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Saturday 2 April 2011

What is a Canadian?


It has been quite some time since I have lost updated my blog post. There are numerous reasons as to why this has happened. However, over the past few months to be honest this had become one of the last few things that concerned me or entered my mind. As most of you know I signed a two year teaching contract to work at a school in Kuwait. Over these past few months my continued employment and service here had been continually challenged based on my own personal beliefs. In the past three weeks approximately I had decided to officially resign. The weeks leading up to my final decision I had been struggling to find any possible reason to stay at this school, but I also could not find a reason not to comeback. However recently, I had found one or two reasons not to return, that story is for another day. in Canada, but it is where I want to be. Also, I am trying not to freak out this very second because I had literally just finished typing up my blog post and somehow I deleted it, and I have no idea how the screen just went blank, C’est le Vie. I’m also on an important deadline, I promised Nicole I would have a new post up for

As the my final days (76) here in Kuwait are limited I thought I would start to catch up on all the posting I had missed and enjoy myself before I have to begin the horrid job hunt for teaching positions back her to enjoy her oatmeal with.

I will begin this new posting with my adventures of Jordan, back in November. Now I’m pretty happy my original post was deleted because I wasn’t too happy with what I had typed. I am going to be very honest, I do not want to story tell all of my adventures of what happened in Jordan. If that is what you’re looking for then come find me in the summer and I’ll give you the slideshow accompanied by music and any questions you have, I will answer. Now where will you find me? The answer is Calgary, I’ll be at the stampede enjoying certain beverages not available in Kuwait.

So what is it that I want to inform you about my travels to Jordan, well there are soooo many things that I could tell you right down to the fine details, but I feeeel since this is my blog post I will only tell you want I want. This posting is directly related to my experience in Petra. If you do not know what Petra is, then please refer to my pictures on facebook, or watch the movie Indian Jones and the Last Crusade!!!

As I wandered throughout the ancient city of Petra, I knew the main reason why this place has been remembered and it should be obvious is because of the endurance of its structures and buildings carved into the sandstone that has survived over a thousand years and the centuries of disasters and the elements. Had all the structures simply crumbled and vanished into dust leaving no trace of its existence then no matter how impressive, powerful or interesting a civilization that had once lived there we would have never known about it, nor cared.

So I started to think about where I am from and all the things that we have built in terms of buildings. Yes, some of them are amazing feats of science and engineering but it seems as though now we are at a point in our existence where we are just trying to push the boundaries of what we can build and one day we will be able to figure out how to make the impossible possible. So what am I rambling on about now?

In an instance if our society was devastated by an earthquake or eventually built over there would not be a trace of our accomplishments left behind.

Even now when you look at our cities, buildings are continually taken down and are forgotten, only with new ones to take its place, we are constantly renewing ourselves. I kept thinking to myself what would Canada be remembered by? All these ancient civilizations had built themselves on such strong solid foundations of rocks and stone and they are remembered for this because we can find traces or whole cities of what they had. There is a great deal to tell about a civilization by simply looking at its structures, even if you have no idea what they are about or were used for; the size, material used, the details and so on give us so many clues. What about our society and cookie cutter houses, our buildings that are so bland; what will someone from outside think of our foundation?

During my time in Petra and up until now, I have concluded we won’t be remembered for anything that we have built, or contributed to science or a great person. As a country we struggle to find what makes us Canadian or what is our identity as a nation, is it really hockey and Tim Horton’s? What can we tangibly put our finger on? If you want my honest opinion nothing, there is nothing that you can physically see that makes us Canadian or can you and you have just not paid close enough attention?

What you will see when you walk outside and around look around is a country a place so diverse that you think you weren’t even in Canada, whatever that means. But what is it that makes us Canadian then? We can list hundreds of things that make Americans, American, or British, British and what they will be remembered for.
What makes us Canadian is the strong foundations of a simple piece of paper, our constitution and entrenched within it multiculturalism. The words in the constitution give us the freedom to be who we choose to be are what make up our culture. Those words not the fear of violence allow is to be who we choose to be. We are a culture of people who are open minded to the lifestyles and beliefs from everyone all over the world.

Now many would argue that by allowing people to enter Canada and keep their beliefs and bend over backwards to please them we lose our sense of Canadian identity and what we were built on. I’m not too sure what Canada was built on, the seven years’ war, the Canadian Pacific Rail Road??? What this country is built on and what everyone believes in our country is the freedoms and rights we have been given; to live a life free from the fear of persecutions of what we as individual might believe in.

All Canadians no matter where they are from in the world when they came to Canada all have this common bond. We all believe in the same basic principles of freedom to choose how we want to live. Nowhere else in the world will you find a country as open to so many lifestyles and what some would even consider controversial at time, consider our views towards marriage. Although why should it be controversial? Yes I understand the deeper issues surrounding the topic however that is exactly my point.

When these “controversial” laws considered by other parts of the world are passed, as Canadians we read the headlines in the paper, (and we might not agree with it, and that is our right) and then we quickly flip to the sports section to see if the Maple Leafs have finally ended their drought and won the Stanley Cup and then we say next year will they will win it.

The real point here is as I have travelled you do find you get two responses towards Canada, either it is viewed as a bit of joke and not a real country, or you can see how much in awe people are of where you come from as they understand the opportunities and life style that exist that you can have.
Canada may never have a unique and exciting history that you can go on about forever and be dazzled like some other countries. We probably will never be the economic power house of the world, or have a military and foreign policy that can influence and dictate the way the world runs, which in some perspectives is considered to make a great country and one to be remembered. Instead we are a country that finds its strength in our freedoms, and equality and even now we are still not perfect at it, but we are the best at it in the world at it.

Canada maybe 15 000km away from where I am living, but I can tell you this much we are more open minded and aware of what is happening in the world than the people who live right smack in the middle of what we call the world. So the next time you in doubt of what makes us Canadian to look for a famous writer, athlete, scientific contribution, and yes I know we have contributed a lot but look within our society, go to the mall, ring on all your neighbours doorbell because I can already tell you the answer the reason why you are seeing the entire world in your backyard is because of our beliefs for the freedom of all to live in peace and happiness, and that is what all countries should truly aspire to. This is what makes a Canadian a Canadian and separates us from the rest of the world.