Spring in Our Step

We made it back safely from our soujourn to Seattle. Lanes and I had a fabulous time. I got to take one nap and three attempts at one, and Lanes got to play with her cousins, who might still be recovering from the madness that is a three year old with boundless energy.

It was nice to just roam around with my nutty sister. I would want to hug her one minute and then I’d get cranky and whine the next. I have low blood pressure and she does a mighty fine job raising it to the normal levels and then some.

She took the week off to hang out with us, during which time she babysat Lanes so that I could get a haircut and beautify myself. My mom had seen a recent picture of me and demanded an overhaul and massive renovation be done at her expense. I had to say I put up little to no fight to that request.

Lanes was delirious with joy at the prospect of an outing with her aunt, and after some window shopping and bribing me with chalupas from Taco Bell (yes, it’s horrific—it’s a good thing I can’t find a TB in Canada), each day at 2pm, we would pick up my nieces’ nanny/beloved aunt, ‘Anna’, who is a very niece, albeit serious Polish lady we have all adopted as part of our family.

She is beautiful inside and out, but when she has an idea in her head, good luck to us all. There are no debates with her. It’s like going into a boxing match with one hand tied behind your back. No matter what you think or how right you are, you have to always gently say ‘yes, yes, you are right’.

Devoutly religious and with impeccable manners (not that one has anything to do with the other), Anna is currently mulling over the prophecies that claim there will be many natural disasters and that the world will end in 2012. She really wanted to talk to P about it, since they share the same religious views, but since he wasn’t around, I was considered the next best thing.

On the first day she cornered me into a conversation about it, after her ritual of giving one kiss on either side of the cheek, two hugs, and saying ‘I love you so much’ three times. I could see from her eyes that she was genuinely concerned. My sister, always practical, and less sympathetic to these notions, obviously proved to be a dismal audience for this poor lady. At the end of the conversation, I was in a flap myself.

So the next two days, at two o’clock when we went to pick Anna up, I had to get out of the car, and remember, ‘kiss, kiss, look sad the world is ending’. My sister thought it was hilarious that I was preparing my sad look, but I think it went a long way with Anna.

While P was in Canada for most of the week, Lanes decided that my sister’s husband, lovingly and comically referred to as ‘Big Daddy’ would make a good substitute for a father figure. She would run screeching towards him when he got home and then would sit on a stool in the kitchen and watch him cook with a rather mesmerized look on her face.

Lanes cast me aside like yesterday’s newspaper and followed my sister and her family around the house. She told them about her best friends in school. She said ‘Randy, and Evy Anne, they are my people’. I don’t know where she comes up with these things. Lanes also hero worships my sister and ate things with her that she normally refuses to with me. I was slightly jealous yet in awe of this.

P, meanwhile, finished up his temp job. He got some messages saying there was a permanent job opening and then when he called them up, they had selected someone else. We have had many moments of getting all excited someone wants to talk to him only to find out we missed the bus. It’s rather disheartening. It’s like showing up at a party a day late and a penny short.

Meanwhile, I had my first taste of the Canadian medical system. I went in for a checkup and had to have a routine scan done. I had to wait two weeks for it, but it didn’t bother me since I was in no hurry and didn’t need immediate help or anything (it wasn’t for my brain, in other words).

I was in a mad rush today, having passed out early last night after returning from Seattle. I had to get Lanes’ lunch ready for school, do laundry, make dinner, and take care of some very important messages and I didn’t have time to read the paper that gave me detailed instructions regarding the scan.

P had set off to a job fair, and he showed up just as I finished putting the laundry away. Always methodical, I decided the highest shelf in the upper cupboard of the kitchen is the best place to keep my medical file. It's right under a cake pan and on top of unused muffin trays. I was rushing to get dressed and didn’t see the instructions for the scan until the last minute.

