One Rotation Around the Sun in the US

Well, it was exactly a year ago that I left Canada on a 4-day road trip that would see me end up in West Texas.  It's been a long journey both physically and also emotionally.  I am appreciative of the opportunity that I've been given to pursue a post-doctoral research position here at Texas Tech University in Lubbock.  First impressions: dry grass, tumbleweed, spread out, lots of tan, brown and red--from the colour of the grass, to the colour of the buildings and hats.  I guess you're not going to get away with having a blue-coloured or green house here...you'd just clash with everything else.  Other impressions are that everyone is friendly, people are obsessed with fast food judging from the number of fast food joints around, and everyone is lazy to get out of the car based on the number of drive-throughs there are...from fast food to bank and pharmacy drive-throughs...what, are people in a huge rush?  Or maybe getting down from their trucks is too much hassle.

The university campus where I work is very spread out - it'd probably take you 30-40 minutes to walk across it...you really need a car here!  (Ironically, if you're a student here, you actually can't drive around campus as this would cause too much traffic and you have to park at designated parking lots, only then to catch a bus to get where you want to get on campus...which seems funny since there's nothing but roads here.) 

I've been used to living on my own throughout my graduate studies back at Queen's University in Canada, but living on my own in another country and not within reasonable driving distance of my true home in the Great White North is quite a different cup of tea...or coffee.  Some things I miss are being able to watch the Toronto Maple Leafs on TV, being able to have dim sum, poutine, a still quiet winter night walking through a park with the sound of snow softly crunching underneath my boots and I try to make out if I'm actually walking on the pathway while seeing the sky lit up with a sparse freckling of snow flakes as they gently drift towards the snow piled on the grass that make you want to jump and slide across it on your stomach.  But hey, I do enjoy the heat here...I'm actually quite impressed I've been able to handle it so well - maybe it's because I'm used to staying indoors when the sun's at it's peak.  I've experienced 40's (Celcius) weather and that's a first for me.  Luckily Lubbock has a high elevation (~3000ft) and distant from a major body of water, making the heat here a "dry heat"...desert-like...so it's much more bearable.

It's taken a bit of getting used to not being able to drive to a major city within a couple hours, although I don't miss being forced to parallel park for a parking space...and having to pay for parking!  But there's a certain energy that you feel when you're in a major city like Toronto...people going in all directions around you - you feel like you can hide in plain sight and you can find anything you want within walking distance.  There are lots of 'moods' around you - happy people, depressed people, people in a rush, people bored at a Tim Hortons, hungry people lining up at a hot dog stand...in contrast, the people and mood here is all very relaxed - which is nice...(although some people's driving skills would lead you to think otherwise)...I actually prefer this type of relaxed setting - no rush, no road rage, no grid-look traffic jams or having to wait for more than two cycles of lights before you actually get a chance to move through the intersection due to traffic and here you can drive across this small city to anywhere you want within 10-15 minutes.  It's just that sometimes I miss being able to immerse myself in the bustle of the chaos of a larger city from time to time.  Of course, the biggest thing I miss is the chance to see my old high school and university friends every so often.  Somehow not being able to see people feels so much more restrictive knowing it's physical distance and not scheduling that is preventing it from happening.

Well, surprisingly for some, I have not purchased a big belt buckle, a cowboy hat or boots...or a rifle, haha...I'm not sure I'm allowing myself to totally assimilate....I am a rare breed down here...being Canadian and Asian...I'll represent the word of Canada proudly...spreading of the legendary poutine, HOCKEY and snow around to those that think 0C/32F is crazy cold...yes, I'm from Canada and damn proud of it!  Sorry!

So as I tread past my first year no longer being a Canadian resident, I will continue to remember where I come from, appreciate that which I cannot have and continue to experience all that I can down here...new places are always exciting and I do look forward to the next year or two I spend here before I move on in my career.

The Christmas holidays are coming up...and one thing I will always look forward to is going back home to visit family and friends...time for me to start planning for my short trip back!

Cheers (and I look forward to being able to do it with good Canadian beer)!

Interesting Differences

In Lubbock:

