ed_rex

The other day Raven and I set out to replenish our supply of printing paper, on account of we'd run out and I needed to print something toute-suite, as they say over in Hull.

Our mission was interrupted however as, barely out of the apartment, we missioned east towards Bank Street.

On a stretch of sidewalk ahead of us was a very old Oriental woman and a dark-skinned and much younger (not to mention taller) woman who might have been of east-Asian or Middle Eastern background. Or something else entirely. Onwards.

Raven and I slowed as there seemed to be something not right with the situation. But being and/or becoming Canadians, we were hesitant about just barging in.

But I clearly saw the younger woman glance at us, and then, take very definite note of Raven. She opened her mouth, closed it, then briefly spoke to the old woman. Then looked at Raven again and once more, almost spoke, but decided against it at the last moment.

This was a couple of weeks back, and I no longer remember if I stopped, if Raven did, or if the young brown woman decided to speak up first.

In any event, there was a slowing down and turning and we made it clear we were open to "getting involved".

"Do you ..." the young woman began, addressing Raven, "well, do you speak Chinese?" She stopped and looked down, as if she was worried she had committed some monstrous offense.

I presume I've mentioned at some point over the past couple of years that Raven hails from Macau? Her first language is Cantonese, Mandarin her second. (English and, lately, French, are coming up fast from behind.)

"Yes," said Raven, "I do? What's going on?"

"I think this lady is lost," said the young woman, but I can't really understand her. "Would you mind ..."

Raven had already started talking to the old woman. She briefly interrupted to let us know they were speaking Cantonese and that the old woman had got off the bus at the wrong stop. "I know where her building is," she said. "I'll take her home."

"Are you sure? If you tell me where it is, I don't mind taking her ..."

"No, it's fine," Raven said, and the woman seemed relieved and just a little surprised to boot.

Raven told me to get to the stationary store before it closed and said she would meet me there. I walked about with the good Samaritan. "I'm really glad you guys stopped," she said.

"I'm glad we could help," I replied for some reason donning the Royal We.

"I didn't want to assume anything," she said. "I mean, just because someone ... looks ..."

"Chinese?" She laughed, and nodded. I laughed too, mostly in an attempt to make her feel at ease. "You were in luck," I said. "Raven is Chinese. And I know she really was happy to help. It never hurts to ask.

"I guess," she agreed, but I don't think she really did. And who was I, the white guy, to argue? Maybe the visible minorities among you reading this can tell me how common it is — how frustrating or offensive it is — to be asked if you speak this or that language. Raven herself didn't mind, but she is an immigrant, so if someone presumes she speaks Chinese (or even asks) well, she does.

Maybe she'd feel different if she were born here.

Meanwhile, the young woman and I went our separate ways, and I never dared to ask where she was from. Her English was excellent, but with a hint of an accent. Just a hint, though, leaving me to forever wonder if she was from Vanier or Hull, or possibly from some place much further away.

For once I don't have any real thesis or rant to make. This was just an incident that has stayed with me, an uncomfortable encounter that I am not sure what to make of. (Besides being reminded that Canadians tend to be very considerate, perhaps to a fault.)

The main issue of this election is personal

"This government is willing to sacrifice Canadian soldiers to bring democracy to Afghanistan and Libya. But it cavalierly dismisses democracy at home.

Cynics hold that Canadians don’t care about such abstract matters, that as long as our bellies are full we will put up with anything. We shall see. The cynics have been surprised before." — Thomas Walkom, in The Toronto Star, March 25, 2011.

Photo by The Phantom Photographer; image manipulation by Geoffrey Dow.

It's been a week since the Conservative government of Canada (also known as "The Harper Government", about more of which anon) was finally defeated in the House of Commons. Stephen Harper had decided to roll the dice and put Thomas Walkom's claim that Canadians do care about such abstract matters as integrity and democracy to the test.

Having survived two and a half years, there was no great surprise that the government was defeated on a motion of non-confidence; what was (or should have been) a surprise was that that motion also declared that the Harper government had not just lost the confidence of the House but that it was in contempt of Parliament, an historically-unprecedented occurrence.

Some have no doubt argued that the charge was strictly political — and maybe it was — but sometimes the strictly political is based in reality.

In this case, the opposition had insisted — quel horreur! — that the Harper Government provide cost estimates for its proposed "anti-crime" bills (I use the quotation marks deliberately, and will return to Harper's "tough on crime" posturing in a future column). Contemptuous of Parliament indeed, the government of the Prime Minister Who Would Be President simply refused to tell the House of Commons — and by extension, the people of Canada — what the new prisons and guards, etcetera, would cost, insisting the measures be approved on faith.

Such a patently unreasonable stance can only mean that Stephen Harper wanted the election, no matter how much he protests otherwise. Harper was gambling that he could campaign his way into that ever-elusive majority government at last — at which point, if it happens, the gloves will come off and the spectre haunting Canada will will solidify into a very real neo-conservative nightmare.

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On October 27, 1982, a minor crime was committed against Canada by 12 Members of our own Parliament (eight less than a quorum), for reasons that were and remain obscure to me. There was no debate and the law was passed in about 5 minutes.

As others have noted, "Canada Day" is about as banal a name for the celebration of a nation's (official — in most important ways, Canada is a great deal older than 142 years, but that's a rant for another time) coming-into-being as can be imagined.

The Americans have Independence Day, not America Day; the French, Bastille Day, not France Day; the Germans, Unity Day, not Germany Day ... I think those three examples alone serve to make the point.

Canada is short-form for this country's full name, the Dominion of Canada, a phrase of historical importance with a Biblical allusion and a certain poetic gravitas.

"Canada Day", by contrast, is a-historical, utterly prosaic and completely lacking in imagination, suggesting to me a weird kind of self-loathing that implicitly denies there is anything worth celebrating in a day that is meant to be, well, a celebration.

"Canada Day" is a name that should be retired as a first step towards reclaiming our history, towards facing both the good and the bad within it.

Still, 142 years of unbroken constitutional history that has led to one of the most interesting and ever-more dynamic cultures in the world. I'll raise a glass, whatever the nomenclature.

"A Mari usque ad Mare!"