Trip Departure September 28, 2005 from London,ON to Truro,Nova Scotia Bonjour! Je m’appelle Trudy, et je suis votre agente de projet pour Katimavik à Truro. J’écris parce que je veux vous donner mon adresse courriel. Si vous avez des questions, s’il vous plait, envoyez-moi un e-mail et je vais vous répondre le plus tôt possible. Au revoir et bon voyage. J’ai hâte de vous rencontrer ! Trudy Hello! I’m Trudy and I’m your Project Leader for Katimavik in Truro. I’m writing to give you all my email address. If you have any questions please email me and I’ll reply as quickly as possible. Have a great trip. I’m looking forward to meeting you all! Trudy Hi Em, Hope your trip was enjoyable. Mom and I miss you already!! e me back soon. Ciao,LP Hey guys, how are you doing lol r u having withdrawl symptoms from me lol jokes, It was quite crazy gettin up yesturday morning and totally leaving everythign and everyone behind. Like i said i did cry for like the first half an hour of the bus ride but i slept and woke up at every stop. You will not believe it, i got to the airport 3 hours early and met Benjamin the guy who is in my group and my grandparents showed up at the airport to see me off. So i got on the plane with four other people from the program and it was a great flight didnt even feel like i was flying, smooth ups and downs smoothest i've ever been on. Yah so as a group we stayed at the airport waiting for everyone for like 4 hours we played twister in the middle of the airport and everyone thought we were crazy. My groups pretty cool, everyones getting a long, lol i kinda feel left out and annoyed when they're talkin about their drinking and sex stories lol but watever... Wilkie "LUSH" lol, yah so its cool were going camping this weekend for orientation for the 3 partner groups here so yah and were just learning the rules and everything now. It's so great I'm so glad i did it and its only lol 24 hours in i feel like i've been away for weeks crazy. I miss you all so much, I love you all and Hilary ur poem was so cute I really appreciated it , Ok bye guys e mail me back asap Love, Em Hey guys, so we went to the mass orientation and we were with our Nova Scotia cluster which means Halifax, us and Tatamagoushe which was fun because that's who's all(lol nicole) was at the airport with us . So everyone was friendly and stuff, and we learned all the rules and expectations of the program. It's all so surreal that i'm here , we're all bonding and we call our Truro house home now after 4 days 2 which were spent at the camp . We played fun leadership games and met really interesting people. We had two bon fires on > the beach where i had a good talk with this one guy from New Brunswick and a guy in my group gave me an amazing massage so i'm having fun and we havent even started our volunteer placements > yayay. Wow > this is so crazy that i'm here > lol . All of the 30 of us are spending Thanksgiving together at our house and we're making it here. exciting... and its funny because the other groups > are pretty melow and calm and i got the loud talkative, active group which is perfect because our project leader (pl) is the same way so it worked out. lol and the other groups are like we wish we had ur group and we're not just loud and talkative but we won all the teamwork and trivia games.I've already been designated the "angel" in our group lol i live with crazies not really haha but yah i knew i was the youngest here Love Emily Hey everyone, It's been about a week and a half now, I'm volunteering at the Canadian Mental Health Association's Friendship Club it's like a drop in/support centre open 5 days a week where adults with mental illnesses help to run the place, cook meals together and do activities. I'm volunteering there with Ben from my group and our job is to basically hang out and plan activities for them. So the first one we're planning is a scavenger hunt for them on wednesday and then every wednesday we'll take them for hour long walks. They appear to be happy that we're there. It's really good when we feel we're helping them and a little frustrating when they are not motivated at all. But overall it's been good. Im not the house manager until 3 weeks from now so i don't have to clean or cook yet but i help out. Today, saturday we went to some fields with a church group and picked carrots that the machines don't get and they get donated to the poor. It was really raining hard and so we got into a mud fight lol what a van ride home. We had a welcome party from the community, it was really cool. I'll be emailing later with more details on my daily life. Love you all, Emily XoXoXo Hey Nicole, Happy belated Thanksgiving Lol you're right I am having fun here. Yah the guy from my work is the first one i met in hamilton and he was really shy but now he's coming out of his shell and im getting to know him more. Yah i actaully just got my period so it was my irritable week before lol but the stuff that happened i would of been pissed about any way its just that i don't really get along with one guy and its not that he's an asshole its just that he hasn't tried to get to know me at all and he makes comments sometimes that really piss me off, The one thing thats gettin to me is that i'm used to beign able to tell all of you my feelings about stuff that are very personal because you know that's how i am and i don't feel comfortable enough with anyone to do that yet and u no how u can usually tell, well there are only like maybe 2 people i feel really comfortable with and ones not even in my group the Bill guy i was telling u about before that i had a good convo with at Mass O at the campfire.oh and i'm gonna end this with a riddle because u had a werid oen for me and its funny because we did a riddles night not planned but we ended up staying up until 1 doing them so here's the one that i got and u can ask yes or no qustions and hopefully u get it i'm not gonan tell u the answer until u get it right so here it goes..... Ok so a man walks into a bar and asks for a glass of water and the bar tender points a gun at him and he walks out happy, so ur job is by asking questions to figure out y this happened? k love u bye, Emily * The answer is that the guy had the hiccups. Hey Riggs I had thanksgiving dinner yestrurday which was monday with the other two clusters from