Arrival in Montreal

I’m in Montreal! I thought I might attempt to keep a blog while I’m out here, just to let my wonderful friends and fam know what I’m up to. I hope I will be slightly more motivated than the french one haha! I can’t promise that I’m a literary genius, but I promise that I will endeavour to get there their and they’re, and your and you’re, in the correct places. Also I’m not too hot on apostrophes, but even if they’re not exactly where they should be, I’m sure there will be a sufficient number in total for you to mentally move them to the right place. Thanks lads.

Well I arrived in one sweaty tired piece! The flight was fine, it looked so like the plane in Bridesmaids that I contemplated taking sleeping pills and whiskey to see what would actually happen…I didn’t, though I did interrupt Nick’s film watching every now and again to make dramatic arm gestures out of the window. It was a bit odd that we left at 6pm local time, and at midnight in London it was still bright blue sky up in the air where we were. We landed at 8.30pm local time after the 7 hour flight, slight issue with the bags in that I thought one of my bags wasn’t there and then it was (and then I found £20). There were uber helpful people at the airport doing a grand job of meeting international students, who gave us maps and a leaflet on ‘The common values of Québec society’. This was also the first outburst of ‘Ah I love your accent, it’s so cute, you’re adorable’ (this last one aimed at Nick).

One smuggled-sandwich-eating taxi ride later and we are outside the hostel with a very steep flight of stairs, and once we’d checked in we were then directed back down the stairs and along the road a bit to the actual hostel – I’ve stayed in skanky hostels before, and this is one of them. Fine, but I’d like to find a place to live soon please! My first impressions of Montreal reminded me of Dakar, with the big criss-crossing motorways and huge adverts on the sides of the roads in French. Also the roads are SO straight; it’s freaking me out a bit. Met a nice Canadian girl, before venturing into the shower and then bed.

This morning Nick and I went to the university to sort out our student IDs and health insurance cards, before going phone hunting. The girl who sold me my sim card (no I still do not have a new phone) explained the Québec pricing system to us, in that 13% of the price on the item is added on at the till, including the monthly contract price. She also explained that the Quebecois really don’t mind speaking in English, but that it’s illegal for them to greet a customer with ‘Bonjour hi!’; they have to speak in French until the person speaks in English.

We had some lunchipoos while poring over craigslist and ringing some potentials. I’ve just finished viewing 2 apartments - the first was ok and the second one was great, here’s hoping! I have another viewing tomorrow and Tuesday, so hopefully I’ll be sorted fairly pronto :) Nick’s gone to the uni housing people for more possibles.

It’s really hot but manageable hot, I went abit off the wall crazy and bought some SPF45 for my pasty pasty skin. The people here have all been stupendously friendly and helpful, it’s very quiet and fairly green for a city, the cars only have number plates on the back, and the dollar coin is potentially cooler than our 50p piece.

Bisous