So it has been pointed out to me that I left my blog unfinished - incidentally, by the same person who called me out on never posting pictures of myself. The rest of you have been slacking! And while it seems unnecessary to have a post simply to say that I'm back, I do like to reflect after travelling and collect my thoughts. My blogs are usually built around being away from home; taking some time to think afterwards helps me figure out what the value of leaving in the first place was, and what I want to do now that I'm back. Heads up - the next few paragraphs are wordy and a little theoretical given that it's related to to my final year inquiry project. You can skip ahead if you like, and jump back in after the photo of the flag.

The biggest surprise to me was Québécois culture. Part of what defines culture is what you hold important and try to guard for future generations, and it is amazing to see the pride held for such a collective set of distinctive foods, dances, musical styles, language/accents, and recounted history.

I believe in a united Canada, but this is also biased by my understanding of Canadian culture as diverse, by definition. I have been asked in the past whether I believe that identity is lost through multiculturalism - and my answer is 'yes', but with the very important qualifier that a new identity or culture can be created out of the blend. For me, this third, forged culture is what Canada gains in return for what it lacks in a recognized collective culture (which is getting more and more difficult to find throughout the world anyway): this synthesized Canadian culture is formed of a generally-held respect for diversity, value for accommodation, and the resultant mix of lifestyles. This isn't to say that limits aren't needed, or that we don't have our problems, or even that this holds consistently across east/west, north/south, or rural/urban divides. However - in my own experience, I believe that Canadians have a greater appreciation for multiculturalism and live with it successfully than other countries.
 
So this leads to a problem on my part when the culture that I want to embrace as part of the Canadian mosaic doesn't want to be a part of it; part of the Québécois definition of culture is that it is not Canadian, much as a key element of being Canadian is that you are not American. It certainly wasn't a topic that I could get a good handle on in the five weeks that I was there, and I would be very interested to discuss it with young Québécois, rather than just host families or instructors. Something to keep learning about in the future, I guess, and if I stay in Canada - as I hope to - probably a topic that will return to anglophone Canada again at some point in the future.

And in terms of my excuse for travel - the Explore program was good. I'm glad I did it. The most rewarding part was seeing the effort I've put into maintaining my skills on my own (I haven't been able to take classes since Grade 12 - that's 5 years!) pay off; my host family said that my speaking was already quite good when I arrived, so they noticed the biggest improvement in vocabulary. That said, I definitely needed the refresher on certain grammatical points (hello, subjonctif), and picked up some Québécois-isms along the way. And there's nothing like immersion to improve the ease of speaking and listening in french; I'm going to miss the pleasure of seeing such a direct translation from effort to real life usefulness.


But on the other hand, I am very much enjoying my anglophone home life. School and summers have kept me so busy for years now; I've worked hard on maintaining my relationships but some are bound to slip a little to the side. July has been a wonderful month and I've been so, so fortunate to spend it seeing many of the people I care about: my mother, father, and brother; my cousins visiting from Malaysia; my university friends as we try to navigate new dynamics after graduation; even my Scarborough friends, the ones I grew up with in elementary and middle school, and the first ones outside of my family who were majorly responsible for forming a good deal of who I am (so: if I have any traits that annoy you, blame them! :P). It's been marvellous, and I'm very thankful.

As for August, I still want to take advantage of this break by spending time with friends and family - but in between that I will be preparing for my next big adventure of graduate studies! So far that's taken the form of lots of paper-pushing and internetting (i.e. fun times with different registration processes on McMaster's terribly outdated online services), and apartment-hunting for a new place to call home. I've found and applied for one place already; one of the things I like most about it is a little deck/balcony that I have dreams of stringing Christmas lights on (for the whole year, obviously!). If you are ever in the neighbourhood, it would be the perfect place for some tea and a chat. I hope that I'll see you there. :)


All the best,
-Robin

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Just typing something up quickly before heading off to meet some students for breakfast. These last two weeks have been pretty whirlwind! There were a lot of obligatory evening events, not to mention practicing and rehearsals for the show at the end of the program (self-organized small ensembles and some groups with everybody since we're all musicians). My final presentation was on the Québécois school system (the main difference is the CEGEP level, which is an extra 2-3 years of education after their equivalence of Grade 11), its roots in the Quiet Revolution (a time of many social changes in Québec between 1960-1970), and the unique distribution of schools in Université du Québec network. There was also the final exam, the post-exam-exam, and a stack of program evaluations.

I didn't want to leave yesterday! I've grown to really like the city, the region, and my host parents. I think my favourite memory is the second-last night; after dinner Réjean was installing the patio stones, and Nicole and I were sitting out on the driveway in lawn chairs. I brought out a table with tea (for me) and an ice cream sandwich (for her) from the kitchen and we all talked until it was too dark for Réjean (and Nicole and I helped him, don't worry!). I like languages - and using them, - because it's something that's so directly applicable. I think about it less often in English, but for both languages there's a pleasure in succeeding in something so useful, and then beyond that using your knowledge to describe emotions, people, situations, and ideas more clearly. The same reason I like keeping a blog in the summer, I suppose.

