Back home, what's different?

Landing once again on a Croatian soil had more of a specific taste this time. Even though spending little bit more than a year away is not a period that is long enough to draw some serious conclusions, my brain is playing a different game. As soon as I left the airplane all of the sudden I'm not in Canada anymore, people bitching around, taxi drivers throwing signs at my face, honking and nervous drivers and many other delights that I can live without.

But the way I adapted easily going from "bad" to "good" the other way around wasn't a problem as well. Late October sunny and warm day made things much easier. Apart from smiling and saying hi to everybody first couple of days, transition to a Croatian version of me was kind of immediate. Although I'm not sure if things are going to be smooth like this after couple more years of Canada.

Anathema, Kino Siska, Slovenia

The circle is complete

Today is exactly a year from the day I landed in Calgary. A year that flew by like many before, but this one had much more significance attached to it. These beautiful fall colors greeted me in the Rockies when I landed and they are going to greet me goodbye at the very same place. Some may wonder why I mention Rockies. Am I not in the Rockies all the time? No! Coastal mountains and the Rockies are two big mountain chains (each double the surface of the Alps) with a very different geological past. One granite, other limestone. One has much more precipitation due to ocean... Ok, nobody wondered, let's go on.

Wedgemount Lake, BC

From Split to Vancouver

Name of this blog is becoming more and more obsolete. No drama, no sudden change of heart, no tears shed...just more or less painless transition from one place to another. Sun is out for last month and a half, not too hot during the day, not above 20 degrees during the night. The idea of summer paradise for my heat hating body. First couple of months I had a cautious approach to my ideas and wishes. Now, after 9 months in Vancouver I can say that I found my place to live. Maybe do some winters up in the far north or something similar with a dose of personal challenge (there is only one True North, sorry Jon Snow!), but in general Vancouver is a place I'm staying for (much) longer. Honeymoon phase is just getting better and better :)

Spring sunrise over English Bay

Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind

A good friend of mine told me that I should stop complaining about rain. Probably he is right. He is not only right, but he is also slim and he has habits! So this post will be without too much words. Just pictures from one of those rare moments of beautiful winter weather in the city. A city I'm growing to love more and more...

Disclaimer for the last post:

Other good friend of mine who is getting married soon and I must try not to get my visa extended so I can attend his marriage was giving me shits because I was talking about real estate prices. To be clear, buying a house is a thing that is not my concern for a next decade but renting prices are. More expensive real estate, more expensive mortgages, more expensive renting prices.

Downsides of living in Vancouver

Before starting with the subject of this post...

While I did mentioned it before, I want to emphasize once more importance of making and updating fore example LinkedIn and Indeed profiles. I suppose it is just a coincidence but in a last 10 days I got 3 job offers (two via LinkedIn and one via Indeed). So it was not a invitation for an interview, but job offer. Obviously when some recruiter contacts people, companies are in a great need for people.

Two of them were from big Canadian companies (Ledcor and TekSystems) and one was from a American recruitment agency to work all around States. To put it in a context, I never sent a single resume for those kind of jobs. For Canadian ones I was not interested (installing residential IT equipment). For USA job I was very interested (pretty much same job as I'm doing now) but unfortunately without Canadian Permanent Residence or Canadian Citizenship companies are not so interested to hussle with all of the papers and shit. Recruiter said she will get in touch if they don't find enough people with "easier" passports. In my mind I was even ready to sacrifice all the mountains here in BC to get a chance to get closer to USA working permit. 

To put things in another context, if any of those offers were for some kind on electrical engineering jobs, either IT or High Voltage, I would probably took it regardless of probably  less pay / beginner type of job. For those kind of jobs I'm sending couple of resumes a week just for the sake of it.

BC Place, Downtown Vancouver

Beginners tips from the beginner vol.2

Three months have passed since the first installment of this series. In the meantime I didn't found out about any magical shortcuts unfortunately. Instead I'll layout some stuff that will maybe sound pretty dull, but there are many things that seem normal / common sense stuff to me and not to the guy next to me and vice versa.

Canadian "vs." immigrant workers

Couple of days ago our GM (General Manager) called a meeting for all company's staff (cca. 15 of us). By the sound of it I thought that maybe company is shutting down after 10 years of being in the industry. Fortunately that was not the case. Subject of the meeting was that there is a lot of job down the pipe in a near future but next couple of weeks will be sluggish. Less jobs, less hours worked, less money.

One flag is missing. Coincidence?!

Breaking news! Nothing is happening

Vancouver is covered by snow once again. But this time is has pretty much melted in couple of days. I'm witnessing one of the coldest winters in Vancouver and yet when going out short sleeves and jacket is all that is needed. Hearing people complain about it reminds me about our human nature, easily settling for better but having a hard time when we encounter some bad short term anomalies.

Full moon rising, Garibaldi Provincal Park, BC

New job, dating scene, going back home / what to do in Vancouver if you're not outdoorsy

Like many people out there I have beautiful and caring friends. Pretty much all they are interested in is "tell us how are girls like up there". Especially my dear friend Mario M. (+385 98 177 92XX) and yes, he is still single believe it or not! So today I'll start with that subject. Maybe I'll sound like a jerk, but I can always blame it on Mario M.!

I have a (big) dilemma(s) about ladies here. First one is where are ladies more beautiful, back in Croatia or in Vancouver. I think I'm becoming more and more biased, but more and more I think the situation here is better, not by the amount but by the quality. More blondes, less make up. We have to take into account that I haven't seen summer here yet. Fuck, I'm gonna entangle myself so I'll skip this part.

