Thursday, July 9, 2009

My first 3 months in the Canadian land... my first balance!

So.. just yesterday has been 3 months.. well, yep, 3 months that I arrived here in Vancouver and it’s exactly half way.. 3 months here.. 3 months to go... but as I already explained my experience won’t end with my period over here in Canada but will go on with what I always wanted to do.. a coast to coast through the States! Yes, my 2 biggest desires since a long time ago have always been.. see as much as possible in the States and travel around Australia :) For the second one there’ll be time, for the first one time will come soon and the planning already started!

And, just in the middle of this experience I can try to draw a first balance of what I lived in these months: I’m pretty satisfied with everything..

The only moment when it was a little bit difficult over here was just the beginning but just in 2 weeks I got a house and in 3 weeks I started to work, I was pretty fast! It happened that I compared this experience over here in Vancouver with what I lived 2 years ago in Spain.. well, it’s a mistake that I’m not doing anymore. Two years ago everything was different, over there, in the ISLAND, was fun, know a lot of people, LUIGHI!!! hang around, lay under the sun and live an experience that changed me completely giving me a chance to know a lot of different Europeans.. neighbours but different! Here instead is another thing: my main goal when I arrived here and still now obviously was find a work and improve my English as much as I can to get a chance to find an international job that will allow me to escape the boring routine of an Italian life.. so what I'm living here isn't an holiday like someone else is doing.. is just work hard to get a brighter future :-)

And I’m really sure that my choices over here are making this possible!

For this, I think and I believe that an English school is completely useless and I wanna also explain why: the only reason why a school can be important is just to meet a bunch of different people, just that. For a 3 months course you can spend till 2000 € (3000 $) and that is completely senseless. If you enrol in a school here, nothing changes compared to a school back in Italy. The only difference will be your classmates: in Italy Italians, here Chinese, Brazilian, Swiss Germans and Japanese. The result will be just one: learn nothing. Why? Simply cause nothing is like to interact with a native speaker all the day long! That’s the point and the secret to get really an improvement! Where I work I’ve to deal every second with native speakers, co-workers and customers and that’s a free school! I don’t need a course to get a certificate! Back in December I got the TOEFL with 108 out of 120 without study nothing and I’ll get the TOEIC over here probably in August without study nothing either. Surely my friendship network isn’t so wide but I knew quite a few people just hanging around with colleagues and with Adam..so..

Second: I’m trying to not speak Italian as much as I can. I know a couple of Italian here and they’re cool but hang around with them is totally pointless. Can be nice talk in Italian for a while but I’ve been in Italy for pretty much 24.5 years of my life (that's already too much!) so stay with them here can’t help my improvements! It's the same choice we did in Las Palmas! I recall that with Luighi I talked in Italian very rarely just because we were always among other foreigners and so..English all the time!Or Spanish :-D

Third: I’m glad about my job. Sometimes can be hard wake up early in the morning or work 5 days in a row but is really something that is helping me professionally and personally and like I said is a free English school with real conversations, real dealings and not something artificial or built up like in an English lesson. The environment is cool, colleagues are cool too and it’s really not formal like back home. You can hang around in a bar with your manager, something that in Italy doesn’t happen too often! And is 1000 times better than work in a bar or in a kitchen! What English can u learn washing dishes?!?!

Fourth: the city. Yea, I like Vancouver. It’s really true that is one of the most liveable town in the world. Ok, the weather often sucks but it’s the only negative aspect! Can I compare it with an Italian city..? Well, of course no! It’s enough read the world rankings! Take a look of them... they speak for themselves! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World%27s_Most_Livable_Cities

Fifth: my sightseeing... well, considering my free time I can tell that I saw quite a bit around here. I haven’t been outside Vancouver but there is still time. I already saw all the main spots downtown and in the suburbs. I still have some point in my list but sooner or later I will do them!

Sixth: my English. Well, I can really tell that improved a lot. To be sincere was fine also before, I was able already to handle conversations and to be understood but now it’s better. I can feel it when I listen around, when I listen some song that before was completely impossible to understand, I can watch movies without English subtitles and I can catch pretty much every accent. Well, ok, sometimes specially in the mornings if I’m little asleep is particularly hard and I still have to ask “Can you repeat that?” sometimes but I really understand around 95 % of words when someone is talking with me. English is really spoken differently! The accents are thousands: Scottish, British, Australian, Southern American.. and it’s not easy get all of them. But there are still a lot of months before my come back and I trust that for that time I won’t have problems anymore! I improved also my way to speak, I pay more attention when I open my mouth and I try to not make vocabulary mistakes anymore.. the only mystery are the Chinese: I don’t really understand them and they don’t understand me!

Seventh: Italy.. well just a sentence: Simply, of course I don’t wanna go back! Nothing else to say...

Well, that’s all! This is my half experience balance! :) 3 months from now will come the final Canadian balance!! LOL!

C ya

2 comments:

  1. first: lay under the sun in spain?? you left LP in the same way you were at the first day...white like a mozzarella di bufala de napuleee!!! :-) and we gave you as a gift a beach umbrella too...probably it's still in calle conception arenal, escalera A, piso 4!

    second: hope you have learnt english better than spanish (no doubt about that!). you have to thank the old man he was italian otherwise you'd have paid double rent with a spanish one!

    third: don't worry about your future. you'll have an international job for sure! like me of course! wait me and I'll reach you there in a couple of months....we'll be rich with our business! I'll clean disches and you'll dry them in an italian restaurant of vancouver downtown! :-)

    forth: I hope you keep on putting "fucking" before every word like in el corte ingles..."watch your language! somebody can understand you!" ahahahahahha da morir dal ridere!

    fifth: hope your language skills have improved as your cooking ones...just out of curiosity, adam's kitchen is already blown up?? auhauhauah I have to send him the pic of that time we had fog in our kitchen! strange weather in LP sometimes... :-)

    sixth: you're wrong! in italy everything is fine! someone keeps on saying that every day on every channel of my tv (eight channels telefriuli not included!) :-)

    settimo: scrivi anche in italiano!!!

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  2. Luighi... SEI UN GRANDE!!! the best!
    Waiting u here motherfucker!

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