Halifax and Tatamagouche , i made the stuffing for 40 people , everyone did something different to help, we did the whole day of cooking then eating we played ping pong and foose ball and talked and found out who's sleeping with who in the other groups. lol all the gossip from the other groups came out, and our group doesn't have any gossip to speak about even though at first we were named the 'rowdy" group. isn't that funny. Yah we have a computer in the house so i'm basically on everyday so u can give me a daily shout out lol that sounds funny . Tell me about uni and stuff >Love, emily The scavenger hunt was today and it went really well they had fun, they asked to do another one soon and were turnign it into a walkign goup 2 times a week so its really good and one of the ladies said i was her friend it was so cute...and it was fun putting them uparound downtown lol .... so were started to plan our events and i think that for leadership we'e being tied in teams of 3 and have to go through a corn maze, for halloween were collecting cans for the food bank, swimming and as cultural discovery were planning a trip to halifax to the maritime museum, music festival and peggy's cove. Love, Emily Hey Aunt Pauletti, You're right life is an adventure here..lol last saturday i organized a trip to halifax and peggy's cove and it was so fun and peggy's cove is beautiful and this saturday we're going on a hike near the bay of fundy and to 2 museums on acandian life and fair trade..i'm so excited. My work is going pretty good, so far me and Ben have organized a Walking Group, a Craft's Corner, and a Scavenger Hunt and the rest of the time we're there we are just hangin out and talking to the members and cooking. The members seem to like having us there and we do interesting things they're based on peoples interest like one of the counellors likes yoga, so on mondays we do that and one of the members at the Friendship Club likes to knit and she taught me but i haven't got the hang of it but Ben has and he's making himself a scarf for Saskatchewan. Sometimes it's really hard because the members aren't motivated but were working on getting them motivated. Suprisingly I didn't find any rain boots at Walmart all they had were kids sizes and I asked them when they were getting more and they said: we don't know, and we probably won't and they said they don't understand why not either....but at the Friendship Club on the table of donations there are a size 7 rubber boots that have been there for a week so if no one gets them i'm gonna take them before they give them away. Yah it's so great to hear that mom's doing well and yesturday she told nme she got alot done again. We actually don't have a t.v here and yes i'm dieing to see Gilmore Girls but i have been reading the weekly episode summary on The WB website and when i billet with a family in 3 weeks i will be able to see atleast two episodes yay. I know isn't it crazy that i will be 18 in less than a month, So tell me what's going on with the fam this week and yiayia and papou. Love, Emily Hey Nicole, I'm on Haloween commitee and we've decided that we're going trick or' treatin for canned goods, we're sending out newsletters and putting something in the paper and we're gonna get costumes donated and go out and donate all the stuff to the food bank. We're also going to a haunted corn maze the day before with the group from tatamagouche so that should be fun. Yesturday it was so cool i organized the day trip and we went to Halifax in the morning to see the farmers market, then we went to Peggy's Cove u no the famous lighthouse and rocks and everythign while it was pouring rain and the winds were crazy and then we went back to halifax and had dinner at the halifax house and me and this really nice guy from the halifax group gave me a downtown/harbour front tour of halifax all night it was so fun and i saw the city it was a fun day oh and we also went to the Maritime Musuem as well. Love, Emily Hey nicole I got Bronchitis the infection of the bronchial tubes we learned in biology oh wait lol i no u didnt take that oh watever and house-managering went well we slept in daniel did most of the dishes and amy and raymond we're home because school had a P.A day so they helped us clean i made bread and it was the frist time we burnt it because we were cooking dinner when it had to come out( we cooked the kiwi and peaches pork with rice it was crazy good lol). but its fine we just will cut off the top. Um and im so thankful its over, but it was cool ben actually showed up with Saxon and Nadine from the Friendship club because they wanted to seee if i could go on the walk with them because they missed me aww....and i go back officially on monday but me and ben went tonight from 6 till 9 for the Halloween party and they said it was the most people they ever had, there was cool decorations i made a lady pumpkin from papier mache lol and a lot of people dressed up , i was a snow princess because when we moved in there were tiaras lying around and i put on some of my winter clothes people thouht it was good so yah. and u will not belive it we danced with the members and at first it was 50 and 60 s music and halloween but then we danced to hip hop and rap and i lead it was hilarious who would of thunk it. it was actually fun a lil werid but cool and ben brake danced. then after we went to one of the members houses because there is a group that are really open and talkitive with us and hang out,outside of the centre so we went to their house and played trouble and mad gab and just talked it was so awesome and i just got back for curfew like a half an hour ago lol and now i'm writing to u yah our curfew is 2 on fri and sat. and for halloween we're getting shopping carts to carry the food and everything it should be fun,we're hiking in victoria park this weekend and going to the corn maze so yah even though wat i was saying about my housemates yesturday there is nothing that would keep me here more then the members which is my main focus telling me they missed me all week and felt bad i was sick and nadine even wanted to do the lexicon with me today so i'm feeling great about that part and even if i dont become really close with my housmates i will of made a difference where i volunteer it already shows.yayayay i'm so happy right now