At Steps From College

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Like I wrote on my last blog post, after my 9 months studying and improving my English to start my College studies, since my flight tickets were already bought, it was time to go back home that November of 2016, at least for a while.

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Back to Curiyork

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After 9 months without seeing my entire family and friends, I was eager to see my town again and to my surprise, I encounter a lot of changes in it. The people, the city, my nephews and niece were huge (at that time, that I arrived they were 4, 2 and almost 1 year old, and I couldn’t believe how much they grow). My friends and family were so happy when I saw them again, I was surprised with all the welcome parties, lunches and barbecues. I had several weeks celebrating my arrival. It took me a while to see every loved one. The city where I grew also changed for the good, the only thing is that I’d loved that somebody had let me know about some of the changes and I’ll explain why in a second.

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I don’t know how Supermarkets work wherever you are reading me from, but before I left Chile the system was the following: You went to a supermarket, you bought your groceries and in the cashier, and they’d give you as many plastic bags as you needed for free. My point is that if you want plastic bags you can get them, and that was not the way that my city’s supermarket bagging system worked anymore. They could only give you one plastic bag, just one. Nowadays, I think they lower that amount to zero. Which is good, that hasn’t even been implemented in Canada yet, you have to pay for the plastic bag, one of the reasons why people choose some more reusable ways to bagged their products, you save money and the planet, but they still offer you plastic bag.

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The only thing is that I wish I knew about that change before I purchase somewhat 15 items of food. Thank God, they had a box or the outcome would have been way more different. When I got home, I told my mum about what happened, she told me…                                                                      

“Why didn’t you ask me for the reusable bags that we have at home”, to which I reply…                                                         

“Well… maybe because I didn’t know about this all no plastic bag thingy,  I haven’t been here for a while, remember?    

She said… “Oh right, I forgot” and then she started laughing.                                         

That was the worst, don’t get me wrong, I love all the green initiatives that my country has but I don’t drive, and walking with a box full of things it is way more complicated than with 2 or 3 bags, especially if you don’t have a very strong box, to carry all your purchases.

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Excessive free time

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On my second month, I started to get bored and I felt that my English was getting worse because I didn’t have anyone to practice with. Even when I was enjoying my family, I am that kind of person that likes to chill but on my own terms. At that time, I was at home, it was December 2016, there was no way I could survive in Chile unless I find a new hobby or something to be distracted with, I felt weird doing nothing, I should remember you that my college wouldn’t start until September 2017. That’s how me and my parents agreed that the best choice for me was to return to Toronto on March but this time to study in a different English school where I took more business-like classes and different classes like journalism where I wrote my first blog post ever, which in more than one way put the idea of writing my own blog someday in my mind. At the end of February, I had every paper ready to go prepared by Soraia, from Maple Study and Work in Toronto. It was time for my farewell parties. This time, they were not as sad as the first farewell parties, I knew that I was travelling to my houseland, I wasn’t travelling to the unexpected, but it still was a bittersweet experience. I will never get used to the feeling that I have when leaving my family and friends, but it was easier this time to walk inside the airport later on.

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Back to Toronto

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-20 degrees Celsius. That was the weather that was waiting for me when I arrived in Toronto. That was the lowest temperature that I had ever experienced. Even with that low temperature I was happy and relieved to be back. This time I thought I have everything figured it out, but thankfully I got more than what I expected studying English in the next four months. Not only, but I also got business lingo that helped me to understand many things while in college. I got a slight sight of doing something that I really enjoy, writing. At school, I had the chance to meet one of my best friends ever, that I met through a friend. She is from Thailand, and she is one of my biggest supporters in whatever I do, we still in touch, but we have to talk in weird schedules since she is back in her country, we have 11hrs in time difference between Toronto and her city. I couldn’t be more thankful for those 4 months. I learn a lot, and I was somewhat relaxed and enjoying classes with no pressure since I had everything ready for college.

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First glances of college

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Somewhere In between my 4 months of English, I had to go to do a placement test for math and English in my college, it was amazing to see the building where I was going to study for the next 3 years but at that time, it felt like high school all over again doing those tests, thankfully I did very well and I got in the college level courses of both English and math. Both of those courses were OK, the English one was something similar to my pathway program. The only issue on the math one, at least at first, I had to learn all the terminology in English. Thankfully the numbers and signs are the same no matter wherever you are.

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September is here

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My first Impressions when I started college were how different my Canadians peers were, at least the ones from my program. In my opinion, they were very individualistic, always running from college to work and vice versa. They didn’t seem to have friends inside the classroom, even though they knew people and sat with them, they always arrive to class alone and walk out of class the same way. They are indeed very hard to be friends with. Even if they appear very nice, they say hi to you, they remember your name, etc.

Personally, I cannot still figure it out why they don’t hang out with people like me. This is the reason why all my friends are from somewhere else or first-generation Canadians meaning that their parents are from somewhere else, it is easier to get along with them because we are in the same or similar situation. It is not good nor bad, it’s just different from what I knew.

In the college, I got very impressed by the quality and the understanding of most of the professors, which showed a lot of patience and they were always willing to answer any doubts, that we could have. In my whole career, out of 40 professors that I had in college, 98% were amazing, and the rest 2% I couldn’t learn very well with their teaching system but I cannot say that it was their fault nor mine.

The other fact that I liked is that College in Canada is way more relaxed than my former university in Chile but if you leave everything to the last minute, you’ll get very stressed, so do assignments with time or it will be a nightmare.

On my next posts, I’ll expand on the differences between my university experience back home and the college experience here in Canada, I hope you enjoy this new chapter, write you next Friday, have a great weekend 😃

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