remember when we said we'd stay together
now until forever
just us
said we wouldn't be like all the others
fight and
hurt each other
not eyes
but we let each other down down down
down
this
is where i used to live guys i am back
at my former apartment here in downtown
toronto 140 wellesley street in the time
that i have had my channel this is
exclusively where i was living in a
studio apartment that sometimes had
cockroaches and that i was paying almost
a thousand dollars a month for and
believe it or not that was a steal of a
deal for this area of the city i had
first moved to toronto in
2013
and i basically lived here until 2020 so
seven years here in toronto and i will
say that while i absolutely love this
city i have so many positive memories
here in toronto
it was also some of the more difficult
parts of my life like i had a lot of
growing pains i had a lot of difficult
things happen and i feel like it was
actually in this city that i really
matured i became an adult you could say
and while my time here in toronto is
only a two week pit stop i'm just gonna
visit some friends before i head to
south america i thought that i would do
a video where i take you guys around the
city to some of my favorite spots see
how it's changed uh during covid and
then at the end of the video i thought
it would be interesting to see if my
opinion has changed
if i think that at some point i may move
back here
[Music]
what do you want
what do you want from me
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
a fighter
so ryan as we wait for our brunch
question for you as a toronto resident
what is your favorite thing about this
city and your least favorite thing about
this city okay well my favorite thing
about toronto is it's right on lake
ontario and so the water is there the
nature around toronto is spectacular
there's an island you can go to and
that's tied with there's a ton of things
to do there's restaurants different
communities different
uh places to visit and explore and my
least favorite
indomania
yeah and can i see myself living here
forever um if i win the lottery okay
great thanks
[Music]
what's absolutely bonkers about toronto
as you guys can guess
is the real estate prices they've been
saying for the longest time that it's a
bubble it's gonna burst
i would think it would burst
when an old town house
like that is easily going for a million
plus if it's in the nicer neighborhoods
it is just outrageous even for like one
bedroom condos if you want them fairly
downtown you're basically looking at a
starting price of like 600 000 canadian
dollars which would be about
i guess 500 000 american
nuts
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
so
[Music]
so here we are in the mecca
of tourist city
which is
dundas square well they're setting up i
think some kind of christmas village or
something down behind me so the whole
main square is closed right now but this
is basically the start of the central
downtown core we have the eaton center
over here we have young street which
runs this way and then we have dundas
that crosses it and what's actually a
bit surprising about what i remember
when i first moved here
is i was a bit intimidated
like even though i had spent a lot of
time living in japan i had traveled
quite a bit by the time i moved here but
something about actually dedicating
myself to this city and really going for
the film industry also spending a lot of
money to live in the city because the
rents are ridiculous
everything about coming here was
incredibly intimidating and i would
actually say that it took me a good year
of living in toronto before i felt like
i really understood this city before i
had a stable job before i had an
apartment i really liked so what i'm
trying to say is that if you move to
toronto or any other big city for that
matter almost always there is a sort of
adjustment period so don't be too hard
on yourself or jump to any conclusions
about whether the city is right for you
until you give it some time
[Music]
is
[Music]
there's nothing there for you to
complicate
growing up you're growing old your lucky
[Music]
don't change
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
so melissa and i just got a giant
pretzel a giant pretzel to share very
excited melissa would you say your like
top two or three snacks to get at the
christmas village oh like this yes um
hot chocolate yes i wouldn't count that
so that this is all in one yeah and
soup oh
i'm excited to try that i haven't seen
the campbell's truck they usually have a
campbell's truck
we'll finally might be sad
there better be
[Music]
okay so we are at cacao 70 having a
chocolate fondue
chocolate fondue i've actually never had
these before but they give you like
brownies waffles different kinds of
fruit and we got the milk chocolate and
we're just having the time of our life
basically maybe while i die yes
[Music]
what's up guys i am walking around
parkdale today and uh this is a bit of a
farther out neighborhood in toronto it's
in the western part of the city and i
actually used to spend quite a bit of
time here because my former acting
studio called rock acting studios in a
different location now within this
neighborhood so i come down here every
single week usually like grab lunch here
but walking around here now uh to be
honest is a little bit shocking
and sad because so many
so many businesses
have closed down like it's just a whole
bunch of vacancies one after the other i
don't know if you guys know but toronto
was actually said to be the most locked
down city in north america throughout
the pandemic basically meaning that it
had the most uh days of having
non-essential businesses closed and in a
city like toronto where the rents are
absolutely
astronomical where it's already hard to
survive you can see how this pandemic
would be so hard on small businesses
[Music]
you're looking for someone i can't find
[Music]
but i can see a future that's brighter
[Music]
to make it right to follow through
it's up to us i don't know what to do
to make it right
to follow through
it's up to us
[Music]
but sometimes you've
okay guys this this is an absolute must
wouldn't you say ryan can you make my
shirt look less wrinkled in post no uh
we are at an amazing ethiopian place
called lolly bella and i will actually
say that toronto is the first place that
i ever tried ethiopian food i feel like
i don't know not all cities have it but
if you guys get the chance and
especially here in toronto this is an
absolute must this is like the veggie
platter this is the
bread yeah and jara bread that you kind
of you take the bread and then you you
know try the different kinds of curries
and it is just amazing
all right so we're going to take a
little piece of injera bread we're going
to take some i think this is like
split peas or something
so good
i'm like really healthy as well that's
what i like about this place it's like
lentils not too much oil
different kinds of veggies
i think this is made with like
semolina wheat something like that it
actually doesn't have any gluten in it
so if you are celiac this would actually
be a really good meal and like super
budget friendly as well so definitely
definitely check this place out
[Music]
so hard to see
from the moment
[Music]
well friends
two weeks has come and gone uh it went
by extremely fast
and in a way i wish i actually did have
a bit more time because it has been
really great to
be back in this beautiful city see all
my friends
and
just be around the english language for
a while because to be honest it is nice
you know as much as i love speaking
russian i also really love speaking
english i'm obviously much more
comfortable in english so it's been nice
to not have to check myself every time i
have a conversation but i guess to end
off this video i hope you guys enjoyed
it uh i guess i will answer the question
that i post to myself in the beginning
of the video which was would i ever move
back to toronto anytime soon how has the
city kind of you know changed since i've
last been here and i think at this point
in time um it is an obvious no for me
i am very happy doing what i do there
isn't actually any place that i really
feel
so drawn to
being full-time at this point in my life
i really am enjoying being on the road
seeing new places being able to do this
as my career even though there are
certain things that are really difficult
about this lifestyle i really don't know
if i can get across to you guys how
meaningful you know the last couple of
years have been to me being able to do
this full-time being able to see the
things i have
like it really has been my dream so yeah
on that note no i would not move back to
toronto um at this point in my life who
knows you know what the future holds i
will say the city is quite a bit sadder
with uh all the closures that they've
had um in businesses because of covid so
we'll see how things go uh hard to say
at this point you know what will happen
but i will say outside of the crazy rent
prices uh toronto is a phenomenal city
it will always have a very special place
in my part i'm always gonna come back
here because i do have friends uh that
live here and that uh i just enjoy
visiting the city as well so i'll
definitely be back so that's it guys i
hope you enjoyed the video let me know
in the comments if you have ever been to
toronto what was your impression
and uh i'm probably gonna release
maybe one more video of footage that i
didn't put into
this video
squirrels are going crazy uh so i might
actually have one more vlog of uh
my time here uh before we get to the
south america content which i'm super
excited for so stay tuned i'm sending
you guys so much love hope you're having
a fantastic day and keep being your own
kind of beautiful bye guys
you