and i'm now wide awake lol but anyways i'll try to call u mid week,next week k Love , Emily Hey Aunt Paulettei, Things are okay here it was pretty tense this past week because the house is having a lot of issues with respect, trust, and two people wanted to leave the house. So we had a big house meeting that was over three hours and we got a lot of issues out. This week we collected food for the food bank on Halloween, we dealt with a lot of group issues and on saturday we volunteered at the museum for 11 hours doing a yard sale, bake sale, and antique roadshow. Sorry it's been a while but i don't get on the comp a whole lot because i use the phone more lol to call my mommy everyday (happy face) You know what I would love for my Birthday would be a black down filled vest liek my white one u got me before because i really miss wearing one so that would be great and it would help me out here. I heard about the birthday party it must have been really cute and fun. Too bad I'm not there it's hard missing family occassions. I hope you're all doing well and tell me how the girls are doing. Love, Emily hey Wilkie wasup everything goin alright here i had a mini cryin thingy on sunday but i'm good it was just about feeling excluded lol but im good im strong so im sure nicole has told u abbout the bday present my parents got me its kinda weird...needless to say i'm excited about wat ur giving me lol btw did i tell u i wipped through nights in rodanthe like in 2 days i love it i cried omg it was beautiful anyway i just wanted to update u a bit i'll call u soon possibly tonight k love u bye Hey Nicole so i finally called my parents today at lunch and my mom told me they were at the mall to buy me something else but they were walking along and saw it and they played the button thing that u squeeze and they heard the " i want you to be here beside me, i miss you ....i love you" and my mom started crying and she said she knows its something weird that they wouldnt get me and they probably otherwise wouldnt of got it, but they did cause it meant something and then my dad said its because when i miss them i can hug the bear and its like hugging them aw so now i feel content lol thanks for listenin to me last night im sure it sounded weird but i'm so glad i have a friend like u to talk to about these things and everything i'll call u soon Love you , Em Yay thats good because i really miss wearing a vest and everyone told me here that it doenst start really snowing until jan. and thats when we'll be leaving here so i just need it for warmth which is why i like wearing a vest so it would be great to be able to wear it now because it's getting cold but not cold enough to wear my winter jacket so it would be perfect, Lol you've got to get her off the vegging....tell her to do something creative i've got it she can make me something hahahah Hahah you're getting roped into the teenage shows Yah yoga, I started doing that at the centre with the Friendship Club members every Monday its really cool and relaxing Yah my group worked out a lot of issues but all of them are still there to a degree. I'm getting along with everyone here but it's not like I've made really good friends with most of them just a couple I can really talked to but it's weird after a month i thought it would be better but I guess if you don't click then your personalities just don't click fully and i guess I'll just accept that. Oh well Love, Emily Lol r u serious or being sarcastic lol i no u r be serious...yaya so i guess i dont think its so bad after but wow werid ... We went to a rememberance day ceremony, then i had the day off on friday so i did crafts all day i made my yiayia her birthday present a picture frame i painted and decorated with a pic of me, and pictures and a postcard, i made stuff for my moms gift which i'll tell u more about when i talk to u and i made some of ur guys' stuff lol and on friday night we saw the tidal bore which is "a natural phenomenon that only happens in a few places in the world where right before your very eyes at the assigned time the waves change direction all at one it takes like a minute its pretty cool and guess who organized it...then we went for hot chocolate, on saturday i went walking and went to the craft store and bought stuff for my scrapbook so that should be fun to finally work on again, then we went to tatamagoucghe to hang out and we played a human game of checkers, then we went to go see somethign that you would like a musical about WW11 it was cool and sunday we helped move one of our work partners furniture around so she can billet oen of us in a room downstairs in exchange for buyin us pizza and we ended up wathcing remember that movie called 'The Perfect Man" with Hilary Duff and Heather Locklear anyway where she writes her mom letter from this make believe guy anyway it was werid but cute, and I am very happy to tell u I beat Brittany 2 times in trivial pursuit this weekend and shes the one that beats everyone else in the house cool ai? And i found this really awesome book about two women who went to Kenya and it was done like my Mexico Journal with material covering recycled cardboard and its an organization so im excited to read it after i found it on our shelf after a month and i only realized it was there cause someone was cleaning and pointed it out itsn't that weird ? ever wonder wat u could be missingsometimes? so that was the first time i saw a movie in over a month and a half , had coke, and had fast food pizza weird lol so how r u tell me all the details after u write ur essays and study for ur exams Love , Em Hey Guys, Thank you all so much for the cool e cards they meant so much coming from you. I am so lucky to have friends as great as you guys and this experience has really made me value all the things i left behind like you guys, my family and places that I fit in. Thank you for being so supportive and listening to me when i needed it. You guys are amazing and I cherish having you in my life. I will send a newsletter soon but i am billeting with the family now for two weeks and they dont have internet so i can only go on at work and i'm not sure how frequently i should go on because i should kinda be working. Ok so i am also gonna probably call u more these two weeks then email so i'll be in touch soon I love you all Emily Hey