There is such a thing as a free lunch...

Apart from pain and heartache, the worst feeling in the world is hearing your alarm go off in the morning. The same, familiar beep always induces a painful groan at having to abandon the warmth of your bed and actually 'do stuff'. What's worse is that if you use a song that you like as your alarm, you eventually associate it with the negative painfulness of waking up and you begin to hate the song. To this day, I cannot listen to 'Sahara' by Nightwish without feeling physically sick.

Luckily, I didn't sleep through the alarm on Thursday morning as I usually do and woke at 7am. I put some toast in the toaster before realising that the university were providing it today and gleefully put it back in the cupboard (another day's lunch, woo hoo)! We all got ready and headed to the university which is about a ten minute walk (or fifteen minutes for slow walkers like me...) and got to the steps of HEC Montreal and ventured inside. We asked at reception where we were due to go and was directed to go up the stairs to the cafeteria. It's hard to describe how I felt when I saw inside for the first time but I was quite overwhelmed with how beautiful it is. It's so modern, sleek, clean, white, fresh and ... cool. Cool is probably the perfect word to describe it. We were told to register at a desk and we were given a sticker with our name and home country on it before being directed to the breakfast table. I have to say, I was very impressed, it was like a Hilton Breakfast (which I am now very accustomed to and can vouch they are awesome). Settling for a Croissant and what looked like Pain au Chocolat, I sat with my flatmates. 

After about half an hour we were directed into the 'Amphitheatre' (loving all the posh rooms already) and were introduced to International Exchange Office personnel, who were all very nice, friendly and warm. They gave us a lecture on Montreal, how to survive Winter (hibernation isn't an option apparently, damn) and a basic introduction into life here. We were then directed to the cafeteria again and waited for lunch to be served (my purse was rejoicing). Lunch was amazing, nice sandwiches, pasta, houmous... I can tell you all right now that Strathclyde would never prepare a spread like that. The Danish Whirls were also pretty awesome. Whilst collecting our lunch, we were given our 'Fresher's Week' wristbands, which would give us access to pretty much every activity under the sun (or snow, whatever). 

After lunch, we explored a bit more of the building and discovered that there are no room numbers in HEC, rather they are all named after local businesses, who probably sponsor them (quite clever I think). For example, there was Scotia Banque, KPMG, Xerox Canada etc. (None of these I have heard of, of course). The rooms look amazing inside as well, comfy chairs, big screens. It really does make Strathclyde look like a rubbish heap and even though I may crave for home, I doubt I will look forward to returning to the Strathclyde campus (or starting a dissertation for that matter).

After delaying the inevitable, we finally joined the back of the registration queue to pay for our health insurance. I'm not even exaggerating when I say the queue didn't move for an hour and then we had to go and show our passport to someone and that took about twenty minutes too. However, as soon as it was done, we decided to show Ludovica where the supermarket was and help her get some stuff. The paths were really slippy that day and I was taking my time but also lagging behind (normal Amy speed really). We eventually made it to the supermarket, albeit, the scenic route and I was celebrating having made it. Until I put my foot off the kerb and slipped on a bit of ice. It was weird, as I was falling backwards, I had enough time to think 'Oh no' before I landed. Luckily, I landed on my bum and my bones were still intact. This is a win for me. Never have I been so happy to carry excess weight! However, I made a decision there and then to avoid shortcuts and follow all paths. It's weird, you lose your confidence a wee bit but you have to get back out there. 

We walked to Pharmaprix, a sort of Boots and I looked for painkillers, having been blessed with the foresight that I was going to have a very sore arse in the morning. However, at $10 for a packet of Tylenol  I preferred suffering the pain. I'm not sure why they don't do 39p packets of Paracetamol here, the prices here are just ridiculous. We then waited at Fido for about an hour before going to the shops. By the time we got home, it was about seven and we needed to leave the house at quarter to eight to go to the first bar of  Fresher's Week. I managed to wolf down some left over pasta from the day before (I am so into the leftover food movement, it's glorious) and put a bit of slap on before heading to HEC. We then had to walk to the bar, which was for me, a hard slog of a walk and we passed Decelles, the other building which I have the misfortune of having a class at 8.30am on a Tuesday. We then went to Bar Tabasco, which turned out to be a ten minute walk from our apartment. We had gone in a circle. Lovely.

Bar Tabasco was great. The drink prices were not too shabby and I got the opportunity to speak to a lot of my fellow exchange students, in a relaxed environment, where we could head each other speak. We then walked home after a few hours and went to bed early, to be up and ready for another amazeballs lecture (yay).

Tea in a Saucepan is how we roll...

