Rebecca Fisseha, Writer.

Few weeks ago, I was riding the subway (what’s new?) as part of my daily rat race, when I see an ad for the Go Global Expo. A two-day event jam packed with information on travelling abroad to work, study or volunteer! Now I know better than to believe the promise of the photo on the ad (seen here) or any photo for that matter, but my immediate thoughts are Yipee! Yes! Must go! Will Go! 

So I go and register to attend this expo.

Then, slowly by slowly (as they oft do) my thoughts around this start to percolate and I begin to vaguely recollect: Waait a second, this whole ‘abroad’ thing, haven’t I done this once or twice before? Moreover, am I not technically, indefinitely “abroad” already? Exactly how much more “abroad” does a person need to feel truly abroad abroad?

Broad thinking of this nature reminded me of something I once heard someone say re: the possibility of life in outer space: “Dude, we are in outer space. We are the life in outer space. To the other aliens, we are aliens.”

Where on earth am I going with this? Be-happy-with-where-you-are-and-what-you-have-and-for-god’s-sake-buy-some-furniture-already?

Yeah, I guess so.

Anyway, I should consider this past year to have been an adventure in and of itself. Not since my early days at York U have I lived for so long so far from the center. Year by year, since first arriving at that campus in suburbia at Keele & Steeles, I inched toward downtown until, once there, I was happy to stay ensconced in restaurant fumes and police sirens. Now, three years after I flung  myself almost 12,000 km away from that center, I’m finally in the final phase of working my way back into it. This time next week will find me reunited with my beloved downtown address again and I’m stupidly excited.

The things I’m most excited about in order of stupidness:

1 – my washer & dryer

2 – my dishwasher

3 –  my jacuzzi bathtub (haven’t had a bubble bath in YEARS! not as tragic as “haven’t had a bath in YEARS” but still…)

4 – stepping outside and having a bazillion choices of places to go and things to do

5 – my park (yes it’s MY park)

6 – being able to walk to/from work

7 – my opera singer neighbor

8 – my mailbox

9 – Chinatown

10 – being able to walk to the Island airport, and to the Island too! (well, not walk)

That being said, there are a few things that I will miss about Scarborough:

1 – the sky, I can actually see it out there! Connected to this: the sunsets (never managed to catch the sunrise but I’m sure it’s lovely. Just not as lovely as my snufflywarm bed)

2 – the morning bus driver who told me my eyes speak (though I doubt they had anything nice to say at that hour)

3 – the Scarborough Bluffs  (see pic)

4 – having a front door

5 – samosas and patties from the Warden station bakery (the ones I had before the mouse sighting was reported)

6 – how Warden station reeks of chicken curry at 8am in the morning because they’re already warming up the lunch food

7 – stealing wifi from the 24-h McDonalds up the street

8 – the abundance of used car dealerships (I now know where to go in the future)

9 – banging a broomstick against my ceiling to get the neighbors to quiet down

10 – falling asleep to the lullaby of the night bus passing under my front window

I would go into what I’m NOT going to miss but I believe that has been covered already in an earlier dispatch.