Invasion of Halifax!

But first – I was in Vancouver for a meeting of LCs and VPFs.  I went with the IAT member to the ferry terminal, where his father picked us up, drove us to the airport for L. to pick up a rental car, before driving out to Granville Island for a dinner/meeting.  L. really wanted to go to Bridges for dinner and that was where we headed. 

After dinner, L. drove me back to the airport where I checked in and waited for my flight.  I was taking the red eye, leaving Vancouver at 10:30PST, arriving in Toronto at 6:30EST, leaving Toronto at 8:30EST and arriving in Halifax at 11ADT.  I had woken up that morning ridiculously early to clean the apartment, prep for a meeting at the hotel and finish packing.  I didn’t allow myself to nap during the day so by the time I got on the plane I was ready to crash.  I ended up sleeping the whole way to Toronto – waking up just in time for the landing.  I sat in the emergency exit aisle and it was great.  Tons and tons of leg room.  I was super comfortable.  Good thing nothing bad happen otherwise I probably would have been in too much of a daze to figure out how the door worked.  I sat between the most interesting characters possible.  On one side, the guy couldn’t figure out how the entertainment system worked.  He would press buttons on the screen and they wouldn’t respond, so he would press them even harder.  He tried his finger, then his knuckle and then back to his finger.  It was hilarious to watch – he hardly ever pressed what he wanted.  On the other side, was another guy.  When I fell asleep, he was watching The Wrestler, but when I woke up, he was watching the end of Marley & Me.  The ending gets pretty emotional and the guy started tearing up!  He was trying to be secretive about it and was wiping discreetly at his eyes as the movie went on.  It was cute!

I landed in Toronto on time and I made my way to the next gate.  I was still extremely sleepy, but I couldn’t find a comfortable place to sleep.  Instead, I passed the time by reading and writing.  Soon we boarded and off I went towards Halifax.  The plane arrived early, I scrambled to get my luggage and barely made it on the 11:15 shuttle.  Good thing I did, otherwise I would have had to wait over an hour for the next shuttle.  Halifax airport isn’t serviced by public transportation and the cheapest way of getting into the city is through their airport shuttle. 

Because I was arriving before NLDC, I made my way to the Citadel Hotel downtown.  The OC of NLDC was able to get a pretty decent rate for the rooms and I think there were a lot of AIESECers in Halifax early to take in the city.  At the hotel, I met up with J. and N. who had arrived in Halifax the night before.  We left our luggage and headed off to explore the city. 

First stop was lunch – I was desperately hungry and needed something to eat.  On a recommendation we headed down Argyle St in search of food.  The weather wasn’t doing so great and it was raining lightly.  Of course I forgot my umbrella at home.  The streets were really empty, with barely any people OR cars.  It was eerie quiet – I had figured Halifax was quiet, but that quiet?!  It was really strange. 

 Not a person in sight

J., N. and I eventually settled on a Greek restaurant and we finally got out of the rain.  By this time I was ridiculously tired after barely sleeping on my red eye flight and sitting down to some food was greatly needed.  I ordered a clam chowder (yes, even from a Greek restaurant), but man wow it was soooooo good!  There was so much seafood in it and at a great price.

My clam chowder

After we were watered and fed, we headed back out to explore the city some more.  The rain had gotten even worse.  To escape the rain we decided to find a mall of some sort and wait it out.  Someone had recommended Spring Garden Road as the best place to go shopping and we headed there on foot.  There wasn’t too much to see and out of sheer boredom, we amused ourselves with amazing facts on parking in downtown Halifax (did you know there are 17 parkades downtown? and something like 700 paid parking spots?! amaaaazing)….  We found ourselves in a movie theatre where J. challenged N. to an air hockey match. 

 Passing time in a “mall”

Somehow we managed to pass a bunch of time and then headed back to the hotel to meet up with R, who had made our reservation at the hotel.  J., N. and I practiced our opening plenary dance while waiting for the last person in our room to join us before we headed out for dinner.

By the end of the evening I was so exhausted and was ready for bed.  The next day was going to be another long one…