my work (first one)

our downtown shop and neighbor ice-wall and mt Rundle looking over it all

Couple of days ago I went to our head office to get an important paper stating that i work in Banff/Alberta and are therefore proper resident applicable for local healthcare. On that paper my job title was “rental agent“. Now that doesnt sound very cool. I was always thinking that i’m working as a ski technician, but bureaucrats know better, right ;)

So what do I do, do be do be doo...

I work in a ski shop that's modestly called ’Ultimate ski&ride’ we sell ski equipment and related stuff and we rent skis, snowboards, skates etc. 

My first days were filled with getting to know everything about skis and snowboards and boots and how to set up ski bindings ...

   Remark: Downhill skis have bindings that are supposed to open up and release your boot if there is too much tension, that should prevent braking legs or other pieces of body in case of accident. Tolerable tension limit can be adjusted according to skiers parameters like weight, height, skiing style and so forth. Hence for         

   every rental you have to adjust bindings according to skier and equipment.

... so I got smart and i even got certifications to prove my wisdom with Head/Tyrolia, Marker, Nordica, Dynastar, and Salomon bindings.

In practice big part of my work is finding customers the best suiting equipment, adjusting it, and handling the money/paperwork. But there is also lotsa other stuff like taking care of returned equipment, waxing , restocking , selling retail stuff, tidyng up shop and doing everything else that has to be done.

We have 2 locations/shops where we are working in 2 week schedules in 2 shifts . 2 weeks in one place and next 2 weeks in another. Morning and evening shifts are also rotating. Morning shifts start at 6:45 and evening ones end around 21:30. And of course there are 2 free days per week.  

This kind of timeframe allows to go riding at least 4 days in a week. And lets not forget that riding a mountain is main reason why i’m working here at all 

If asked am I skier or snowboarder I would choose latter but considering quantity and quality of ski’s surrounding me and available for trying out, I inevitably ski a lot too.

Add caption

Main ski brands we are carrying here: Head, Salomon, Kästle, Dynastar, Liberty, Nordica. We also have Salomon snowboards, rossignol x-country skis, k2 skates and louis garneau snowshoes, and lotsa other stuff, like clothing and backpacks and body protection and helmets and goggles and whatnot.

 There are some extra benefits about working in place like this, I can get tasty discounts for everything we sell and free ski lessons if there is availability. Also, for staff rentals are free, therefore main problem is to decide what model of skis to take out next

One our shop is just in downtown and about 5 min walk from my house but the other shop is on far end of Banff so I usually take my bike and get there also with 5 minutes :D

Technology is progressing, you know. I have read in old books that in capitalist world workers used puch cards to mark beginning and end of their work time. This is past now – there are no cards anymore. Now there is a big smart machine on the wall to punch and mark start and finish of your shift. And to make sure you are you it has fingerprint scanner to scan your youity – cool and funny. For me its not very understandable coz i have different history with no punching cards. Not very european thing it is, probably started with industrialization and work management picking up in north- america in beginning of 20th century... started and still survives in its mutanted way...

how i got a car

arbeit car makes free. 

Soon after i had applied for discounted season pass for bus that would take me to closest real ski place - sunshine village (http://www.skibanff.com) i understood that it was a mistake. Even with discount price it would cost me ~400$ and give access to just one resort in fixed times. But i wanted freedom - to go to other places too and on whenever times. Also i needed device that could transport me and all my valuable valuables around in canada later on anyways. So i decided to buy a car. I had just finished my first couple days at work and had few free days to spend. i went to calgary on Sunday morning with greyhound bus.

Remark: greyhound is pretty much only company offering canada wide public bus transport. And according to my experience (departure severly delayed on 2 out of 3 times) they are faaar from reliable. This Sunday morning bus left from banff to calgary ~1,5h later than scheduled. I even had time to try hitchhiking. with no success, although not because noone stopped just everybody was going towards mountains instead of calgary. Such experience just grew my wish to be owner of personal vehicle.

got to calgary, back to good old hostel and browsed kijiji for potential cars. best looking ones were just sold or seller just didnt respond. Only viable option was ford escort wagon ’97, advertised as ’running good’. 

kijiji is the most popular online marketplace in these woods

Jon drove me to see it in the evening and we got to know that car actually didnt run at all, coz transmission didnt work. After consulting with google later and going to see  the car on Monday in daylight we managed to fix transmission but discovered that windscreen had massive cracks, most of electronics didnt work and tires were slick.. even with final selling price 400$ that would have been too much trouble/expense  to get it inspected and roadworthy. so no escort for me.

