Uncategorized – View From This Spot

Celebrating Our Anniversary in China

September 15, 2019January 14, 2020View From This Spot

Today, we celebrate our 3rd anniversary and wanted to reflect on our last 365 days around the sun together.

Finding a Sense of Community in Ganjingzi, Dalian

September 1, 2019May 13, 2020View From This Spot

We all have favourite places. Favourite stores, favourite restaurants, favourite cafés, favourite parks… We love these places because of the good times we’ve had, making us feel safe because we know exactly what to expect. We have best friends or friendly staff members that we meet in these places giving us happy social interactions. Or we may very well just love the food and drink.

So what happens when you leave your city or neighbourhood or country and don’t have these favourite places anymore? When we left Hamilton, a city full of familiar coffee shops and meeting places, we absolutely missed these places more than we expected. But it also gave us the chance to create new favourite spots wherever we end up.

View From a Chinese Starbucks

July 3, 2019May 13, 2020View From This Spot

We’ve said more than once that living in China, for two Canadians, is kind of like living on a different planet. There’s still the sun in the distance, the ground beneath our feet, there are still people doing everyday people things, but at the same time things are so unfamiliar. From the bus ride to work to buying groceries to working out at the gym, things that felt so ordinary are now so strange–and to be honest, exhausting!

I Took a Chinese Physical and Survived

June 10, 2019May 13, 2020Rose

When we were offered teaching jobs in China, we had no idea just how involved the process would be to get our visas. We had to take countless pictures, send documents back and forth dozens of times, and still ended up unemployed and in Canada for six weeks longer than expected. But nothing in the visa process was quite as interesting as the physical exam.

How Did We Get Here?: Adam’s View

May 26, 2019May 9, 2020Adam

I think it’s easy to say that we, as humans, enjoy being comfortable. We like knowing where life is going to lead us. We like knowing what we’re going to do tomorrow and the next day. We like knowing that there is a roof above our heads and food in our bellies. We like knowing that the bed we sleep in at night is familiar and, well, comfortable.

How Did We Get Here?: Rose’s View

May 26, 2019May 9, 2020Rose

Six months ago, I was feeling really stuck. I wasn’t loving the city I lived in, I was exhausted working four day jobs, and even though I called myself a theatre artist, I was feeling equally uninspired to do anything creative.

View From This Spot

May 24, 2019May 26, 2020View From This Spot

We’re Adam and Rose. We like seeing new places, meeting new people, and eating new things. And we’d rather spend our 65th birthdays reminiscing about our adventures than wishing that we’d started travelling earlier. We’re always looking for our next adventure and we’re sharing our stories along the way.