Vancouver - 10 days in

Hi everyone, and sorry it's taken me a while to get around to posting my first update since arriving here in Vancouver! As you can imagine, it's been a busy ten days - here's the story so far:

I had a great flight out from Heathrow to Vancouver, got very lucky and was upgraded to Club World (BA's Business Class cabin!). I was upstairs on the Boeing 747 and it was over half empty so had room to swing several cats and a very attentive service - there were 2 cabin crew up there for about 8 - 10 passengers! Lovely food and very comfortable seat/bed - I could get used to that kind of travel, and it was a great start to my move to Canada :-)

After landing in thick fog (like being dropped in a cauldron, you couldn't see anything apart from the landing lights on the runway!) I made it through immigration and finally landed as a Permanent Resident! Luggage in tow, I got a cab downtown and took my stuff to the hotel. Then I headed straight out to a sports bar on Granville to watch the Canucks hockey game! Made it through to the end of the game and then hit the wall and crawled off to bed.

The days since then have been productive. To start with I sorted out my SIN number (like a National Insurance number), got a cell phone (see picture), opened a bank account, and applied for my health care card. I've also met up with friends old and new, viewed rooms for rent in apartments in various areas, and been job hunting (have been round all the agencies, apparently I "really rocked" on the tests at one of them!). I even went to a new friend's birthday meal last Tuesday and met loads more people! I've also got tickets for the Ting Tings gig at the Commodore Ballroom for the Saturday of Easter weekend, April 11th!

I viewed about four or five rooms for rent before picking the one that will be my new home. It's an apartment in a heritage building on Oak and West 22nd, a 2 bedroom place and my roommate will be Tara who is Canadian and from Ontario originally. Although Tara has furnished most of the apartment my bedroom will be unfurnished as her current roommate is moving out and taking his stuff with him, so yesterday I made a trip to Ikea in Coquitlam to buy bedroom furniture. A few hours and a few hundred dollars later I was the owner of my very own bedroom furniture, which is being delivered to the apartment tomorrow. I move in properly on Sunday and then flat pack hell awaits as I have to put it all together, argh!

The weather since I got here has been colder than seasonal average so far - after a few days of fog came a couple of gorgeous crisp clear blue sky sunny days and then snow, and more recently some cloud and rain. It looks like we'll get some more rain/sleet over the next few days.

Apart from picking up a cough and cold, that's pretty much an overview of it so far! Just one other thing - it looks very possible that I'll have a job starting next week for 3 months initially! It's due to be confirmed on Monday, so fingers crossed. I won't say any more about it at this point for fear of tempting fate, but funnily enough after I spoke to the woman at the agency about it today I then had another 3 calls about opportunities... just like buses it seems, you wait for one and several jobs come at once!

Hope you're all well, thinking of you all and missing you very much - wish you were here!

Keep in touch, lots of love,

Adele xxxxxxxxx