boo-ya!

I have always hated runners. You know, people who run, for fun. You see them on the street, all happy and running. There used to be a Running Room (retail store for runners) down the street from my house and they had a running club that you'd see going down the street with all their gear - special water bottles, the best shoes, and 'running room' t-shirts, ugh.

When I was in high school I would do anything to get out of gym class, ANYTHING. Especially if running was on the menu for that day. We had this giant field with four football fields and a track at one end, it was huge... to me anyway. Once a year we'd have a "fun run" where the whole school would turn out and run around it loads of time. I still don't know if it was to raise money or just for fun, but I hated it.

I think it's always been jealousy of those people that can run. They always looked so healthy and fresh; like they were really having a good time. A couple of months ago I decided (at the gym, which I go to five times a week) to give it a go. I started slowly; a couple of minutes running, a couple walking, a couple running... The first time I ran ten minutes straight I couldn't believe it. Today I ran for TWENTY FIVE minutes!!! without stopping, without losing my breath, without getting a cramp in my side, without any pain anywhere. And when I got off the treadmill I felt higher than a kite!

I'm really proud of myself this week. I've turned my life around in the last five years. I've made a real effort to be a different, better person, and I can see the results of much of that now. I've lost over 50 pounds in the last four years and I don't hate the runners anymore... I just want to be like them! I've pulled myself out of a life ordinary and made it something more.

I just wanted to let you all know that I am really happy and proud to be where I am today and I wish you could all be here with me to celebrate.

**
In other news: I have applied for my Ancestry visa - the one that will allow me to stay in the UK for five years. I have an appointment at the British High Commission in Ottawa on September 15th... so keep your calendar clear, cause I'll be around!

visas

I've been having trouble of late. Nothing serious, maybe just a case of the winter blues, maybe a case of homesickness, and maybe it's some kind of mid (quarter) life crisis, though I thought I was done with those... I think it really comes down to me sorting out what I'm doing.

I have dreamed of living in England for as long as I can remember. I don't know why, I can't explain it, even to myself, so I won't try to explain it to you. But here I am, realizing a dream that has been simmering inside of me for half my life, and it just isn't satisfying that itch.

I came here, at this point in time, because the opportunity arose. I had some money, nothing going on back home and no idea what to do with myself... so I figured why the hell not? But now I'm starting to ask why?

I thought that I would have some great opportunities here to hone my craft and possibly (hopefully) get a job in journalism. To get some experience that I could take home (or wherever) with me when it was time. But I have discovered there is a huge wall between me and these dreams - my working holiday visa.

This is the easiest visa for a Common Wealth citizen to obtain. It only took me 36 hours to get it... and I got it because I was under the impression it was the only one I could get. Thing is, it's only good for two years and I'm only meant to be working for 12 months in those two years. Employers know this and they don't like it. Why employ someone who will have to leave the country in such a short time? Why take the chance on someone that we may have to do extra work and pay a lot of money to sponsor in the end?

They are right. If I were an employer I wouldn't want the hassle either. So, after being told by numerous companies that this was a problem for them, I started to dig, see if there wasn't something else I could do... maybe get a different visa. My grandmother, after all, was born in Scotland.

The only other visa that I knew of that I could potentially be eligible for is the ancestry visa. It gives you the right to live and work for 5 years with the option of applying for residency if you spend the (almost) whole time in the UK. Sounds like the perfect "in", doesn't it? I looked into it a few years ago and was told that I had to have my grandmothers original birth certificate in order to be accepted, so I never thought about it again. Since her birth certificate (which would be almost 100 years old) had long since been lost.

I found out this week that the document I have from the Office of the Registrar of Scotland is now accepted. What this means is that I can apply for an ancestry visa, which would make me the closest thing to being a resident, without actually being one.

Great, isn't it? There are, however, a few small problems with this that I'm not sure what to do about. The first being all the other documents I have to get to prove my lineage - marriage certificates for my parents and grandparents and my mother's birth certificate. Then there's the 200£ fee. And finally the problem of leaving the country for six weeks to go home and take care of it all. (I can't apply for it from here, I have to be in Canada.)

While all of this is do-able, if not an expensive and long process, do I really want to? After three months here, can I really say that I'll want to be here for the next year, or three, or ten? I don't know. I know that I'm not ready to go home and I'm not ready to leave either, but I just don't know more than that. I suppose that I should just go to the trouble so that I can give England the chance that it deserves... to give employers the chance to see what I can do...

It seems like a lot of hassle though... it will be like starting all over again when I come back. It will be expensive to live for however long it takes which could be as little as 3 days but as long as six weeks. And what if, after all of it, they say no? It's a big risk...

Right now I'm going to sit on it. Let it simmer in my head. Find out how hard it will be to get all the documents. See how expensive it will really be. But if anyone out there has any ideas, let me know, cause I'm feeling a little overwhelmed with it all.

I promise a more upbeat post next... I'm working on one all about the English language here... it should be pretty fun...