Everyone, I promised you all that I would send an update on how I'm doing here right now when I had the time on the internet because my billet family doesn't have it. So I'm writing to you now from the only library in Truro because I'm being taken from place to place by the family that has activities in town because they live 20 minutes outside of Truro in a place called Onslow Mountain which is in the middle of no where and so I am just hanging out at the library right now. So I had a great birthday due to all your wishes and it was exciting turning 18 although I haven't really thought about it a whole bit because I've been too busy with work. Now I'm an adult officially lol who's kidding I've been one for a couple of years atleast now, don't you think? Anyway I am currently living with a billet family that consists of a mother that works as a Social Worker at the Mental Health Services Division of the Hospital, a father that works at a chicken farm, a girl Jessie who is in grade six and a guy Ben who is in grade ten. They're a nice family, and they have been incorporating me into their daily activites so I'm usually tagging around with atleat one of them to their events. The first day I was there we watched t.v. which was very exciting for me after not seeing any for a month and a half, played board games and went to a musical night at their church which the mother happen to be singing in. It was called First United Idol, it was pretty good. Then on Sunday I went to church with them which was intresting, then we went to a craft show which was cool and then we bounced around between their cousins, aunts, and grandmothers houses for the rest of the night. On Monday I went to a girl guide meeting with the grade six girl Jessie because she asked me if I wanted to come. It was cool going there because it made me think of childhood memories and think about how much being in guiding was rewarding and that its part of what lead me on this journey of wanting to help people and make a difference in the world. I remembered the promise that you say when you're enrolled in the program: "I promise to do my best, to be tru to myself, my God and Canada, and accept the guinfing law and I will help others whenever, and wherever I can for the rest of my life" and I really want to keep the promise I made when I was 10. I have decided later on when I'm a mom, I definatly want to be a Girl Guide Leader. It was funny the only thing that changed of the opening and closing ceremonies was the part in the song that said "It's been eighty years or more since we've traveled here before and were coming along as gay and strong as ever we did before we are Guides all Guides...." was changed to " It's been ninety years or more since................................." Wow it really shows how time flies and how old I have become. The family was very welcoming, and I have a sauna in my room but I haven't used it yet because I haven't had time ,we've always been out doing something. I sleep on a small air matress which isn't that comfortable but atleats I can sit up in it so for that I'm thankful. For the next weekend there is the Tree lighting ceremony, the Truro Santa Clause Parade, we're helping to decorate some floats that are going in the parade, going to a contemporary mass on Sunday, going to the Ten Thousand Villages Fair Trade Christmas Sale at a church which I'm really excited about and hopefully we will be going to see Harry Potter on Saturday night because I haven't seen it yet. And then I'll be staying with the family until next Friday December the 2nd morning. So overall the billeting experience has been an interesting and busy time on top of working 9-5 and planning events. At the friendship club this last couple of weeks have been very good but I've also had some stressful times. The events that I have set up for them coming up are a Scavenger Hunt, an outing to the Colchester Historical Museum, and a Walking Tour of the Tree Sculptues in Truro because there are over 40 and there are stories behind each one that was created. I have been cooking more at work with the members, and doing a lot of motivating and talking with them. At times it is so hard to motivate these people because they are depressed and don't really feel comfortable out of their comfort zone doing things that they might not be confident doing. One of my joys last week was when during our Crafts time that me and Ben set up I got 6 members to make hemp bracelettes for themselves which I had just learned to make 2 weeks prior and even though they had to utilize their fine mortor skills, and sometimes found it hard to focus they all completed it and I felt great that they were happy they could create something themselves. This one women who came in for the first time in months who I hadn't met before came in because she said she had to get out of the house and I started talking to her and I decided I was going to teach her how to make the bracelette. When we started she told me that she had scizophrenia and that there were voices in her head that were making it difficult for her to focus but I went slow and helped her and she too made the bracelette and said it had been nice talking to somone and that she would come every Tuesday during craft time from now on and talk to me. That was also a very good experience. Yesturday though was a pretty stressful day because I called a guy named Mark ,Markus and he freaked out on me and he said I don't like being called that, I don't want to come here any more, this place is hell , get me out and he was convined that somone was trying to poison him but he didn't getting physical or anything he wans't a danger to me, we were very far apart and he just walked off, but he walks off alot. That was the first time in a month and three weeks that, thatt has ever happened and it was dealt with. The staff told me not to take it personally because they said sometimes it's wat he's thinking about and he'll just yell and walk off. All the members are stable and some are more normal than others so that is just one case. The other thing that happened today was two members got into a physical fight because they had always been picking on one another and it freaked me out but I got staff and Ben physically restrained them and it was also dealt with effectively but at the time it