Tag: English

Introduction

Another week has passed with a lot of fun things. I have worked on 4 out of 5 days, Judith has been very busy on choir stuff, I have had a cold for nearly 4 days now. So for the past 4 days every night I opted out on writing a new update and went to bed early. Judith is still having troubles with her arm being affected by the not so ergonomic desk and chair here, something we’re working on to improve. She is the main person behind posting pictures and everything and I have a nice piece of paper with some notes for this update written by her, but I am mainly doing the clicking and typing.

October 28, part II

After writing the update we gave Scott and Carolin a call and went over to their place. I got to meet Edgar, their enthusiastic, energetic and cute rabbit. He was hopping around the room. We talked a bit, played some Beatles Rockband; very nice and relaxing. Although I was a tad bit sceptic about Rockband / Guitar Hero and more games like that, it was enjoyable to do. Not sure if I could play it as often and much as the games I have played so far, but it was better as one would think after seeing the Guitar Hero episode of Southpark.

October 29

Quite uneventful. I went to school to pick up notes and instructions for subbing on Friday. I did some prepping for that, we had dinner and I went to bed early.

October 30

When I walked into school that day I was in for a surprise. Nobody told me that like 80% of the students and nearly 50% of the staff would dress up for Halloween, 1 day before the actual Halloween. But yet, there it was! At moments like these, one feels like a tourist :-).  Applied Mathematics 10, Applied Mathematics 20 and Science 10 were the subjects I taught that day. Applied Math really doesn’t have too much too it. It’s like or a tad bit lower in level than “Wiskunde A” at a level close to  “HAVO 4”. A lot of kids weren’t there  because of Halloween.

Science 10 had almost all kids present and it was the class I had to prepare for the day before. I received some notes on the topic “Energy” on Thursday with the request to find a nice way passing them on to the kids. Since I couldn’t get some materials needed for a “placemat” activity, I ended up teaching it in a frontal instruction, in which I did try to keep them thinking actively as well by firing questions at random, doing some votes, advocating your choice, etc etc. It was fun and after I was done it turned out we (or rather I) had been talking about Energy for nearly 50 minutes. I did not realize it before because the class did not “feel” like a Dutch class after being in a frontal instruction for like 50 minutes. Especially if you realize this was the last period they had before weekend, before Halloween. Good kids they were!

After school we went to the Elks. Not as busy as usual, since quite a few teachers were in Edmonton for a teacher conference. It was very nice though! Talked a lot to different people. Afterwards, we were in a small group “leftovers” that went to Surly Bobs for some dinner. (See pictures below). We were invited by Travis to come over for some more wine, which we did as well. Turned out to be an evening with more wine and good conversation. A tad bit unlucky on the cab again, we had to walk to the main road to catch a cab home. At moments like these you realize a cellphone would be nice.

October 31

Halloween! Doing groceries, cleaning, etc etc. No kids came trick or treating at our place, so we went to Alan and Allison’s, who live just around the corner. In the Elks they invited us to bring our candy over to give it to kids that went by at their place. They already had had like 40 kids when we arrived, but at the end of the night, while watching soccer, drinking wine and hearing stories about Halloween when it is really cold (-20C and below) about 100 kids had visited Alan and Allison’s. Judith did a good job on handing out candy! 🙂

Travis forgot he would phone us at Alan and Allison’s, but remembered after he gave Allison a call about something else. Robyn and Travis picked us up a good 20 minutes later and after one glass of wine we went to see the Rocky Horror Picture Show. After we bought the tickets at the theatre we waited at the Black Knights’ Pub to admire the costumes of all the people there. Halloween really is a big thing here….. The Rocky Horror Picture Show turned out to be a cult movie that had a lot of traditions to it. People threw rice through the theatre at the moment rice was thrown in the movie at a married couple, sprayed with waterguns when it was pouring with rain in the movie, threw toast at the word toast and several decks of playing cards were thrown through the theatre as well. Also there was a united response to the characters in the film, like “asshole”, “whore” and “boring!”. One would expect such a thing to fade out over time, but the opposite was actually happening. It was quite a thing to experience.

November 1

Sleeping in! Some more shoppings. Judith went to rehearsals of the choir (sectionals), because of the performance at the Torch relay, later that week. While she was gone I made my own dough for pizza and used the leftovers to make a few tiny breads as well. It turned out to be so much fun! Breadmaking from scratch is really not that hard and the result is very good!

