Roz.K

I had been in Canada for almost 3 months now.

I had signed up to a Toronto Meet-Up group prior to moving to Canada, and had hung out with the leader of this particular meet-up group many a time, but May 2016 was my first meet-up with the group, giving me the chance to meet some more Torontonians!

I had asked Amy if she wanted to join me at the meet-up as she was not part of the group. Amy jumped at the chance! We met up after work at the Eaton Centre before heading down to Jack Astors restaurant and bar (kind of like a TGI’s or Harvester).

Amy had asked me to meet her at the Eaton Centre to kill time, but also as she was meeting 2 friends briefly to catch up.

I got a chance to meet Amy’s 2 friends. One of them was Redmond. Redmond is American. Originally from Detroit, Redmond had moved to Canada a year ago and was living downtown with his grandma. Then there was Monique. Monique was another Brit, but from South London, England (boooooo!) she lived outside of the GTA in Stouffville.

We sat ate, and chatted until it was time for myself and Amy to head to the meet-up event. I invited Redmond and Monique to come along  as it would also give them a chance to meet some new people as they were fairly new to the city just like me and Amy. Redmond joined us, but due to Monique’s fairly long commute, she decided to head home.

By the time we got to Jack Astors, we had seen that a good few members of the group had already arrived. They had a Raptors game on in the restaurant, and as it was a Friday evening after work, it was pretty much busy and buzzing. More people had started to arrive. Everyone from the meet-up group was so friendly, polite and introduced themselves. Their was one girl that Amy and I had spotted when we arrived as we had seen her get out of a taxi, and we got talking to her.

Her name was Tereska! My first thoughts were that Tereska is such a unique name, especially for a black girl! Would you believe that Tereska was yet another Brit! We were so stoked to have met her. Tereska is from South London, and after chatting to her the entire night, figured out that her and I are the same age (look at God!) that her and Amy literally live a block from one another, and that we all moved to Toronto, Canada on the same IEC visa only a matter of days a part. Amy on March 8th, myself on March 11th and Tereska March 15th. It was all a bit too freaky, but yet so exciting that we had so much in common.

This was the beginning of a very meaningful friendship that would take place.