Back in Canada

I woke up 40-50 minutes ago here in Vancouver hearing that two of my uncle Arne's car wheels had been stolen. Well, that's that.
Anyway, I left Estonia with my family on the 14. July. The flight from Helsinki to Toronto was pretty uncomfortable, as I wasn't sleepy, and there wasn't really a lot to do on the plane. But it was good to be back in Toronto. The day after arrival we went to downtown, kind of obviously, and I showed some places to my brother, now that I felt less like a newcomer. Eaton Center, the side of Lake Ontario, the Toronto University grounds and so on. Later Tiina took us to a free outdoors cinema, where they showed "How To Train Your Dragon". They had loads of technical issues but after an hour or so, they finally got it going.
On the 16. I walked to Danforth Avenue from our base on Burnham Road. There was a South-East Asian Festival somewhere around there and later at Woodbine Park down south I saw the Jazz Festival, same one as last year, there were some good performers. I liked a band called Left Foot Yellow, who played, and I assume composed, some instrumental rock songs.
The 17. was our last full day in Toronto, we're going back soon though. Soon we will start our little road trip in the States, and then we'll shoot off to Florida from Phoenix and then we will return to Toronto. Anyway, on the 17. I decided to walk around and explore (something I've become obsessed with recently) by myself. I went North, to a rich neighborhood. From there I went into a park, the one that's connected to Sunnybrook Park. It felt like it would never end. It was a great park, but in the end I wanted to find a way out and which ever way I went, there were just more plains, baseball fields, horse stables and so on. Eventually I did get out, obviously. It was through a campus of York University. Ten I went to Eglinton, and after an hour or two I was back home. We then went to Chinatown with my family, with many classic products in the smelly supermarkets, such as bean flavored ice lollies.
So, we had a flight to Vancouver two days ago. Staying at my uncle Arne's and his family's place around South Surrey, which I think is about an hour's drive from downtown. I've never been this far west before, until now the most west place was probably Florida, but I visited that in 1995, when I was a 1 year old.
It was a nice flight, loads of space. In the evening we all went to White Rock, a little town near Surrey, and there actually was a white rock there, on the beach.
What I like about Vancouver is that there's a lot of water here:

We went to Granville Island, which is in downtown. Filled with places like a food court, broom shop, some art shops and a brewery. There was also a show where some guy who called himself Dynamike, rode on a 3 metres (maybe) high unicycle while juggling machetes. Later I walked around by myself on the North coast of downtown, Stanley park and some other bits there. Pleasant area.
I'm not exactly sure what's gonna happen today, currently they've been dealing with the car, so I've had time to write here in my blog. Oh, and I'll try get some photos soon.

Biking, The Islands & Haunted Houses

On Friday the 13. I visited Toronto University with Henno, his mother and one of his friends, we were given a tour of the place. I've still sadly got at least 3 years until I can go to university, but right now I feel that I want to come to Canada to university. It was good to get a brief overview and idea of this place. In the evening Viive had to go to Hamilton, because she's designing a clothes store there, so I and Robert dropped her off and went to Niagara again. It feels very different in the night, in the day it's very sleepy and lazy compared to this. There were rock star/movie star wax museums, a Ferris Wheel, loads of haunted house attractions, a Ripley's Believe It Or Not museum, karaoke bars, souvenir shops and more. There was a fireworks display, which was quite impressive, I guess... We visited one of the haunted houses. It was pretty scary at times. Something was slithering against my back, I ran a few metres forward and it followed me. It was fun. Our car was parked next to a karaoke bar. All of the people (except for one) who decided to come up and sing something were great. However, there was one person who couldn't sing at all. He wanted to try again later, but for some strange reasons, he couldn't. Later we returned to Hamilton and eventually Toronto.
Saturday (14. August 2010) wasn't very eventful for me. In the morning I went biking by myself for some time. It was nice and relaxing to ride down the hiking tracks and slightly less relaxing to get back up, especially because it's still so warm here. After that I had sunglasses ordered for me. My uncle Aarne and his family came to Toronto (Aarne had arrived from Vancouver on the previous day, he joined his family at Joekaaru camp), we had dinner eventually, consisting of meat, corn, President's Choice chips, olives, cucumber, cheese, tomatoes, crackers and more. Then I went for a small (1 hour) walk in the neighborhood. We had dessert (muffins, cake, mango flavored ice tea) at Kristiina's home, she wanted to see Aarne's family too.
It was Sunday now. Aarne's family wanted to do something here before they returned to Vancouver, in the evening. They decided on visiting the islands (Centre, Algonquin and Snake islands), of course I went with them. I had wanted to visit them eventually. I really like these island. They are calm, relaxing, fun, you can see a great view of the city and you can see very interesting private houses and beaches there. We ate Pizza Pizza's pizza. Apparently my dad used to eat it a lot. In the evening we (+Tiina and Viive) went dining at Astoria, a Greek restaurant in Little Greece. The food was excellent. I had chicken souvlaki with rice and potatoes, a Greek salad for a starter and Pepsi (with as many free refills as I want!). Aarne, Aliina, Annika and Anne had to leave to the airport soon after that. It was nice seeing them again, the last time being in Estonia several days before my sudden trip to this place.
Today I visited the York Dale Centre again and bought some items there. I had Chinese food with Viive at the Food Court there. I also drank root beer for the first time on this trip, it had a very familiar taste. It was already nearly 7 in the evening when we left the Centre (or center, if you're American). After that I went biking again, Robert showed me a trail that led to Lake Ontario. It was after 9 that we arrived at Cherry Beach there. It was a different, more industrial side of Toronto, it seemed. In the night Viive did a strange allergy test to me, according to that I have allergies against chocolate, chili peppers, hay, latex and several other things. However, this was a very nonscientific test, so I'm not expecting it to be very accurate.
By the way, I wrote this post backwards, starting with today and finishing four days ago.
I'm leaving on the day after tomorrow (sadly), so I'm not sure if I'll post anything to this blog, while I'm still in Canada.