It's the little things

After a trying week at work, I am grateful for the weekend, even if

I started that about seven hours ago, then got to deal with an on-call which took up majority of my day.  I have no idea where I was going with that now, haha.  The perks of being the on-call social worker!   

This week has been pretty busy.  It's pretty easy to get swept up with work, putting in overtime, taking work home with you, pondering what you could have done differently in certain situations.  Practicing self care is essential - but admittedly harder when you're out of your normal surroundings and away from loved ones whom you normally talk to.  Thank goodness for Facebook.   In addition to having a tough week, I was also pretty sick, and as things were so busy at work, I didn't feel like I could call in.  It's only today I've actually started to feel better - I can't wait until I'm back to my normal.  And because shit happens in three's (or 33's) I also lost hot water and heat and internet for two days this week - so it was kind of hard to cheer up.  Glad that's over with!

This where it gets a bit hard though - because I feel like Nunavut is one of those places that you can't really understand unless you live here.  It's difficult to complain, and vent, and people offer very many well-meaning "solutions" and "can't you just"s, etc, but the thing is, more often than not, I can't.  Because this, because that, because Nunavut.    

I got this wonderful care package in the mail from a friend/fellow yoga instructor back home and it honestly made my week.  I was skipping through the grocery store, waiving it around and jumping up and down while opening it in the check out to see what was in it!  Chocolate!  A note!  Lunch when I get back to Toronto!  Totally uplifting. 

 As you can see, I was super eager to get this box open.

Another element of self care was finally treating myself to a pizza made at the Tujurmivik Hotel.  It seriously was the best pizza and definitely the best in the circumpolar world - and also it was the first meal in over a month I haven't cooked for myself.      

 Ontarians be like wah it's 15C and I'm all hahahaha shut up.

 This week was also the week I decided to surrender and actually dress appropriately for the weather instead of pretending like I'm still in Toronto.  And guess what?  My morning commutes were a lot warmer, which made me come to the office a lot less crankier!  Imagine that.  Fashion is out the door, let's start being functional.  I am from Chicago.  I don't understand why this is such an issue.  I should know better.  

Enjoying some coffee at the Tujurmivik Hotel after a stressful morning. 

I would also like to take a moment to express how truly grateful I am that I came here and met this extraordinary young lady.  She has been a huge help in my adjusting here, a fantastic colleague, and a wonderful friend.  We've gone out on the land, shared so much laughter, vented a tonne, and she's just one of those people who just has a perfectly ridiculous thing to say during a moment of stress, which ends in more giggles and laughter.  She's also a pretty talented throat singer, and has been teaching me the basics.  We recorded a pretty hilarious video on Friday of an attempt at several songs and I wish wish wish my internet was fast enough that I could upload it!  Perhaps when I return down south.  But anyway - her friendship was worth my coming to Igloolik, and I know that when I leave in September it's not going to be a "good bye" but more of a "see you later".  Cuz there's just some people who come into your life who are just too good to let go!  And this girl, she's the goods!   

Igloolik is also host to some insanely talented people, who are very eager to stop by your office to try to sell you All The Things. 

Like these earrings, made from soap stone.  Enjoy, mom :)

The carvers here are also excellent, and I've bought several things to take back to Toronto with me and already know where I'm going to put them :) 

This is exactly what I look like when I dance.  I couldn't not.  

The first carving is made from a white marble that's found on Igloolik.  I forgot the actual name of it (or if there is one).  The second carving is made from bone from a bowhead whale.  Both are incredibly gorgeous. 

And finally, my seal skin/fur slippers.  A client actually made these and I adore them.  

If anything, I can always admire the amazing view I have from my office.  The skies here in the "arctic prairie" are something I can't seem to get enough of.

I'll leave you with a nice shot of the hamlet I got the other afternoon.  I don't think I've managed to get too many of the town yet!  A more informative, thought-provoking blog to come - too tired today :)  

 

Halfway Home

Last week, I reached the halfway mark of being here.  30 days gone, 30 to go.  I meant to write out this big long blog entry, but come the weekend, I ended up with an insane cold, insomnia, and crappy(er) internet, and kinda felt like I was over the north thing.  Now that my internet is back (after having to buy an extra gig and pay for next month's) and I can breathe out of one nostril, and hear out of one ear again, life isn't so bad.  Now if I can work on the sleep thing, that would also be cool.