Carolin and Scott came over for dinner and, like the week before, I had prepared well and planned on a nice dinner. I made:

• mushroom risotto with scrambled eggs and lettuce. I would normally use rocket, but it wasn’t available in the store 🙁
• a bonbon of goatcheese, drizzled with honey, wrapped in zuccini which was spread with a thin layer of green pesto, wrapped in prosciutto ham, baked shortly
• 2 different kinds of pizza, one with fresh tomato, pancetta, mozzarella and oregano and one that would be my standard overloaded salami piccante, less picante than normal on request by our guests. Still good though 🙂
• Semi freddo with speculaas served with warm apple compote. Yes, you have to love freezers. 🙂

The bad thing about so much food is it fills you up: we had no space for the delicious cookies Scott and Carolin brought. But it was a nice night, good food, pleasant company!

November 2

Another day of subbing! I did Arts and Car Mechanics. Half a day for one teacher, other half for another. Judith went to the gym in the morning. Huge compliment from the students at Car Mechanics: after like 30 minutes of class with me they finally understood the physics of breaking, something another sub had spend three days on last week. At times like these you do realise that being educated to teach actually matters, something that seems to be disputed by all the “experts” on your average birthday party. But as we used to say: the quarter dropped (kudos for Canada for still having quarters) Because it would be a busy week we did not do much more. We ate the leftovers from the day before (still good!)

November 3

Judith had a choir practice. For me this day was mainly spend relaxing. Looking back at this week, it was the only day I did not have to work.

November 4

Another day of Arts and Car Mechanics. Both are actually fun to teach. Of course, that may be because the Arts class is very nice and the Car Mechanics class did not have too many students and mainly good students. Last choir practice for the day of the Torch Relay! Judiths choir was practising with the kids choir and the official Montreal choir that travels with the torch! I was not feeling too well, so I went to bed early. Start of my cold. 🙁 I made a nice soup from the leftover mushrooms, which was enjoyed a lot, basically cause I yearn for soup when I have a cold.

November 5

Judith went to Mildred Hall Elementary School. At the district Cheese and Wine party, a few weeks ago, when I was in the Netherlands, she met one of the teachers there, who invited her to see a class in Elementary. Judith spend the morning assisting seven and eight year olds reading and doing other things. I slept in, feeling not too well. Around 10.30 am I got a call to sub for the afternoon. After a few seconds of hesitation I accepted, hung up, showered, took a paracetamol and off I went! Pure Mathematics 10 and 20, in the French Immersion program. Quite interesting again. I was abled to help them on the math, so that was quite OK. Some girls were a bit excited, because the 4 day volleyball tournament would start that evening and they were playing. So the last period was a tad bit restless at times.

After school I went home, just in time to see Judith before she left to the Torch relay preparation. That night the Olympic Torch would come to Yellowknife! After some resting and a paracetamol, I put on my thermo underwear and went to the city hall. Standing still at -5C to -10C is not that funny without thermo underwear and I was glad I put it on. Only my feet were stonecold at the end of the night. Walking home started circulation again, but it turned out not to be that well for my cold.

But it was worth going there! For sure! It is a very special moment seeing the torch nearing the stage, feeling the arousement. Canada really is proud having the games and that really shows off. Food was available from different stands, including a fundraising stand from Sir John, which I of course sponsored by buying a hotdog. After warming near ther barbeque I positioned myself fairly close to the stage. It took like 45 minutes from that point before Judiths choir entered the stage. I kept warm by moving a bit and keeping my gloved hands in pockets. First Judiths Choir sang Oh Canada, together with the “Fireweeds”, the childrens choir of Yellowknife. After that the Montreal choir joined and they sang the Torch Song, which, in the opinion of many choir members, was a bit cheezy. But it was a good performance, very powerful and it made quite an impression on many people. Afterwards we went to warm up again at the SJF barbeque and walked home. This really was something special to experience!

November 6

Armed with black liquorice I went to sub for Kirstin. That meant I got to teach my own subject. Neat! Judith brought in some paracetamol I forgot to bring during the first 10 minute break (thank you Facebook chat) and it was just fun to teach Chemistry 20 (twice in a row) followed by Science 9. Nice reactions by a lot of the students, because they had seen me quite a bit before, since these were the classes I visited and helped in the weeks I was exploring the Canadian educational system.