was scary and we didn't think it could happen. The staff told us that the last time there was a fight here it was 6 years ago so it again is an isolated event, this week has been really abnormal and kinda crazy but I'm sure everything will cool down. We are continuing to do the one hour walking group 3 times a week, crafts on tuesdays where we made origami swans this past tuesday. We do art with one of the members who is an artist, and I have been producing some pretty creative unique paintings that I will be sending home so you guys will probably see some. So I have one month and a half here left at the Friendship Club where I'll be continuing to do events....if any of you have any ideas or suggestions for activities to motivate people please tell me I'd love to hear them. I have been making good friendly relationships with a lot of the members and they have really opened up to me. I'm really learning a lot, things you can't learn at school, things you can't learn passively, you must actively seek them out and be willing to learn this kind of stuff ,that's why this program is so great. I'm so glad that I did it. And I'd also like to thank you all for supporting me in all I've done, you don't know how much it means to know you have support back home. Right now and in the past weeks I have been thinking about how much I value all of you, because not being able to just see you has been hard and it's made me realize that I wouldn't be the same without all of you in my life. Thankyou for always being there and showing you care. I found this cool quote to write out on the Friendship Club's board because guess what I put a motivational quote and write the schedule there everyday so here it is: "No pessimist ever discovered the secrets of the stars, or sailed to an unchartered land, or opened a new heaven to the human spirit. Helen Keller" In my free time here haha do I actaully have any, well sometimes when we aren't doing our 2 hours at the gym, French actvities, workshops or planned activites I mostly read, walk, do my hemp bracelttes, let my creative juices flow and scrap book so you'll be able to see my journey in pics too. So this has been one crazy long email, but I feel like I've expressed everything I want to for the time being so I'm just excitied to see what you all write back, I'll be doing these newsletters more frequently hopefully so they won't be as long. But probably not soon since I won't have interent for another week. So I just wanna end this with saying that I love you all so much and I'm so glad you are all in my life! Love, Emily Hey Everyone, I'm doing pretty good, how are all of you? At work this week i did some cool things like help edit a poetry book written by one of our members, call businesses asking for donations to the bingo program where I managed to convice some to donate pretty substantial amounts in gift certificate form, and we decorated the club for Christmas. The members are now starting to talk about how they don't want us to leave even though it's 3 weeks away because they don't adapt to change well. I made a friend from work who is on a student placement for a month, so me, Ben and Amber have a place to hangout lol and watch t.v and meet other people...so that's been different and fun. This last week at the house has been tough because Manue one of the Quebecois girls had to take a medical leave to get checked out by her family doctor and had 4 weeks to get a clean bill of health to come back so she might come back in two weeks, might join us in Saskatchewan or not come back. Throughout the week tension has been high in the house, and everyone is getting mad at eachother. So we finally had a house meeting to get it all out. It was a 3 and a half hour house meeting where a lot of people broke down and a lot of people got offended. We ended up partially solving some things, and still there is a lot we have to work on. On top of that Johnathan the guy from Gander, Newfoundland said he was thinking of leaving. We tried to talk about it, but he said it was his personal decision and there was no way of convincing him to stay. Also he said his reason for going was that he didnt believe the group was performign as it should be and that he didnt think he was gettign out of it what he should be. He also wouldn't tell us the specific isssues he felt were necessarry to address . A few people and I find this unfair because I don't believe you can say you're leaving for a personal reason that you have identified to the group is them mainly and not address what it is or attempt to try to solve it, or at the very least to put it out there so that the group can deal with it and grow. His feelings of wanting to leave happened pretty quickly and strongly. Then Daniel also had a series of confrontatiosn with two girls in the house one because he couldnt stand her and the other because they were getting invovled and the relationship went sour. Due to these events he got a Final warning in Respect A because of the disrespect he showed to these two girls. His decision to leave was based on getting this final and the fact that he thought it was childish to get it and that the group is to immature , which I strongly disagree with seeing as how he didn't owe up to anything disrespectful he did in the relationship with one of the girls. So By Wednesday night our group was down to 10 and by yesturday night and now it is presently at 8 participants. They made the decision after the house meeting Thursday night, signed the papers friday morning and got on the plan friday night. We came back home and the van felt really empty. The house feels empty but starngely it feels like a burden has been lifted and hopefully we can be more cohesive now. Other that all the drama in the house I'm still growing and loving it. We got our first snow fall last night and it was beautiful , we made snow angels, I sat on a snowpile on the sidewalk for an hour, the guys made a gigantic snowman and we had a snow ball fight. It's beautiful and warm for me here. I love it. Hope you guys are all well. Tell me how you are all doing. Love, Emily XOXOXO Emily! Miss Volunteer Extraordinaire!! How is everything??! What kinds of placements have you been up to? I’ll have you know that you have been an icon that I refer to within the volunteer and leadership trainings I do