I was furiously guzzling down water because there was a message on my machine instructing me to drink at least four glasses of water prior to arriving at the clinic. However, after reading the fine print, I realized I had to drink it two hours before the scan! To make things worse, I had just used the ‘facilties’ and the instructions said not to use the loo for three hours before coming in.

Great. As usual, P shook his head sadly at me and my failure to follow instructions. He said he would have read it word for word and done it precisely. This is true. He would have also highlighted the sheet and measured out the precise amount of water that had to be consumed. He and his bladder would have then proceeded to sit smugly at the doctor’s office and ‘tsk’ and people like me.

So I went into the ultrasound office feeling like the guilty kid who accidentally let all the frogs out of the lab or something. P eventually felt bad for me and told me that it will be ok, after scaring me saying if I get turned away they might charge me $120. I decided to just wing it. When asked if I drank water, I truthfully said ‘yes’, without mentioning it was 20 minutes ago instead of two hours.

The technician or whatever you call the person doing the scan looked at me with his eyes wide open and said accusingly ‘your bladder is empty!’ I felt like I was going to be sent to the principal’s office. I admitted I drank water, just at the wrong time, but then between him and someone else in the office they sorted me out.

When I left, if the technician could have wagged his finger at me and said ‘naughty, naughty’ he would have. We didn’t get the reports then and there, apparently they send it to the GP’s office. It was also weird to just walk out of a medical office without paying. Amazing. Yea, healthcare system.

P was waiting outside faithfully, with a bemused smirk on his face. We had to pick Lanes up from school, but I didn’t quite make it there because all that water had run through me. I was about to turn blue and it didn't help that P was hitting every single speed bump in Burnaby.

I had tears in my eyes, and even having my favorite aging Canadian rock star on the radio didn’t help. We also got caught to every red right in town. I felt like a water filled balloon that was about to hit the pavement at 30 miles an hour. I wanted to call the technician up and ask him what does he mean my bladder is empty and would take hours to fill up?

Any old how, terrorizing technicians aside, I’m glad it’s done and over with. And guess what? We have been in Canada now for exactly six months!! Time really goes by quickly, although we have not much to show for it. And I have yet to go in for my driving test.

I must run and close all the vents and open the windows in the apartment. The heat was never on in the dead of Winter, but now that Spring is emerging, the heat’s been cranked up. How does this make sense? Any old how, more adventures next week… Catch you soon…

South of the Border

As you might guess from the title of this entry, we are outside of beautiful British Columbia, mostly because our daughter, Lanes, has her Spring Break. Sorely lacking in the skill sets needed to entertain a three year old for nine days straight, my harassed husband, P, and I decided we’d cross international borders and descend upon my sister and her family. Lanes was so happy about going there, she looked like she was right out of an ad for Disneyland or something.

It turned out to be a really long trip. The drive takes three hours and any additional time depends on how long the line is at immigration. Border wait times on Saturday mornings are terrible. I heard that a lot of people drive over to America to do bulk shopping and gas up their cars because it is cheaper. Or maybe like us, they want to go and bug their American relatives a little bit. Spread the joy. The good thing is that the wait times can be looked up on the internet.

We knew we had to wait for around ninety minutes, but I surrounded myself with anything and everything Lanes would ever randomly want or need and was set to go. I sat there smirking and rather proud of myself for being uncharacteristically lucid in anticipating her wants and needs. If she randomly screamed ‘I want my red dragon!’, hey presto, there he was.

Of course, since I came prepared, turns out she didn’t want or need anything. She was so focused on going to ‘Merica (as she calls America) to see her Aunty (aka 'Big Mamma') that she couldn’t even eat. Before we knew it, we were about to cross over, but alas, our visas, which are extended in six month increments, were overdue.

We were told to drive into a secondary inspection unit and get a new form, and that that’s all that needed to be done. So we got out of the car, taking only our passports with us thinking we just had to ‘pick up a form’. When we got into the building, the line was incredibly long. P got into panic mode thinking we were going to have to wait for two hours in the line—with unpredictable Lanes.