I've dealt with insomnia for the past two years or so, with it getting super awful for most of 2013.  At one point I was sleeping maybe only 8 hours a week, and it was really crappy.  I can't stand people who brag about the little amount of sleep they get, or how they "never sleep".  It's not cute, and you're not cool.  Your body and your brain needs that time to re-set and heal.  Not sleeping is overall unhealthy for both body and mind.  I've found for my insomnia, traditional Chinese medicine has been immensely helpful.  Cupping, acupuncture, herbs, massage - it didn't all work straight away, but I would say after a few months, I was sleeping pretty regularly, and only struggling to get to sleep maybe only once every six weeks or so.  I even got to the point where I was napping during the day and still able to sleep at night - I have never in my adult life napped!  And I know for sure I hated it when I was a kid.  

I was feeling rather anxious when I first got here about 24 hour sunlight and how it would affect me.  I sun-proofed my bedroom by using aluminum foil and duct tape over the windows, and every night around 9-930 I would go around the house, closing all the curtains and turning down lights to make it appear it was getting darker.  It also helped that Igloolik has had some pretty crappy weather this summer, with lots of clouds, to hide the sunlight.  And for the most part, I was fine!  

The past couple weeks though, the sun has been rising and setting.  And unfortunately, I have been rising and setting right along with it.  While Earth-Goddess-Hippie-Karina is all you are one with the Earth, keep wearing your patchouli and Birkenstocks with socks, Social-Worker-Karina-Who-Unfortunately-Has-A-Schedule is all FFS go to sleep and stay there until your alarm goes off.  

The sun has been setting and rising every night since July 30th, and we lose about a half hour of sunlight each day.  However, I am quickly learning that just because it's "setting" doesn't mean it gets dark.  Even with the six hours of set we are getting now, it will only get really dark for about an hour or so.  The remaining hours will be a dark twilight.  So, I guess that's been interesting to see and all part of "northern experience".

These skies, though:

 I am pretty sure this is what Rod Stewart meant when he talked about the ocean meets the sky - you couldn't even tell what was what the other night.  

 The only filter I used on this photo and the following was an HDR one to make the image sharper - I did nothing to adjust the colours.  The entire horizon and sky was on fire at sunset the other night.  Makes up for the Northern Lights I won't get to see:) 

On youth.

Something that I noticed right away when I came here was the sheer amount of youth: babies, children, teenagers.  When driving around, you need to be really careful as they are always out on their bikes, walking along the roads, congregating in groups of people at all hours of the day and night.  I was even treated to a midnight chorus of airhorns a few weekends ago on my street.

There seems to be a harsh reality of life here though, for most of the youth of Igloolik.  On Friday, our community had the most unfortunate experience of another youth committing suicide (they were saying the third or 4th one since December).  Social services does not really intervene in terms of youth suicide, but the community had a heavy heart and you could tell by walking through the hallways of the health centre Friday morning that it was not a happy day, despite the sunshine and warmer temperatures.  It is incredibly sad to witness the death of any youth, but for someone so young to give up on life so quickly always calls into question: where are we going wrong?  Fingers are pointed.  It's the parents.  It's the loss of culture and trend towards a more colonized, southern-Canadian approach to ways of life.  It's limited access to mental health resources.  I feel that these are all contributing factors of near-epidemic levels of youth suicide in Nunavut.  But I feel that one of the larger problems here in northern communities, is that youth are not engaged.  In some of my meetings with young offenders and families, I ask the youth what they want.  I ask them their hopes and their dreams.  They take an awful long time to think about it.  Too many times I hear "I don't know".  When I was growing up, if someone asked me what I wanted to be, I would be able to rattle off a list of possibilities, everything from President of the United States to a nurse to a dolphin trainer.  I never felt like my options were limited.  How can we provide that same level of dreaming to our children in the North? 

Risk factors associated with youth suicide in Nunavut are many.  Relationship issues appear to be wide-spread here, and can often be quite dramatic.  Lack of developed coping skills in both children and adults are often a springboard into suicidal ideations.  As I stated before, there are large barriers to mental health treatment.  Our hamlet of 1500 provides only one mental health worker.  While we in social services are not there to provide counseling, we spend a good portion of our day taking and engaging people in on-the-spot counseling sessions.  Sometimes, people want to come in just to sit down and vent and have a good chat.  I am happy to provide this opportunity, and grateful to anyone who steps into my office and wants to speak with me.  But I can say this is so hard, when there is so much paper to push, and so many other things to do.  I realize the importance of this though, and I try to do this as often as I can.  As I've stated before, and am reading in various literature, our Northern communities also have high poverty rates, lack of adequate housing resouces, food insecurity, and high unemployment rates.  