Meanwhile i had found two other candidates. 1. dodge caravan ’99 that was pretty close so we drove there (13:30) and first impression was goood J everything was clean and seemed to work, so after quick test drive i said: ’ i will buy it’.

2. option was ford taurus wagon (in europe known as ford mondeo turnier)– in theory more economical option but i had just owned and sold such car hence i needed something different, something more north-american, something bigger, something like dodge caravan.

So I went to closest mall, got cash, gave it to seller (final price after was eventually 900$), he signed bill aka ’proof of ownership’.

bill or proof or just very necessary piece of paper and looks  ridiculosly unofficial

 I took this small piece of paper and went to insurance (15:00), where i presented this small piece of paper, my international driving license and my car insurance history from estonia. In return i got small pink piece of paper aka vehicle insurance card and obligation to provide car’s mechanical inspection form (in 30days time) and getting myself local/alberta driving license. 

the pink one, also very necessary

this pink paper for a year cost ~450$. without obligation to get alberta license and without estonian insurance history it would have cost minimum ~1800$ 

With these two small pieces of paper i went to car registry office in downtown (16:45) gave these papers and 85$ and got vehicle registration certificate and numberplate.

last piece of the puzzle - registration

Now i had everything i needed to be street legal with me new car

So it took me ~3h to buy car and get all red tape done. Few hours later we went, screwd on new numberplate and i drove my van back to hostel. it even had half tank of gas  J

Next morning i went to togo tires, let them put good used winter tires with studs in front (120$), went to walmart where they changed oil (35$) and bought some liquids, tools and whatnot for car and drove back to banff. I had a car.

here it is - biggest vehicle i ever had (engine is 3.0L V6)

Dodge caravan is as common in canada as canadians themselves. Its not too economical – my first statistics  (mixed: highway/city/mountains with temperatures down to -25C) shows fuel consumption around 12L/100km. - and it looks boring but it has lotsa room (could roll my bike into it with no hassle) and although my specimen has some big dents it seems otherwise to be in good health J

p.s. just before new year happened, i got copy of recent (~2 months old) mechanical inspection from previous owner and sent it to insurance who said they like it and now just need me to get alberta license for complete happiness...

banff and lake louise and how i got a job

view from banff

So i had figured out 3 essential things neccessary for work: sin, sim and bank account.

I had also printed out some resumes and as i was already tired of boring calgary, i bought a bus ticket to banff (20$ with hostel card discount)  for saturday morning, planning to start there and continue to lake louise on my quest for a job.

Banff is nice, small town between rocky mountains, it has river passing it to add some extra quality and main thing – it is close to several ski resorts. I started in tourist information, and got to know that Saturday is day off for hr people. Still i got some local papers and hints where to look for job. So i found quiet coffe shop with wifi and browsed through employment ads. There were some with potential, one of them skishop on main street, soon i was there and gave my resume to shop. Somehow day was already past noon, so i needed to move on. 

trans-canada highway

Sun was doing good job with shining so i decided to hitchhike, either to lake louise (50km further north from banff) or back to calgary, depending on drivers will. There was sun and snow and -12C.

I walked to the highway but retreated soon as there is lotsa gravel to kill slipperiness and this gravel likes to fly around and break cars windows. So survival instincts got me back to the exit road and luckily some good people soon gave me lift to calgary. 

hitchhiking

In the evening i got phonecall from skishop, and got asked to job interview for next day.

Conveniently Jon was planning trip to Lake Louise next day, so I joined his company on and spent first half of a sunday hiking around lake. very nice place indeed ski, hike or ride horses.

supercute horses at lake louise

Gingerbread for my mind was discovery of nice ice climbing route and some rock climbing routes there. Will have to come back here with right equipment and some jolly camrades. 

Most importantly in the evening I had very positive interview in ultimate ski&ride shop and got to know that I have a job – not too bad considering it was just my fourth day on this continent.

I was supposed to start work on wednesday, so that gave me couple of days in Calgary to do last things in big city and get ready to move.