The crowd was growing steadily behind us and we were sandwiched between two narrow roped up lines. There was no hope of getting Lanes’ paraphernalia that I had so carefully selected. I didn’t want P stumbling through the masses, running to the car to get anything because if daytime talk shows are anything to go by, you don’t want to be a brown man running around randomly at the border. It just won’t end well.

Lanes was standing around at first, and I was clinging onto her arm for dear life because of the crowd. After ten minutes of scanning the line anxiously for signs of movement, I realized that Lanes had neither fussed nor fumed. There was no high pitch sound warning of a meltdown and her arm felt limp and compliant. Alarmed by the silence in not only her speech but of her body language, I turned my head towards her so fast, I nearly gave myself whiplash.

A a really nice 20-something Korean lady was kneeling on the floor, stroking Lanes’ arms and talking to her. The poor woman saw my head snapping and quickly let go of Lanes and showed me her palms like she was surrendering to me at gunpoint, and said ‘I’m sorry I was talking to your daughter’. It was almost like she thought I’d whack her with my handbag for talking to Lanes.

Quite the opposite, I was relieved Lanes was distracted. Ok 2% of me was hoping the lady’s hands were clean—who am I kidding—I am that anal. I told her it was ok and to please go ahead with their conversation. Anything to keep Lanes entertained, as we had to buy ourselves a lot of time.

In the end Lanes and her new friend had some discussion about boots and Lanes told her she really needs to go to America to see her Aunty. After that P and I had to take turns lugging her because she was fading fast between the built up anticipation to see her cousins and cramped up conditions of the lines.

Almost two hours later, we were stamped, scanned and sorted and on our way. Lanes was very good about the entire thing, mostly because she kept thinking Big Mamma would randomly pop up at immigration. She was really heated up from the sunlight being in her face most of the time, and after we fed and hydrated her she passed out and woke up just when we were turning into my sister’s driveway.

Lanes and I will be in Seattle for a week. P came down with us on Saturday and had to the next day. He could come back up on Wednesday, when his five day temp job is over, but he wants to stay in Canada. He said he is going to use the quiet (read: noninterference from his spouse and child) to focus on his job hunt.

I was not sure whether or not to be insulted/offended by P longing use the ‘quiet’ to do his work, but I figured the silence in the apartment would be deafening without Lanes’ screeches of joy (which she reserves for P) and my nagging/sarcastic comments about life in general. By the end of the week he will find Lanes’ interruptions and my running commentaries endearing. I’m sure?

Also, I purposely made and froze enough food for him to survive up to Thursday. If the boredom (or dubious state of apartment maintenance—currently we are being over heated which no doubt might result in us being put back on Fire Watch) doesn’t get him coming to ‘holiday’ with us, starvation will. But then again, his life doesn’t revolve around food like mine does.  I am not sure how Lanes will survive without him, because she is rather obsessed with her Daddy.

So far we have survived half a day ok. Lanes is really happy to have company, and I realized, so am I. My sister dyed my hair.  I must say, she has a rather spotty reputation when it comes to providing beauty services. Once she insisted on tweezing my eyebrows, which resulted in them being on two different levels. Then she dyed her husband’s hair brown, but it really came out bright orange.

He had to walk around in a hat and then go to a fancy salon where he had to listen to a stylist sighing and tsking nonstop, only to come out with black hair, because the stylist felt the only way to get rid of the ‘orrible orange’ was to make it black. Black was not a good look with his very a fair complexion and freckles.

Knowing this, I still let my sister dye my hair. I thought dark brown was a good safe way to go. She appeared to do a good job. When I washed my hair, the water was indigo--like someone dropped a vat of blue ink down the drain. I screamed her name in horror, but no one came. But it ended well though since I think my hair does not appear to be blue. And more importantly, it's still on my head.

