Aquarium

Yesterday we went to the Vancouver Aquarium. It was pretty big and fun. We saw lots of things.

Bugs (ew):

Birds:

Turtles (trying to escape/ make friends with us):

Dolphins:

Belugas:

Jellyfish:

 

Frogs:

Pictures of Walruses:

Giant fish:

 
And of course regular fish:

Then we got to watch a 4D MOVIE!

The 4th dimension was touch. Eg when the whales squirted their blowholes we got squirted in the face with water, when the fish made bubbles the theatre was filled with bubbles, when there were kina we got our ankles whipped by bits of plastic. Fun. Now we kind of want to see Avatar. Me not quite as much as Sam.

Visas

Today it was announced that the returner visas for Canada have been cancelled effective immediately, which means we can only stay one year now, which is pretty stink. We'll have to think of some other travel plans I guess!

SUPERBOWL XLIV

ok people, pick a side. WE HAVE!

sure it's like a month away & eight teams are still in it but we've picked our teams & we're putting it ON THE LINE

SARA=INDIANAPOLIS COLTS

SAM=MINNESOTA VIKINGS

@stake....!

a wii fit for sara (tan not included)

OR

mundane recording equipment for sam

if neither team wins WE BOTH LOSE

LAMMMME

Weather

Because of the weather on Grouse, it was closed for 2 days. While we weren't working we went to visit Gastown and China Town. Gastown is a pretty cool part of town, it's a national historic site and looks really pretty. It has lots of fun shops and a steam powered clock.

China Town was fun also. We went to the Chinese gardens which were the first of their kind built outside China. They were really nice and had turtles and giant carp which were pretty cool.

China Town was pretty traditional, with shops selling heaps of strange things. We didn't buy anything because we didn't know what anything was, but one day with more time and exploring it'd be a pretty fun place to shop for spices and things.

Today (Wednesday) Grouse opened, not because it snowed but because we had a couple of school groups coming and as they just use the beginner slopes they opened to make some money. In the end they cancelled, but at least we got to go to work and earn some money. This is what it looked like:

This is how slushy everything is:

This is Sam and Eric, who we work with, frowning because the snow is yuck:

Everywhere is usually covered in snow, no rocks or gravel or anything, so it looks pretty different at the moment. The mountain hosting the Olympic events has closed for the winter to save all its snow to build a halfpipe. Hopefully they have enough, and hopefully it snows on Grouse soon so it's less yucky and dirty looking!

While we've been working on Grouse it's snowed only about 3 times, with snow makers making the rest. When it rains they can't use the snow makers, and recently its been pretty rainy and the snow has been disapearing quickly. There are rocks and plants poking through and everything is the consistancy of frozen coke. That's meant that we haven't had a chance to do any practicing because its pretty difficult conditions to learn in.

Last night while we were working a storm came through that was pretty similar to a Canterbury nor'wester. It felt like about 12c, which is pretty hot for the moutain and it was super rainy. When we left at 10 everything had turned to puddles of slush. This morning we checked and the mountain is closed til we get snow, which they are hoping might be Wednesday. Hopefully it gets snowy by the olympics. They're thinking they might have to moved the events from Seymour, which is a neighbour of Grouse, to Whistler 2 hours north where the rest of the outdoor events are happening. Anyway, because the mountain is closed we have no work, so hopefully it snows soon!

We haven't been up to too much lately. We had New Years, so on New Years eve we went to a house party that a few people we worked with went to. This is what we drank:

Pretty north american looking.
This is the party. The second is some of who we work with:

We went to another part of Stanley park and looked at a collection of totem poles:

Aparently people like to rollerblade in the park:

We also went to Granville Island which is a little island in the harbour that has a marketplace on it. It has so many delicious treats. We didn't take any digital photos but this is what it looked like:

If the snow keeps away we will have more time to do things, so maybe we will have more to report soon. Hopefully it just snows and we can go back to work though.

Comments

We have had some requests to explain how to comment. In hopes of boosting our comment count I'm posting this:

If someone has comments enabled on his or her blog, then you can usually find a "comments" link at the end of each post, like this:

If you click this link, you will go to the comment posting page. (Note: in some templates, this link may take you to the post page first. From there you should be able to find the "Post a Comment" link which will take you here.) The comment posting page looks like this:
In the upper left corner, there is an option to show or hide the original blog post that the comments relate to. The rest of the left-hand column contains any comments that have already been made. The profile photos of the comment authors may also display, depending on the blog's settings.
On the right hand side of the page is the space for you to enter your comment. Beneath that are the identity options. (Some of these may not be available, depending on the blog's settings.)

The options are these:

• Blogger username: Your display name will appear, along with a link to your profile and your photo (if you have one).
• Other: You can enter your name and a link to your website, without having to have a Blogger account.
• Anonymous: No identifying information is displayed. The comment is credited to "Anonymous" without a link.

The owner of a blog also has the option to have comments open in popup windows. In this case, all the primary features will still be present, just arranged a little differently:

Christmas day

Because of our work schedule and so that we had Christmas the same day as everyone in NZ, we had our Christmas on the 24th. As our Christmas present Sam's mum bought us a night in the Marriot, so we stayed there for Christmas eve, which was pretty fun. This was the view of North Vancouver from our room (note the olympic ring lights on the barge in the harbour).

We could even see our work from our room. This is a run called The Cut and the wind turbine The Eye of the Wind.

After some swimming in the hotel pool we went out for Christmas eve dinner, which since I haven't been paid yet, couldn't be very fancy. This is what we had:
Bottomless pepsi:

Burgers with bottomless steak fries:

And HEAPS of onion rings:

Then with the leftovers we could make the olympic rings!

The next morning we woke up and it was Christmas!

It wasn't a white Christmas unfortunately (the weather man said it only happens once or twice every 10 years). We opened presents, put on our Christmas outfits, then had a champange breakfast, or rather a metodo tradicional breakfast.

 

This is one of Sam's presents I made:

On our way back home, we stopped at the supermarket, and were considering buying some eggnog, but because it sounds gross we asked the guy working there what it tasted like. He opened it up and made samples for us.

This is what Sam thought of it:

We didn't buy any.

After that we went home where we had lots of Christmas mail waiting for us! This is what we got from Sophie and Mike to remind us of home, very cool.

Then we made some gingerbread men to take to work for everyone who has to work Christmas with us.

All in all a good day. It's pretty different having Christmas over here, it's strange that it doesn't signify the holiday season. People are still at school and uni, no one has work holidays, and we're really busy at work. It's fun to have change and have a winter Christmas like on TV, and to have everything be so Christmassy and pretty.