Before settlement and colonization, Inuit had a horizontal family structure accompanied by a kinship-centred society.  Post-colonization, we have witnessed a move from that to a more individualistic ("Western", or "European"-based) approach and a more vertical, nuclear-based family structure.  The introduction of foreign foods, alcohol, drugs, electronics, and more individualistic ways of living has broken down the family structure and left youth caught between two worlds.  The exposure of "the rest of Canada" through media perhaps leads them to feelings of displacement, despair and longing for a life which they might never get to experience, a life which is vastly different from their own.  The introduction of Residential Schools and "The 60's Sweep" left the family structure broken and vulnerable in our Northern communities, an attempt of cultural genocide by the colonial Canadian government which will take many generations to fix.   

Schooling in the northern communities also leaves much to be desired.  School attendance is not enforced, and many youth drop out of high school at a young age to have children, or because they do not like going.  What can we do in order to get our youth more engaged in learning and wanting to better themselves?  Is this in and of itself a southern Canada value judgement?  I have been informed that many times, teachers will hand out passing grades to all students and that the system needs major restructuring.  

Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK) provides a voice for Inuit living across Canada.  In drawing upon traditional knowledge from Elders in Nunavut they feel that Inuit need to:

• Pay attention to each other’s needs
• Focus on helping others as a way of promoting connection and a sense of usefulness
• Do something productive, active and healthy
• Talk things out
• Solve conflicts with others, and
• Accept that life is not always easy but that tomorrow can be better

 Source: Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami Website

I've also noticed a severe lack of things to do for youth in Igloolik.  While I have seen various advertisements around the hamlet for day camps, I still see youth up and around every hour of the day and night.  There have been a series of break-ins and vandalizing around the health centre as well.  Even our own truck has experienced some vandalization, with children writing and drawing certain phallic items into the caked-on dust.  Yes, I know our truck is dirty.  Sorry, but I need to erase your Picasso.  While yes, we can say it stems from a parenting issue of not setting firm boundaries (not establishing curfews, not enforcing education or structured day and evening activities, etc) we can also turn towards ourselves and ask ourselves: how can we engage our youth to prevent further incidents from occurring?  It has less to do with locking up cans of spray paint and not making it accessible for youth and more to do with providing them a place to express themselves and paint murals (or whatever they wish) as a group.  Lord knows we have the room and space available.  It has less to do with blaming parents and more to do with coming together to accept the responsibility that we are to support and raise this child.  We live on an island, but we all don't have to be islands.      

My thoughts and prayers are with this family and everyone in this community. 

• Nunavut Kamatsiaqtut Help Line - Phone: (867) 979-3333, or toll-free 1-800-265-3333.
  Every night, 7 p.m. to midnight.
• Keewatin Crisis Line - Phone: (867) 645-3333
  Monday to Friday 7 p.m. -10 p.m.
• Kugluktuk Awareness Centre - Phone: (867) 982-4673

Wanted: noms.

Because I cannot get the unlimited variety of groceries and produce up here, I had to bring a lot of stuff up with me.  Tonight I went Middle-Eastern for dinner, with some homemade hummus, falafel, tabouleh (because I finally found tomatoes and cucumbers at the Northern Store) and couscous.  The only thing I didn't bring up was pita bread, thinking that this would be sold up north... silly me.  So I enjoyed all of this with some toast, and used my imagination.  And cried on the inside.   

I've been getting the worst food cravings since I've been up here.  I am sure I am only craving certain things because they aren't even accessible to me while here.  Like, I got super jealous of a friend of mine who's social workin' it up in Pang, because their Northern Store has a KFC and Pizza Hut... which I would never even think about touching back in Toronto!  The Tujurmivik Hotel here in Igloolik boasts the best pizza in the territory, with people ordering from as far away as Cambridge Bay and Rankin Inlet, but I'm from Chicago.  There are turf wars over the best pizza there.  However, many people have raved to me about their Arctic Char pizza, so I guess I will have to try it.  