She then put an anti-frizz serum in my hair and blow dried it and my hair couldn’t look frizzier if I swam in a tank of electric eels. I’m so glad I’m going to get a haircut tomorrow and this mane will be someone else’s problem. When I am asked what I've done to my hair, I'll wiggle my crooked eyebrows in the direction of my sister.

But suspect make overs aside, I'm glad to have big sister--after enlisting her to help me put Lanes to sleep and answer questions as to where Daddy is, we were chatting. Somehow she convinced me to open up my Facebook account. Before I knew it, she was all nostalgic and wondering how my childhood friends were.

She was happily surfing to see their profile pictures to see how they turned out—then she wanted to click on their spouses pages to see who they married. I was on pins that she would accidentally ‘friend’ the spouses—under my name nonetheless—or worse. Before I know it, I’ll be known as the Facebook hussy or something thanks to her.  I was so nervous trying to get her off my pages that my stomach and bum were clenched so hard, I think I’m fully toned.

I got her off and made sure I was securely logged off—just in case she came back to look up more stuff. I have no idea how the rest of the week will go. My sister is eyeing my eyebrows again, so I’m on guard. My nieces have school so we will miss them during the day. Right now Lanes and I are home alone.

My sister has put the alarm on and locked us in. Hopefully neither of us will open a door or window and set it off. All I know is that I was faithfully promised dim sum today—which means my sister will be missing for a good part of the morning. I must run and get ourselves ready for the day…until next time…

'Relative'ly Good

First of all, I have to say my sister and her family are the greatest. They had gone on vacation to Hawaii, and returned to find their house flooded out by a burst pipe (it must run in the family—they must have had sympathy leaks for me). Their house is all gutted up, and last I heard, their dishwasher was in their porch and they had no ceiling or floor downstairs.

However, they left the mess to came up, crossing borders and all, for literally just the night, to hang out with our three-year-old, Lanes, all so we could go to a dance. They were our fairy Godmothers (well, not sure my bro-in-law will be thrilled to be a fairy or a godmother, but he does bear a striking resemblance to my mom's friend Madge). If only they could have waved a wand and got my hair and eyebrows fixed…but we’ll settle for babysitting.

My ten-going-on-fourteen year-old niece did offer to cut off an inch or two of my hair, and in desperation I agreed, but my sister shut down that idea immediately, saying I would greatly regret it. Actually, I think I was in such a flap about the bird's nest that is my hair, that I begged my niece to cut it when my sister refused to do the honors.

This was rich from the person who convinced a fourteen-year-old me it would be fun and fantastic to do my eyebrows. Ever trusting at that age, I let her have a go at it, and I came out of it with one eyebrow one inch higher than the other. I don't even know how what hit me.

I knew it was really bad when her husband (then fiancé) gasped with horror and screeched ‘what have you done?’ when he saw my face. I could have strapped a hedgehog to my forehead and he wouldn't have noticed, but he noticed the eyebrows. That's when I knew I was in trouble. If you look closely, my eyebrows are still not level.

Any old how, after Lanes was left under the care of her extended family, my long suffering spouse, P, and I went on a date, I mean, out to the dance that our really nice friends from Surrey invited us to. We had a fabulous time and met some really nice people.

The band was flown in from Sri Lanka, and the drummer remembered us from seeing us around Colombo. I was delighted when the first thing he said to me was that I’d lost ‘so much weight’. That was the best thing ever. P had to quickly agree or else.

That was the highlight of our week. We were horrified by the news of the earthquake in Japan and until we saw Facebook posts and responses on e-mail from our friends there, we were on pins. Ironically, before the earthquake, we were asked by Lanes’ school to make a comfort/survival pack to be kept in school in case of an earthquake here. Our thoughts and prayers go out to all the people affected by the earthquakes/tsunami.

We didn’t put the news on too much since we discovered Lanes takes in a lot more than we realized. We were not sure if it would make her scared or upset. She is nicely settled now, give or take the preschooler meltdowns that come our way every now and again.

