You can never prepare yourself enough in saying good-bye. I think I ahve over-estimated myself too many times in this area.

My last few weeks in TO has been a series of tasks - work, last minute catch up, drinks, dinners, shopping and tying up loose ends etc etc... so miuch so that is made it quite convenient to forget what it was all for. I'm flying out of a city that has been home to me for the last 7 months, and it hasn't hit me yet.. although my luggage is all packed and ready at home.

Canada is a great country, but I think I have done everything I have set out to do here. I've travelled... I've rekindled old friendships as well as made new... I've partied... I've worked in various jobs that I would never have done at home... I've roughed it, cried, laughed... and I've spent a shitload on shopping.

I think I'm pretty much ready to leave this country, the only thing holding me back is all the relationships I've made here... all the people who have been my family and friends. From a city that meant nothing to me but work opportunities, to a city full of close friends... how things change!

I'm trying to think how sad I was when I left Sydney one year ago... and to tell you the truth, I was more excited than sad. I guess I take my family for granted, but it's also the fact that the lifestyle I left behind can be easily resumed with a few minor changes. Home is always home. I'm really feeling the different as I leave TO.

Thank god that although cities stay, people are able to move... the world is not as big as it used to be.

Thanks for the people in TO for topping my year off, and thanks for all my friends at home who have always lent an ear when I most need it!

At the moment this city is packed with celebrities and parties as the Toronto Film Festival is at play. I never was one to make a big deal about celebrities, partly because I refuse to give them the attention that so many fans unconditionally smother them with.

But when just a stroll home opens an opportunity for a prime position right next to a red carpet at a large broadcasted celebrity party, my pride was tempted with the story I could publish on this very blog. So I sacrificed myself for you guys, and agreed to stand in an exclusive area right next to the red carpet.. with the catch being that I stay there for at least 20 mins.

So I find myself right at the barrier, within grabbing distance of any celebrity that may stroll up the red carpet. My mind was spinning with possibilities of exciting news that could lift my blog from the boring updates I have been posting lately. But the only celebrity I saw as an old dude that was meant to be a local newsreader (so someone explained)... and whoever was being interviewed on the big screen at that time. Not only was I jipped of celebrity sitings, everytime a stupid camera rolled by, I was instructed to scream and cheer so that I can be broadcasted live on TV like another one of "those" fans who have nothing better to do with their time than stalk celebrities.

Speaking of stalking, I cannot for the life of me pronounce it with a Canadian accent... or with any accent that these Canadians can understand anyways. It usually takes me an average of 5 repeats before some understands me!!!

Anyways, a little more exciting was the World Cup Hockey Semi-Finals that I went to watch between Canada and the Czech Republic. Appropriate since I am in Canada and will be visiting the Czech in the next 3 weeks. Tickets were so difficult to find and probably sold out a year ago... but lucky us, we were given free tickets by a patient of Gord's. So I got to experience the ultimate Canadian experience... sitting in the ACC, watching an World Cup Game of the nation's most followed sport. It was a really close and exciting game... where Canada won in overtime. I did well in terms of not embarrassing Gord with my clueless cheers... he made me memorise key players and their numbers.. he got excited when I practised my cheering when lead-up games were covered on TV, but was horrified when I yelled "yah, we won a point!"... I was promptly corrected... how was I to know that you "score goals" in hockey and not "win points"?? But I think I did good at the actual game, I even got a bit of the flag waving action going... and the fact that it was a home game meant that I was always safe in cheering when the rest of the stadium was cheering!

The victory spilled onto the streets of the city where people celebrated by jamming the streets, honking horns and high-fiving anyone you came across. This lasted for at least 3 hours!

Anyways, lotsa of excitement, but this week has also brought the realisation that I will be in fact leaving in 2 weeks which dampens the mood a bit!

The summer that never was...

New photos have been posted up. There's photos from my Montreal girly trip, my roadtrip with Christina, and just photos from various Toronto outings.

For the random followers of this blog, you may be confused with the references to Sigma Caillou in my comments. They're just a bunch of really cool chicks I hang out with, and we often joke about being in a soroity and incorporating it. So we have extended it as far as having a position and responsibilities etc etc. Recently I have been promoted from "The Recruit" to "Overseas Correspondent" for obvious reasons. As silly as it sounds, these girls are a bundle of laughs.

Hmm.. so whats new for this week? I went to a party themed "Playboy Mansion" (where I went as Sarah Jessica Parker and rubbed shoulders with Paris, JLo, Britney and such guests), caught up briefly with Milli and Terence when they were in town, tried out Jamaican food which wasn't bad at all (considering I was rather skeptical with the Ox-tail dish) and had a few many BBQs as these Torontonians are savouring the last of summer. But mostly, I have been sleeping heaps... partly coz I was sick last weekly, and partly coz I'm just plain lazy!

27 days to go...

... and sad to be leaving. I've been a bit quiet of late because I haven't really had any stories to tell. Been chilling out a lot... after Christina and I came back from the roadtrip, we did a lot of eating so that Christina will be well stocked for her next journey of being a true backpacker with a diet of museli bars and miso soup.

Another friend Chris from my uni days is also here for the month on a business trip, which was quite a surprise. So we have been re-acquainting ourselves with the constant payouts we dished in uni. He is also living in some really swish apartments, on the weekend we went over and played virtual golf... which meant we were hitting the balls on to a wall of material, where there was a projection of a fairway. Man, if you think real golf is hard, virtual golf is twice as hard! I think we took hours just to play 2 holes, and had no hesitation in prematurely calling it quits.

Milli and Terence are also in town for one short week... so will be catching up with tonight with a bbq on Chris's roof-top patio. I think these are my last visitors... which brings the count to a grand total of 13 in Toronto! I feel loved! *beam*

Being my last month in TO, I finally have my flights organised. It's sad, and I have been going through a number of mixed feelings, but hey, I guess I gotta leave some time!

So... will be flying out of TO on the 27th Sept, and will be heading to London, Prague and Hong Kong before arriving home on the 20th October. You guys should pencil in the 22nd October for another drunken episode at the Opera Bar (for old times sake!).

Anyways... for people in the land of Oz, enjoy the first day of Spring. I am so looking forward to coming home to a decent summer!