Wednesday arrived with a 'clatterboom' as I heard my landlady's shrill voice at 9am, heralding the arrival of our Chinese flatmate, Ka Ki (or Katrina). All I can say is that I'm glad Aziza was up and about otherwise they would have been standing behind that door for a long time. An interesting thing that I should point out which I have noticed both at Strathclyde last year and in Montreal is that students coming from China often choose English-sounding names as monikers during their studies. As cool as this is, I also feel slightly sorry that Chinese people feel the need to choose names that people find easier to pronounce. For example, I would hate to simplify my name, it's my name and everyone should know it (I'm not sure why I'm going on a bizarre tangent here, I'm tired).

Anyway, I hurriedly pulled on my clothes, not wanting to meet my new flatmate in nothing but pyjamas and tried in vain to mould my hair into an acceptable style. We introduced ourselves and spoke to her for a while. She had had an insane 18-hour journey from Hong Kong and was very jet-lagged, poor thing. Leaving Ka Ki to adjust and settle in, I went into the kitchen to prepare a seemingly simple breakfast of toast. Except the fact that the toaster is broken and you have to physically hold the toast down whilst it cooks. I mean, Jesus wept and that's all I have to say on the matter.

However, at around 11am, the landlady very kindly offered to drive us around the block and show us the local landmarks. Firstly she took us to the shopping centre near us, which is probably similar to a retail park. Inside, there was a supermarket, Metro, which I would describe as the equivalent of Morrison's, a shop very similar to B&M and 'Dollarama', a one-dollar shop and possibly my favourite shop here so far (I am a genuinely poor student now, after all). The landlady very kindly waited whilst we did some shopping and then drove us back home, which was great considering how heavy our bags were, via HEC Montreal, which was the first time I had seen it in reality. I have to say, It's quite an impressive building, if not slightly ugly. Although, as my cousin said, it was 'probably sexy in the nineties'.

After we were dropped back home, I fluttered around, trying to make sense of my biggest enemy since the rope frame at the gym, the American-style washing machine. I believe that the washing machine is its own entity, has its own mind and has one goal and one goal only, the goal being to confuse every single international student who uses it. There are so many dials on this thing... I didn't even know where to begin. By a random act of divine intervention or magic, I managed to get some things washed but they didn't turn out very well (although, it might be because the detergent is from Dollarama, go figure).

It's always after you've been shopping that you realise you have forgotten something and I realised that I needed to get another pillow. I have a King-Size bed in Montreal (which I'm not used to, I still use only one side of it, although I intend to learn the spread eagle position momentarily) and I only had one pillow. Not only do I have four at home (don't gasp at me, they are flat and firm, not these big, soft fluffy monstrosities) but the bed just doesn't look right with one pillow. So, I decided to be a big girl and venture out on my own, back to the retail park. I was quite proud of myself for undertaking this expedition, mainly because if I fell and injured myself, I would probably be left to die in the snow (like what happens to climbers on Mount Everest).

I made it to the retail park unscathed and headed to SUPERMAX (the B&M) and found a pillow for $8, which I thought was pretty good. The other thing I needed was a king size sheet because the double one I bought would not fit, no matter how many times I pulled and stretched it. The cheapest one they had was $35 so I think I can live with the double sheet not quite fitting the whole bed for the moment (I've taken student living to extremes). Then, I headed to Dollarama, which is genuinely amazing, bought a few bits and pieces before buying milk at Metro and making my way home. And I made it back alive. Put it this way, if it was socially acceptable to high five yourself, I would have, I was so proud of myself.

Then, I Facetimed my family and it was genuinely great to see them all. It's probably the best part of my day. But then as soon as I sign off, I get a wee bit teary-eyed and start to miss them. Sometimes, I wish they'd just put my sister's iPhone on the sofa, in front of the TV and then I could be with them for a few hours, sort of like a robot. But that would be silly (but possible, I think it could work, wishful thinking...) I'm not sure if these bouts of homesickness are going to pass or not but I hope so. Sometimes, I think I'm being silly because I see my flatmates and they don't seem as homesick as me. Bleurgh!

Around about 8pm, Nana, our Japanese flatmate arrived with her two friends to move some of her stuff into the apartment. When I say 'some' stuff, I mean it looked like she had robbed a shop because she had about fifteen different bags with different things in them. I thought the apartment might explode. Once her friends had helped her move in, we all sat down and had a wee chat (and her friends had a well-deserved rest) before they all went to the bar. It seems I'm not as hardcore as I like to think I am because I didn't go. About an hour later, Ludovica, the last flatmate arrived with friends of her family and she settled in, before going to bed, exhausted from a day's flying. Whilst she was getting a tour, Aziza, Ka Ki and me decided it was a good idea to have a cup of tea and retrieved the kettle. All was well until we looked inside the kettle and discovered it was as black as night. Yuck. So, we settled for the next best thing, a saucepan. Lovely. The best part was that as we were huddled around this saucepan waiting for the water to boil, the landlady described our kitchen to Ludovica as 'well-equipped'. Uh huh.

However, the tea was a success and after a nice wee chat and a laugh, we decided to go to bed because some bright spark at HEC Montreal thought that everyone would like to come for a welcome meeting at 8.30am. Nom.