Apartment shopping: The thrill of the hunt

So I'm moving... Yes, I mean it this time. I'm getting myself out of the arctic for a while and finding an apartment in Ottawa for about a year. I'm not sure exactly about the details, I'm probably going to go on EI after my contract ends this April and take it easy and travel for a while. I'm a little bit aprehensive about taking the plunge like this, but hey, I'm young, this is when I'm supposed to do things like this. Right? ...Right!

I'm going to be moving in with Meredith (my girlfriend) I want to get into the Inuit art scene and I think Ottawa is a good place to start. This is what my heart wants to do, so now all I have to do is fully convince the rest of me. Personally I'm excited, I've been stuck up here, toiling for 2 years now. I've saved up a bit of money. I figure that when you're making a life decision, your happiness should be an important determining factor. I'm not happy up here most of the time. Ottawa will be a good base for me, I think. The Inuit art scene is established, it's much cheaper to live in than Nunavut, the weather is much nicer, it's cheap to travel from and Meredith is there. I can't wait to do it. I just have to tell my boss...

Iqaluit is a rough town to live in. You need big teeth to survive here sometimes, or at least thick skin. It's a highly political town, with a lot of inner tension most times. I'll always be able to come back and start again in this town. Anyways... there are a thousand reasons why I want to leave this place... So that's it, I'm going to stop rationalizing it, I've decided.

I'm excited! I love apartment hunting.

More later.

Daydreaming with Rainer Rilke

Not all that much has been going on these days, I've just been trying to get back into the swing of things at the office and getting used to being in the arctic again. I did become a proud owner of a microwave last week thanks to a coworker that's moving to Calgary today. I can't say that I'm not a bit jealous... It isn't particularly that she's going to Calgary, I mean I like Alberta and the west in general, but It's more that she's actually leaving Nunavut. She's just picking up and leaving this evening. I miss that feeling... I wish I could just sell all my crap and move, start anew again, it's an exhillerating feeling.

Anyways, I've been spending my spare time reading these days. As I said before, I'm still reading the Time Traveller's Wife, but I've also been getting into the works of Rainer Maria Rilke. It's some pretty amazing stuff. I loved it immediately. I can't and won't claim to know much about poetry, or literature in general, but I really like the writings of Rilke.

For those that don't know, Rainer Rilke, was a Prague born poet from the late 19th century. He lived in a very interesting time in Europe, Everything was changing, new ideologies were forming. his poetry is beautiful, it flows very well with undertones of meloncholy. Here's a snippet from the Duino Elegies:

"Sing, in your lovelorn

longing, of the losers.

Make their dark fame glisten.

Sing of those whom you are

nearly moved to envy in the

purity of their despair:

hearts more loving in their pain

than many never broken.

Sing again-and yet again-

your altogether insufficient

praise of them.

The hero lives!

His ruin is but a pretext

to be born again."

In other news... I've been thinking about the upcoming election and dreading the increasingly real possibility of a Conservative majority. This Blogger pretty much captured my sentiments, but the whole thing boggles my mind. I refuse to believe that the majority of Canadians are actually conservative. It can't be, they can't know what they're getting themselves into. How did it come to this?

Most people in Canada dislike the politics south of our border, There are very few people that I've come across in Canada that think George Bush is a good president or that his ideology is beneficial to anyone except the wealthy elite. We see all the time what the Right is doing to our neighbors and we don't like it. But then why in the hell are we even considering electing a right-wing nut job in our own country?!? It doesn't make any sense to me at all. Is our collective memory that short? Do we not see the clear ideological parallels between the conservatives and the republicans? Religion in Nunavut is strife. Most communities up here are basically run by the church, in one of the communities I lived in, most people went to church three times a week. (It was kind of scary sometimes since I was usually the only non-religious person) So obviously the populace up here at the moment is against same sex marriage, abortion, and basically anything secularist that the Tories have so skillfully attatched themselves to like some sort of hideous leech-like creature. It's quite clear that the Conservatives are anti-gay, which is a popular sentiment up here unfortunately, but what they don't realize or at least let themselves realize is that thier policies are also anti-aboriginal. I think it's a pretty safe bet that if Harper gets into the PMO on Monday, we, the aboriginals in Canada can say goodbye to the promises made in First Minister's Meeting in Kelowna.

So yeah, it looks to me like Canada is in a lose-lose situation politically. The Center is corrupt, the Left is unorganized. That leaves the Right with a clear path to majority control of the country... I, for one am dreading the next few years, looking for work abroad has never looked better.

I guess we'll see what happens on Monday.

Do I have to go back?

So I'm not going to lie to you, living in Iqaluit is tough. Somedays I can barely stand it. So when I left this Christmas, I was pretty happy. I had a great Christmas break, I relaxed in Northern Ontario with Meredith and her family. It was really fun, it was a simpler trip than I'm used to, but it was still worth it.

Still, I had to come back after two weeks, it hardly seems fair. I had to leave Meredith at the airport once again. I hate doing that. Over Christmas I got the Time Traveller's Wife Which is a book about a man who travels through time against his will and the woman he loves who has to stay behind, I just started reading it, the story is a bit strange, but it's actually a good book so far. I've really been able to relate to it.

Being in Wawa gave me a sense of nostalgia. I had been there once before in the summer of 2002. I was passing by during a bus trip from Kelowna, BC to Cheyenne, Wyoming up to Winnipeg then to Ottawa. It was quite the trip, there were no specific plans, I just chose some checkpoints and some vague dates and improvised the rest. Barring the upper respiratory infection I got in Cheyenne that kept me bedredden in a cheap motel for a few days, it was a great trip. I love that type of freedom. Just me and the world. No work, no routine, doing whatever I please, on my own time. I can't really explain properly what exactly travelling means to me, it's my life, it's what I know best. Having a secure job definitely has it's perks, but it does make me feel kind of trapped and I don't like that. How can I be happy sitting in my office day in day out when a memory of a thousand places I've been and would like to be flashes into my head everytime I close my eyes?

I miss the excitement and anticipation of the flight to somewhere completely unknown to me. Imagining what it's going to be like, how the people will be, how I'll dress for the weather. I've been to some far off corners of the globe already and my wanderlust is still not satisfied. Not too many people like flying commercially anymore and for good reason really, but I actually feel comfortable in planes for long stretches. I took my longest flight in one sitting this past summer. Beijing to Toronto direct. 20 hours baby. One hour of which was spent sitting on the tarmac because the runway on which we were supposed to take off from needed repairs. I don't mind planes and airports that much. I once spent 4 days in the Vaanta International airport in Helsinki thanks to a misplaced passport and lack of money. I was 17, it was an adventure I'll never forget. It's these types of adventures that I want to live again. Sure, being a responsible citizen has been ok, but my place is over the horizon.

I'll figure out a way to get out there again.... I think my inner gypsy is going to wake up this spring...