Thursday, February 17, 2005
It's snowing!!!!
Boy, it's comin' down pretty hard oot there, eh?
Yes, that's right, it's snowing! A lot! Strangely enough, it's the first proper snow I've seen since I got here (it's mostly been rain). Everywhere looks pretty in the snow, and this even includes Hamilton. The snow covers up the industrial grime, the cracks in the pavements, and the Tim Horton's cups that seem to sprout from every square foot of pavement (the Timmy's cup should be dubbed the city flower).
Hamilton is known as 'Steeltown' and is the industrial hub of Ontario. As such it's not going to be getting any 'Canada in Bloom' awards any time soon. It's the country's Detroit, all strip malls and garish lights and ads for 5 tacos for $3 so you can make your butt even fatter. Presumably it's friendly once you get to know people, and they're certainly friendlier than in London, but a lot of people seem to have that grim stoicism that you'd expect to find in a Russian mining town.
There are a lot of very beautiful places in Canada, but Hamilton is not one of them. In fact, beauty and nature are two things I'm missing a lot at the moment. London is so green compared to a lot of cities.
Anyway, I'll stop whingeing. The big redeeming feature of Hamilton is that it's in Canada. So it doesn't have the crime, the homelessness, and (at first glance) the kind of poverty that you see in '8 Mile'. It also has amazing customer service, convenience (if you have a car - public transport, or 'transit', is okay too), and rock bottom prices. How could you complain about somewhere that offers the Sheridan Hotel for 80 quid a night (for two people)???
Another good thing is that I'll be going with Joe tomorrow as he does his sales rounds, which involves seeing a lot of the wider area. I'm hoping we'll find a nicer place where we'll be able to buy a house eventually.
Yet another is that I've now got my Ontario driver's licence - hooray!!! Now they're letting me on the road (the fools! mwahaha) I can get a car and be a fully fledged North American.
Finally, the signs around here provide a source of constant amusement. After the gun one with Hitler (see previous entry) they've been cropping up all over the place. Here's three more:
1. "Please do not walk in front of bus" (closely followed by "Please do not shove head in waste disposal" and "Please do not hack arms off with a large knife" - okay, I might have made those two up).
2. In an ad for a college - "Striving 4 Excellence" (!!!)
3. Outside a restaurant - "Back by popular demand, deep fried ice cream" (!!!!!!!!) I thought deep fried Mars Bars were bad enough, but just looking at this sign made me gag.
New cultures are great - finding out new stuff, figuring out how things work, seeing a different viewpoint on life. One of the best bits though (and a great coping mechanism) is the stuff you can laugh at : )
Yes, that's right, it's snowing! A lot! Strangely enough, it's the first proper snow I've seen since I got here (it's mostly been rain). Everywhere looks pretty in the snow, and this even includes Hamilton. The snow covers up the industrial grime, the cracks in the pavements, and the Tim Horton's cups that seem to sprout from every square foot of pavement (the Timmy's cup should be dubbed the city flower).
Hamilton is known as 'Steeltown' and is the industrial hub of Ontario. As such it's not going to be getting any 'Canada in Bloom' awards any time soon. It's the country's Detroit, all strip malls and garish lights and ads for 5 tacos for $3 so you can make your butt even fatter. Presumably it's friendly once you get to know people, and they're certainly friendlier than in London, but a lot of people seem to have that grim stoicism that you'd expect to find in a Russian mining town.
There are a lot of very beautiful places in Canada, but Hamilton is not one of them. In fact, beauty and nature are two things I'm missing a lot at the moment. London is so green compared to a lot of cities.
Anyway, I'll stop whingeing. The big redeeming feature of Hamilton is that it's in Canada. So it doesn't have the crime, the homelessness, and (at first glance) the kind of poverty that you see in '8 Mile'. It also has amazing customer service, convenience (if you have a car - public transport, or 'transit', is okay too), and rock bottom prices. How could you complain about somewhere that offers the Sheridan Hotel for 80 quid a night (for two people)???
Another good thing is that I'll be going with Joe tomorrow as he does his sales rounds, which involves seeing a lot of the wider area. I'm hoping we'll find a nicer place where we'll be able to buy a house eventually.
Yet another is that I've now got my Ontario driver's licence - hooray!!! Now they're letting me on the road (the fools! mwahaha) I can get a car and be a fully fledged North American.
Finally, the signs around here provide a source of constant amusement. After the gun one with Hitler (see previous entry) they've been cropping up all over the place. Here's three more:
1. "Please do not walk in front of bus" (closely followed by "Please do not shove head in waste disposal" and "Please do not hack arms off with a large knife" - okay, I might have made those two up).
2. In an ad for a college - "Striving 4 Excellence" (!!!)
3. Outside a restaurant - "Back by popular demand, deep fried ice cream" (!!!!!!!!) I thought deep fried Mars Bars were bad enough, but just looking at this sign made me gag.
New cultures are great - finding out new stuff, figuring out how things work, seeing a different viewpoint on life. One of the best bits though (and a great coping mechanism) is the stuff you can laugh at : )
