Before you start to read this, you must know that I try to stay as close to the truth as humanly possible. It’s hard to write a few pages everyday while working, planning and cooking meals, exercising, going out at night, biking, thinking, breathing, etc. In some cases I won’t be able to write on the exact day of the log entry as that would be nearly impossible. I haven’t really written anything in a few years, so my writing is very rusty…please bear with me in such instances. I am also my own editor, so if I have misspelt something or I make a grammatical error, please excuse me. There is no goal or outcome that I will be striving for and I am writing this for me, so if you don’t like it…FUCK YOU. Enjoy! Excelsior and Namaste.
I’ve been planning this journey now for a while: To go to the other side of the world for six months and escape my mundane life to grow to be a better person. I first had the idea about a year ago to dodge the long, cold and boing winters in Toronto. My first step was in June was contacting the owner of the same company I work for in Toronto: City Sightseeing Sydney. He was like sure I’ll have work for you in December as that is our high season of business. Done.
Once I heard the great news, every particle of my being moved towards me leaving. Sure I love Toronto, but you get tired of the same old places and faces. I’m just fed up with the bullshit Toronto has fed me for the last 25 years of my life. Sure I have a lot of positive memories; it’s just that all the negative ones seem to always outweigh the positive memories. I learned everything I know in Toronto Ontario Canada. A lot of the stuff I was taught though is useless and has been holding me back for quite some time. The plan originally was to go with a group of people I knew, but they all bailed. It’s ok thought because I might be the best in the world at self-amusement and soon self-trust. Toronto such a comfortable and safe place, not that it is a bad place to live, I just want to grow and experience new things and meet new people. After finding work months in advance of my trip, I was telling everyone I know about the great news. I told my mom, my brother Brad, my boss, my best friends, my friends, my acquaintances, my co-workers, random people in the street and even my enemies.
The first step I made was applying for an Australian working holiday visa 417. This visa means that I can travel and work for up to six months in Australia. It took me a few days to fill out due to my habit of procrastinating. I filled out the form after reviewing it between twenty and thirty times. My credit card was charged the $235 AUD it cost to apply for the visa. After applying for the Visa on the 24th of September, it was approved the next day. Committed 100% to leaving.
My next step was to book a flight on October 1st aboard Air New Zealand. This was, if I’m not mistaken, the biggest purchase of anything I have ever made in my entire life. I bought an $1150 ticket from a booking agent at Jarvis and Queens Quay with all the toonies and loonies (2 dollar and 1 dollar coins) I had been saving for over a year. The itinerary: Toronto to Vancouver, Vancouver to Auckland, and finally Auckland to Sydney.
After booking the flight I made a list of everything I needed to do in the next 40 days before I left and left it on my third floor. With a fading turquoise sharpie, on a blank piece of paper that only contained my mother’s letterhead from when she worked at PTI, I wrote down every important thing I must do in order to leave:
Pack bags/luggage Painting
Netbook Fix Bikes: - Hulk
Bike box -Sirrus
Banking/C.C. - Frontier
New Shoes - Hard Rock
New Jacket - Fire Mountain
Gym cancelation
Camera bag
Mp3 player
Hostel
Return flight L
It’d hard to believe that I managed to complete all that stuff before leaving. A week before I was in full panic mode with some of the things on the list.
Luggage:
- November 5th
- Random souvenir store at Yonge and Gerard
- 95 CAD + taxes
- 1 Swiss Gear duffel bag with main top compartment, bottom compartment and 2 small side pockets
- Packed between November 5th-9th
- 1 black M.E.C. backpack
- Mountain Equipment Co-op at King and Peter
- 39 CAD + taxes
- 1 black Pacsafe money belt
- Mountain Equipment Co-op at King and Peter
- 16 CAD + taxes
Netbook:
- November 1st
- Future shop at Yonge and Dundas
- Bought Laptop over not netbook since they have no CD/DVD slot and basic windows 7
- 681.79 CAD including taxes
- 1 Hewlett Packard blue laptop 4GB processor with 640 GB harddrive
- 3D (great friend) got it with me (same day he got his new HD sound system) and since he knows computers, I gave him carte blanche to do whatever it took to make it as user friendly for me as possible…thank you 3D!
