The Canadian Dream

On Hive this weekend we got given a challenge to talk about firsts: first kiss, first pet, first time to move out or first time to move abroad. I decided to share my adventure of living in Canada!

It All Starts With An Opportunity

When I was studying in the Netherlands during my bachelor at uni there was an option to apply for studying abroad without having to pay extra fees. I applied to go to Canada, the nature and university appealed to me. Obviously hundreds of other students applied as well and there were 2 spots.... But somehow I was one of the lucky two to go and off to Toronto I moved!

I was accepted to York University but went to a small campus of theirs that was bilingual French and English as I could speak both. I moved without knowing much at all, I had gotten a date to move into my dorm room and I had confirmation of the courses I was going to follow but that was about it.

Canadian University Life

Quickly Canadian University life turned out to be quite different than the Netherlands. I lived in a dorm now, nobody in the Netherlands lives at a university dorm, you just live in a house somewhere in a city. My dorm room was tiny, but at least I had one to myself, most were sharing which was something I really didn't want to do!

I ended up in a girl only dorm and let me tell you a hallway of 30 women living together is.... interesting haha especially since many shared a room there were discussions often about noise, visiting boyfriends and shower habits haha.

The awesome thing though was getting to know lots of new people and living with them too. We all ate together at university, as these dorms don't have kitchens. Something I didn't mind as I am not a great cook.

The High Points of Canadian Living

It was super interesting to go to a North American university and get to see some new things: Spirit rallies (to get people excited, involve lots of cheerleaders and music), American Football, Lacrosse, Basketball, Canada Day etc.

I did not become a fan of American Football, but I did like going to basketball games of the Toronto Raptors and going to Niagra Falls, which is pretty close to Toronto. We also went to New York and Washington DC and visited Montreal as well.

It also got cold of course (duh it gets cold in Canada) and I love winter, so got to go ice skating too!

The Lows

But it is never the case that everything is great, and this wasn't the case here either. I think what I found hardest was making Canadian friends. I went in the third year of my studies, by that time most people have set friend groups and Canadians are very friendly but not the easiest to become friends with, their groups can be a bit closed off.
So in the end most Europeans stuck together and formed a friend group. Which was great, we had amazing friendships and many of them still last today, but we did miss out on the Canadian experience a bit because of this.

All us Europeans also started missing our food sorely after a while. We all missed cheese, I dearly missed a potato based cuisine and licorice. The Italians and Spanish missed olive oil and meats and the French missed everything. We ended up starting a little food club and rent a kitchen every now and then to have our own food.

It turned out, our European identities revolved mostly around food haha. It was great fun, but I wondered if we missed out on the true Canadian experience like this by sticking to our own habits.

All in all I had an amazing year in Canada and am still super happy I did it! I had to go back to the Netherlands to finish my studies, but will always remember the Canadian days with a happy heart!