across North America – people approach me all of the time asking what sorts of long-term volunteer things they can do right after they graduate high school … and I mention that I happen to know a very groovy chica who had such determination and gumption that she joined Katimavik. And then, all of a sudden, volunteering for a year seems like a very achievable, exciting adventure because someone like them has done it, too. You have been on my mind and in my words quite often … so fill me in with what has been happening!!! I look forward to hearing from you!!! Genuinely, Robin Leadership Coordinator Leaders Today "We are the generation we have been waiting for." Hey Aunt Paulette, I got the present yesturday. Thank you all so much, I love the vest and I won't take it offlol and the shirt fits me perfectly and I love the pictures you sent. I finally got my X-mas cards sent off so you'll be getting one in the mail soon. I'm just on my way out, because my 48 hours of free time is starting soon and I'm gonna catch a bus with 5 other people from my group to Halifax, we're staying in a youth hostel and I'll be exploring the city. I'm so excited to get into the city. I'll talk to you more when i call on my dads cell when you guys are celebrating Leah's birthday. Thanks again. I loved it. Love, Emily Hey Robin, I'm now in the last 10 day stretch of leaving Truro and moving on to Weyburn Saskatchewan. The placement that I am most intrested in doing there is with H.E.L.P International which is an NGO partnered with a branch in Kenya that's goal is to provide aid and edication for here and in Kenya. For example the Katimavik participants that were there these past three months helped collect books and package them and send them to Kenya. So I would really love to get that job when I get there. I love being in the Katimavik program because it's taught me so many things like conflict resolution, group dynamics, and I've been thinking about so many things here. I'm considering all the programs I can be a part of in future during my studies or between my studies. I am thinking about someday volunteering with Mother Theresa's organization for a year or half a year. Because of your stories and others I would love to go to Kenya and help aswell. I would love it if you had any words of wisdom or advice/guidance about this. I would really appreciate your thoughts. During Katimavik I've evaluated my life a bit so far in how I got where I am right now and I'm excited to keep learning and doing more volunteer work. It's really cool, they have a fair trade cafe here which is so nice to see. I'm also considering possibly opening one up someday. I've just been thinking a lot about my life and what i wanna do. I am also getting a bit frustrated because I have all these ideas and dreams in my head that I wanna do and I wanna do them all now lol even though I'm on an adventure of a life time here. I'm so glad i came on the Mexico trip because it was an opener to a new way of seeing the world that I wanna be part of. I feel like I could also be doing more small things here even though I'm away from home and on a long term volunteer program that could invovle major world issues like the genocide in Darfur and the Make Poverty history campaign, if you have any suggestions I would love it. Again I wanted to express to you and Scott that I am so grateful you shared you life experinces, life lessons and wisdom with us on the Mexico volunteer trip, that I will carry what I learned forever and that will guide me on my path. I'll be sending you updates like I do to my friends and family that I try to do weekly. Love, Emily P.S I'd love to hear how your time in Kenya went and the projects you guys did. Hey Everyone, First off I wanna say I'm really sorry but it's been so busy and hectic here, between the 48 hours off, getting my period and being house manager while trying to convice Amber that she should stay and everything else that I'll tell you about below is the reason I didn't send your Xmas cards with a lil something extra in them ....until 5 hours ago even though I started making these lil somethings over a month ago sorry..the lady said that the mail people don't work like thursday or friday or the monday so that you'll probably get it on the tuesday or wednesday after Xmas day but I hope you love them because I put a lot of TLC in them (tender love and care)! Anyways so I'll start from about where I left off after our group dropped to 7 but is currently back to 8 because Manue came back from her medical leave and is fine. So on friday I left work early to pack for our 48 hours off and get the bus for 4:55 to Halifax. So i showed up with 5 other people in my group and we met up with these two guys that a girl in my group knew from her billeting family two weeks before that. They invited us to go to a cafe called One World ( a fair trade cafe) that had 3 singer, song writer/guitarists playing and the money raised went towards the One World organization. It took us forever to find it, we had to cross all of the Halifax downtown in the rain and the rain just kept getting worse, we finally got there and it was amazing all the songs they did were emotional social aware and beautiful. It was great and then we walked through all of halifax downtown again through the rain to catch up with the guys who were doing a pub crawl. Their goal was to do 10 pubs that night, we joined them on their 4 and 5th but then they gave up so we all went to the hostel at 2:00 and all we could see were 3 heads and hair in the beds because they were already 3 girls in the room and we went to bed and didnt see them until the morning where all we said was good morning and went our seperate ways . On saturday me and Catherine went to the farmers market where all the produce and hand made stuff is, it is very cool and unique. Then we went to Pier 21 which is the pier in Halifax that everyone who immigrated to Canada came through and got either "landed immigrant" or "rejected" stamped on their papers. Both sets of my grandparents came through it so I felt really connected. I got my grandparents coffee mugs and spoons that say Pier 21 "Pier into your past" and I started thinking, I cant belive that both of my grand fathers at different times just picked up, living in small villages in remote areas of Italy and Greece