After my recent shenanigans in Canada I was happy – on the week of my return – to have a concert by kd lang to look forward to. Don’t ask me why kd uses the diminutive to spell her name as I have no idea – but as she has always done so, I will follow suit. Last night was the second night of her Irish engagement in the National Concert Hall. I was in like Flynn. It’s lucky that I even heard about it. The National Concert Hall does not sell tickets through Ticketmaster – an automatic plus for the venue – so it was by chance that I heard about the shows on the tram when I bumped into a friend and her wife, who informed me. Continue reading Concert review: The wondrous kd lang
Category Archives: Canada
My Nova Scotia adventures
‘One of your finest seats please’, said I to the check-in lady at the Westjet desk in Dublin Airport.
‘I am sorry Mr. Murphy, but you have no visa to travel to Canada’, said she.
‘Oh, but I do,’ said I with a smug chuckle. I had applied for, and received my eTA (electronic travel authorisation) three days earlier.
It turned out however that I had entered the wrong passport number when applying. My eTA was invalid and therefore I was not allowed to board.
My heart sank. I had been warned about this. Continue reading My Nova Scotia adventures
A visa for Canada
While pondering on how to successfully poach an egg – while eating one – in the canteen at work in the Wastelands this morning, I started eavesdropping on the conversation beside me. A colleague was describing her son’s summer working holiday in Canada, and about how he has just started work in a distribution centre in Vancouver. How sweet, I thought, to be nineteen years old and traveling for the first time. I inquired whether or not he’d need a visa to work there. Unsurprisingly the answer was yes. Of course a visa is required to work on another continent. I mentioned my impending holiday to the Maritimes, and announced smugly that I wouldn’t need a visa. Continue reading A visa for Canada