Return to the Motherland

As many of you may know, I have more winter holidays than Jean-Marc (whereas he has more summer holidays). While he had three weeks off for Christmas, my break only started in January and lasts for seven weeks. Because I was not working, I decided to return to Canada to surprise my grandfather for his 90th birthday.

I departed for Canada on January 8th. While on layover in the Tokyo airport, I watched the sunset before my 12hr flight. I arrived in Toronto at about the same time, on the same day, that I had left Asia. This meant that while driving home from the airport, I saw the sun set on January 8th for a second time. I thought this was so cool - time travel in real life.

My vacation was off to a fine start. After 24hrs in transit, I was happy to retire early to bed and sleep for more than 14 hours. When I woke up at 9:30am on January 9th, I thought to myself, 'I beat jet lag!'. Little did I know my body was going to wreck havoc on my circadian rhythms. When I moved to Korea the jet lag really only meant I was awake at 6am for a week. Apparently there is a general rule that it takes your body one day for every hour of time difference to get back to normal. And since Korea is 14 hrs ahead of Eastern Standard Time, I had two weeks of erratic sleep patterns to look forward to. Seriously, some days I wasn't tired until 5am. Other days I was falling asleep by 7pm. One day I slept in until 2:30pm and the next I was wide awake at 4:30am twiddling my thumbs thinking of all the things I could get done so early in the morning. It took 14 days exactly for me to sleep through the night. I have to thank my mom for being patient with me. I had no idea how hard it was going to be coming home.

So January 11th was my Grandad's big day. We had planned a party for him at my Dad's on Saturday the 12th, so the Friday night my mom had him over for supper. With all the kids in town (there are 3 of us - I have a sister and a brother) together for the first time in over a year and a half, my mom cooked a big turkey dinner. It was delicious and the conversation was entertaining. We had a conversation about homosexuals with my 90 year old grandfather who was quite open to hearing about gay people we know. He was even asking us questions about 'tolerating and participating'. While slightly awkward at first, this is what I love about my grandparents. They were always so accepting of people and there is no better way to teach tolerance than to set an example.

Mmmm turkey.

Happy 90th Birthday Grandad! Live long and prosper!

The actual party for his birthday was great. My aunts had flown in from their respective towns and even a cousin from my Grandad's hometown of Golden, BC flew in for the occasion.  My grandfather seemed very touched that everyone was there. We even had a toast with Dom Perignon! That's right, I was totally gangsta. I could here P.Diddy playing in the back of my mind.

In addition to seeing my family, I also sought out my friends while I was home. Some of them who don't live in Ontario (Kathleen, Erika and Katy) I was able to catch up with simply because I was in a more suitable time zone for telephone calls. I had dinner and played games with my college friend Branden, and lunch with my old roomie Ben, who just happened to be in Oshawa one day. On the weekend my mom and I road tripped it up to Ottawa where I got to see my Oma and have brunch with Sandra. In keeping with tradition, Maryse and I went to the annual Seaway Wine Show in Cornwall where we poured wine for Pelee Island and then got our groove on out on the dance floor.
The following week I took a trip to Toronto to have a homemade Indian dinner with Sandhya. I also got to see my childhood friend Jaclyn and the new addition to her family, Carter. The last weekend my mom and I drove up to see my sister in Hamilton. We took a nice walk along some of Hamilton's waterfall trails and while in town my friend Wes stopped by for a few rounds of Euchre. I was also able to sneak away and visit my alma mater Brock University and my college friend Larissa who still lives in the area. I got to meet Avery, her beautiful daughter, who arrived in the world the day I moved to Korea last August.

Pelee Girls!

Frozen Waterfall Walk

Cold snap in Southern Ontario = Me as an Eskimo

I was very fortunate to have the opportunity to catch up with a lot of people who I have not seen in awhile. Of course, there are still lots of people I didn't get to see (Montreal!), but I have my sights set on you for next time.

I think the trip was well worth it. I stocked up on lots of Canadian goodies for Jean-Marc since he wasn't able to come home. I got a lot of things done that I hadn't had time to look into before I left (like taxes!). But I have to say, it was really hard being away from my life, and especially Jean-Marc. We tried Skyping or texting via Kakao talk every day, but the time difference meant we were just on opposite schedules. The biggest thing was how much I realized I love that kid. Not even a year ago, we were doing long distance from Montreal to Halifax, but it never felt like I was that far away from him. So here I am, about 2.5 hours from landing in Seoul, flying somewhere over Russia, and I'm so excited to get back to Korea to be with him. I miss Canada of course, and that is definitely my motherland, but I have realized that Korea is my new (albeit temporary) home, with Jean-Marc.

I love you bb!

Jennika