la première fois que Dale voyageait en avion donc il était excité). La femme était étonnée parce que ce n’est pas tous les jours qu’un sac crie. Avec précaution, elle a ouvert mon sac et Dale était là, en pleine face. La femme n’a pas trouvé ça aussi drôle que moi parce qu’elle a tout vidé mon sac à dos. Mon voyage s’est bien passé et Chip, Dale et Denver sont tous réunis et heureux.

*Note: For all you anglophones this blog post was basically about a family of stuffed dinosaurs we have at our house here in Alma. Chip and Dale are the two dads of Denver, an asexual Dinosaur from Vanderhoof. (Ellen DeGeneres was their surrogate mother but that is another story.)*

The Terry Fox Experience

The time is 1:45am EST and I obviously cannot sleep because I am writing this blog post from Alma Quebec in our totally crazy computer room, which is painted pink (Carmine Pink if we want to be specific) and grey. So much stuff has happened over the past few days in my life from an extremely scary interview at The Four Seasons hotel in downtown Toronto, to being mocked at an airport for having a purple dinosaur in my bag, to arriving in the town I reside in now.

This little adventure of mine began on the 14th of April 2010 when I bid my group farewell for a mini break from the program. I got the leave due to an interview I had in Toronto for a scholarship opportunity. The Terry Fox Humanitartian Award is an award given to approximately 20 applicants per year. I was given the opportunity to have an interview with some of the members from the selection committee and basically advocate why I would be a good choice for this award. I felt the interview went pretty well. There were three interviewees there. The one lady was a past Katimavik Project Leader so it was great to have someone know about the program I am in. The gentleman to her right actually lives five minutes from my soon to be apartment on Coombs street in London and the fine lady to her left was an avid runner who just competed in the marathon I hope to compete in next year (which is the Around the Bay race in Hamilton). I was as charming and genuine as can be so the rest of my fate is now in their hands. If I win the award or not it does not matter to me. This was a great experience and made me realize that all the things that I've done in the past few years have really made a difference.

This interview experience has also opened my eyes to what an icon Terry Fox is in Canadian society. Sure we all know his story because it is told to us by our parents and we read about it in our history books, but when I stop to think about it Terry Fox was an adult hardly older than me. His life obstacles were horrendous and living with cancer at that age would be demoralizing. Nevertheless Terry Fox did not fail to run a complete marathon every single day for months on end. That perseverance and determination is hard to find in this day and age. It is fact that Terry never made it across Canada, having to stop in Thunder Bay and then succumbing to Cancer later that year, but to me and other Canadians reaching his physical goal wasn't important. The legacy he left and the hope he gave to others meant so much more. His attitude and ideals were extremely contagious and effected every aspect of life.

Well, it is well past 2:00am now and I did have aspirations to talk about my travel day to Alma so I will have to fill everyone in tomorrow with a special blog post. All I have to say is that I am glad I got the chance to interview for this award. I need to thank Marion and Donna (my incredible aunts) for taking me in for a few days along with Eric and Jackie who helped me after my interview and made sure I got to the airport on time.

Rockets and Krakatoa

I picked this picture for two reasons. First of all it shows me and Anthony eating the delicious little candies known as rockets and yes we had a competition to see who could eat 100 rockets the fastest. I also chose it because you can see the commencement of Krakatoa. Krakatoa was the pimple on my forehead which inspired a fine piece of artwork by Shoshana. It still hangs above my bed in the Newmarket Katimavik house. I am very disappointed for forgetting it, so if in anyway possible if could find its way to Alma, I might just cry tears of joy.

Video Blog Literally about Nothing

....so here is my first real attempt at a video blog but I don't really talk about anything significant for a whole 1 minute and 54 seconds so I wont be offended if you don't watch it. Katimavik is about developing new skills so hey why not try to make an epic blog, instead of the one I try to update every few weeks. You never know, I might become incredible at blogging and rival some of the greats such as Perez Hilton and Shoshana Okano. No I can never be Asian or nearly as flaming as Perez but I pledge to make my gosh darn-it blog as interesting as heavenly possible!



Maybe someone could give me some tips on how to ameliorate my video blogs in the future....

Second Trimester is a Wrap

So once again I fell off the band wagon when if came to updating my blog. What is different about this time is that I have come up with a new system to keep me motivated as I move to Quebec. I pledge to:

1. Write one blog in English (Mondays)
2. Write one small blog in French (Wednesday)
3. One Video Blog in either language (Friday)
4. Upload a Picture of the week (Sunday)

Jeez this is a ton of stuff to do but hey I have less than 11 weeks in the program so why not give it a try. Katimavik is a great program and I want to make sure I don't let it fly by without accomplishing what I want to do :)

....I guess I will be back later today with a video blog! So in the mean time here is a music video three girls in our group spearheaded, for our final presentation, which I think is fantastic!