West Ham United Vs. Dirty Stoke Buggers

Hey there!

Well, after a bunch of school work I decided to head back to Borehamwood near London, to see the grandparents. Also, my uncle had came over from Canada for a visit.



This prompted my visit to Upton Park to see some Premiership football action. Luckily I found some cheap (but well placed) seats, as you do, and after a long couple rides on the tube, we made it along with the rest of the West Ham hooligans to Upton Park. It was a great atmosphere with a over 35,000 in attendance to watch the 1-1 draw between the two sides.It was a decent game with chances on both ends. I was happy just to see a WHU goal and join in on some chants, while watching my uncle call some Stoke players wankers. All good banter.  My highlight was finally getting to sing "I'm forever blowing bubbles" and eating what I thought was a burger but was probably more like paste. After a long night we arrived back at number 96 in Borehamwood for some much need rest!

A home away from home- Dublin, Dún Laoghaire and Bray

I apologize for not writing on here for a.... actually no I don't apologize, screw that.

Haven't blogged in a while. Cool story. Here is a blog about my trip to Ireland way back!

One night as I was sitting in my room at Kirkstall Brewery, I spotted a status from one of my fellow exchange students, Naomi (from Australia). She and some other friends were going to Dublin, for really cheap too! It caught my eye, and as I wasn't doing anything that weekend, and as usually happens on exchange, you go for it.


So after booking flights with those cheeky monkeys at Ryanair, we headed out at 5 am to catch our flight. The girls had been out partying before so they were a bit tired to say the least. We were quite the bunch walking into Leeds Bradford Airport. An Aussie, a Mexican named Gala, a Canadian (moi) and the only seemingly domestic English person, Katie!

We got on the flight, blah blah blah. We landed. Surprisingly, customs was a breeze for me, while the American in front had quite the difficulty getting through quickly.

We got out of the airport and took a shuttle to the city centre which was a decently long ride where we caught some sleep! When we arrived we were greeted by many buildings of all shapes and sizes including this peculiar needle 
 which was quite, maybe even unnecessarily tall.

Everyone had gone without breakfast that  morning, so we decided to stop in at a little cafe for some much needed food. I had a traditional Irish breakfast (looked quite a bit similar to the traditional English breakfast.... hmmm) while the other had... well I can't bloody well remember now can I.
 After this we all headed to Ashfield house, a hostel where we were staying for the trip. It didnt look as bad as I thought it would, it was quite nice really. It wasn't  The Ritz, but it'd do. That's if I would've stayed there anyway..

We were to early to check-in, and while the other dealt with some other stuff ( other travel plans and sleep), Naomi and I went exploring Dublin.  We set off into the streets aimlessly looking for some cool buildings to take pictures off. Dublin city centre is quite the place. It's like any city with busy people all around, but it has a vibe to it, that "Irish feeling" that you expect to be there in the first place. Our first stop was Trinity College. This was probably the nicest campus I had seen in terms of being picturesque. It had an old feeling to it that made it extremely interesting. Plus there was this giant gold ball that I don't know the significance of just chilling in the centre of campus.

We walked around for a bit and found ourselves in the temple bar area, which also happened to have a shopping area which was quite busy and had the coolest vibe about it. Music was everywhere, there were performers, whiskey shops, pubs, all of it, just as you'd imagine. It wasn't that crap music you see sung by that Beiber toolbox from Stratford,Ontario, it was good stuff of all kinds. There was even a boy band that could actually sing and play instruments there... wow lol!

Dún Laoghaire

Now this is where stuff happens on the fly, it was a pretty cool experience.
About a day and a half  before I had come over I had talked to one of my mom's cousins in Ireland, telling her I would be coming. Short notice I know, life of a student?

I was unsure of if we would be able to meet up, but when I checked Facebook using the Wifi at the hostel, sure enough Deborah had left me a message. After much searching and buying a phone card, I found myself on a random train to Dún Laoghaire (try to pronounce it, you won't get it trust me) to meet up with family members I had never met before.

On the train it seemed the further away from the city you got, the more beautiful Ireland became. I can say this from first hand experience it was one of the most beautiful places I had ever been.
Ok back to the eventful day.

I had no idea what to expect stepping out onto the childhood stomping ground of my grandparents, but in the weirdest way it felt like a home away from home.

I waited by the water for a bit taking in the area, when I got a text from Deborah that she would be there any minute. I will say it is weird meeting someone you are related to for the first time, but not in a bad way. Little did I know just how many people I would go on to meet.

