Speaking of forgetting things, I have yet to meet a single Thai person here in Toronto which might be partly my fault for not looking hard enough. They're here, I know they are. I find myself always listening to conversations in other languages on the bus seeing if I can pick up anything familiar or recognizable but thus far my evesdropping has been fruitless. As a result of my lack of practise, I'm sure my Thai language fluency has gone out the window, kind of like my Spanish...and my French.
School has just started, today was my first day of classes, and what with UTSC being constantly lauded as the most multicultural campus in Canada I'm sure there are Thai students as well. I'm going to keep my eyes peeled.
I'm really excited for this year, my courses look really interesting and I've got this thesis to do as well. I've been working like a madman transcribing the recordings of the research interviews I did while in Thailand but it's probably one of the most tedious processes I've ever undertaken. To write down a transcription for a 6 minute section of interview takes about an hour if I'm "in the zone" and there aren't any distractions. I've managed to finish two over the summer (my goal was to finish all eight but in my defence these were the two longest ones). My thesis supervisor is really supportive though and I think (/hope) I'm in good hands. This is going to be a good year. I'm also going to have to give some though as to what I want to do afterwards (Grad school? Work? Travel? Buy some land and start a farm? The possibilities are endless, which doesn't make narrowing them down any easy task)
On a scale from 1 to awesome I would say this summer was pretty flippin' sweet..
Working at Sheridan's was pretty much as lousy as I'd expected it to be which was made worse by the fact that I wasn't able to make as much as I was hoping to because they keep raising the minimum wage with means places feel like they don't need to give their employees raises. I mean I know this is generally a good thing for the majority but I still feel justified in being just a little bit miffed when I'm still making the same wages as the 16 year old loading cars at the front of the store my third summer on the job. Not planning on going back there.
Obviously my working environment did nothing to increase the quality of my summer, but this was more than made up for by the fact that all my friends were in town for the summer. As a result of my choosing the LONGEST DEGREE PROGRAM EVER, all my friends have now graduated, and were back in Toronto for a lot of the summer. Summers past, many people who go to school out of town opt to get a job there, especially if they're already having to pay for a room over the summer. This means it's sometimes kind of hit and miss with summers, you never know who's going to be around, but not this summer. Everyone was back, and it was phenomenal. On top of fun times being silly with friends, I was also co-coaching a frisbee team with two guys I've known since high school. That was also a stellar time, playing lots of frisbee, hanging out with the team, staying fit all the while.
As I expected would probably happen I've fallen out of touch with most of the people I was close with in Thailand. This is one of the unfortunate realities of traveling, you meet so many amazing people and share great times with them, but the relationships often lack the permanence you might expect at home. I'm painting in pretty broad strokes here but this has been my experience generally. I'm still in touch with Ying who is burried in work starting her Master's in English and working full time. Various others are spread out across the US, Europe, Africa and Australia all doing their thing in one form or another. Thing is, I know if I ever visit the city they're living in, I know I'll always have a bed waiting for me, and vice versa.
I was going to try to sum up my time in Thailand in a few words but I think that anything I could come up with would hardly do justice to the times I've had over the past year. Sure it was hard, but aren't the experiences that really matter supposed to be? I laughed, I cried, I learned, I grew and I changed. Who could ever ask for more than that?
So many adventures, and to those who shared them, I salute you.
