Hello

After such a big upheaval, I'm not surprised if it hasn't all felt fantastic & I'm not even there yet.

A couple of other sites for if you are browsing around:

http://www.okanaganforum.com/

http://www.relocate2bc.com/thompson-okanagan.htm

Bali

This probably isn't helping. Nothing against people that work in coffee shops, but when you've spent time training for something else doing casual work without a visible end can be dispiriting.

Why it unrealistic to be a paramedic?

Awww, to me it sounds like the place isn't the issue, it's the

a) lack of career
b) lack of circle of friends

This is normal after a year after moving anywhere new, especially if you (or your OH) were pregnant for most of that time and you now have a 3 month old baby! Social circles take YEARS to develop - they don't happen overnight. Getting a feel for a city takes years before you truly start to understand it.

My OH moved to Vancouver in 2002 from Montreal and didn't fully experience the city until after 2 years of being here. Until then the only people he knew were the people he worked with. He had no social circle outside of work. Vancouver was a lonely place for him. And that's moving from one part of Canada to another!

But after several more years, you get out more, you meet new people, you're bound to expand your social network.

Part of the problem is that people compare their lives to what they had back in the UK. You cannot replicate a lifetime of friendships to one year as an expat anywhere. It takes time to build quality friendships, and even more to build multiple quality friendships and true social circles.

Of course, it helps if you're involved in a particular activity or "scene". I'm heavily involved in photography and music and have volunteered as a photographer and have met many people in the local media/music industry. I have expat friends who join clubs like the UBC Surf & snowboard club to meet like-minded individuals and they have grown their social circle dramatically.

Even websites like Meetup can introduce you to new experiences and like-minded people, which should hopefully help you grow your social circle: http://www.meetup.com/cities/ca/bc/vancouver/

Of course, where you live does play a part, but so many times we take a look at the microcosm and apply it to the macrocosm, when sometimes just moving to a different community within the same city can help immensely.

I don't know if this helps, but I just gather from what you said that your feelings have little to do with whether you're in Vancouver or Timbuktu - you'd be feeling that way regardless.

They can't even have a proper strike. They drive around doing their normal job's with 'on strike' written on their vans - what's the point of that?

...that's very Canadian.

Hey - will Pm you =- you sound like me a few months ago - actually I was a LOT worse!!

Hahaha! It's true. Don't forget the fact they make an effort to look grumpy as they do their jobs

In regards to the original post, how I've felt lately is that I've "forgotten" what it was like before when I was in the UK and what it felt like to be constantly wanting to leave the country. When I think back on the UK now it's a lot more objective and I'm more comfortable talking about the plus sides of the place than I was 6 months ago.

The advantage in my case was I didn't have a lot of friends in the UK and my main family had already moved to europe so coming here wasn't a big deal for me, and a lot of the stuff you mention I can't really relate to, so I'll just end my post here.