Filipino Living in CANADA

Oh Man…WInter is coming!!! Brrrrrrr…cold…my hands and feet is hurting! And the garage have a lot of snow piling up. This is the time of th year I really miss the Philippines. I miss the warm and humid weather, Parols hanging in every house. Here in Canada, you have to start the car and lt it heat up for 15 minutes then make sure to plow the snow then once you go home….plow again the snow. But what can I do, I’m here in Canada. Have to wiat until I’m in my retiring age..around 55 to  go back to my beloved Philippines :).

Well…Canada is not that bad. Here, I have a car and a house that I can call mine. I meet a lot of interesting people…Indian, Polish, Chinese, British, black, white, and yellow race..all here. You’ll learn to protect yourself, specially the racists. In the Philippines, once I go home after working in BF Homes as an Analyst (if I dont have a schedule teaching part time evening class in AMA Alabang), I’m waiting for my Ginebra to win basketball games in my small TV set. Here in Canada, I’m intensively watching the Maple Leafs win their Hockey games while maybe drinking one or two glass of white wine ( I miss drinking San Miguel Beer in th Philippines).

In the Philippines, you have sunny and rainy weather, and fish are much cheaper than meat, while here in Canada you have sunny, winter, Fall, and Spring, and the meat is cheapr than the fish, that’s why a lot of Canadians here are gtting fatter and fatter.

Happy Binyag to my godchild, Nate Edwick. Although I really regret that I can’t attend this wonderful event, since it was held in the Philippines, I would like to congratulate my cousin, Vangie for having a cute baby! Hopefully by next year, I can visit them in the Philippines, and they can visit me here in Canada. Look at the beautiful mother, carrying her baby, and on her left is my beautiful mother (Norma Hernandez), and my favorite cousin, Ate Evelyn. The males starting from the left is the proud grandfather of the baby, Eddie Balajadia, my own father (Rolando Sr.), and Ate Evelyn, loving husband, Kuya Edwin.

Ottawa is the capital of Canada, and offers unique combination of both 30 museums, 50 galleries and theatres. There’s a lot of medieval towers, and historical places that Ottawa boast of.

• According to Statistics Canada, families in Ottawa had the
                  highest median incomes of any Canadian city in 2001
• Ottawa was ranked sixth in the world for quality of life by
                  the Corporate Resources Group, a Swiss-based management firm
• Languages spoken include English (50%), French (32%) and a
                  host of other languages including significant capabilities in
                  Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, Chinese and Arabic

It’s Labour day tomorrow….September 5, 2005. Dona, Harvey and I will just celebrate it at home, maybe just eat some barbecued chicken, and watch DVD movies.

Well 3 days more, and it’s gonna be mu beloved mother and my favorite brother in law’s birthday.  These are two people who I really love, and from the bottom of my heart, hope they have more birthdays to come.

We have reached our fourth year in Canada. It has been a wonderful journey through out this great country. I still remember our first year here in Toronto. A lot of people would dampen our spirits by giving us false and negative information. Telling us that in order to succeed here, to upgrade our learning which means paying couple of thousands of dollars just to finish one to two year courses.  That was 2001, now it’s 2005 and things have changed for the best. We won half of the battle. We have accomplished some of our goals. With a stabled career, a house of our own,  we have our parents, and the Lord above to thank for.