Tagged with visa …

11.12.19 [Monday]
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australia, travel, vancouver, 中国

adventures don’t go smoothly

Because of the different ways Holly and I got to Sydney we’re flying back to Vancouver on different planes and will have very different journeys.

Holly’s heading back through China because we were saving money when we were figuring it all out back in May. She’s in the air now (I think) heading to Guangzhou then Beijing then Vancouver. (I’m flying back direct to YVR in about an hour.)

I have a two checked bags allowance which I’m actually using, since Holly only could take one through her perambulations, as she learned to her great pain and sacrifice in June. So today when we got to the airport we thought we were pretty prepared. Now I’m not sure when I’ll see her again.

You see, she has no Chinese visa, because she will be in China for less than a day, and the consulate and the airlines told her that was no problem. Today as she checked in for her flight we learned that might be a very big problem. Long story short, the airline wouldn’t guarantee that she’d make her connecting flights (which we booked with plenty of time between flights, but have inexplicably shrunken since then) so getting out of China before her 24 hours is up may prove difficult.

To help with this, we did another repacking so I took her checked bag so she can go carry-on only and run around in Guangzhou to make her connection. My checked bags are now just under their maximum weight limit (I had to put some cookbooks in what is now the heaviest carryon bag I’ve ever carried).

But Holly’s on her flight. She has her international credit card to solve any problems that might crop up, but Holly’s way better at dealing with that kind of thing than I am. I hope she’ll still get to Vancouver on schedule. If not we might only meet up again in Seattle or Virginia.

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11.05.11 [Wednesday]
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australia, travel

the internet is installed on thursday

And I never did get the hang of Thursdays. But whatever. Here I am. I have an apartment that isn’t a normal tiny apartment the kind I’d pictured Holly and I living in. I mean, I looked at those kinds of places but didn’t end up getting one because my decision making process really needs someone else to keep an eye on it. I tend to think “This weird way of doing things is weird so it’s obviously better!” Which sadly may not always be the case.

Anyway. The apartment I got for Holly and me is in a former storefront and has a shared kitchen and a ridiculous number of TVs for us not to watch. There are rooms with couches and a deck and a barbecue and two microwaves and a gas range and I swore there was an oven, but when I moved in it had disappeared.

The shared kitchen thing. Kitchens are always so wasteful if you aren’t using them. It makes so much sense to share one. But it kind of depends on the rest of the people in the building to see how it’ll be. It’s entirely possible this could turn out to be terrible. In any case, it’s just till December (or less time if my visa gets denied, I guess).

The apartment is right near my future workplace so that’s good. It’s so weird to think about working five days a week for 8 hours a day though. Having weekends mean something. I don’t know how I’ll do it for so many months. I’d be kind of happy with this being my bout in the 9-5 world, combined with our bout in a weird apartment world. Something to do and then move on from. But we’ll see. Maybe I’ll love it.

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11.05.03 [Tuesday]
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travel

i’ll start working in a couple of days

I’m watching election results while waiting for word back on the apartments I’ve been applying for. I knew Sydney was expensive, but it’s a good thing I’m going to be making a bit of money once my visa comes through. The amount I’m getting paid looks a lot smaller than it did when I was paying Vancouver rent. Take a moment to think about that. Vancouver rent seems reasonable to me now. The thing I’ve adopted is to look at rent as a percentage of salary. That makes it feel a bit better. But Jebus H Christmas, living in a really sweet big city might not be my destiny. That’s not me saying I’m going back to Winnipeg, but if Holly and I live in a smaller, more affordable city/town/shack in the woods somewhere I’ll be okay with that.

Yesterday I went to Prosentient and had lunch with my new bosses. Happily, even though I don’t have a visa yet we’re going to work some stuff out so I’m heading into the office and not just hanging out in the hostel and going to parks and stuff. I mean, I like not having things to do, but I’d prefer to have a bit of money while I’m doing them. And though they can’t pay me, there’s nothing preventing them from renting an apartment in the neighbourhood and me happening to squat in it.

The apartment I looked at yesterday was a tiny studio thing, but it had it’s own kitchen and bathroom (you can find a lot of apartments here that are shared bathroom/kitchen kinds of deals). I can completely see Holly and I living there till December. It’s not the lap of luxury or anything, but it’s not much worse than her apartment in Nanchong now. But I might not get it. Who knows?

