Week 13: Oh, snow!

 

I had to re-write this post, as my first draft was about just how snow-y Montreal had got. Well, the that would have been true a week ago. It was bitterly cold on the East Coast and the winds were biting. We had snow properly settled on the ground, or at least on any surface other than roads and pavements. It has all melted again now, and it was 16 degrees (centigrade..) on Monday. So the worst is certainly still to come.

Although I was completely prepared for Canada to be far better armed for the snow (and it definitely is), I have been really struck by the overwhelmingly nonchalant attitude towards it in this city. It makes sense, who wants to welcome three months of a freezing nuisance? But just think - the first snow fall in the U.K. would have every body outside, bundled up in ten jumpers, making snow men and snow angels with the inch of snow we are always just so excited to have. Here however, snow boots go on and so does life. Case in point: look at my first picture of Lower Field on campus. 48 hours in and the snow is barely touched (apart from the one obligatory phallus for everyone to see through the library windows - students, ey?) At home, that field would have been DECIMATED in minutes.

With finals looming and term papers due, there's nothing much more to report. I've been back at McGill Medievalists, and bowling with Best Buddies but those are pleasures I really don't have time for at the moment. Not long now, however. In fact I can't believe how soon I go home, the semester has vanished.

I have calculated that this semester I will have:

• Had twelve hours of class time each week with assessed participation.
• Sat ten tests and one final exam.

• Taken part in one play (wearing one novelty beard).

• Submitted nine essays, five translations, two term papers and one research project.

None to shabby, when you look at it like that . . . so I feel I definitely deserve my Christmas break even if it is far too short for my liking. 

I think coming back in January is going to be the very worst part of this year, saying goodbye to the people I've missed so soon after saying hello again - though I'm sure once I'm back and back in the groove I will remember just why I'm here and enjoying myself so much! To help counteract my bitter-sweet arrival in January, Faye and I have booked a New Year's trip to New York in the weekend before term starts. Definitely extremely cool and I do have to pinch myself to realise this is my lived reality - I can 'pop' to the Big Apple on a very tight budget. I promised my Dad that I would have fun and make the most of my year and so far I really feel I have, which makes me very happy. It would be awful to regret not making the most of this opportunity. Fitting in everything I want to do is very hard work - especially on top of the endless McGill workload - but it is utterly worth it when I start to look back on this semester.

Crikey, it is so weird to almost be able to look back at this semester in the past tense. I cannot WAIT to be able to open Day 1 on my advent calendar my aunt very sweetly sent over, though. Christmas is coming!