On Sunday evening, just 7 days after we arrived, we bid
Kobus goodbye. He was off to France for the week. There we were, me and the 2
boys, just barely off the boat and left to our own devices. Fortunately my
lovely husband knows that I’m iron woman and can handle anything...right?!?!
On Monday I started to work again. I was fortunate enough
that I could keep my SA job (doing it over the internet) and reckoned this was
a good week to get that ball rolling again. It would keep me occupied while the
kids are at school and the income was needed to cover some expenses we still
had in SA. The hotel room had a comfortable desk, I requested an office chair
from reception and the office of Daleen Inc. was up and running again. It got a
bit quiet all alone in the room so I would switch on the TV and A&E channel
would have all these reruns of Criminal Minds and CSI Miami, some of my favourite
shows. So it was that my economic productivity commenced against the background
of blood, mayhem and evil serial killers being hunted by perfect looking people.
On Tuesday I went to test drive a Ford Explorer, this later
proved to be the beginning of a painful and frustrating process of
acquiring wheels that’s at least attached to some form of an engine. The
process of buying a car warrants a whole blog post of its own so more about
this later...
During this week I had a meeting with the school principal,
Mr Moore, and with both of the boys’ teachers, Mr Wylie for Cilliers and Ms
Pennings for Loest. Cilliers was adjusting well and his standard of work was
satisfactory. Even French was OK, with a bit of extra help of course.
Every child at school needs to play a musical instrument.
Cilliers got quite panicky when he heard about this as he has never had any
exposure to any musical anything, of course entirely our fault. The only wind
instrument that has ever touched his lips was a vuvuzela, which, I must admit,
he is quite proficient at. He eventually
decided on a flute from the variety of instruments available at school and after
a couple of days of practise managed to coax at least some sound out of the very complicated and shiny object. Eventually he would give up on the
flute, it was just too difficult, and instead came home with a saxophone. A
much sexier instrument and it wasn’t long before he started to enjoy playing it.
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| The flute did not work out so well |
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| Much better with the sax |
Loest was having some trouble with reading and writing in English. He only started grade 1 in January in SA and now was in grade 2 in Canada (this decision was made based upon his age). It seemed that the kids here learn to read much earlier than in SA and he was struggling. I got quite a fright when he came home with spelling words such as “nutrients” and “centimetre” and this while the poor little boy still had trouble with basic words like “dog”, “cat” and “ball”. He didn’t even know what the word nutrients meant, let alone spell, write and read it!
Fortunately the boys’ school is just absolutely fantastic
and all the help we could possibly need was offered. I met with Ms Pennings and
it was decided that I would work with Loest in the afternoons with a computer programme,
she would do some phonics in class with him and he will receive extra help when
needed. We had 2 months before school closed for the summer to see if we could
get him up to scratch.
The boys actually settled in and adapted very well. They
both made friends very quickly and seemed to have no trouble with the huge
transition. I kept waiting for big emotional meltdowns to happen, which just
never did, thank goodness. I stood in wonderment at their ability to take
everything in their stride and the ease with which they coped and just rolled
with everything.
During this week we decided, with Kobus being away and all that,
that we would go rent some DVD’s. After making some enquiries at reception as
to where to go we set off to the nearest Rogers store. In we walked and at the
counter I asked what the procedure was to rent some DVD’s. The young man
informed me that my timing really sucked, they had ceased to rent out DVD’s the
previous week!! Seems that DVD rental stores were a dying breed in Canada with
so many on-line places to watch and rent movies from. I wonder how long it
would be before this would also happen in SA. Dstv’s Box Office service is
probably the beginning of the end of the corner DVD store. It was with some
sadness that I thought of our local DVD store in SA that we have been faithful patrons
of for so many years.
On Thursday I met Martie for coffee at Juki’s house, another
woman from SA. We spent an enjoyable morning together and it was great getting
the insider scoop about living in Canada from a South African perspective.
We were discussing the dandelions that seemed to be
everywhere in Guelph. When we first arrived they were all in full bloom and
lawns and sidewalks everywhere were covered in carpets of yellow. We thought it
was quite pretty, all these wildflowers flowering in such abundance. We soon realised that these ubiquitous weeds
were a headache for one and all. The pretty flowers were short-lived and pretty
soon they were just ugly weeds standing everywhere and blowing their seeds all
over the place. The war on dandelions was a one sided affair, with the
dandelions winning, as weed killers are outlawed in Canada. No Roundup you will
find here. Apparently you can still buy weed killers in Canada but then you
have to sign a form stating that you won’t use it. So, I’m just gonna buy the
weed killer because I love the bottle and would like to have it as an ornament
on my mantelpiece.
The shops are filled with a stunning array of dandelion
removing gadgets and television commercials of eco-friendly products to kill
dandelions abound. We have heard from anonymous sources that some people would
cross the border into the USA, buy weed killer and surreptitiously spray
their lawns late at night in clandestine anti-dandelion operations. A nice weed
free lawn thus equals a poison smuggler.
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| Some Canadian geese on a carpet of flowering dandelions, when we still thought they were pretty |
Dagga (marijuana, pot, weed) is legal in Canada for
medicinal purposes (yeah, right!) and it is strictly controlled. There’s a
couple of shops in Guelph, like “Wacky Tabacky” (seriously J), where you can buy
all the interesting paraphernalia needed to administer and utilise weed in all
its forms. We saw a couple of characters hanging around this shop that I’m
pretty sure was not acquiring things in order to administer weed to control the
excruciating pain they’re experiencing from some or other terrible disease. You
have to love the irony. Don’t kill the weeds, just smoke it.
On Friday Kobus returned and Cilliers had a friend, Eric,
over for a visit after school. The boys swam in the hotel pool and played Xbox
and computer games. There's not much else to do while cooped up in a hotel room.
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| Cilliers and Eric hanging out |
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| Loest watching a movie on my laptop |
On Saturday we went to the movies for the first time. Me and
Cilliers watched Hunger Games and Kobus and Loest watched The Lorax. It took a
while to figure out the automated ticket kiosk but soon we could just stock up
on popcorn, sit back and relax. Movie tickets are really expensive and the
popcorn servings are colossal. I ordered a large popcorn, as I used to do in
SA, and was presented with a titanic paper bag filled to the brim. Not even my
huge popcorn consumption ability could finish off that much. I must confess
though that the popcorn’s really, really nice. All buttered up, moist and
flavourful.