1. It's dry and warm (but I have yet to experience their summers).  There was 1.5 days of rain total in the last 4 months I've been here.
2. The difference between the high and low temperatures in a day can be more than 20 degrees Centigrade.
3. People say, "Uh huh" instead of "welcome" here.
4. People are on average more friendly here than in a big city such as Toronto.
5. Everything is really spread out and there is no "down town".
6. There is rarely any traffic and there are more highways than there need to be...one of them that encircles the city is a 6-lane highway (3 lanes each way)...no one ever uses the inner lane cause a) there isn't enough cars to need it and b) you'll be at your desired exit by the time you get over in that lane...if you're on the loop long enough to need the inner lane, why are you driving in circles?
7. I can play tennis from February until December.
8. There is no hockey team.
9. Any cut of steak is always top-notch, even the cheaper ones...and the better ones are to die for.
10. The cost of living here is low.  And there is no State tax, which means your dollar goes further here than in most other States and countries.  Sales tax is 8.25% and there is next to no liquor tax, of which beer and wine are at about 50-70% of the price of what I'm used to paying.
11. I have to get used to paying for health care.
12. People make wide turns all the time - have to get used to this and watch out for it.
13. There are way too many fast food places and way too many drive-throughs...not just for food...they have drive-throughs for banks, pharmacies, a pet store and coffee shops...and there's no reason anyone should be in a hurry here.
14. Due to the high altitude (~3000ft.), there are rarely clouds in the sky.
15. They sell SPF100+ sunscreen here.
16. All people talk about is football, basketball and Nascar.
17. Every block you drive by, you're bound to see 1 or 2 churches, no matter which direction you drive.
18. Gas is cheaper down here, by about 20-30 cents/L.
19. The city owns no snowplows.  I doubt they have road salt.

What I miss...

1. Watching the Leafs on TV every other night.
2. Poutine.
3. Canadian beer.
4. Dim sum.
5. An intensely diverse community, both ethnically and religiously.
6. My Ontario License Plate.
7. Playing street hockey.
8. Hearing the sound of snow crunching underneath my winter shoes on a still, sunny winter day...because there is never any significant amount of snow on the ground here.
9. Skiing.
10. Being able to walk along a natural lake/river.
11. Forests.
12. Hills/mountains.

Settled, Exploring and Unwinding

It's been a month since my last posting and the time has gone by so fast!  Having gone back home to Toronto for the Christmas holidays a month after my initial move to Texas, I felt like I was able to just pick up my previous life I had there and Texas would almost seem like a dream that I dreamt up...it would feel very real, but in time, my conscious mind would just accept it as a very realistic fabrication.  Now that another month has passed, I think I'm going to start missing friends and family back home as the months go by and I'm not able to visit them.  My cousin has since had his second child on the same day that a friend of mine had triplets!  Babies seem to pop out at a high rate in February...oh, those warm July nights...

A cold weather system had recently uncharacteristically made Texas it's home base before walloping the Great Lakes region with tonnes of precipitation in the form of blizzards and white-outs.  Even Lubbock got snow!  I was definitely surprised!  Even more surprising is that with windchill, due to the high winds in Lubbock, it was colder here than in Toronto for a day or two!  Don't forget Toronto gets the lake effect from the air warmed by Lake Ontario, which buffers the frigidity of winter (and has the opposite effect during the summer months).  Sure, I was told that Lubbock gets about a foot of snow but that's throughout the whole winter season.  I actually even had to dig out a small hand-held scrapper to scrape some ice on my windshield one morning - am I glad I decided to bring a scrapper just in case!  What I did NOT bring, was a hat...wish I did, but luckily I don't have to do much walking, and I'm naturally hardened by having suffered Canadian winters my whole life.  Ironically, many people in Texas wear t-shirts and shorts out when they should be wearing pants and a jacket...either they're insulated by lots of southern-cooking or they don't own any clothing for cooler weather!  Must be the food...speaking of which, I just had a delicious pulled prk sandwich at Dickey's Barbeque Pit:

I've only started to scratch the surface of what there is to do in this quaint city. I had taken some photos from various local places (some of which were sketchy and would have been interesting to share), but unfortunately I accidentally erased it from my phone...so I'll have to get some more interesting pics in the future.  The one place I went to, called "Chances R" was as townie/country as you'll ever get, with a large dance floor full of townies, some sporting cowboy hats and boots mixed with a more modern middle-aged crowd.  Too bad it was so smokey there...that's one thing in Lubbock, smoking is allowed in every bar/pub I've visited so far...I guess things are a bit "backwards" here...last time I went to this pub called Fox and Hound and it took a few days for the smell of smoke to get out of the clothes I wore there.  Another backwards thing is that apparently there is no by-law (called "ordinances" here) against driving with one hand on the steering wheel and one hand holding a cell phone against an ear.  People also sometimes don't signal when changing lanes or before turning into a driveway/plaza entrances (especially helpful for those trying to pull out and merge into oncoming traffic) and stop more than a car length's distance from the solid white line at intersections that you're supposed to line up with when stopped for a red light...which can be for a full 90 seconds, even if it's not a busy intersection.

Anyway, I've started to scratch the surface of things to do here...unfortunately I don't think I have the will to try everything all at once, but slowly, it appears that there's enough to keep me busy here...just have to find them!  I'm actually very surprised to have gone to this hibachi Japanese restaurant that actually had really good warm lychee sake...and as the restaurant may suggest, had one of those chefs...wait, "cooks" cook...wait "heat up" your meal in front on you on a large flat steel grill.  But I enjoyed the experience nonetheless.  I also tried a nice TexMex place called Abuelos that was packed, even on a Sunday evening.