Lanes has begun thinking about what she wants to be when she grows up. This week she started out wanting to be a fireman, then a pirate, and finally she excitedly and mischievously announced she wants to be a parrot. We are proud parents, I tell you.

Although our apartment is no longer on Fire Watch, a fireman or two stop by the office from time to time to check on things. As we came back from school one day, one was in the office. Lanes was sad he didn’t come in the fire truck, but she stood outside looking at him in awe. She was thrilled when he gave her a big wave on the way out.

She squealed with delight, much like Betty Boop, and said ‘oh my he is a BIG boy, like Randy, Randy is a big boy, he can be a fireman’. Randy is one of Lanes’ best friends in school, and he is the slight bane of P’s existence. She rather idolizes Randy, and spends a good part of the day gushing about him.

I quickly took the chance to tell her if she wants to be a fireman, she needs to eat her veggies and fruits to become big and strong. Lanes, ever quick to realize when I’m trying to hoodwink her, decided it’s not necessary to eat those things as she doesn’t need to be fireman, she wants to be a French fry eating pirate. 

Not one to be outdone, especially by a 3 year old, I said pirates need veggies and fruits too, so they can row their boats. This is how Lanes came to be a parrot, and I lost yet another war to a preschooler.

Meanwhile, we still have had no luck on the job front. P did get a five day job starting tomorrow for a low pay, but at least after taxes, it should cover our groceries for this week. In a few weeks, it will be six months since we got here, so I’m afraid P is going to aggressively start applying for jobs in Alberta and Ontario.

When I was pregnant with Lanes, I had such bad nausea that I was sick even in my dreams. On my fifth month, I finally had some relief and on the first night I fell asleep, P woke me up saying ‘are you up? We’re moving to Canada’. I was about ready to jump down his throat explaining to him that our insurance did not cover him for bodily injuries sustained to his person from irate pregnant women, but I liked the idea of the move and thus he got off unscathed.

P usually passes out before I do at night and that was the one night we stayed up longer than I did. I really like British Columbia, and so now I’m desperately trying to stay awake and go to bed after him in case he decides to wake me up to announce we’re moving East. Once P is asleep, he is asleep till the next day, unless nature calls of course.

A job is a job, but I feel so settled here. Any old how at this point, I’ll move to the North Pole happily if there is a job there. Being unemployed is no fun. I wish I could write for a living--at least that will be an income: )

As for me, no news yet on when/if my blog will be part of that magazine’s site. I heard yesterday that my much adored rock star is having a baby—not with me. So poof go my dreams of stealing him away from the old folks home in ten-fifteen years (which might result in me getting ten-fifteen). P and my nutty sister have been smirking at me nonstop.

I had a ‘me’ day this week though. I went out to lunch and then window shopping with my cousin’s girlfriend. I had such a nice time, I called and asked P to get Lanes from school and babysit. That’s the perk of being unemployed—always two of us around for Lanes: ) P was so happy that I finally had some company, that he willingly pryed himself away from his ongoing job search.

I did crack open my driver’s manual. It’s sad when opening a book makes you wish there was a DVD form of it. I took the online test several times last week and was all geared up to go take the test tomorrow, but that’s when P’s temp job starts. So we'll do it next week.  No doubt I'll get into some spot of some sort with it...So until next week...

Here Comes the Sun

Guess what fans? My three year old, Lanes’, PR card finally arrived!! It feels like sunshine after the rain. I got so used to anxiously lurking around my mailbox every day, that out of habit I still run down to check on it, only to realize I finally got what I have been waiting for.

Here’s the other piece of exciting news. My article, ‘Blue Monday’ is featured as the ‘Last Word’, in a magazine called ‘Canadian Immigrant’. P had brought home the magazine from the supermarket one day saying that it had useful articles for newcomers to Canada. I saw an ad for article submissions, and tried my luck.