We ordered in some food, after I made another portion of mushroom soup. Although I have been quite annoyed by my cold, the soup has been very good. 🙂

Finishing….

If we keep postponing writing updates, stories keep getting as long as this one. I know, I know, I know. And it must have been quite a bit  to read. But we hope you enjoyed it. We surely enjoy being here! Thanks for all the calls, e-mails, PM’s, Skype conversations and what not more. Although we are surely progressing in making friends here, it is always good to hear from friends and family back home and from around the world!

Introduction

A lot has happened again. We had a great weekend, we took care of the last few formalities and I got to teach my first days as a paid substitute teacher. Before telling you all more about that, I feel I need to explain why the majority of posts seems to be in English, since quite a few of our readers are Dutch and the blog is mainly aimed to keep them up-to-date. It has occured to us that quite some of the visits of the website however are from countries other than The Netherlands (close to 30%). And we do want them to be able to do more than just watching the nice pictures :-). So at times we’ll still post some stories in Dutch, but we’ll focus on English a lot.

Friday Oct 23

I was up at Friday around 06.30. Couldn’t sleep anymore. I was in school for quite a part of the day, Judith picked me up around 16.00 to go off to the Elks. I bought the crew a round of drinks, to celebrate the visa and we had a great time talking to various people, including Aidan (not sure on the spelling there), Alan’s son, whom we met for the first time there. We also had a great conversation with Robyn and Travis, who invited us over for dinner. Travis is a professional cook, so we didn’t have to think twice there ;-). Really good food, good wine, good conversation. We invited them over for Sunday to have some “Dutch food”, since as a cook, Travis was quite interested to try that.

Saturday Oct 24

Judith was out for choir rehearsal. I did some shoppings around town, using my bike to get there. That turned out not to be a really great idea, because all the slush and dirt and the fact I did not have a rear fender on my bike made the bag, my pants and my jacket all dirty. I was up quite early again after a night of not too much sleep, since we tucked in quite late with quite some alcohol consumed, so I was dead tired around 16.30u and slept for 2 hours.

Sunday Oct 25

Went out to do more shopping. And, besides knowing better, I went by bike again since the buses don’t go on Sunday’s. Seriously, they ought to shoot the guy who came up with the idea of having stores open on Sunday without the buses bringing you there. Brutal! The afternoon was spend preparing for dinner. Judith went to another choir rehearsal from 16.00-17.00. These choir people are really serious!

A great dinner

Travis and Robyn arrived around 6 o’clock. Everything was cut and ready to be cooked by then. I made the following menu:

1. Starter / Amuse: Pork tenderloin, served on an aumuse-spoon (brought those from NL in my suitcase), with sun-dried tomato, basil and a dill-cream sauce. (yeah, most probably 75% of the people reading has had that dish when being over for dinner at our place 😉 )
2. Entrée: Red cabbage done in two different ways: with marinated bacon (in an Indonesian marinade) and mashed potatoes, finished in the oven. And red cabbage with a meatball and onion sauce, served with mashed potatoes
3. Desert: speculaas semi freddo (A bit of Jamie and a bit of myself there), served with hot apple compote. And hell yeah, that experiment turned out to be really nice. Home made speculaas, which is a Dutch cookie, in a home made semi freddo. Not having a mixer gave me a sore arm, but it was so worth it!

Since Travis knew and liked liquorice, he had to try all the ones we brought with us :-). To all the Uruguayans and other non-Dutch liquorice-pagans: candy does not have to have sugar to be liked! We Dutchies are not the only ones who do! Hah! 🙂

Monday Oct 26

We went out to get a social insurance number and to open a bank account. All worked out well and since I had been booked to sub on Tuesday, I rushed back to school to get familiar with the way the shop classes were run. Interesting stuff for sure, interesting students as well. Leftovers for dinner, which were still good!

Tuesday Oct 27

Subbing! A tad bit nervous I was way too early, since I only needed to sub period 2, 3 and 4. My first class was “Small Engines”. Basically, I paired up the experienced guys with the rookies and they had to tear down Briggs and Stratton Engines, and put them back together. Some of the Grade 12 guys worked on their own projects, but after 45 minutes the trying stuff begun. I kept them in the room, they didn’t kill eachother or broke the stuff in the room. Despite that being basically all they require from me, it didn’t feel too well. Welding class was even worse: the guys did not want a written assignment, they did bad, but I managed to keep them in, keep them civil and had them even complete some questions. Don’t ask how though….. Aviation class in period 4 was a relieve! Decently motivated students, a clear assignment, a short explanation and to the shop we went! Almost all of them finished the assignment and were quite focussed and motivated while working on it. Quoting one of my collegues here I could say they were “Good Teenagers!”

