Friday, August 21, 2009
After a 6hours flight to tokyo, 2 hours transit, 12 hours flight to New York, 3hours transit, and a delayed 1.5 hours flight, i finally reached montreal in the middle of the night. the journey was long and the entertainment was quite boring, so i napped throughout the entire trip since i slept only 2 hours the night b4 my flight. security at new york is the most stringent, and I have to remove my sweater and shoes. the customs at US also seem the most hostile. oh, when we checked in our baggage, we were told that our luggages will end up in montreal and we didn't have to collect it in tokyo or new york. however, at new york it turned out that we had to collect our luggage and checked in them again at the baggage recheck in counter, which i thought was rather retarded.anyway, my flight experiences so far showed me that air stewardess from the ang moh airlines are usually old aunties, while those from asia are a lot younger. i wonder what happen to singapore air stewardess after they get old. i doubt most of them can continue to work in some office/management jobs in SIA. but well, in singapore, even if you have a phd from stanford, you might still end up driving taxi. anyway, after i alighted, i took a cab to my apartment which cost around 42 CAD.
the first two days were spent on buying the essential daily items. lennard and i went to the chinatown area in montreal, and we lugged back one big bag of rice, soy sauces etc and to our horror, we realised that there were a few shops within walking distance from our house which sold the same stuff. i bought a rice cooker for 40CAD, and when i paid, i was shocked to see a 55CAD on the cashier machine due to the heavy taxes on electical goods in canada.
i went to walmart alone in the evening and it was a long 15minsto 20mins walk from a metro station. bought a fan, pillows, bedsheets and other stuff, and i felt like a cockster when i carried all these items and walked back to the metro station while most of other shoppers had their own cars. while i was there, i got a SIM card which allowed me to make unlimited SMS for 25 CAD. sadly, i had to first buy a SIM CARD which cost 35 CAD , and the activation fees were 35CAD. there seem to be unlimited hidden costs everywhere i went.
oh, the guy who attended me at walmart's mobile phone section was a black. i noticed that in new york's airport, all the counter staff at macdonalds are black. i was surpised the guy was so friendly and he explained to me patiently on all the different phones plans and prepaid cards. he was excited to see my mobile phone, which was a new model(i bought it one week ago in sg) and he even explained to me what's good about my phone. frankly, i was quite impressed that a counter staff doing such a mundane job can have so much pride in his work, which is something i never experienced in sg. when i left, i asked him if i can fill in any form to commend on his good servce, and his reply was,' no! don't worry about it. it's okay as long as god knows', LOL
the next day, i went to mcgill to collect my student ID, the process was efficient and i got a nice ID card(aka matric card in sg) quickly. at each station, there were people explaining to us things like the meal plans in school and also staff from libraries who told us how their libraries worked etc. once again, all of them were so filled with enthusiasm that i actually felt very happy and satisfied after this short trip to school. LOL
Labels: mcgill
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