Lots of time the chocolate here is pretty stale and almost to it's expiry date, which is a shame.  I bought some really nice chocolate right before leaving Ecuador and wonder how it's doing, sitting all alone on my dresser... along with all the other things sitting on my dresser which I forgot to pack.  

Then I think about all the stuff I can't have right now... Chipotle, Salad King, really good Indian food, Chinese food (wanting to rent a private jet and get Heng Wing from my home suburb of Palatine [yes this was your shoutout] to deliver), and then I think of how my wonderful Greektown neighbourhood back in Toronto smells - because it always smells so delicious in the summer.  This weekend or next should be Taste of the Danforth, and even though I usually avoid it like the plague, I will probably miss my hood being invaded by throngs of people from the GTA to celebrate and pay homage to meat on a stick.  I have nearly made an itinerary of everywhere I am eating and meals I am cooking (my wonderful slow cooker Moroccan chicken made with my homemade preserved lemons which I cannot stop thinking about, for example!) once I return home to southern Canada.  I am getting my hair done the day after I get back and fully plan on going to Chipotle and ordering like 20 burritos with some chips and guac and sit on my couch like Jabba the Hut and will watch an entire season of Big Brother.  And it's gonna be a beautiful thing.   

And hopefully I am still back in time for fresh Ontario produce and will have enough time to preserve and can that stuff for the winter! 

I also really miss good coffee.  And the ability to go and get good coffee before work!  And homemade chocolate chip cookies.  Gah.  I need to stop.  

Anyway.  Polar bears.  Icebergs.  Tundra.  Clear skies and possible northern lights.  And a pretty neat job and opportunity to really make a difference here.  It's been worth sacrificing all that.  

So what's there to do in Igloolik?

"So what's there to do in Igloolik?" you ask.  I begin to laugh maniacally, then realize you expect an answer, and clear my throat.  "Uhm..."  

Here's the thing.  Igloolik is one of the sleepier little hamlets of the north.  It's not like Toronto, where I can just leave my house and meet my friends for wine and pizza in Withrow Park, or go to a free outdoor movie night in East York, or go downtown and walk around Yonge Street and people watch in Yonge and Dundas square.  There are no coffee shops, restaurants, movie theatres, shopping malls.  If I want something, I'm going to the Northern Store.  I usually end up looking at prices and decide I don't want anything anymore.  

 Why yes, that is indeed a $4.00 can of coke.

Many of the local families have cabins "out on the land", which is any land that's not in Igloolik proper.  This weekend, my colleague invited me out to her uncle's cabin for tea and bannock (fry bread, which I thought was only a south Canada First Nations thing, but apparently not!).  There were lots of kids there and I got to see a vastly different part of the island of Igloolik.  It was a super enjoyable experience.  

From the outside it looks small but on the inside it's quite roomy and cozy.  It was so nice to sit and relax and talk and laugh.  The landscape though, was beautiful.  There is such a stark beauty here that I didn't see at first but has grown on me these past two weeks.  

Sea ice, still breaking up.

Everyone will take these big blocks of ice and use them as freshwater in their cabin (that's how our tea was made!).  A lot more pure than the chemicalized, "treated" water we get in Igloolik that has made me sick almost every day I've been here. 

If you're adventurous, like me, you can walk on the sea ice.  Apparently this has been made illegal, as it's dangerous as you can slip off the ice flow and into the ocean.  Even if you can swim, the water is frigid and hypothermia is never far away.  In spring time there's a possibility you can fall through a crack and not be able to get back to the surface.  OK I'm not adventurous.  I'm a wimp.  But I walked on sea ice (which I will call an ice berg) when it was on the land.  I fell into the sand which was pretty much like quicksand.  Does that count as dangerous?  

Uppin' my street cred'.

I also built my first "real" Inukshuk.  I call it real as I made a decently sized one.  The rocks here are super flat, which makes them easy to stack, unlike the Inukshuks I've tried to build everywhere else (Canada was here!) and have fallen the minute I've taken my hands off them. 

You also see these pretty yellow and violet flowers all over the place.  I haven't had a chance to get up close and personal with them yet, but the yellow ones look like poppies.  I forget the name of the violet ones already.

On the land, you also find random monuments to... who knows what.  

Like this random missile.  Hall Beach, just south of here, used to be a former DEW Line, so maybe that's the answer. 

