Days 141-144
I spent day 141 hungover after the night club crawl. I talked with my cousin on the phone, worked out, and worked on my blog. The following morning, I spent hours on the phone with my doctor in Los Angeles, the pharmacy, and my medical insurance. The pharmacy filled a 90-day supply, but my insurance only allows for 30 days at a time. It was infuriating that I had to spend hours rectifying this and explaining to all parties involved what happened.
That evening, I was looking for things to do that would get me out and about. It was the dead season, so there was not a lot going on. On the Whistler community website, I saw that they were hosting a few game nights over the next several weeks on Monday evenings at the library. It was free and I love board games, so I was sold.
The library was closed, except for the room near the entrance that was hosting game night. Volunteers were helping explain the games that people weren’t familiar with and handing out cups of popcorn. I was intimated walking inside because I didn’t know anybody. There were probably around 25 people there, already divided and playing games. I was only five minutes late, but clearly, these people all arrived early.
I saw a guy and a girl sitting together, and they hadn’t picked a game yet, so I asked if I could join them. They said I could, and then three girls walked in late. They joined our group, and we looked through all of the large plastic bins of games to find one we wanted to play. One of the volunteers, who owned all of the games and let everyone use them, helped us pick a game. He was tall and sort of nerdy. Let’s be honest; it’s a game night at the library, we were all sort of nerdy.
The volunteer recommended we play a game called Dix It because it was good for non-native English speakers. Our group had one girl from Taiwan, one guy from Chili, and three girls from Japan. Their English was good, but they were still learning. None of us had played Dix It before, so the volunteer helped walk us through the instructions.
As we played, I got to know a little bit more about the players. The girl from Taiwan worked with the guy from Chili. Two of the girls from Japan were roommates, and they had just met the third girl from Japan right before they arrived.
All of them, except for one, had a work visa for one to two years. They were relatively new to the area and still getting used to where things were. One girl from Japan who was sitting across from me said she was just there to vacation and snowboard. Unfortunately, there wasn’t any snow.
The girl to my right, Saya, was from Japan and had a one-year work visa. She started in Vancouver, but several friends told her about Whistler because they’re all skiers and snowboarders. She came to Whistler a few months prior, got a job, and decided to spend the rest of her year there. She works two part-time jobs in a kitchen and a bakery.
Saya and her ex-boyfriend hiked most of a popular trail in the south end of New Zealand in 2016. We bonded over hiking and I told her I hiked the John Muir Trail in 2016. The year she hiked in New Zealand, they were having a horrible summer with constant rain, so they didn’t complete the hike.
In two hours, we played two games, and Saya won them both. It was enjoyable! Sometimes the guy from Chili had to look up words to see their meaning. It was a good game for them to practice their English, and it challenged me to find ways to explain certain words. They mentioned they were all going to a free English class later in the week and asked if I wanted to go. I laughed, “I’ve had enough English classes in my lifetime; I’ll pass.”
Once the game night was over, I walked over to a bar that I saw had a trivia night. I was too late to join in, so I sat at the bar and had a beer while I listened. I was bummed that I didn’t have friends to join me and regretted not asking my new game-night friends if they wanted to go. Sometimes it’s hard to put myself out there. Even with friends, there’s a fear they’ll reject me.
I spent the next day working out and writing. On day 144, it was time for the afternoon beer crawl. I met up with the hosts, Brittany and JD, who I had met at the nighttime club crawl. Brittany was 30, fit, with straight, long dark hair. She’s from North Vancouver but was currently living in Squamish (about 45 minutes south of Whistler). JD appeared to be in his late 20s, was tall, and had light brown hair. He is from Tasmania, lived in a few other Canadian cities, and now lives in Whistler. They were both really friendly and helped to make the time enjoyable.
In the group, there were two customers: Abbie and Caleb. Abbie was 28, tall, thin with long blonde hair, and was from the U.K. She spent eight months in Australia, but her work visa expired, so she figured she’d go to Canada or New Zealand. Canada is closer, and friends told her about Whistler. In May, she found a job and a place to live, so she decided to stay until her visa expired. She doesn’t see herself living in the U.K. and said, “I’m 28; maybe I should be applying for permanent residency and put down some roots.” Abby told me that she went to the south in the U.S. one time, and the waitress kept wanting to hear Abby talk because she had never met someone from England. Abby couldn’t believe someone could be 60-years-old and not have met a person from England before.
Caleb was in his 20s, was around 5’9”, and had dark blonde hair. He was from Australia and had been in Whistler for two years. He works at the same hostel as Abby. I mentioned my board game night and Caleb said he used to be part of a monthly board game club.
I was happy that our group was small enough that we could get to know each other better. We went to four different bars, sampling lots of beers. Brittany and JD provided a lot of good information. At one point, Brittany’s roommate, Dan, joined us for part of the tour. We had a couple of appetizers at one place, but we had a lot of beer over the course of a few hours.
Brittany and JD had a meeting to attend so they took off, but Abby, Caleb, and I were hungry and needed some food in our stomachs. They said there was a local wok restaurant that had a half-off special for locals since it was dead season. We walked over there, loaded up on food, and got really tired.
The three of us walked to the hostel where they worked. The upstairs has a restaurant overlooking the sidewalk in the village. It was much nicer than what you’d expect for a hostel and they had board games in the corner. We grabbed Uno and started playing with a few other people. There was one girl there who kept changing the rules of Uno to suit her, which was frustrating.
After Uno, a few of us played Settlers of Catan. It was my first time playing, but I had heard a lot about it. They taught me how to play, and it took me a while to figure out a strategy – I did not win. While some of the guys were getting drinks, Abby told me about her relationship with the manager there she’d been dating for the last few months. He was temporarily back in Spain and she was feeling distant. I totally understood her concerns and how hard it was to find someone who had the qualities she kept looking for but struggled to find…until she met her current boyfriend. Once you find that, the fear sets in that you’ll lose it.
I went home after the board games and was starting to feel like I lived there. I was getting discounts for locals and the people I met lived there, they weren’t tourists. Whistler was such an international city. I loved that I was meeting people from all over the world. I was starting to see myself there for the long-term.
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