*DISCLAIMER: I MET SO MANY PEOPLE I WILL PROMISE I WILL CALL SOMEONE THE WRONG NAME IN THIS SECTION, DO NOT BE OFFENDED, I HAVE THE MEMORY OF AN 100 YEAR OLD MAN*

Deborah, Jackie and Elle then came around corner, and again in a funny way it didn't feel like the first time we had all met.

From there we talked and went along till we got to the swimming area where my Grandad used to wreak havoc called the 40 foot. You can begin to see from the pictures exactly how picturesque Ireland is. Following our walk the fun began as we went to the my grandads sisters house where it seemed like a million people I didn't know had gathered to say hello. Everyone made me feel right at home, and most importantly: fed me. It's true what they say about there's nothing like family.

It was getting dark so we headed to my cousin Eimhin's house to get some grub and relax. We got Chinese (amazing).  It had been quite a long day so I hit the bed with force, game over.

Bray

Next morning I got a big bacon and egg breakfast courtesy of Chef Patrick. I then headed on another train to meet my cousin Elaine to head to see Mary and Carly in Bray.

I had met these three years back, but it was nice to meet them in Ireland for a tour of Bray. After a brief catch up session in the house, we took a walk up Bray Head. Oh the sight. You could literally put the pictures I took straight onto a postcard. When you envision Ireland, this is what you imagine. Hills, fields, horses, the whole thing! After the long walk up and down and a nice meal, it was time for goodbyes! Fortunately I'll be heading back January 2nd-4th some point! 

I arrived back in Dún Laoghaire for a second meal and got ready to hit the town hahah. The monumental moment of this night I will say
was figuring out that oysters.......are not Evan's thing.  After some drinks and a good time I awoke to remember I had left the rest of my global crew in Dublin City Centre and they may or may not think I am in a ditch somewhere.

So we went for a brisk morning walk up  Killiney hill to do some sightseeing (Pictures in the hands of others! Will update soon) for some more amazing sites TO BE UPDATED.


BACK TO DUBLIN

When back in Dublin City centre, I met up with the others who were all hurting units from the previous evenings shenanigans. Gala was set on a city tour, which we joined in on for a brief amount of time.

We went to the City Hall, the halls of Justice, saw the remainng pieces of Dublin castle, and a poets house before getting some nasty takeaway and  heading to the airport.


All n all it was a great trip, although the plane landing was by far the scariest thing I have experienced on an air plane. I didn't really have time to catch my breath....hockey practice was waiting for me straight off the plane.

Bonjour Paris

Well, where to begin. An unreal trip, lots of great memories from this one folks. Here we go off to Paris for the first time along with playing the Millennium World Cup.......

So, the plan was originally to fly, but why fly for 2 hours when you can drive for 10! Yes fun! It turned out to be a good time though even with my two mongoloid compadres Brennan and Martin beating the absolute shite out of each other, with Brennan continually showering the van with his vile rear-end. Enough of that though. On to the memories....

Dicky picked me up from Kirkstall Brewery (my residence  in Leeds), and we headed down to Birmingham Disruption HQ to meet the rest of the goons and their mother a.k.a Pikey (Just messing Pikey).

We hung out and went into downtown Scunthorpe to get some chips (clearly should be called fries). We then headed back to HQ and slept for about an hour. Got on the rented bus, and hit the road at about 3 am to Cheesy Baguette land!

It was a long journey from Pikey's to the ferry in Dover that Wednesday night/ Thursday morning, where in fact I got my first glimpse of the White cliffs. After telling Brennan they had just got a fresh coat of paint, we board the giant tin can and set off for Calais, France

After having a questionably expensive breakfast on the ferry and getting some Euro's, we landed in Frenchy land. It was deja vu as we were on the correct side of the road (the right) again. It was another 4 hour drive through odd little French communities and country sides till we started getting close to Euro-Disney. As we finally pulled in to the hotel where some of the guys were staying, I got a good look round. Place was sweet.

We then headed to the field for what was to be my first glimpse of a World Cup Millennium tournament in Paris. I was quite excited! The whole place was done up quite nice with a lot of vendors and fields. Some of the teams were training so we chilled out for a bit and watched.

At the end of the day, it was time for me to head to my team's villa. Wow what a place. It was pretty far from the field but was an extremely nice villa with a pool, 3D HDTV massage parlour, and a number of other things! I unpacked my bags and a bunch of us attempted to find the nearest grocery store in the pouring rain. One thing about France when you are in the outskirts of a city, everything is tiny little shops and cafe's. So we spent an arm and a leg on random French food and walked home soaked, where I feasted on my ham and bread sandwich, which was glorious by the way.