Wednesday Oct 28

Around 09.00 the phone, which was sitting next to my side of the bed, went. If I could sub this afternoon for English Languarge Arts. Since I had no other obligations (duh-uh) I could. At school I found neatly prepared assignments and a clear instruction. The dash 2 class however had work for like 30-40 minutes, which took us (yes, it was actually a heavily teacher-oriented activity) 40 minutes. After that I had to improvise. Luckily I had foreseen this and thought of a solution, which I of course used. After that I had the 30 dash 1 class, so the academic grade 12. This was somewhat boring, yet fun in another way, cause these for sure were “Good Teenagers!”, which were working nicely on the assignment. Easy cash it was, Yoda would say.

Updated!

So, that’s about it! You’re all back on track now! We’ll keep you updated, and yes, yes, yes, we really need to post more pics. Will do soonish!

A close call
While I am writing this, I am just passing the border of Greenland. By air of course. Still 5 hours to go until Calgary, clearing customs and getting the permit, some waiting and then on to Yellowknife. Getting the permit, you heard that right. Although getting it was far from easy and proved to be quite stressful for a lot of people.

The medical tests
The Canadian Embassy in Berlin was the place that processed almost all my stuff for a permit. Almost all, because the medical tests were reviewed in Vienna. A recipe for disaster it turned out to be….. I had my meds done Thursday Oct 8. My blood work was done Tuesday Oct 6. After the results of the blood work and the urine test were in, the doctor that did the procedure send all the stuff to Vienna. This would have been either Friday Oct 9 or Monday Oct 12.

Some clarification needed
That Thursday, Oct 15, Vienna send a fax and an e-mail for further clarification concerning my asthma. It turned out the Dutch abbreviation CARA is really a Dutch abbreviation, so they didn’t know what to think of it in Vienna. The doctor on the other hand did not recognize the request, because those were normally done by mail and had a name written on them. The request for my case only had a file number and was send by fax and e-mail.

Stress
On Monday I e-mailed my contact at the Embassy in Berlin if I were able to go on the flight on Thursday, or needed to reschedule. She assured me it was doable and went to reach Vienna. She e-mailed a disturbing answer: the doctor had not replied to the request made on Thursday. so I went by the doctor first thing on Tuesday Oct 20, since my contact at the Embassy assured me that all would be fine if the doctor would reply before noon that day. After some searching and some apologies, the doctor found the request and some time for me. Really nice and he would fax the stuff right away.

On y va
I decided to go on with the flight, checked in my road bike (yes, it is going to Canada, along with a Bicycle trainer, which allows me to bike indoors, kind of like spinning) and did some last changes to my insurance stuff. Because I am going to work in Canada, I needed a different kind of insurance.

Stress, part 2
Wednesday Oct 21 I should get the permit letter by fax. Judith would receive it, because it is her faxing number and she would e-mail it to me. Nothing arrived, so I e-mailed again to Berlin. After some investigation by my Berlin contact, it turned Vienna could not find the fax sent by the doctor. It was not there.
I replied and explained about my asthma and that is quite common and in my case quite mild as well. Eventually, on Thursday, the day my flight was leaving. I sent the cell phone number of the doctor as well to Berlin and my dad and I went on our merry way to the airport. The night before I received an e-mail that told me not to stress, because they would find a way to make it work. Easier said than done, but I managed to have a good night of sleep.

Unbelievable, yet true
When clearing customs before boarding the plane, so after the passport check, I received the news that Vienna was OK with the explanation of me / my doctor. I would get the permit number by e-mail, phone and my mom and dad will text it as well. I only need the number to get a permit. I have no clue how it works, but I will just try and be my charming and a tad bit clumsy self. So far that has worked quite well, getting my bike in (that was overweight due to the bicycle trainer) and getting to pay the lowest fee possible for my excess bagage.