But I did have to leave eventually, and yesterday morning I took the bus into Québec City with some of the other students, and arrived at noon. Towards the end of the program I was trying to juggle a lot of different travel plans which were kind of stressing me out, but this is so worth it. Québec is completely and utterly charming, and I can often tell how much a city inspires me by how many photos I need to take (I take a lot of photos anyway, but I can feel it's different when I'm really inspired). I may or may not have taken 175 photos yesterday...the 176th one on my camera is of me with my host parents at the bus station. I can't wait to put them up on my photo account, but it'll have to wait about a week.

Time to run now...until next time!

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..Because this post is in English. But I'm so excited to be here that I couldn't wait to translate (and also it's really late), and it's also kind of a shout-out to Adri that I arrived alive. :)
I left Ottawa this morning with Adri, and en route to Montreal we stopped for my first smoked meat sandwich (delicious, if a bit mustard-y) and poutine in Quebec (to be clear, I love poutine but I've never had it here). They were awesome! So my introduction to Quebecois food (started earlier this week with St Hubert's) continued!

Then I caught the bus to Quebec City, which wasn't that scenic but for those in engineering I did see the Quebec Bridge! It was funny - the bridge was graceful, and impressive, but it wasn't actually as large as I had imagined it to be, and it was sad to think that it was what led to so many deaths (for those not in engineering, it's a classic example of bad engineering that led to worker deaths during construction, twice, because of negligence).

Once I arrived at Quebec I checked my luggage and then walked around the city for an hour. I didn't really get to see the downtown but I did a walk around the ramparts.

 

 Then it was off to Alma! And the bus ride was awesome - if you have somehow missed this, I am ridiculously fond of trees (to me they mean Canada, and home) and I love hilly landscapes, so three hours of driving through forested mountains was just the most amazing thing ever. I was glued to the window the whole time, and once we were really high up the lakes were frozen and there was snow in the forests! I EVEN SAW TWO MOOSE. The pictures I caught don't do it justice but I tried.

Then after arriving I got picked up and spent the last bit of the evening with my host family, who are lovely and in fact the couple who hosted my friend from Scarborough, Emily, when she visited last year! :) I can communicate fairly well with them, and I hope to improve a lot talking with them as they are very friendly.

Anyhow, I have to get up early tomorrow but I was so excited I wanted to share! And also it sounds like I might be busier here than I had bargained on, so I wanted to get a post in now. Have a great week!

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Hi there!

I've finally graduated, and I'm off for the summer! In this first post, I wanted to collect a few of my thoughts on why I'm doing what I'm doing this summer.

This year, I graduated from McMaster University with a B.Eng.Society, and a minor in music. The music for me is unrelated to engineering or my career, but was a personal goal to prove to myself that I wouldn't sacrifice my love of the arts for my engineering education.

Additionally, I have been incredibly lucky over the past two summers to work abroad, and by extending these trips to visit family and friends. These experiences were exhilarating, exhausting, inspiring, and thought-provoking. I am so grateful for how they allowed me to see through the eyes of others, and how they live their lives.

The unexpected result, however, was a feeling that I was losing touch with my own country - or if not that, at least a new realization of how much of it I take for granted. There is nothing like being asked to explain whether or not something is 'Canadian' to really put in perspective how large our country is...and, at the same time, how remarkably small a population when compared to other countries. Having lived all of my life in the Golden Horseshoe area I realized how inadequately prepared I felt to speak about Canada as a whole,  and I was simply stopped in my tracks by all the qualifiers I would add when I spoke about my home country.

And so, this summer is a Canada Summer. To celebrate graduation and living together for four years, my housemates and I took a road trip around the Georgian Bay. I'm also visiting Adri, my housemate who I wrote about last summer as well, in Ottawa on the way over to Quebec. And then, to really commit, I'm attending a french immersion course through the government program Explore in Alma, Quebec. The school that I'm attending has a special focus on music in its activities and workshops, and this is why it's such a good match: music and french were the two interests I was most afraid I would lose in the intensity of engineering. It's a perfect way to finish off by returning to them.

So that's my main philosophy for this summer: I want to learn about Canada, and start to understand a little more of this great country than I've been able to see up until now. I hope you enjoy learning about it with me, and please comment if you want to know something specific or have a suggestion for my writing! It makes it much more interesting for me to respond to something, and it also keeps me accountable if I know people are keeping tabs on me!

Happy summer everyone, and all the best. :)
-Robin

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