I hate Canada Post

I already have an update. So, after getting all of my stuff together to mail to the consulate in Vancouver, I went to the post office in Warman to mail it. I sent it Priority next morning. Thinking that it would get there the next morning. Silly me. Why would I think that just because all the posters on the walls in every post office say it will get there the next morning, and the web site says it will get there the next morning that it would have actually gotten there the next morning? I tracked it this morning, Thursday, I send it Tuesday, only to find that it is in Richmond BC, not in Vancouver where it should be. I called customer service, waited for 10 minutes listening to some really annoying Canada Post commercials, only to be told that because I mailed it from a rural location, next morning really means two business days. Never mind that the package was in Saskatoon that afternoon. It is not a major center so Canada Post couldn't possibly get it to Vancouver the next day. It's not like Saskatoon has an airport with direct flights to Vancouver everyday or anything. Oh wait. Yes we do. There are flights everyday to Vancouver. But according to Canada Post, we are some hick town and they can't do anything useful. So now, my stuff is not at the consulate in Vancouver where it should be. I don't know when it will get there. The consulate is closed this afternoon and tomorrow. So they will probably get it on Monday. Then it takes five days to process. Then they have to mail it back. I included a priority next morning envelope for them to return it in, but I live in a rural location, so it really means two business days. So, if I am lucky, I will get my stuff back two weeks after I mailed it. Isn't it good I sent it priority post?

Korea update

Okay, here's the deal. I am leaving. Probably next week. After some major dealings with the consulate in Vancouver, I finally got all my stuff together to send to Korea. I got my visa number on Tuesday and send a whole bunch of stuff back to the consulate in Vancouver to get the visa processed and put in my passport. Hopefully it all works the first time. My job starts next Tuesday, but I won't be there. I will be a few days late. My time left in Canada is very short. I am very excited to leave, but very worried about what I will find when I get to Korea. I am my father afterall, and I have to worry about things that aren't even going to happen. I am sure everything will be fine, and I will have worried for nothing, but it gives me something to do instead of packing. I really need to pack, but I only have a few episodes of Stargate SG-1 left, so I'm going to do that instead. Way more fun.

I will keep posting while in Korea. I will try to make it a weekly post again. Feel free to comment. I like to know that people read this.

Yay!

I am very happy to say that I am leaving. I have found a job in Korea that starts in early January. I don't know exactly when I will leave, but it will be soon. I will be living in a city not far from Seoul. The school is pre-school, kindergarten and early elementary. It is a school, not a language academy like the last place I worked. This means that I will be teaching curriculum, not conversational English. It will be quite a change from the last school I was at. I'm very excited about it. I am also very excited that I will get to finally be in the same country as Samuel. It has been a very long time since I last saw him. I kind of feel like I am moving half way around the planet to go on a blind date. But not a blind date. Hmmm. Anyway, I'm leaving. It's a good thing.

Seriously people?

I noticed something recently. It seems that I am quite frequently stuck behind a stupid driver. You know the kind that takes the ramp to get on to the freeway but doesn't bother accelerating to get up to the speed of the other cars on the freeway, or the kind that slows down on the highway before they move over into the turning lane when the turning lane is more that sufficient space to slow down, or the kind that goes ten under the speed limit until you get into city limits and then they go ten above. Why am I so lucky so often? Today I almost got sideswiped by a stupid woman who changed three lanes at once without bothering to look, and then she looked insulted when I honked at her. I was behind a van today getting off of the freeway. Instead of merging into traffic like a normal person, he stopped. Yep. Really. Does anyone other than me actually know how to drive? Some days I really doubt it.

CBC thought-train of the week

Okay, I listen to a lot of CBC podcasts, but I like them, and then I don't have to listen to my own thoughts as I clean toilets and mop floors. Much of the time the podcasts direct my thoughts toward certain things. Sometimes I tell you about my thoughts, sometimes I keep them to myself. I will share this one.

DNTO this week was about repetition. One woman talked about a book she read over, and over, and over again, and why she liked to read that book. I have a book that I have read many, many times; The Blue Castle by L.M. Montgomery. I don't even know how many times I have read this book, but I am on my third copy. This is one of the few books I brought with me when I went to Korea, and I think I read it three or four times in the time I was there. I think I like this book so much because I identified with Valancy. There was the Valancy that everyone knew, and there was the Valancy that she knew was there, but was too afraid to let out. One day she decided to stop hiding the real Valancy, and she started to say the things she always thought, and she did what she wanted to do no matter what her family thought. She started living life instead of watching it. She had fun. And she found her blue castle, the place where she knew she belonged, the thing she had been looking for her whole life but couldn't find. She was finally happy. I love this book. The thing is though, I haven't read it in quite a while. Almost two years in fact. I don't think I need to. I found my blue castle. I'm not there right now, I left it, but I know it's there and I will find it again. My blue castle is waiting for me.

Changing

I was listening to a DNTO podcast recently. As if often the case, it got me thinking. This probably isn't the goal of DNTO, it is a comedic program after all, but it got me thinking anyway. The question they asked that episode was whether it is posible for people to change. My initial response was, of course it's possible for people to change, look at me. Most of you would say that I am definately different now than I was before I went to Korea. I would have said that too. But I'm not so sure now. I certainly behave differently than I did before. There are things I do now that I never would have done before. But am I really that different? I think the core of who I am has not changed at all. I think this person that I am now has always been there, waiting inside, for me to let her out. I just didn't know how to let her out. Now that I have let her out, I am so much happier than I was before. Robin now is the true me. I never really was the real Robin before, and I wasn't very happy. I don't think it is possible to be happy while not being true to who you are. I think I was just pretending to be happy before. Certainly, there were happy moments, but I don't think I was truly happy. Sometimes I feel the old Robin coming back to the forefront, and I don't like that. It scares me because I know what being old Robin was like, and I didn't like that at all. New Robin is so much better. But are old Robin and new Robin really different or does old Robin hold new Robin prisoner until she can escape? I know old Robin isn't completely winning because I wrote this. Old Robin never would have let other people into her thoughts.

I will stop refering to myself in third person now. I know it's been a long time since my last post, and then I have to go and post something overly serious like this. I will be more trivial and funny next time. Unless, of course, I listen to DNTO again. Those CBC programs are deep sometimes.

Did I miss something?

Okay, I thought the whole point of having a convertible was to look cool. You know, driving around in your way cool sports car with the top down. Showing that you have enough money to have an extra car that you can only drive for about two months of the year. Chick magnets. I think I missed something, or that guy totally did. The other day I saw a convertible and I was confused. It was a Smart Car convertible. Okay, it is absolutely imposible to look cool while driving a Smart Car. It just is. There is no way. Making it a convertible does not change that fact. You still look dumb. Only now maybe more so than you would have if you had stuck to the original. It's like pimping out the mini-van. Doesn't help at all. Makes you look pathetic. I don't think this convertible could in any way be called a chick magnet. Unless it gets the girls to go "awww, it's so cute. Like a little baby car." Size matters guys. It really does.