My new two buddies with striking resemblance of somebody I know (me)

Why...? (REvisited)

Reminder that I need to continue writing this post came in a form of a older man in his late 30's, longer messy hair, born and raised in Kelowna, BC. It's not what you think it is, although it would be a nice twist. Last couple of days Guss and I spent in a mountain range called Marriott Basin between Pemberton and Lillooet, roughly 200 km driving North of Vancouver. 

Chasing sunset at UBC

Holidays with family and friends

Actually this Christmas holidays I spent completely the opposite, in the mountains for 3 days of endless fresh snow and 30+ random people. I don't care too much about any holidays but as a week in the mountains it was beautiful. At work we are having a week off because of the network operators don't want to mingle anything with network hardware during holidays = higher cell usage. Since I started working almost immediately upon arriving in Vancouver not working for couple of days is a nice treat, to take a breath, sort thing about driving licence, diploma recognition, IETLS test, medical insurance, immigration stuff, changing companies / careers...

Few more days and holidays are over and of course I didn't do any of the mentioned above. Only thing I'm really committed to is planning where to go next weekends. And yea, Mario made zeljanicu (burek from zelje, zelje = spinach in Bosnian, Bosnians are grumpy when saying burek from zelje so I'll be politically correct and say it pita from zelje), I was also really committed to ate it all. Unfortunately for Mario, cover picture will be mountains, but zeljanica will be 2nd to the top, promise!

Trail to Elfin Lakes, BC

Beginners tips from the beginner vol.1

Today I threw away my first Canadian toothbrush. Such a fulfilling moment! So glad to be #alive #nofilter #besties #forever21 #behappy #notwrittingnewposts #hippiehashtagbullshit. It takes few hours to write something meaningful and especially to correct all the gramar mistakes (see what I did there?!? #grammarjew) and I'm short on time and as always, lazy. If you're an outdoor person and love food, saying that you're bored in Vancouver is a crime against humanity. Add a usually 9+ working hours a day and you get the idea. 

Dad, you're going to google translate this so tell mom to send more woven socks from zavicaj, old ones are dying. Also, she needs to get rid of flying sooner or later. :D

Vancouver Downtown

First month in Canada

I don't like stress. Skype has much less lag than Whatsapp/Viber for long distance IP talks. That's about it for this post. And yes, Vancouver police cars are so cool! 

I need to suck up to them, because they were nice to me and my buddy Captain Morgan. They gave us just a warning ticket (230$ fine otherwise) for carrying an open bottle of alcohol.

Officers play ARMA III inside while on duty!

To hell and back, rainy edition

In the last episode our two main characters were on a way to wake up and decide what hike should they do following day. Decision was a hard to make, tears were shed, lot of beautiful trails, snow was already 20+ cm deep and our heroes were on a edge of breaking down. More after this messages from our sponsors.

Lake Minnewanka, Banff, AB

Canada, a country where being polite is normal

Eagle has landed, I repeat, Eagle has landed... 

I landed in a Calgary International Airport on a late night of October 7th. It was a pretty long trip. First bus from Split to Zagreb and then flight Zagreb - Munich -  Halifax - Calgary. All in all trip lasted for about 32 hours with layovers. Of course you can arrive for a lot less (for example, Split-London-Calgary) time but it costs more. This way I saved a few bucks that I can now recklessly spend in the Banff National Park on eating out, renting a car and driving around. 

Back at home there was a lot of saying goodbyes, some tears and in general people where more nervous than me. I had a feeling like I'm packing for a usual week in a mountains. Some family/friends announced that they'll be coming as soon as I settle down, especially if I end up in Vancouver. Some of them are waiting for me to pave the road so they can also try they luck in Canada. I promised to my parents to buy them tickets for flying over after a couple of months but mom refused. She is very afraid of flying (for that matter driving through tunnels also). Only option remaining then is buying some boat so she can row to Canada.

First sight of Canadian soil

Job interviews, rebooking and resignation

As day of my flight (October 30th) was getting closer I decided to concentrate on searching of suitable companies around AB and BC, sending resumes and filling out Indeed.ca, LinkedIn and Monster.ca profiles. Last week I sent a dozen of resumes, some for electrical engineer jobs some for rope access jobs.

It resulted with a few declines and luckily with three interview requests. Two of them are for high rise windows cleaning and third is for telecommunications tower climbing. One in Calgary and other two in Vancouver. I hope they will be kind enough to let me do the first round of interviews via Skype. If not, than field trip to Vancouver it is.

Tower climbing
Photo: internet

Expectations, plans and the absence of the above

It's not easy to make plans and have expectations when all you have done is sitting in the comfort of your chair, reading things online and imagining how things could turn out. At least it's not easy if you want them to become reality. But however unlikely they are, man has to have them. He needs to have something to strive to.

There is a famous movie based on almost as famous book based on a real life events. Name of the movie is Into the Wild, same as a name of the book written by Jon Krakauer. Inspiration for both is a true wanderer named Christopher McCandless aka. Alexander Supertramp as he called himself. 

Last photo of Christopher McCandless, Alaska
Photo: Internet

Why...?

That is one of the hardest thing to ask a man on his way to nowhere. How to put such a mix of feelings in a bunch of words?! How to explain to someone that you want to leave a stable job in your field of studies, your many friends, family, outdoor hobbies, everything you have been building (or was built for you)  for 28 years? How to explain that to yourself? Especially when you're moving to Calgary, Alberta, CA to start from the scratch in the middle of the biggest crisis Alberta has seen in decades? Not to mention that immigration laws have become significantly tighter in a past couple of years.

And yes, how to explain to somebody that you are leaving this beautiful country behind?

Velebit mountain, Croatia 
Photo: F. Kozemelj