Live from T.O.
Good afternoon, all! I'm writing from the wonderfully free internet access at one of Toronto's many public libraries. Hooray for free! Hooray for libraries!! I do believe I will spend much time enjoying more of both of these blessings in the months to come.
So orientation at ICS is complete. I'm all oriented to the school. My classmates are great, profs (or "senior members", since students are called "junior members") are super smart (yikes), and my apartment is wonderful, albeit a work in progress. No kitchen cabinets until October at least, so cooking (actually, storing dishes) is a challenge at this point. I also need to invest in a couch of some sort, and my parents are coming with a bed this weekend. I love living on my own, but I do really miss having friends around all the time. Toronto is a great city, though, and you all should come live here.
I'm taking a class at U of T through the ICS, and I'm incredibly intimidated at the thought of it... please keep me in your thoughts this Tuesday at 2pm!
My time is running out...more updates later, possibly even with pictures.
If you're reading this, I miss you!
posted by sara without an 'h' @ 2:52 PM
7 comments
7 Comments:
Enjoy it! How exciting!
I know someone who graduated from U of T.
There not all that scary. You'll do great!
email me your phone number!
you're really smart, too, sara... you'll do wonderfully.
sara, glad to hear that you have arrived to "past-orientation" life. :) hope it goes well for you! ya, my friend steve v is there (you said you met him)! we'd love to come visit sometime... we live so close!!
Smart profs are intimidating I agree! But then you just have to realize that if they weren't, you wouldn't have any respect for them and wouldn't want to learn shit from them. So if you look at it in that way, you would be wasting your time if you weren't a little bit freaked out by how much they know. Ahhh, the progression of knowledge. And I miss you too, even thought we really didn't "hang out" a whole lot!
I agree: Everyone should live in Toronto. man, I miss that place. But I think I miss YOU more than T-dot. I almost had a chance to visit you this weekend. But it fell through. Say hi to the homeless folk in the downtown core for me. They are probably my friends:)
PS. You will do just fine @ U of T. I know people who study there (ie. Jason) and I promise that you will do just fine. In fact...you'll excel!
Sara! Remember how we were talking about ìf it is true that Quebec is more Americanized and secularized (not necessarily 2 synonymous words) than the rest of Canada last night?
I just read in a reading that Duplessis (a very conservative man) thought that American capitalism was the only way to run Quebec and so opened up Quebec to pretty much be run by America (at least, all the big companies that employed the Quebecois). On top of that, the Quebecois were not well educated, because the Roman Catholic Church was very powerful, to the extent that they banned specific books and did not have quality university education on par with teh rest of Canada. Because of the Church, they therefore weren't even very capable or equipped to do anything other than farm or work in the mines. That was pretty much from the early 30s to late 50s, until Rene Levesque declared SOVEREIGNTY...
But you can still see the effects of Duplessis in that the Quebecois are the biggest consumers in North America (America made sure of that when they `''occupied'' Quebec...heck, I`m one block away from the most frequently occupied mall in North America) while on top of that having one of the highest drop out rates from high school(something absurd, like 30%).
Anyways, in summary, I think I agree with your friend from McGill. And I think it will take a long, long time to change things in Quebec because the problems are so deep-rooted in the educational system and even the economics.
Have a wonderful day, discerning between the heretical and the truth! :)
ann dear,
thanks for your comments. i love it when things seem to 'come together' like that!
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