You are a long way from home, my friend.  
 

One of the coolest parts of the afternoon (and it was all great, so this is pretty much ultra amazing) was when my colleague took me to another part of the island to see the skull of a bowhead whale.  And it wasn't just any bowhead whale!  Earlier in the week, I had been gifted a lovely piece of carved baleen (or, the tooth of the whale), which had been carved from this very skull.  

 That stringy stuff you see is what it uses to filter out kelp and plankton from the Arctic waters.

Someone had thrown it out, and the person who found it brought it to me and told me it was mine if I wanted it.  How wonderful is that?  It's also not every day you get to meet the animal who gave you such a gift too.  It was wonderful to do that and to be able to "thank" them for it as well.  

I am about 165cm and I am pretty sure it was taller than two of me stacked on top of each other. 

It was massive.  I am reading that bowhead whales are second largest only to the blue whale, and often grow to weigh about 100 tonnes.  It would have probably taken about 60 men and many many boats to bring it back to shore.  I am learning that the Arctic is all about survival and the Innuit have done a brilliant job of surviving for about 4000 years now.  I don't think I could ever go out on a boat and bring in a mammal that weighs about 100 tonnes.  

It was a really good day. 

Eighty-Thirty to Five

Working in child and adult welfare services is vastly different from mental health. The stress is similar; trying to make do with the resources available (never enough) and to speak up and serve those who may not be able to speak up for themselves. Both fields require tireless advocacy, creative thinking, and and a heart of steel. I'm still working on the "heart of steel" part. 

Igloolik from the gas station.

In mental health, it is largely understood that change won't happen until the individual is ready to make these changes and take these steps towards recovery in their life. This might mean taking medication, withdrawing from medication, seeking counseling, going back to school, using substances in a way that is the least harmful to them: whatever steps they take in order to gain control and have meaning and purpose in their life. Whether it is the complete absence of symptoms of mental illness in their lives, or living a full life while learning to live with ongoing mental health issues, this is all up to the individual. They are in the driver's seat, so to speak. Any supports, myself as a social worker included, are secondary to the individual. You can lead a horse to water...

In child welfare, it's constant investigating. Referrals are endless, mainly due to mandated reporting. Domestic issues? Investigate. Youth arrested? Investigate. Does it involve a child? I'm there, following up, within 24 hours. Majority of our cases will be closed after an investigation, and thankfully, most cases after that will be involved in a voluntary service agreement, where the family is willing to work with us for a minimum of six months. While my first week was slow, this week has been full of investigations. It seems that no sooner I finish one, two more are referred my way. It keeps me busy, and the days go quickly. And I am eternally grateful that majority of cases prove to be nothing; no protection is needed.

What I am not used to, are the severe lack of resources in the North. Twice today, I ran into dead ends when wanting to refer individuals for more services - I simply could not, because those services just did not exist. And this is where it all sounds so trite. Because how do you work on a budget with someone who makes less than $400 a month and there are no subsidies to receive and food is so expensive? How do you work on supports with a young family when they are too young to qualify for income support? How do you sit there and tell someone there is no food bank, after they have told you they haven't eaten in days and they are starving, and then come home and eat lunch? This is where my heart bleeds. 

In my little community back home in suburban Toronto, I could probably talk for thirty minutes about various resources available for the population I serve. Here we have a clothing donation bin but no food bank. There is no access to subsidies for food, which is priced high due to shipping costs. Subsidized housing is non-existent. Generations of families live together, but what happens when you are on social assistance, aren't allowed to live with your family anymore, and can't afford to rent a place, which starts at around $800/month? Many people resort to building shacks on the land; called "love shacks" here. Newer initiatives have been put out by the government to offer more rent-geared-to-income housing, however there is still a greater need than resources available. There is currently no housing for individuals with mental health issues; though a pilot program is being worked on in Iqaluit and they are hoping to implement group homes in each of the hamlets in the long term. There are endless amounts of work to be done in housing and mental health up here.