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11.05.01 [Sunday]
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australia, comics, games, library, travel

lazy sunday

Today I woke up to the snores of an Irishman. From across the room in the hostel, but still. Very loud. The Americans who woke up to the noise were vocal about their displeasure. I merely lay there waiting and figuring out how to spend my day.

See this is the thing about being in a country that isn’t cheap when you have no real money, you can’t just head off into the void and do whatever, confident in your ability to make it out financially unscathed. Relatively I mean. If you go ahead and crash a scooter even in a country where they’re as cheap as Armenians well yes you do have to pay a bit even then. You need to plan out your day so it’ll work.

Having not a tonne of money in Sydney means I’m spending a lot of time in parks and libraries. It seems a waste to just hang out here at the hostel reading, but too expensive to justify going to have afternoon beers by myself. It’s nice out, 20 degrees during the day, so it’s no great hardship to go sit in the sun. Today I found the local branch of the city public library (as opposed to the state library I was in yesterday) and read some comics.

Also, I got a SIM card and now have a phone number. Not that I use the phone part of my phone very often, especially when I don’t know anyone in this city, but it’s probably good for my future employer (assuming the visa comes through eventually) to have some way of contacting me.

Yesterday I found a really swank comic shop and a decent game store. I’m going to wait until I have an apartment before I start buying books/comics/games, but gamers are the only community I feel any confidence in dropping into. My first forays in Vancouver were to game stores too.

Anyway, I guess the point of this post is that I’m really looking forward to when Holly arrives in a couple of months.

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11.04.25 [Monday]
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australia, school, travel

your troubles in your old kit bag

So in two(!) days I’ll be getting on a plane bound for Australia. My Occupational Training visa has not come through yet,and last week this was a cause for much anguish. The Easter weekend and the time delay in sending things around the globe means there’s little chance this visa will be ready for me to begin work in a week as scheduled.

But. I have a tourist visa to enter the country. And really, there’s nothing I can do here while we wait for the Australian government to approve of me in all my glory, so why the fuck not go? And that’s what I’m doing. It would be nice to start work and actually be receiving a paycheque but the fact remains that my room in Vancouver is rented out already, so it’s couchsurf here or be a tourist in Oz.

Now I’m packing up my room to put things into storage till Holly and I return to Vancouver in January. Essentially all my books are packed. I have an entire bag of Tshirts that isn’t going to Sydney. I’m almost at the point where anything that isn’t packed can either get tossed in a random box or be thrown out and it won’t really matter one way or another.

I’m restricting myself to taking two carryon bags for the next 8 months. Mostly because I like that kind of challenge, but also because then it feels a lot less like I’m “moving to Australia for 8 months” and more like I’m “going to Australia.” Going to Australia is a lot less freakout-inducing. I mean, I’m really excited about this and everything, but still, crossing the planet isn’t something everyone does really lightly.

I like living in chunks of time (part of why I like being back in school with its semesterization), and I don’t think this is as worrying as beginning a job or something without an end in sight, not knowing how next year at this time would be different. I mean, next year at this time Holly’ll be here and I’ll be taking summer courses to finish the degree inshallah. The year after that: completely unknown (except that Holly and I will not be separated by oceans; I can’t wait to be done with that).

Anyway. Two days till I leave and I have a bunch of packing left to do (plus voting).

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10.10.08 [Friday]
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travel, vancouver, whining, 中国

what money can buy

This morning I took my sniffly head down to the Chinese Consulate’s visa office. Being in Vancouver now, I was kind of happy to be able to have such a hassle free alternative to my usual Xpressposting across the country and paying an agent to deal with it and all that. The actual office is a busride away! What could be simpler?

The room was stuffed to the gills with people. There were at least four different lines, none of which were labelled. I stood in a long one for ten minutes before noticing people with forms that looked like more mine in a much shorter line, so I bailed for it. Then after a few minutes I noticed everyone in my new line had a ticket indicating what number they were. “Where did you get that?” I asked the guy behind me and he waved behind both of us at a lineup for talking to what I’d thought was a security guard. So I left for that line and then thought about it a bit.

This new line to get a number for the other line was long. Then I’d be waiting at least 50 numbers to drop off my form. This was going to take hours. I did a quick evaluation of what my time is worth and decided to leave.

There was a China Travel Services place down the block. It had the same fonts they do in the PRC, so I felt very at home. I went in and found out their fee was $25 to handle that room for me and call me when my visa was ready. So that’s what I did, short-circuiting the story of how I spent my Friday trapped in bureaucracy hell. I’d say it was a good value.

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