Saturday 6 July 2019

'Once Upon a Time in Canada' Epilogue.

The thought of not being in Toronto has caught me off guard for the past month. In Toronto, this was kind of the same thing for the first month or two. It may be summer there in Canada, but’s rainy winter here in New Zealand. And you now what? It doesn’t matter as much as it used to because, for the past month, I’ve settled back into my old life. Oh well, I’m really not in Toronto anymore. I can tell because there are no streetcars here, there is no TIFF Lightbox, and, most importantly, the people I truly call my friends are not here. I’m still adjusting to this fact.

If this were a movie, everyone I have known there would have seen me go at the airport, and there would have been tears and painful goodbyes all around, especially from me. But it didn’t out pan out that way even though I was crying in the inside as my plane took off from Lester Pearson International Airport. I was suffering from heartache during the entire flight back home. I was aching the whole time, but I was especially aching when I was at Lester Pearson and Auckland International Airport. I didn’t want to break down in actual tears and bother people on the plane, so I just watched a lot of movies to get my mind of it. If that didn’t work, which it didn’t for a few moments, I would go to the bathroom and let out a few tears privately.

Once I got back from heartache-land, I went back to my seat and continue whatever movie I was watching. The flight was a LONG one, so there was a long movie marathon and more private breakdowns. My brother told me this was going to happen and warned me in advance (which didn’t serve me well since I didn’t it to be this painful when the time finally came). Once my Dad and I got back from the airport, I had a long rest for the entire day. I got plenty of rest since I couldn’t sleep on the plane because of… you know, and it was more than I needed. It would be a pretty shitty day if I got back after two years and I couldn’t be left alone to rest. After about a week of rest, my mum made me help her out with her concert by creating the programme in the shortest time frame ever for any of her concerts. After I had created the programme to the best of my abilities and as fast as I could, I was then tasked to oversee the technical aspects of the concert, such as lighting and heating. Pretty straightforward. After the concert, it was time to start job-hunting again until I could do my Honours degree at the University of Auckland. Then also came to do some extra work on my blog. I had a bunch of movies and shows I had to watch either in cinemas or on Netflix. So now I have stuff to do.

In the midst of all of this, I still think about Canada and my friends whom I miss dearly, and I can’t get these thoughts out of my mind. I had leave behind my life when I finally realised that I wasn’t going to get a work visa from anywhere. Countless time and energy spent trying make it this happen. All of that resulted in nothing, which destroyed me when I came to the terrible realisation. Then, instead of continuing to fight a losing battle, I made the painful decision to return home. New Zealand will become my safety net until my next venture. The result for all of my time and energy put into this venture was nothing. All of that for nothing? Why bother? Well, okay, I have an answer for that. Part of it might be what I represent: progress and the future I’ve always strive for and dreamt ever since I was five years old. But really, I did it because, quite simply, to get out of my comfort zone, broaden my perspective and grow personally and creatively. It might not seem that way to some readers, but it’s true.

If I hadn’t gone to Canada, I would not have broadened my perspective. If I hadn’t gone and built my own life on my own, I would not have learned a lot more about myself. If I had not grown as a person, then I would not be the person I am now. This is so fundamentally important to someone such as myself without exception. Yes, the future I had hoped didn’t work out and I had to return, but I learned about the wider world and more about myself that I could never had imagined. And because of that, I can take all the lessons I had learned and apply them here so that for the next destination, I’ll be more than ready.

Also, see Chapters 90 and 1.

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