I’m very excited as they were interested in importing my blog onto their website. So far no official confirmation on it yet, but it feels good that people who are not duty bound by friendship and who are not biologically obliged to like my blog find it interesting.

The other good news is that the apartment is no longer on Fire Watch. However, the garage gate was broken for a couple of days and access to cars and the buildings via the garage was a free for all. Luckily, this happened on a Sunday, otherwise folks in the building would not have been able to get their cars out to go to work. So it was a good day to be unemployed.

The gate had become jammed due to snow and our handy dandy ever faithful fire department had to come and saw it off or something like that. I got this according to the grapevine, aka a neighbor I never met before, who claimed one of the maintenance folks—luckily not my friend—passed out trying to get the gate open to appease irate tenants.

Meanwhile, I continue to have adventures in the laundry room. I dashed down there bright and early Sunday, while everyone appeared to be sleeping. It was smooth sailing when I went to put the clothes in the wash, but when I went to the dryer, there was a lady there looking at a washer quizzically. She had a very young face, and probably was not a day over 30 at best, but she had salt and pepper hair that was styled much like a dandelion.

She was delighted when I walked in and waved me over to her. She insisted on speaking to me in Mandarin, undaunted by the fact that I was a brown person responding in English.  Luckily, I had taken beginner’s Mandarin last year, but at that time all the words failed me except for saying “I don’t know”, “my name is”, “I cannot speak Mandarin”, and that I have a daughter who is ‘three’ years old.

As I tried to explain how many minutes it takes for a wash cycle to end, an entire lesson on telling time flashed blankly before my eyes. All I remember from that lesson was thinking should I eat a lemon flavored Mentos, or an orange flavored one? In the end, not only did I eat both, I had a strawberry one for good measure, and I convinced P to go out to lunch after class because my head hurt after so much thinking.

Any old how back to the story, after a rather comical conversation where she spoke rapid fire Mandarin and gestured amicably at the machines, we finally got her clothes in the wash. I thought my work was done, but when I started putting my clothes in the dryer, I found her standing smack dab right next to me, peering into my machine.

A certified prude, I was mortified at the thought of a stranger being so close to my undergarments. She was standing one inch away from me, craning her neck and looking at all my laundry. Fortunately 80% of it belonged to Lanes and P and she even reached out to inspect one of Lanes’ sweaters. Talk about being too close for comfort. I feared that with my luck a piece of underwear would fall out just at that moment, but luckily it didn’t.

I knew she was concerned about using the dryers, and I showed her how to do it, but when I finished loading my unit, she took my card and swiped it for practice and nearly pressed the wrong button. Who is this character? I wanted to put my laundry basket on my head and run out the door screaming.

Luckily for me, she realized she didn’t put any detergent into her wash and then made a mad dash to her washer. I was soon summoned, arriving when she was aimlessly pouring laundry liquid into the washing machine. I stopped her in the nick of time and measured the right amount for her.

I don’t know what happened after that because I excused myself and ran upstairs before I got involved in any ironing of said clothes, which might or might not result in the Fire Department having to make another pit stop to this joint.

And that’s about it for our adventures this week. P continues steadfastly to look for jobs. Anyone who hires him will be so lucky, he’s reliable, and a hard worker. Hopefully something will work out soon—new waves of optimism are washing over me—hope I don’t get wiped out.

Lanes watched an episode of ‘American Idol’ and is now crazy about it, even trying to sing along with contestants. From time to time she decides she is scared because 'snails' have invaded her room--those 'frightening' times coincide with clean up time. As for me, I have yet to finish, or rather start, studying for my Learner’s test so that I can get motorized. 

I must sign off as I have spotted a huge spider in the living room,  because my spouse won’t leave the bedroom till the spider is out of the apartment. Disposing of all reptiles, amphibians, rodents and insects are part of my wifely duties. He kicks out marsupials, crustaceans, roaches and ghouls. Bug catching duties are calling me…I better get on it…catch you next week…