1st day and calgary and hostel

empty downtown is behind the rabbit. 
now why there are wild rabbits in center of city? - go figure

at first sight (and on second and third...) calgary downtown seemed empty, cars had no numberplates in front, and most of the cars were not cars at all but suv's or pickup trucks on steroids

poor mercedes can feel big in europe but here, compared to locals,
looks like a little girl

Streets/avs (sw and ew) are straight and numbered, altogether boring looking place.  there are still some nice things, like river (but in winter its also grey) or cbd panorama

calgary city panorama with river

So first day i was productive and got my sin number from services office, got my bank account (cbic - cause it’s big and has lotsa offfices /atm’s), got new phone&sim cause neither of my sony ericsson phones didnt work in canadian 3g networks (virgin, contract 25$ month, no registration fee, nationwide calls etc). changed my european cash to canadian$ 90eur->109,5 cad (1:1,2555)

hostel where i stay (hi-calgary) i like it, although its tad expensive by europen standards. then again backpackers hostel is fairly new phenomen in canada so hopefully it will get better/cheaper. Main subject in hostel is work, everybody here seems to be looking for job. Alberta province has low unemployment rate and everhappy oil industry providing jobs, so here are also many canadians who came from other provinces to find work. so many australians and brits are here. By the way i find canada and australia similar in many ways – huge countries with small populations, having vaste inhabited territories with harsh climate (too hot/dry/cold) but providing natural resources and hence very well paid jobs in certain places  (mines in oz / oilfields in canada).

my hostel in calgary (well recommended) & Kiki

Staying in hostel is not too much more expensive than renting a room, if lack of privacy is not a problem, then superb location and convenience of serviced rooms makes it pretty reasonable accommodation option even in long term. In hostels breakfast is usually included. Its buffet style and you can have juice/coffe/tea, toast, peanut butter, jam,  margarine, some fruit like banana or oranges and of course canadian special pancakes with maple syrup. There is big electric pan and jug with dough so everybody can create his own fresh pancake.

be ginning

Estonia, 3rd november, 5pm, darkness has fallen

beginning was this time in the beginning of november. Days in Estonia were getting shorter&shorter ( 5 minutes per day!). and even if it was a daytime, sun usually had better things to do than to shine in Estonia. Instead we got lotsa rain and otherwise boring weather.

Thats when I remembered that my canadian work&holiday visa is starting to expire (20.12.12 was last day for me to set my feet on this land of maple leaves and syrup)

thats me...

So i decided to go there - They had too much nature, too much snow, too many mountains and I had heard too many positive things and met several spectacular residents of that country to let this opportunity to slip away into oblivion.

I sorted my things at work, rented out my flat, sold my car,  found places to hide  my evergrowing pile of physical possessions, got plane tickets tallinn-riga-london gatwick (airbaltic, 117eur, including snowboardbag), got plane ticket london gatwick-calgary (airtransat 485euri, 1 snowboard/sport equipment <20kg is for free!).  i bought tickets ~2 weeks before flight hence they were not cheapest ones, but still not too bad. booked hostel in calgary for 1 week (148eur, including hostelling international card that gives some spectacular discounts in canada).

paperwise: I got myself new biometrical passport (to make visiting US cheaper/easier), international driving license (for insuring car in canada), my car insurance history (to transfer it to canadian insurance), new debit/credit cards (so they wouldnt expire overseas), travel insurance from rsa  (276 eur, 1 year,  all world). i already had letter of visa approval from canadian embassy.

packing...

As usual I started packing evening /night before flight and  so got to sleep just few hours. Big hug and everlasting gratitude to Kristine who took some photos and helped me packing and getting me with everything to airport. I ended up with 30L backpack as hand luggage(13kg)  and big snowboardbag to check in (~23kg). For snowboardbag i added improvised wheels (got old wheeled bag from secondhand for 5eur and just stuck one end of snowboardbag into it) as i remembered that carring it on shoulder would be too much pain.

christmas@gatwick & my luggage (wrapped in plastic is not laura, its me snowboardbag)

So i flew to riga and to london and to calgary (with my beautiful eyes i managed to get 23kg snowboardbag checked in for free for calgary flight inspite of 20kg limit). transcontinental flight itself was not too bad: 9 hours, 2 meals, 1 free beer/wine and unlimited soft drinks and personal mediasystem yeah! i watched 3 movies :)

So i got to calgary on Wednesday evening, after passport control went to immigration and got massive work permit stapled into passport (ridiculous invention).

In shuttle to town i met spanish couple who showed me way to hostel and around 22:00 i was there.

~25 hours it took to get from my flat in tallinn to hostelin calgary

i was in calgary. I was in canada

calgary city @night