Bike Box:
- Acquired on October 13th
- Urbane bicycle at Queen and John
- Came with all necessary fittings
- Free
- Naish gave me bubble wrap and zip ties from Cervelo…thank you Naish
- Was supposed to contain my “HULK” (Steve Bauer Sirroco) road bike that I spent the last two weeks sanding, painting and assembling with all new parts (300 CAD worth), but due to a last minute impulse decision, I brought my Specialized Sirrus Sport hybrid as it was a more logical decision
- Packed on November 8th
- Attached 2 pieces of yellow polypropylene cord around the bike box and attached a shoulder strap, from my huskey tool bag, for carrying purposes on November 9th
Banking/Credit Card:
- November 8th
- TD Canada Trust at Yonge and Erskine
- Signed my mother Nancy onto my account
- 6000 CAD bank draft
- Exchanged 429.17 CAD to 400 AUD
- Called Capitol One on October 18th to let them know I will be using my MasterCard overseas
New Shoes:
-Never purchased
New Jacket:
- Also never purchased
Gym Cancellation:
- November 8th
- Smart Fitness on Avenue road
- 5 months left on contract, will have to pay each remaining month at 52 CAD /month
- Will have 5 month credit upon return to Toronto starting in May
Camera Bag:
- October 11th
- Future Shop at Yonge and Broadway
- 9.99 + taxes
- 1 Roots brand black and blue camera bag
- Contains my black Canon 12MP camera, battery charger and Gorilla flexi-tripod
I ordered a battery charger for 5 CAD from China on October 11th and was stressed for over a month and it finally arrived on November 2nd. Upon arrival it barely worked and I had to jiggle the cord just to get it to charge properly. On November 9th it stopped working, but while riffling through my electronic drawer I stumbled upon my old one by dumb luck. Here is a random quote form the seller sent me, that you might find quite interesting:
We are honesty seller,we all love good journey ,if you don,t trust
us and like to open dispute,leave Neutral or Negative Feedback,pls
don't bid from US !!!!
We are honesty seller,we all love good journey ,if you don,t trust
us and like to open dispute,leave Neutral or Negative Feedback,pls
don't bid from US !!!!
MP3 Player:
- October 19th
- Future Shop at Yonge and Broadway
- 29.99 + taxes
- 1 COBY 4GB mp3 player with built in USB adapter
Book Hostel:
- October 30th
- Hostels.com
- 3 CAD deposit of 31 AUD grand total
- 1 night at Wake Up, 93% positive rating, arriving on November 12th
- I’m taking the advice of this guy Wesley who works for the yellow bus company in Toronto, Shop and Dine (Dark Side of the Force), and will book another hostel upon arriving in Sydney if the Hostel isn’t up to my standards and because November 13th is fully booked…risky
Return Flight L:
- Yet to be booked and I will leave this open as I want to travel in March and April in order to check out other parts of Australia and potentially New Zealand, Fiji and Hawaii if I have the time and funds
Painting:
- I wanted to do one of my stencil paintings depicting a double decker bus on the QEW overlooking the CN tower and Rogers Center but I didn’t have the time
Fix Bikes:
- None of them ended up getting fully repaired and I regret this and it would take pages and pages to describe the problem with each individual bike
- Should have purchased cassette lock ring tool and chain whip
- Only the Sirrus was ready to ride so I will brought it with me instead of the HULK, as I broke the front derailleur the day before leaving while hastily fixing it and not giving the task my full attention
My mom also had a list of things for me to fix and complete before I left, but I will instead just give a basic description of each of these tasks:
- Replace light bulb in Hall
- Take posters down in room for painting/drywalling of house in late November by CJ repairs
- Clean third floor
- Clean room
- Find moms shoes in third floor eaves (incomplete)
- Hook up Wii and do a Demo
- Explain Skype and do a Demo
- Wipe Tar off of door knobs and walls (incomplete)
- Clean Sunroom
- Install 5 new smoke detectors
- Paint edges of roof
- Fix roof on Garage:
This was backbreaking labour and I spent over 100 hours on this task. I had to get the materials with the assistance of my mom’s friend Jill Greenwood (thanks Jill) my neighbour and former school mate Eric Fredrickson who lives across that street (thanks Eric), which were 7 sheets of plywood, 3 strips of roll roofing (heaviest stuff ever), 1 can of roofing glue, 4 sticks of sealant, 1 can of foam sealant and 1 box of 1¼”roofing nails. After transporting all these materials home I had to rip out all the old plywood and shingles from the garage roof as well as carefully removing the flashing from the perimeter as this was to be reused (exhausting). After removing it from the front I realized that the wood under the flashing had rotted and also had to be replaced. I used the jigsaw to cut pieces and installed them as well as the plywood, which I had to bring on top of the roof by myself. After installing the wood I had to bring the roll roof up to the roof and that was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do, once again all by me and each strips weighs about 60 lbs. After measuring and cutting each strip of roof, you must nail them down and apply the roofers’ glue, with a brush, under the overlapping pieces, to ensure no water seepage during from rain and snow. Once this was complete I had to use the sealant on the northern, eastern and southern sides of the roof. The sealant somehow got wet, and the case it came in ripped open, so instead of using the mono gun I had to do it by hand and it took about 2 hours just to clean it off my hands once it was completed. The Western side was sealed with foam, as the gap between the rear slant and the roof was larger and required an expanding form or sealant. The final steps were reinstalling the flashing and painting the wood green on the Southern facing bottom edges.
Everything was eventually completed on that list except a couple of minor things, which can be done when I get back in the spring. The morning of November 10th I smoked a joint in my garage just before calling Beck taxis in order to get a van which will carry all of my stuff to the airport. Before I left I wanted to hear one of my favourite songs, Jack’s theme from LOST, so I played it several times while awaiting my cab and got very emotional as it is a very touching and beautiful song.
Ready…set…GO!
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