James laughs with fellow NYA Next Participant Cait while playing volleyball at Algonquin College Residence. (Photo Credit: Thorsten Gohl)

Hi my name is James Koomak from Arviat, NU. I completed the Canadian Phase back in 2011 and was placed in Windsor, ON; volunteered at Canada South Science Centre. I’m very happy to be participating for NYA’s newest program called NEXT.

Firstly, we arrived to Algonquin College residence on July 8th straight from the camp and we are staying here for the month. We were training construction class for 4 weeks and we assembled a picture frame with 4 different joints and then made dog shelters with different angles. I really enjoyed the construction class because I got to know how to measure different angles, how to use the power tools and anything related to construction. I really like living here at the residence because it’s close to the Campus and the stores. The staff members are so welcoming and there is almost everything inside the residence such as an exercise room, several laundry rooms, kitchens and convienence store.

We did a lot of cultural and traditional exchanges with many different types of people around Ottawa including African and Syrian immigrants. The people were very excited to share thier knowledge of their cultures and traditions. Each and every presentation is momentous to me because it was my first time getting to know different cultures and traditions from other sides of the world.

I really enjoyed when we went to a baseball game, soccer game, and to the northern lights show at the Parliament Hill as a group because we made some memories together. Most importantly, I’m glad that we got to be taught about the Judicial System around Canada wether it’s Federal, Provincial/Territorial or Municipal to be prepared for it.