 Friday morning my friends on Disruption were playing. I subsequently destroyed my voice through excellent Canadian patented coaching ability, with Disruption ending up winning against Paris Camp Carnage! After walking around the event site, Dan, Lucy, Alastair and Paco (Luke) decided it was time to go to central Paris and see what all the hype was about.

The train ride was very funny as we got some goofy looks from the French natives who apparently thought English was quite funny. After slowly figuring out what station we were to get off at, we hopped off onto the streets of Paris.

Now, when you visit Paris, you may be under the assumption that everything (Louvre, Notre Dame, Eiffel Tower, Royal Palace) are all near each other or are in close proximity. Not the case in the bloody slightest.

   We started off someone near the Louvre, which is massive. We decided that enough money would be spent on other parts of the trip, so we passed on being art connoisseurs for the day and continued on. As you walk around Paris you begin to see why it is one of Europe's top tourist destinations. Central Paris (apparently it is not the same on the outskirts) has a very clean-cut tidy feel to it with tons of beautiful buildings to look at. We walked alone getting some extremely nice pictures and then as a cloud was starting to come in we decided that the best thing would be to go and see the Eiffel tower.

This is the point where we actually realized exactly how far away it really was. An hour long walk later we finally were able to see the tower. We took some funny pictures, had a beer in front of it on the grass and then relaxed.

While I was slightly mad I didn't get to see Notre Dame, my feet were killing me, I was hungry and it was match day tomorrow. Back to the villa we go. The train stations were quite packed on the way back, and a train was just arriving when we got onto the platform. It was full, but Alastair decided to be a bozo, and jumped on the train laughing at how we would have to wait. While he was getting lost and getting his face squeezed on the glass, we got the next train which was much more comfortable. We had to make a transfer and assumed Alastair had known this. He was no where to be seen along the locals, so we left him behind like the good friends we are, knowing he'd probably make it back or become a slave to some criminal organization.YOLO.

We arrived back at Disney land and after eating  a very good Chinese/Korean meal we headed back to the villa. I slept on the pull out couch very comfortably and woke up to Ainsley playing Eye of the Tiger (scared me more than anything). We headed to the field and registered and started to make preparations to kick some ass. Our first two games of the 2012 Millennium World Cup of paintball did not go some well. We went 0-2 to start the tournament, mainly due to terrible paint and just a bad start. We knew we had to finish off the day strong, playing a UK team, Russian team and a Belgian team. In these three games, we got some new paint ball's and somehow the negativity from the first three games dissipated and we dusted the last 3 games off ending the day 3-2. We had one final  game that decided if we went through to playoffs or not. It was against a French team with some pansy name that I can't recall because it was silly. We murdered them hands down, off to the playoffs the following day.

32 teams went on to the playoffs in a single elimination structure. Our first game was against the Moscow Bears. We were having paint issues again and the rain was becoming a really large factor affecting everyone's equipment. The little guy Jordan on our team was so cold he was shaking (maybe he should eat a burger once in a while). We started the game and quickly jumped out to a 1-0 lead with some sharp play up the middle of the field. I went on for the next point and was shooting  flame thrower (paint was breaking inside the barrel) but still managed to shoot a couple while the rest were cleaned up by my teammates. On to the round of 16!

In the round of 16 we were lucky, very lucky. We went back and forth and ended regular time tied 1-1. Going to the extra point we were unfortunate to get a penalty early on leaving us with only 3 guys remaining. The french team were good, but they also received a penalty. The only thing was, the player who was pulled out did not leave immediately, resulting in the ref giving them another penalty. Their team was left with one player, who Alastair blasted and we moved on. The French team were absolutely livid and flipping out, and would not shake me hand. Typical.

Heading into the quarter finals, everyone was cold, tired and had been through a lot of tough games that day. We tried to get through it and were playing the London Tigers, a very established team with quite good players on the roster.  They weren't very good sportsman, but that's paintball for you. We essentially lost the match for ourselves with Dan getting a major wiping penalty  very late in the first point, equaling a loss which we never recovered from. At the end of the match, the Tigers player absolutely leveled poor Jordan with an unnecessary but of overshooting (prick) which ended our tournament.

 From the game I headed straight off as the Disruption guys were waiting at the bus for our trip home (Yippeeee-- not). I was still soaked as we made our trip to the ferry. No messing about this time we were taking the quick way back.

