Deep Freeze
Now i know the true power of the Montreal winter. Two days ago, it was snowing so hard throughout the whole day that snow had accumulated up to nearly my knees in places that weren’t cleared. Coz my uni is located on a hill, the road along the perimeter of my school is upslope too and it was quite scary, walking to school, to see cars slipping and sliding on the road, especially trucks! Saw a bunch of students giving a push to a car that was stuck. It gets pretty messy indoors when there’s snow coz all the snow stuck to the bottom of everyone’s shoes will start melting in the heat indoors and leave wet puddles everywhere. But at least when it snowed, it was still not that cold.
Today when i woke up, i checked the weather forecast and my first reaction was that it had made a mistake. -24 degrees celcius outside! But once i stepped out, it was not doubt that cold. The coldest i have ever experienced in my life! Even with my gloves on, my hands were completely numb after walking for more then 10 minutes. It was so cold that my glasses fogged up everytime i stepped indoors. My nose also felt like it had frozen solid and could just fall off anytime. At least i have a hat covering my ears, if not probably they would feel the same too. But according to the locals, this ain’t the coldest yet. It could go as far as -40 degrees(!!) once or twice a year. This year’s winter is already considered extremely mild.
Oh well, at least i’m enjoying the snow…haha…
duct tape and post-it notes
sometimes it feels that my life now is being held together by duct tape and post-it notes coz i just have so much stuff to do and to remember that i write them all down on slips of paper and duct tape it to the wall in front of my desk or just use a post-it note. it’s almost like i can considering wallpapering my room with them…haha…
oh well, today was good coz i settled quite a few administrative stuff and now my mind is weighed down by less stuff. plus i’m going to be charged quebec tuition fees! and if i take into account of my scholarship, which is $1.5k a term, my education here is almost free. not including my living expenses though. and i have to maintain my GPA above 3.5 every year to keep my scholarship. but overall it’s a pretty good deal.
anyways it’s fast approaching 3am already. i have to grab some sleep and try not to wake up too late tmr as i still have lots of stuff to buy tomorrow. Have to drop by chinatown for a visit for some essential cooking stuff…also have other groceries to buy at the nearby supermarket. I’m still not used to having to keep track of everything though. i’ll probably start discovering expired food in the fridge soon…
Sigh…
I hate entering as a winter student. No one comes in winter and somehow they don’t seem to remember me. They can’t find my A level certificate that i sent directly to them from the Singapore Examinations Board, the entrance scholarship that i was supposed to have received disappeared with no news and my advanced credits that I can get from my A levels are not getting through. Arghhh!!
Be careful of what you wish for…
Well i was hoping for snow and now it’s snowing really heavily. Don’t know if it is considered a blizzard yet though coz I haven’t experienced one before. But to me, it really is one of the heaviest snowfalls i’ve experienced here. When I turn in the direction of where the wind is blowing from, I immediately get a faceful of snow. Time to take out my waterproof snow boots.
I’ve still not gotten used to the fact that I have to check the weather forecast before going out so that i’ll know what temperature the day will be like, coz in Singapore there wasn’t much of a need to. But over here, more then once i had to come back home to wear an additional layer or leave on layer at home. Probably I’ll be able to judge better as time goes by.
I also have to get used to taking of a layer or two of clothing whenever i go indoors just because it’s so warm inside. So like whenever I enter a classroom or lecture hall, I’ll be busy removing my jacket and trying to get the big fat jacket to behave.
Also, condensation on my glasses happens to other way round as compared to Singapore! Back in Singapore, I get condensation on my glasses when I leave an air-conditioned building. But over here, my glasses fog up everytime i step into a building.
Basically that’s just some of the things I have to get used to due to the changes in the weather between here and back in Singapore. There’s still tonnes of other stuff that i have to adjust to, especially like that cultural differences and such. But that would probably belong to another post at some other time.
I’m still here!
It’s just that i’ve been really busy. So here’s just a quick update:
First week of school was hectic to say the least. Spent most of my time getting from place to place trying to get my admin stuff settled. Lessons are still ok since they have just started. There’s still no snow though. It was so warm I could wear a thin windbreaker to school last week. Today the temperature just dipped to -10 degrees in a day. So the weather is weird. I have a headache. It is late. I have to go sleep. I have early lessons tomorrow. Sorry for the short post. I hope I can find time to update this week.
Snow at last!
I’m accessing the internet from Starbucks using my laptop now as I have no internet access from my room yet.
Anyway, i got m first glimpse of snow on Boxing Day, on my way over from Toronto. The temperature’s been steadily dropping now and is currently past -10 degrees Celsius. The weather forecast now will seem foreign to any Singaporean accustomed to only two modes of weather, “rain” or “shine”. There’s terms like “snow flurries”, “freezing rain”, “wind chill”, etc. Each of which sounds just as cold as the other. After the snow started on Boxing Day, weather forecasters have been saying that “the snow is finally here!”.
However, the evidence of climate change is undeniable now. Two days back, there was this report about a big ice shelf that broke off in the north of Canada near the North Pole due to global climate change.
On a happier note, I’ve been wandering around downtown Montreal checking out the area and getting familiar with the city, finding out places to buy stuff and to eat. The only problem is that it’s very troublesome to take photos now that it’s so cold. My gloved fingers are simply too clumsy to operate the camera and not using gloves will cause my fingers to start feeling numb in about half a minute.
I also went to visit Ottawa, the state capital of Canada, as well as Quebec City, further up north of Montreal. I’ll try to post some photos of my visit as soon as possible on my photoblog.
As I don’t know when’s the next time i’ll be coming online again, I’ll just like to wish everyone reading a Happy New Year! May all your new year resolutions come true! Haha…
Rejoice!
“For to us a child is born, to us a son is given, and the government will be on his shoulders. And he will be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.”
– Isaiah 9:6
Merry Christmas!
Merry Christmas everyone! Hope everyone’s enjoying their holiday!
Too bad it isn’t a white Christmas this year where I’m at now. I haven’t even caught sight of snow yet! This El Nino thing is getting serious…and possibly affected by global warming too…
Help a starving kid this Christmas!
Do a good deed this Christmas! Every minute, a kid somewhere in the world dies from starvation because HE DOESN’T KNOW HOW TO COOK! You could save a student at McGill from starving to death this Christmas!
Just send in simple recipes to teach him how to cook! It’s that easy! All that is required are detailed instructions on cooking simple dishes. Remember to include stuff like timings and quantities. The email address to send to is “hs[dot]chin[at]lycos[dot]com”.
Thank you for your contribution! Every little bit helps!
NB: This post was done in jest but the need for recipes is real! Thanks!
Things you probably don’t know about Montreal…
Montreal has:
- more university students per capita than any city in North America
- 4 major universities (including McGill)
- 60 theatre stages
- 37 movie theatres and over 170 screens
- 32 major museums
- 13 annual international arts and entertainment festivals
- 1 major Grand Prix auto race (Formula1!)
- 4 professional sports teams
- 45 downhill ski runs and 80 golf courses
- over 32 km of underground pedestrian walkways all linked together in downtown Montreal (largest underground city in the world!)
- 65 subway stations spread out over 4 lines