Recently, my lab had a post-doc visiting from Manchester, England, so the other post-doc in my lab and myself had ourselves a post-doc trip to Palo Duro Canyon about 2 hours north of Lubbock in Canyon, Texas, which is home to the 2nd largest canyon in the US.  It's of course no where as magnificent and grandiose as the Grand Canyon in Nevada, but the difference with this canyon is that you can drive down to the bottom and walk around various trails (there were even mountain biking trails) and have a leisurely hike within an afternoon.

Well, I'm still slowly climbing up the learning curve at work, which is probably why time seems to fly by...I never seem to have enough time to just relax and well, do nothing...long days at the lab acts as a bridge that merges two days together and before you know it, you're tired and drained of energy and the weekend couldn't come sooner...and then you realize you may have a little work to do even on the weekend and then not only does your candle burn at both ends, it starts to melt in the middle!  You know that feeling when your brain is so drained that you feel light-headed?  Kinda like jet lag!  So I think I'll need to start playing harder to keep my work-play life in check!  Let's see how sane I am by the next time I get a chance to blog again!  But rest assured, I'm definitely having an enjoyable time settling in here in spread-out Lubbock!  A couple friends drove to Dallas this weekend...I may need to do the same sometime!

Fresh Start

One week back from the holidays and I find myself tied up at the lab until well past 5pm, which seems slightly unreasonable to me, but regrettably justifiable and hard to avoid, the reason being that my schedule is in part determined by the schedule of those helping teach me the ropes in the lab and by my boss who has partial control over when I do things.  Sure, I still set my own pace, but right now it's in everyone's interest for me to go as fast as possible.  The learning curve is steep and the faster I start out, the quicker I may be able climb this steep hill to a gradient I find more comfortable.


So finally it's the weekend.  I took the opportunity to check out the Burgess-Rushing Tennis Center here in Lubbock as part of my scouting of local tennis clubs I could join.  This place is quite awesome, featuring 16 outdoor lighted hard courts that appear to be very well kept, and most courts even have wind guards.  It was however, quite quiet there for the time being, as it's still a bit chilly these days, with temperatures getting (temporarily) down to the single-digit temperatures (Celcius).  Afterall, it's winter...even in Texas.  But the sight of sounds of birds, reminds me that this is no winter I've really experienced before.  I wonder if the birds will disappear completely at all during these winter months, of it this is the final destination (for some species).


I also had to re-stock my fridge...Walmart style...haha...it's still such an odd thing to see beer and wine being sold there.  I shall continue to relish 6-packs of beer and bottles of wine for $6-8 and $5-7, respectively.  One of the places I've come to like is this place called World Market, which is apparently a large chain and they're located throughout the States (and you can buy online)...they have foods, beers, wines from around the world (i.e. with beer, it's not just Bud Light and Sam Adams), including a great coffee selection and non-perishable foods like Indian curry sauces, noodles from China, even Japanese snacks.  


Having just gotten more established and another bank account opened, I've also re-applied for a credit card - I wonder if it'll get approved.  It appears that they view credit cards as a way to get loans down here and ever since the recession, I think banks are all paranoid about giving credit cards out...if only they'd understand that I'd only be using it to get points and make payments and were able to check my credit history from Canada.  They're treating me as someone without any credit history, which is technically true in the US, but it's not like I was born yesterday - they could do some investigating and find out I've always paid my balances in full in Canada...and I still have at least one credit card and a couple accounts active in Canada.  Ah well, it's not the end of the world.  At least I have a chequing account (or "checking" as they would spell it) to use. 


One thing I like about the cable TV down here, is that I have a plethora of shows to watch on demand.  I previously got caught up on the Sing-Off, and just this week, got caught up on The Event, which I watched a few episodes of in the fall, but never found it that interesting...but watching them back-to-back actually lets me make more sense out of the show and easier to understand.  The next show I may catch up on is Dexter, which everyone always raves about.  However, only episodes that are moderately recent are available, so they only have Season 5...but that's OK, I may go for it.  However, one bad, bad minus, is that it's not possible to get the NHL network or NHL CenterIce with my current provider, and I can't exactly put a dish up for satellite service in the apartment I'm renting.  The internet it is...maybe next season, I may buy the NHL CenterIce online version, so I could watch it on my computer and even then broadcast it on my TV...we'll see.  It's not really worth it at this point.


Lastly, my current boss wants me to give a brief seminar this coming week followed by a question and answer period, which I am NOT looking forward to.  Looks like half my weekend will be spent doing some work.  I never mind the question part of it...I just hate the "answer" part of it...cause my brain has already deleted the traumatic memories of my PhD defence from my memory, along with some pertinent information...I think it's a brain defence mechanism to get rid of traumatic memories so the individual can function in everyday life.  Haha...we'll see how that goes...the silver lining is that it may force to me to get acquinted with a local bar the coming weekend!