Toronto: Year One

It's crazy that one year has already gone by since we moved. It feels so raw when I remember back to how sad it was to say goodbye to our home, family, and friends. But so much has happened this past year that I wanted to summarize, just in case next year really sucks.

Canadians
I came to Toronto thinking that Canadians (Torontonians, I guess) would be so Euro. They're on the east coast, close to Europe, I expected a culture shock. But there was none. In fact, the people are not much different than Californians. Wait, let me clarify, they're not much different than Californians from larger cities. You go to small town Cali (like my hometown), and you get a completely different persona. So coming from San Diego, where people are very integrated into different cultures, lifestyles, etc, it was no biggie for us.

HOWEVER, there were a few noticeable differences that I did notice from the beginning that only we could chuckle at. Because when you're the newbie, you can't make fun of the rest of the population for how "different" they are, because really, we're the ones that are different. So you have to suffer alone and just keep the jokes to yourselves, because no one will laugh but you:

1. They say "ash-phalt" instead of "asphalt". Come on, people!
2. They curse a lot. They drop F bombs in front of their kids even. Except they're so sweet and kind when they talk, that you barely even notice that they're cursing.
3. They all say "eh". ALL of them do!
4. They hate the cold. Seriously, we're from California, and we were outside every day during the winter. All of our neighbors were huddled inside.
5. They're so very kind. I always thought Californians were kind and welcoming. Torontonians have us beat. We felt welcomed every where we met someone new, and people always seemed interested in getting to know us.
6. They have a huge lake (Ontario), but no one swims in it! They say it's too dirty. When they tell me that, I tell them that when I was a kid I swam in drainage ditches lined with foam from the pesticides.

I don't really have any complaints about Toronto. It's a fabulous city with so much to do, and it's beautiful with it's lush greenery and huge canopied trees and European style mansions. However, there is one complaint, that, as a civil engineer, drives me absolutely bonkers. The traffic engineering design is the worst I've ever seen in a major metropolitan city in the developed world. For example, there are rarely any left turn lanes, so if you're driving, you hope to god no one decides to turn left, otherwise, you're stuck behind them until all the opposite traffic passes. Also, there are normally two driving lanes on both sides of the street, however, they allow people to park there, so it cuts it down to one. Add that, on top of getting stuck behind someone turning left, and get ready to welcome the road rage. When we first moved here, I'd yell at Johan "Don't do it! Don't make yourself turn left, for fark's sake!" The freeway design isn't any better and is equally frustrating. It takes forever to cross the city from one end to the other. Hence, we take the subway whenever we can.

Axel loved his first year in junior kindergarten. I started him off going Monday, Wednesday, Friday full days, then I'd send him half days on Tuesdays and Thursdays so that he could have a nap and we could spend time together. However, soon after he started asking if he could stay all day, every day. Okay, sniff sniff, off you go, little bird! There are a million kids in our neighborhood, three of his best friends live on our street and were all in the same class. It was wonderful to be able to walk together to and from school, and play together in the park after school. There is also an amazing community of moms that I've never experienced before (well, I've never had a child in school, so I don't have much to compare it to!). But they are all so fun and kind, and we've had a couple of large get-togethers, as well as monthly wine nights mostly for the moms on our street who know eachother a bit better. They've become my closest friends here.

Axel is still crazy. Johan and I have started calling him Axi Boom Boom. I don't know where that came from. But the kid is still a mini Evel Kneivel. Moms who don't know him panic when they see climbing up and jumping off of 5 foot walls, or riding his bike or scooter as fast as possible off the road into a neighbor's yard or grass ditch, only to throw himself into it. Sometimes if he's bored, he'll make a ramp on our driveway, launch off it with his skateboard into the street until he reaches the grass ditch across the street and throw himself into it. He just likes to crash and fall. But he never gets hurt. I guess he's been doing it for so long he's learned how not to get hurt. I was joking to the neighbors that he's like a cat, if you threw him off the roof he'd still land on his feet.

This year, he learned how to ice skate, play hockey, snowboard, go off jumps at the terrain park with his skis, play t-ball, and swim on his back. Now it's soccer season, and he's working on getting the ball in the air when he shoots. He's starting to shoot really hard. Here's a video of him with a nice left into the goal:

Here's a couple of videos of him at the terrain parks at four yrs old:

Johan loves his job. He's got amazing co-workers who make work fun, which makes for a great work atmosphere. He loves taking the subway or riding his bike to work because he hates driving a car to work and sitting in traffic. He is still making strides to find an effective treatment and cure for cancer. The goal is still for his company to have good enough results to get a drug on the market within the next 3 years, so that his company can be sold, at which time we'd move back to San Diego.

I also love my job. I work three days a week, which gives me a really good balance of work, having time to run errands, and spending time Axel and my neighbors. I started a boot camp for my neighbor moms back in the Fall and we're still going strong! We'd drop the kids off at school, then go to the park and bust our booties. It's been a fun way to get together twice a week.

This month, we celebrated midsummer, Swedish style, with our neighbors. I was so impressed at how well everyone embraced the cultural traditions. They helped prepare food and drink, walked out into the forest to pick flowers for the maypole and the flower crowns, and even sang a song in Swedish and drank our homemade schnapps!

We really have the best neighbors. I really credit them for making us love Toronto so much. I told Johan, I don't think I'd ever want to live somewhere just because it was beautiful or had good weather, I need to live somewhere where I love the people. Whether they're family or friends; Surrounding yourself with good, loving people makes it possible (and enjoyable) to live pretty much anywhere.