and had the courage to go to a land where you had to cross the ocean for days on a ship, couldnt speak the language and didnt no wat to expect. I think this is amazing and now I'm interested to know more about that experience and how they did it. It was so cool they had a multimedia show taht was amazing and it looked like there were real actors on stage and it told a diverse cross section of immigrant stories. I even got papers that you can send to Ottawa where all the records are kept and get a family members ship list and information because me and my dad are interested in seeing the actually paper or record. Then we went to eat lunch and I had Thai food wow boy was I craving it.......then we all went our own ways because everyone wanted to do something different. I decided to walk around, saw the harbour front and a bit of shopping but I was so mad I wanted to get your birthday/xmas all in one gifts at the Ten Thousand Villages Store but right when I got there at 3 they said they normally close at 6 but they were having a staff xmas party so they were closing early and i didnt get to even see anything in there. So I wasnt able to buy you guys somethign I felt comfortable with or wanted to get you and the places around here dont have much besides the supplies for the thing I already made you so hopeffully they get there soon aka after xmas. I believe were goign back on the 30th so hopefully I can go there then. So anyways I was kinda pissed but I continued on and noticed an awesome Basilica that was called St. Mary's and cool parks in the centre of town. So I decided I was gonna walk to the Halifax House but it was gettign dark and its not right downtown so I called Amy to catch up with her and we decided to meet at a cafe so we read our books for a bit but the cafe's coffee machine was broken so we decied to go to another one lol our own "cafe crawl" thats when i started reading The Guardian ohhh dreamy i love it it so emotional and so beautiful. Then we met up with Catherine for Sushi for dinner. Where we ran into the guys from before that invited us to the cafe and he said after dinner we shoudl come over to his house, so we did. It was fun we talked they were both English majors and so intelligent it was very fun. Then they wanted us to come to a club with them that had a raggae band all night but obviously I'm not old enough here so he had a plan for us taht we didnt bother with because they were I.D.ing and he said if they did that go to KYBAR becauase they dont I.D. so we went there and it was good, there was a band and they was a poetry reading . Then we ended up wanting to go so we did what the guy said we went to the Pita Pit, asked for the red marker and copied the stamp that you get on your hand if you go in pay ,show ID and wanna come back in, it was a circle with an OK in it,so all the underagies a.k.a. there was 5 of us and we all copied it liek colouring over somone elses and stamped it on our hands we walked up ,the bouncer looked at them and let us in. lol you should have seen the look on Josh's face, he was so surprised we got in and then I told him I didnt even pay the cover charge he was liek wat the hell and then I and others started dancing to raggae all night. It was so much fun, it was great and we left at 3 and went back to the hostel and teh next mornign we went for breakfast and then me and catherine went for a walk in Point Pleasent Park, Halifax's Springbank Garden Park and then we I spent 24 dollars on fair trade beads at an all bead store called The Bead Pod and I bought a toque thats knitted navy, pink , green and has ear flaps and it looks really good hopefully i'll send u a link to pictures soon. And then we took the bus home and got home around 6pm and we heard everyone elses drinkign and gettign high, and sex stories lol ...the whole weekedn I only had one beer at the pub on friday night and it was Alexander Keiths becasue its Nova Scotian beer and boy is it gross. I think I was the only sober one on saturday night at the club it was called Stage Nine f.y.i. and Moe teh girl in the Halifax group was drunk for her first time and when i was in the bathroom with her she was like you know Bill really liked you.....( do you you guys remember me talking about the only person who really asked me questions and we talked at the camp fire all night at Mass Orientation yah thats him) and anyway I was like oh i stopped talking to him oh well I've heard stories about him that I dont like oh well anyway . Um on Monday I went out with Amber and Ben and I wasnt in a good mood because I had just got my period and Raymond gave me one of the sweetest thigns anyone has thus far ....he taped up 4 pieces of construction paper over my bed on the slanted ceiling that had everything about me that was great anyway its late so i better wrap this up lol get it wrap it up, with that omg I love you all, Emily Hey Everyone I'm happy to tell you all that on Wednesday January 4th at 9:15 am until noon I will be at the Toronto airport en route to Weyburn, Saskatchewan. Our flight from Halifax to Toronto is with Canjet #101 and we will arrive in Terminal 3 at 9:15, then we have to check in at Terminal 1 so that's where I'll be meeting anyone who wants to meet me there at the Air Canada baggage check in. It would be great to see all of you! Love, Emily HEY GUYS, THANK YOU FOR THE QUILT SO MUCH OMG IT'S THE BEST GIFT I'VE EVER RECEIVED IN MY LIFE. IT MEANS SO MUCH TO ME. iT MADE ME CRY. I CAN TELL IT TOOK A LONG TIME TO MAKE, A LOT OF CREATIVITY AND A LOT OF LOVE. YOU MUST KNOW THAT THIS MEANS THE WORLD TO ME.MARRY XMAS AGAIN ON THIS XMAS EVE.....I CALLED AND TALKED TO HILARY ALREADY, NICOLE YOUR PHONE WAS BUSY, WILKIE YOU WERE WORKING AND THEN I HAD TO MAKE DINNER, HAD DINNER, AND NOW THE PHONE IS BEING MONOPOLIZED BY EVERYONE ELSE SO I CANT GET ON SO I DECIDED TO WRITE AN EMAIL NOW. SO I'LL TRY WILKIE, NICOLE AND RIGGS AGAIN IF I CAN AND THEN I'M GOING TO MIDNIGHT MASS. IF I DON'T CALL U TONIGHT I'LL CALL U ALL TOMORROW NIGHT. YOU HAVE PUT A PERMANENT SMILE ON MY FACE, MY HEARTAND SOUL. I LOVE YOU GUYS SO MUCH, EMILY p.S. THANKS FOR THE BEAUTIFUL CARD AND FOR SENDING MY YEARBOOK Hey Everyone, I'm just emailing you all to wish you a happy New Years. I'm going to be voluntering at Truro's community event. It should be fun hope to see you all in