by Joshua Griffiths

Since my last post, my time at UVic has become a bit more hectic with the midterm season having just ended, for 2 weeks most of us on the floor were focused mainly on studying for our midterms and completing assignments, but I still managed to find time to do some things around Victoria.

A small group of us have started a weekly pool group, where every Saturday night we head into downtown Victoria to hang out, have dinner and play pool at Peacocks Billiards, an all-ages pool hall and bistro, which is a fun way to destress at the end of the week. As a part of this, I get to explore downtown Victoria more as well and sometimes Peacocks Billiards is crowded, which led us to discover a small Karaoke place nearby we went to instead.

I also went out to celebrate another friend’s birthday, going to watch an ice hockey game between the Victoria Royals and Spokane Chiefs at the Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre, which was an exciting experience for me being able to watch an ice hockey game in Canada. After the game, we all went back to UVic to our floor to hang out for the rest of the night and play some card games.

In early October it was also Thanksgiving in Canada, and while I didn’t apply to have dinner with a host family, my floor held a Thanksgiving potluck for everyone on the 9th. We all brought something for the dinner, some even making food from their culture to share with everyone, making for a very enjoyable dinner and evening before we entered the midterm season.

My time in Canada has still been enjoyable and I am looking forward to exploring Victoria more before my exchange is over.