Blog of the month October 2008
The Scottish Lemon
I am Christine Leman, I am Canadian, but I can't really specify exactly where I'm from as we moved around so much when I was growing up:
- Born in New Westminster, British Columbia,
- then moved to Toronto, Ontario
- then moved to Thunder Bay Ontario (twice),
- then moved to Westbank, British Columbia
- then went to College in Edmonton, Alberta
- then moved to Kitchener, Ontario
- the moved to Vancouver, British Columbia
- then moved to Burnaby, British Columbia
- then moved to Surrey, British Columbia
- then back to Burnaby again before moving overseas. I moved to Glasgow, Scotland in October 2006
Have you been there for a while?
- coming up to the 2 year anniversary this month!
How long do you plan to stay?
- funny you should mention that, I just found out I'm moving to Edinburgh, Scotland in January. I'm quite happy to stay in the UK and have no plans to move back to Canada. But one never knows for sure where they will be from one year to the next. Lets just say I'm open to any and all options.
Have you ever lived abroad before?
- nope, first time
How many countries have you visited?
- Hmm need to think about that. I only really started travelling extensively in 1998. Prior to that it was just camping or a road trip either in Canada or the US. But once I made that first overseas flight I was hooked. I've been to Cuba, Dominican Republic, Venezuela, England, Germany, British Virgin Islands, Antigua, Granada, St Lucia, Martinique, Barbados, Jamaica, France, Spain, Peru, Chili, Costa Rica. Scotland and Ireland. So lots more ground to cover yet.
When did you decide to go and live abroad?
The idea struck me on my first trip to Europe (Germany) back in 1999? I think. But the actual serious 'hmmmmm' was in 2005 on my 40th birthday trip to Ireland and Scotland.
Why did you choose to live in Scotland ?
I moved out with a friend and she was moving to Glasgow for work so it seemed a logical place to start and the pieces just fell in place.
How would you describe Glasgow?
When you say place I assume you mean the city? Glasgow is great, it's small enough that it has the friendly feel to it but has many of the things I like about living in a bigger city (good restaurants, an art scene, live music, history, culture and great architecture).
What do you like the most about it?
The fact that its not too big and its cheap to get around. I think the cabs here are the cheapest in the UK. However, most of the time I can walk from point A to point B. Case in point I'm a 25 min walk to work, 30 min to city centre, 15 min to the Kelvingrove Museum etc. This way I don't need to join a gym and walking everywhere has helped to compensate from the extra calories from things like pints of Guinness or the odd dram of a nice single malt. Oh and the pubs, I love the old man pubs like the Uisge Beatha on Woodlands, The Three Judges on Dumbarton or Tennents Bar on Byres.
What is your occupation there?
Currently I'm a Team Leader for a Contact Centre but that's going to be changing in a few months as I start a new job in January.
How is the cultural shock?
To be honest there wasn't much really. Vancouver and Glasgow have similar feels to each other. They are both very multicultural, friendly, great restaurants. And the governments of Canada and the UK are similar too. People on both sides of the pond complain about too many taxes, not enough money going into health care or education, petrol costs too much and there's never enough parking. But the accents that took a bit to get used too. For the first 2 months my flat mate and I would watch the first season of Chewin The Fat over and over again to try and understand the pop culture and the accents. TV helped with that. In fact I can remember after a few months watching an episode of QI and realising I was laughing at all the right parts.
Do you miss anything from your homeland?
I miss the mountains, real mountains with snow on top and the smell of the forest. Its what green smells like to me.
Your blog: when did you start it?
Wednesday October 4, 2006
For what reasons?
To document the process of my emigration experience and once I actually got to Scotland it was an easy way to keep touch with my friends and family back home in Canada. Lets face it, posting a blog entry is much easier then sending 25 emails. What can I say, I'm lazy.
Did its original purpose changed along the way?
A little, it's evolved into a number of different things over the past 2 years. Initially it was just a narration of what I did, what I saw, what I ate, how the new job was working out. But then I started enjoying the actual writing process and I dabbled a bit with some creative writing with a few short stories and some poetry. When ever I travel then it turns into a travel journal but for the last year its really become more of a photo blog as I've become very passionate about photography. So its a lot of things, it just depends on whats going on at the time I guess
Do you spend a lot of time on it?
Not as much as I used to. At the beginning everything was new so I had lots to talk about. But once I started working full time well life gets in the way and people get tired of routine. So when I'm on holiday I'm pretty good about posting on a daily basis. But when real life kicks in then I tend to only post if I've done or been somewhere interesting or had an interesting observation that I though others would like to hear about. I'm very concious about how my life is not all that interesting and don't want to write about nothing because that would just be dull.
Did you make new friends with your blog?
Depends on how you define friend. I have had some wonderful bloggers leave comments and so I always check their blogs out and if i like what I read I'll link to them. Eventually if you comment enough you start to develop a bit of a dialogue. I do have one fellow blogger that I struck up an interesting friendship. He's a writer from Ireland but originally from Scotland and that's how he found my blog, searching for a taste of home I guess. We've written each other lots and its been a fabulous cultural exchange of sorts. But we've never met, and probably never will and that's ok. Its the communication with others that is the great part of all this. Bloggers are everywhere. Even the church I attend has a 'blog roll'
Have you ever met somebody you spoke with on your blog?
Yes a few - I went to a Scottish blogger meet in Edinburgh once. Apparently it used to be a regular thing, but the group kind of fizzled. And I finally ran into another Expat-blogger in a West End Pub and we chatted for a bit. And I've just recently met a married couple (they each have a blog) that also live in the West End and we've quickly become friends and meet up for coffee or lunch every now and then.
Expat-blog (of course!): when did you register?
Um is it a bad thing that I can't remember?
Any particular reasons?
I think I saw the link on someone else's blog and it seemed like a good idea at the time. A way for fellow expats to read/share each others experiences.
Any 'memories of an expat' you would like to share with other bloggers?
I do recall with fondness discovering this great little coffee shop that would end up being around the corner of what was to be my first flat. I think it was my third day in a row I came in around 3PM for a coffee and a pana chocolate, I guess I was turning into a bit of a regular. The barrista had always been very friendly and this day he came over to my table and started a bit of a conversation. After the 3rd time of asking him to repeat himself I just decided to smile lots and chuckle if I thought it was an appropriate moment because I didn't have the heart to say I couldn't understand a word of what he was saying. It took 2 years, but I can understand him now and it also turns out he's now my next door neighbor.
Your best souvenir?
Well whisky is always a good souvenir but we keep drinking it ;)
Or maybe your worst experience?
Oh that's easy, trying to get a bank account. That process took a whopping 5 months even though I already had a job and an employer that wanted to deposit my pay cheque. That is one thing I always warn people about if they ask, make sure you have enough money to get by on for at least 5 or 6 months because it will take that long to set up. It was a nightmare!
