miscellany

i was fuming at some point last week. i'd just about had it with the Nat'l Student Loans Service Centre (which OSAP is a part of).. all the calls i've made, letters i've sent, forms i've faxed.. visit after visit to the TWU financial aid office.. i had spent so much time and energy and money trying to rectify their record of my current situation that when they called my house (in toronto! even though i'd told them over the phone numerous times and made a note of it on my online account that i'm not residing there at the moment!) and left an automated msg saying that if i didn't call them back by a certain day they would take my case to a legal advisor, oh my goodness gracious i was ready to strangle someone! sometimes i'll call and get a competent customer service rep who actually knows what s/he is talking about and leads me one step forward, but other times i'll get someone who is completely ignorant of my situation or what needs to be done and they end up taking me two steps back. it has been a very trying few months... but there's not much more that i can do. i've done everything i could possibly think of. the NSLSC is a very poorly run system, but it is the only system of its kind. and i can't beat the system. i can't switch. i can't be picky. if anything, i should be grateful that such a system exists to provide financial aid to full-time students and allow them to maintain an interest-free status on their loans. what would i have done without my loans? my goodness. and they had even assessed my funding and reduced my debt load by a couple grand last year.. so who am i to complain? after all the help i've received from them, is it really right for me to call them out on their error regarding the (what seems now relatively minor) logistics of my loan status? no, it's not. come to think of it, who am i to receive such help in the first place? i've had a pretty self-serving attitude with this whole situation and i haven't been nearly grateful enough. and so... i was fuming for a while last week. but no longer. i'm just plain grateful now :P

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i had a nice loooong walk with An yesterday. it was beautiful outside.. 14 degrees i think? spring is definitely in the air... i can't wait for the cherry blossoms to come out. anyway, i had decided to wear my nike runners that i missed oh so much and asked my mom to send me through L when she came to vancouver last wknd.. but i think my feet have grown here. the runners were tighter and not as comfortable as i remembered them to be. when i got home a couple hours later i realized that i had acquired a few blisters... hahaha... how ironic that the pair of shoes i wanted so badly precisely because i remembered them to be comfortable ended up giving me blisters after a simple leisurely walk!

during our walk we talked about some interesting things. i still remember this one line An used: i'm not looking forward to *not* having a washing machine to wash my clothes. in fact, i'm not looking forward to *not* having any clothes at all! we were talking about the struggle of having one foot in the present comforts of our current life and the other foot in the comfort-stripped life that we are ultimately preparing ourselves for. and.. that is all i have to say about that for now.

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remember when i was venting about my TWU/ACTS application because i couldn't fit my whole name into the 'full name' field, yet there was twice as much space for 'given name' and so i had [Merry June Grac] under full name and [Grace (won't fit above)] under given name? i *finally* had the opportunity a while back to bring it up with one of the tech guys at enrollment services... apparently the software they're using doesn't allow for changes in field sizes, but they're hoping to upgrade/change the system by next semester to allow more space for full names. in the mean time, there's nothing anyone can do... but [Grac] was still bothering me cuz it was showing up that way on all my official documents and letters and class lists and stuff, so they took out the space between my first two names and now i'm officially registered as [MerryJune Grace]. much better ;)

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L and C came to vancouver last week and it was fun hanging out with them for two days :) i ventured out of langley/walnut grove by myself for the first time... it was slightly nerve-wracking as i had to transfer three times to meet them halfway in burnaby. unlike the TTC, it is of utmost importance that one plans their trip ahead on the Translink website for maximum efficiency or else risk missing transfers and waiting a potentially long time for the next one. anyway, thanks to L and her friends we managed to not get lost or stuck anywhere :P i met up with L and C at Willingdon Church for their saturday night service, and then we headed to E Bei for sushi buffet. the following day we went to Dragonball where L introduced me to green tea ice cream bubble tea... it has since officially become a favourite of mine ;) oh, i suppose i should take this opportunity to thank L and C for the umpteenth time for bringing me a suitcase of meat from my beloved momma. so.. thank you! and of course to L's friend T who drove me home so i didn't have to cart around my luggage full of food in the pouring rain. what a pitiful picture that would've been eh? haha.. it's funny when i think about it :)

me, L, S, Lw, J, C