All is well that ends well?
We’ll see in about 5 hours how I will do at the customs. I think it is going to be OK. After all, I did all the stuff right and I have a number that should be in their system. The travelling gods somehow decided they would be nice to me. Instead of sitting next to a former hockey player twice the size of the chair, like last time, I have an empty chair next to me. Quite something. Shutting down the laptop again, I may need it later on in Calgary. I will finish this update later.

All is well that ends well! (18.30, Calgary)
I did get the permit. Fairly easily actually. Taping the bicycle box that was ripped apart by some nice cargo people on the airport took me at least twice as much time. I do hope it survives the last part of my flight to Yellowknife. But I went to immigration, gave them the number, permit was printed and attached to my passport.

So, I am on my way to Yellowknife. Finally. No more stress, yet I know that a few more bureaucratic challenges await me there. But I am looking forward on seeing Judith again! Until the next update!

P.S. This update was placed a few days later, I have done quite some things since I returned that kept me from posting it, but that is something for a next update.

The title, a quote from John Milton, says it all. I am waiting. 12 days have gone by since I was at the physician in Groningen for my last test. After the last results came in the physician has send all the paperwork to Vienna, where it is being processed.  When it is approved, Vienna will send the approval to Berlin, where finally my visa (/ work permit) will be made and send to me in Groningen.

What have I been checked for?

Well, quite simply: a lot! My blood work has been done, a chest photo (X-ray) has been taken, my urine is tested…… I have been tapped upon, bend, stretched and what not more by the physician. At least after all this I can say without a shadow of a doubt I am healthy and in good condition. And that I don’t drink too much according to Canadian standards. 🙂 Seriously, one of the three or four questionnaires the physician has to fill out had questions like:

1. How many nights a week do you drink alcohol?
2. How many glasses of alcohol would you drink on such a night?
3. The last time you had an out of the ordinary night on which you drank alcohol, how much drinks did you have on that night? (And yes, they mean how much drinks I has on the last party I attended ;-))

And of course the more logical questions about chronical diseases, surgery, etc etc.

I may have to wait longer….

It’s about 74 hours before my flight is scheduled back to Canada. Rescheduling needs to be done 48 hours before the flight, so the time frame grows smaller and smaller. Scenarios of having to stay longer in the Netherlands have already been discussed and a plan B is already there.

While I am typing…

While I am typing this I had to pause, because I received an e-mail from the Embassy, that took some of the worries away. My paperwork is being processed in Vienna, but it has not not been approved there as we speak. But, the good news was the permit letter will be faxed to me. That will save a lot of time, so I changed the deadline from 17.00u this afternoon (T -4 hours) to noon tomorrow (T – 23 hours). Means the Embassy has 19 more hours to get things done. And hopefully they will, because that will save us a lot of money, frustration and energy. But it is somewhat scary since it is something you cannot control at all, besides sending a lot of e-mails with questions….. (No, they don’t have a phone number, so I cannot stalk them by phone :-))

In the meanwhile

I have met quite a lot of friends and family being in the Netherlands. Having dinner at different places with different people, so I didn’t have to power on the fridge again. It is nice to see them, but I’d rather would be in Canada again, with Judith. As you can see below, she really has done a lot of nice things which I would love to have done as well. So hopefully I will be back soon and not miss anything more of the start of winter in Yellowknife and the cool things people do for us. It is really nice to see we’re accepted and taken care of as much as people in Yellowknife do!

Bike, photos and more

I have been biking a bit here. As it seems I will bring my road bike to Canada, along with a bike trainer to be able to bike indoor. (Kinda like spinning for those who know that). It’s not expensive at all flying my bike in. And when the weather is still good or will become good again I will be able to explore Yellowknife and surroundings by bike and be able to explore over greater distances. We’ll see.

Saturday I biked a bit in and around Groningen and I drove into the city-herd of sheep. They use them to “mow” the grass at certain places in Groningen. We once woke up around 07.00 a.m. and heard and saw the herd passing through the Stephensonstraat, the street we live at. Quite a sight in a city, having somewhat like 100 sheep walking through a street. 🙂 I will post the pictures later today, along with some pictures of Bunny and Elmo, our pet rabbits, who are at our “rabbit-sitter”. I visited Bunny and Elmo last week en took some pictures.

So, I hope I will receive good news withing the next 24 hours and that I am able to go back to Canada Thursday Oct 22. We’ll keep you updated! Take care!