I don't think it is wrong to want the best for the people I serve. I don't think it's wrong for anyone, in general, to get their needs met and receive the support and assistance they require, when they require it. In my profession, we often hear: "At least something is better than nothing!" and "We are doing the best we can under difficult circumstances". I am sick of both excuses, especially coming out the mouths of social workers. These phrases only seek to breed complacency and maintain the status quo. Social change was never achieved by sitting back and telling ourselves that something is better than nothing. Wanna know why it doesn't change? Because of people no longer challenging and more or less contributing to the status quo, as opposed to trying to break down barriers and decrease systemic oppression.  It is difficult to challenge, though, when you are so weighed down by work and at the end of the day just want to come home and not think about anything.  I myself do not have answers but I can indeed tell you the system in place (all over Canada, not just up here) isn't working.  But what do you do?  How do you change a system that has become so entrenched in our society?      

Elders felt that three Inukshuks we had in Igloolik were inviting violence into the hamlet, as with heads and arms, they are in warrior stance.  To try to quell violence which has been an issue in the hamlet, the heads and arms were removed. 

Igloolik

If you ever wanted to know what two months of my life and $280 worth of food crammed into a trunk, two carryons, and a cooler looked like, please observe the above. 

Getting here was... interesting, to say the least.  I was told I could bring two containers weighing up to 90lbs each by the government... only to get to the airport and be told by an Air Canada ticket agent that was in no way correct, and that my allowance was 70lbs only.  Thankfully, I was only overweight on my trunk, by about 8lbs, which got disbursed between cooler and carryons.  However, having to carry around extra weight is never fun, and unpacking and repacking the items you so meticulously taped up and sealed for extra protection is always a pain in the ass.  But, it was accomplished, and I was off to my gate to wait for my flight to Ottawa. 

I was unable to schedule my own flight due to my being in Ecuador the previous week before taking off to the Arctic, so I was scheduled to travel over a period of two days from Toronto to Ottawa, Ottawa to Iqaluit, where I would overnight, and from Iqaluit to Hall Beach, then finally to Igloolik.  I was sleep deprived and nervous.  I really liked Iqaluit apart from the unhelpful cab drivers and hotel staff, who were content to watch me struggle with having to deadlift two 70lb trunks every five seconds.  I guessed it was every person for themselves up here.  I found Iqaluit to be very pretty, very busy, and experienced the midnight sun for the first time, when I got up at 330am to use the washroom that night and it was still bright as day outside.  I pretty much stood at the window for five minutes, with my jaw dropped.  I also found it to not be cold at all, and was able to run around the city both days in jeans and a tank top. 

I made it to Igloolik the next day, in a ten-seater airplane with propellers which was loud and bumpy and I pretty much felt like we were going to go down into the ocean the entire flight.  Once at the "airport" (which was smaller than my Toronto apartment) I found there were no luggage trolleys and got to haul everything down a set of rickety metal stairs, trying to balance everything and not accidentally step on or be tripped by Inuit children who were playing on them.  It was no fun. 

I was driven to a super nice house on the edge of the village and was informed that I would be living by myself, which was great.  It's a very large and modern house by Nunavut standards, with an ensuite master bedroom, and second bedroom and bathroom as well.  It is warm and that's pretty much all I care about. 

I was also informed that there is a very light caseload at the present time as most people are away for the summer or "out on the land" hunting and fishing.  Majority of my children are medically fragile, and are in foster care in larger cities due to the inadequate medical resources Igloolik has to provide.  There are some custom and private adoption cases as well, but other than that, it has been very slow. 

Graffiti, Igloolik style.

Igloolik has a population of about 1900, and is located in the Foxe Basin in the Baffin region of Nunavut.  On most maps, it looks like it is located on the Melville Peninsula, however it is an island just off this peninsula.  Igloolik translates to "there is a house here" and refers to the sod houses which were originally located on this island (no igloos.  Shocker, I know).  The island was inhabited as late as 4000 years ago, and was visited by Europeans starting around the mid 1800s.  The first permanent fixture of non-Inuit people in this community was built by Roman Catholic missionaries in the 1930s.  Igloolik is considered one of the more traditional communities in Nunavut, with Inuktitut and local dialects largely being spoken here.  The children learn English at school, and the government employs local interpreters to assist social workers, nurses, home care providers, and the RCMP in their daily duties.  It is very cloudy and dusty here.  The sea-ice is still retreating from the ocean, and when it rains gusts of wind starting at around 60-80kph shake my house and it sounds like I am inside of a washing machine.  This is definitely not the 15-20C weather I was informed I would be experiencing.  

But some days, the sun shines, the sky is bright, and I am learning to tell the difference in the sky between "day sun" and "night sun".