OurOysterJade

I grew up in what can only be described as the middle of nowhere. I didn’t leave my home province until I had graduated high school. After that however, a whirlwind of discovery commenced. I started out with my home country, Canada. I discovered much of the country through the youth volunteer program Katimavik. I then moved to more international discovery. I did a year abroad to Denmark with my university, and liked Europe so much that I decided to stay. While living in Denmark, I explored nine European countries and one African country with friends I had made at Aarhus Universitet, where I was studying. I spent more time away from Denmark, than there, and manged to go on trips to Norway, Netherlands, Germany, France, Spain, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Latvia, and Morocco. Next, I moved on to the United Kingdom to look for work. I lived and worked in both Edinburgh and London. I met so many amazing people in the UK and visited so many interesting places within its borders. That still didn’t stop me from seeing many more parts of Europe at the same time. While I was living in UK, I manged to find time between work and social engagements to visit Italy, Sweden, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia. I also spent some time backpacking in Vietnam, Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos. In between working in the UK, I took three months off to jet off to central America to take part in a youth volunteering program. Youth Challenge International arranged it so that I would join thirteen other young people to live in a small village in Costa Rica. While we were in Costa Rica we worked along side the local people to turn a tract of community owned jungle into a nature reserve. This not only saved the jungle from deforestation for agricultural use, but provided the members of the community with increased jobs and income. While living in Costa Rica I studied Spanish daily, and by the end of the three month volunteer program I was able to joke along with the local young people. In 2009 I followed my partner of the time to Belgium where he had found work. Working in Belgium was much more of a challenge for me than any other place, and I truly felt the consequences of not being a native speaker of their languages. I did manage to find several activities to spend my time, one of which was sampling a large proportion of the 700 different varieties of beer brewed in Belgium. While living in Belgium, I took advantage of cheap rail passes and visited most areas of the country. I still found time however, to also visit Austria, France, Italy, Netherlands, Germany and Denmark. In between all this I moved back to Canada to finish my degree, see old friends, and save up money. One can’t do all this travelling with an empty bank account! I currently am living in New Zealand, where I am working as well as exploring all this country has to offer. Up next: Malaysia and Australia!