Toronto on Jan.4th in terminal 1 at the Air Canada booth. Love you all, Emily Dear Emily, I sorry I did not say good bye to you and Ben before you left for Saskatchewan. The two of you helped to restore my faith in young people. Perhaps that is an overstatement. It is just that I don't know a lot of young people and some time I confess I despair of some of the young people I meet especially when they crowd me off the sidewalk as they pass me bye. I enjoyed your company and hope that this year will give you a better understanding of yourselves and what you are being called to do with your life. I hope you had a Good Christmas and that 2006 will bring you happiness. Take care and God Bless you, Tim Hey Everyone, It's been one week since I got here. I like the town a lot, it's got a big city feel downtown because it has big buildings and streets but its population is only 10,000. Its really cute, the people are really friendly and everyone's helpful. We already got into the newspaper and if you go to www.weyburnreview.com go to Current Issue and scroll down you will see us all in the museum with the whole group except we all look a bit scary but oh well an appearance in the paper is an appearance. We can go to the movie theatre here for $2 and a new movie comes every week i've already seen Narnia, but didnt wanna see King Kong. We've gone swimming, walked the Tatagwa View trail which is their only real park here like the Spring Gardens or High Park of Weyburn but its so flat, its hilarious and you can see for miles lol, liek if one person is 15 minutes behind you on the path in another part you can see them. Next weekend we're going curling, square dancing and to see the Moose Jaw Tunnels where the mines and Al Capone's bootleggin paths were, should be fun. Now my job is one that I wasn't thrilled with in the beginning but I know I will eventually love it. I originally wanted Help International because I'm interested in International development and I think its a great orginization (its about finding more efficient and enviromentally friendly farming practices in Saskatchewan and for their branch office which is in Kenya, proving education about this and other issues facing Africa and smaller projects they do like Books 4 Africa where they coolect books here and send them to kenya www.help-international.com) but the actaul jobs/tasks the guy wanted done over this three months is takign a part his tractor and fixing it, building a building and a fence, and some computer programing and seeing as the other two people who wanted this job had Auto mechanic, framing house and computer programming experience that I didnt it fit them better but i didnt know this information when I found out they got the job instead of me, and also I wanted the job at the Early Childhood Intervention Program place because at first they explained it as a administrative position but added that if you were gunhoe which of course I am that you could take on some clients and actually work with the Social Worker Interventionists by researching the problem a child is havign and preparing games, toys and creative ways to help them learn and I think I coudl really excell at that but because the other couple of people who wanted the job had the same list of job preferences, no one wanted to go to the museum so because they other two are allergic to dust abnd have doen the same kind of work before I got the job at the museum even though it was on my Jobs that I defiently don't want list that our Project Leader agonized over where to place people for one whole day. his conclusion was that everyoen woudl be a little unhappy or everyone woudl be really happy and one person would be pissed and that one person happen to be me, mostly because everyone knows I will find the positive in it, I adapt the easiest and was a change from what i was doing before. So in conclusion to this long e mail I'm happy at my work placement so far which is working at the Family Place in themorning from 9-12 (they don't like to be classified as a day care because they are so much more, they run classes with 2 year olds on Mondays and from Tues. to Fri with 3 and 4 year olds that usually have physical, emotional, or social disabilties or mostly come from families where the parents either work all the time or don't care about them/can't deal with them as I've observed after 4 days of being there but a lot are pretty normal)play with them, do gymnastic, swim, dress up, play with playdoh for about an hour, then we have snack time(and they eat a lot because I think a lot of them don't get a lot of food at home), then we have circle time where we read stories and sing songs and teach them skills like the days of the week, the weather and "Head, Shoulders, knees and toes, knees and toes," then they play a bit more and then I leave at 12 while they're about to have lunch and the program doesn't end until 1 so all the staff (speaking of which on Mondays we have 12 kids and there is 8 staff and on Tues-Fri theres 23 kids and 14 staff its crazy how many of us there are but its needed)and the two other Katimavik participants have to clean it all up and that's when I move on to the museum for the afternoon from 1-5. Soo Line Historical Museum is where I work with Lavine who has been Curator/Manager at the museum for 28 years where I will be cataloguing artifacts, helping people find stuff for research, doing administartive tasks, providing tourist information, settign up displays, taking them down for instance we took down 8 christams trees and a Xmas scene which took us all of Monday and Tuesday lol and at 3:30 everyday we have hot chocolate and cookies.....so I'll be learning about all the aspects of a museum especially did I mention cleaning I've already vacuumed and dusted like 3 times ahhhhh oh well I'm liking it so far. So this concludes my extrememly long email of my first impressions of Weyburn and my job, I'm also on Cultural Discovery and Leadership Committees so I'll be planning a ton of activities. I hope you are all well and staying warm lol because even though its suppose to be -20 at this time of the year itsonly been between 1 and -1. hehehe I love you all, Goodnight or Good morning however you look at it wow its Friday the 13th today just noticed thats lucky for Italians right hope to hear from you all soon!