We got to the ferry in great time, although Dicky and Pikey were quite worried as we had no petrol left and so far to go. We scrounged up what cash and coin we had (as you do) , and attempted to find petrol. We found it and were on our way. Some, Brennan and Martin still found a way to get pissed at each other, as Brennan let Jim use his Dr.Dre's while he wouldn't give them to his own brother..... everyone else found it funny until the punch up started getting out of hand and Bathy decided he'd seen enough.

It was about 3:30 am when I finally got back into residence. Somehow, my flat mates were still up after a night out, clearly affected by the alcohol hahah. I was so tired I threw everything on my bed on the floor and passed out.


Cool story right?

York...Going Medieval

This was one of my less exciting, more standard adventures. So I decided one Wednesday to hop on the train to York, have heard that its beautiful, old, and features Diagon alley from Harry Potter.
When I got there, I had no idea that York was such a populated place. It was bustling and the train station was quite big.I had to cross over a couple bridges inside to get where I wanted to go.

Walking through York is liking walking back in time. Even the shops looked older than anything you'd find in Canada. Of course you've got you new shops, but that's to be expected.

My first stop was the York Minster cathedral. Now if I could say go see one thing in York, regardless of who you are, I'd say go see this. The place was absolutely massive. Easily the biggest cathedral/church I've ever stepped foot in. Besides the cost to enter, the place is pretty great. Everything is massive, and so nicely sculpted and setup! There are a lot of rooms and a cellar where you can see the foundation of the roman fortress that was there hundreds of years earlier. 

 I decided to take the tour of the tower (it's a long trip up). Before I did, there was a little "bake sale" going on in the corner for some charity. This is when I realized I was surrounded by an absolute mob of old people, "senior citizens" if you will. This may have scared any other off, but I went in for the baked goods. Having to have a conversation with one of the old people about their life story was easily worth the delicious goodies that these ladies could bake.

 By then it was time to head up the tower. There were a bunch of us that went up single file in the absolutely ridiculously narrow stairs (which were all uneven and different sizes). I made the mistake of letting an older person get in front of me and was stopped a few times on the climb up the few hundred stairs that were present. The top of the cathedral made for a really beautiful view that allowed you to see for miles! On the whole way up and down along the wall thousands of people have written their names and the year they visited. Same here brah, Emac is now part of York Minster history.

 The next stop was actually the one that was hyped up for me: Diagon Alley a.k.a "The Shambles". This was named the most picturesque street in Europe, and it lived up to the hype. It used to be the butchers street in medieval times. There would be meat hanging everywhere with blood dripping all over the place and dirty little medieval people putting their grubby hands on it. It was cool to see and was one of the most busy places hands down.

 On the way to find Clifford's tower (castle keep in York), I found this crazy road sign. I thought it was unreal so I took a knee and asked a lady to take the picture. She and many others seemed to wonder why I was so interested in getting a picture. If they have this many weird street names in Europe, then I guess it's going to be hard finding my way around! After the weird looks I quickly jogged off to find this damn tower.

I finally found it. Took some time and some hard core navigation (actually I followed a sign that read: "Clifford tower- left") but I made it. Seeing the keep surrounded by a hill was pretty cool. It was a lot higher up then I thought. After taking this photo to the left I also thought I could become Windows new default desktop background photographer. The keep wasn't as big as I thought but it was crazy to think how hard it was to build it on the hill and lug all the materials up.

Okay, that sums up my standard York experience. Next up the Paris blog (A little, make that a lot, less standard)

Peace!

Hopping in a car with a stranger can end up being......

A great time, well, maybe not all the time, but in this case it was awesome! So before I came over I decided that I wanted to try and play in the Millennium World Cup (A massive European paintball championship). Little did I know I would end up meeting some awesome people and having some good times I won't soon forget, and the championship hasn't even happened yet!

So on the Friday night the owner of the team and  the site where the team trains (National Paintball Centre in Penkridge) called me up and let me know how I was getting down. I was to meet someone at a train station in Leeds that I'd never been to before and they would then drive me to some place in the middle of nowhere (sorry Pikey) where I'd stay for the night before hitting the road again Saturday morning. Sounds like the start to some movie where a serial killer reels in someone via the internet. YOLO

So I grabbed a cab to the Leeds train station, waited around a little bit then I get a text "Look for the car with two Japanese kids standing in front of it, i'll be out in a minute". I'm about to be kidnapped and my dad probably won't be able to go Liam Neeson in Taken for me. Sweeeet. 

Turns out that Dicky, Martin and Brennan (a.k.a Mongoloid) were pretty awesome people. We talked about Canada (Brennan ripped me apart about my voice-still does to this day) and paintball along with other things making for a quick car ride. We then arrived at Pikey's house after travelling down a road that I'm going to recommend to a director/producer for a horror movie (or film, as they say in the UK). This is where I met some other members of the Millenium CPL team Birmingham Disruption . Along with being the friendliest and funniest of guys, it so happens they can play paintball pretty damn well.

We stayed up till around midnight with Pikey's fascination with hockey ("ice hockey") keeping us up watching Scott Stevens destroy hockey players lives on YouTube.

We hit the road in the morning starting with a Sausage and  Egg McMuffin. They taste the same everywhere in the world, and when you eat them they are great, but after it was the worst decision you've ever made.

  After a couple hours of driving we arrived at the field, blew up the bunkers. My teams practice wasn't until the next day, so the BD guys let me jump in to get some good practice. Turned out to be a good day weather wise and even had a little 100m sprint and MMA fighting involved at the end (Brennan finished the day with a shite record).

 That night I went to my teamate Ali's house. We were starving so we decided to check out the local carvery. I hadn't been to one and there aren't many around in Canada. Turns out that it may be one of the single greatest ideas anyone ever had. You pay around six pounds and get a choice of Turkey, Roast Beef, or Roast Pork , or a combination. You then get a Yorkshire pudding of various sizes and every other piece of roast dinner you could possibly imagine (besides the meat, you can have as much as you want).

Needless to say I almost passed out after finishing my meal thinking my stomach was about to explode!

The Sunday was a day of scrimmaging, it was fun to meet all the new teammates and get to know the field layout while playing BD, and the Firm (from Manchester).

I then hit the road home, and then remembered the next day was Monday and yelled an expletive.

Arriving In Leeds

After getting a little lost with the grandad and his new "SatNav" (GPS for us Canadians), we finally found my new home for the next 6 months.
Being the Friday of the move in weekend, not many people were there, so I went and grabbed my keys and pulled my ice hockey equipment out of the car. Of all things to be expected, I did not think that someone would instantly come up to me and ask me about my hockey stuff and where he could play! Pretty crazy. I started to move my stuff in with a few trips down the creepy hallway with flickering lights shown above!

I was pleasantly surprised as I got into my new flat. it was miles bigger than many of the others and my room was actually twice as big as in my first year at Brock University in Canada! It is funny when you think of the differences of being so close to home and being able to drag unlimited furniture, clothes and other stuff to uni that when you are on exchange you cannot believe how little you have to put in your room. To this day just under a month later my room still looks barren.  When I went to borrow a duvet cover and sheets off of my grandparents, I didn't really know what I was going to get. Apparently my grandmother thinks I am a ten year old girl with pink sheets and a  floral laced duvet cover which still hasn't seen the light of day. Some times you just have to laugh it off and go with it haha.

I was at this point where my roommates (flatmates) started to move in slowly. I got to meet Melissa, Kathryn, Ollie, Lexi and Joel. I seemed to have lucked out with some pretty awesome flatties and we are having a blast so far !

They are all English and are from all over the country, sometimes I can't understand a damn word they are saying, but nodding and saying yes seems to work!

Paralympics!

So for the first while of being at the grandparents house, I desperately was attempting to get tickets to the athletics/ other Paralympic events, to no avail. I even went down to the Olympic park in Stratford to try, and came up with nothing. Although I did meet an Australian Gold medalist and his coaches, getting to see the medal! Still, with almost every event listed as sold out,I had given up for a time. This was until I somehow saw a twitter alert just as it came up saying tickets had become available. Not only had I scored tickets, they just happened to be for all the gold medal races/ track events!

 With this I set off not realizing how unreal the event was going to be. I grabbed the tube down to the park a bit early as I was to meet a friend going to Leeds Met as well (still had no cell phone, what a challenge to find someone without one!). Even better was that Jemma had been volunteering at the Paralympics for a while, so she she showed me around the entire park, which was unbelievably massive!

It came time to part ways and I headed into the Olympic stadium to find my seat (decent seats and I was at the end of the aisle-BONUS). The athletics had just started and I got to see some fantastic races in  the greatest I had ever been apart of, so sick. It got towards the end and the race everyone had been dying to see. Johnny Peacock of Team GB vs. Oscar Pistorius, and some other guys. Here is the video!

It was a great night, I got many great pictures, met some cool international people. Well worth the 30 pound spent, would do it again anytime. Next on list- Winter Olympics, World Cup!