Posts tagged with christmas.

O, Canada – home and native land?

by Raksha Vasudevan, July 21, 2009 at 5:33 PM

 

Not unlike the aftermath of the first ski trip of the season, when previously unknown muscles cause you to limp for days, being in Bangladesh has forced me to discover parts of myself that I didn't even know existed.

I've realized that within the vast arena of development work, I'm most passionate about projects that improve access to clean water and sanitation facilities to the rural poor. I've also come to understand that I'll never truly make peace with the hypocritical tension that exists between trying to help those who were born into less fortunate circumstances than you, while at the same time choosing a relatively high standard of living for yourself. Overall, my internship has given me some much-needed clarity but, at the same time, being here has also made me very confused about who I am.

Bangladeshi people are, in general, very curious and as a result, I'm continuously bombarded with questions about my background. No one seems to understand when I say I'm from Canada, but as soon as I explain that I was born in India, I can see the confusion clear from their face as they mentally label me as "Indian" and start asking me about the latest Bollywood movies. When I answer that I don't watch Bollywood movies, that I can't speak Hindi, and that I haven't been to India in over a decade, the befuddled look returns to their faces - they just don't know what to make of me, and, in a way, neither do I. In my list of choices about nationality, which box do I check off? Canadian? Indian? Bangladeshi, if I stay here long enough?

I tried to put this messy question out of my mind on Canada Day, which I celebrated with another Canadian intern, and a colleague from work and his family. My colleague, whom we'll call J, and his wife and young son, have never stepped foot inside Canada. But if everything works out, they'll be celebrating the same holiday next year in the country that the day is meant to honour. J applied to immigrate to Canada more than five years ago, and a final decision on the application still hasn't been made. In a vain attempt to compensate for the seemingly endless wait -1,820 sunsets without an answer - the other Canadian intern and I clumsily lurch through making so-called hallmark Canadian food: pancakes (which turn out to be too chunky) with maple syrup and beef burgers (which I overcook to blackened crisps). Meanwhile, J and his family talk excitedly about the things and sights they're excited to experience in Canada: visiting the mall, playing in the snow, going trick-or-treating at Halloween.

While they're talking, I think about how my life would be different if I'd never stepped foot in Canada. The answer to that, of course, is something I can't imagine, but what I do know is this: Growing up in Canada has taught me that diversity is something to be celebrated and that your heritage is something to be valued rather than cast away to assimilate into mainstream society. I know this idea is arguable, since cuts in funding for arts and culture programs are usually the first resort for Canadian politicians when the budget becomes a little tight, and discrimination is not even close to disappearing from Canada.

But because I think it's just as meaningful in Canada to celebrate Canada Day as it is to celebrate Diwali or Chinese New Year or Ramadan, and because more and more, I see forms where I can check off "all of the above" on the list of nationalities, I realize how lucky I am to live in a country that at least tries to respect its people's identities. And perhaps that's why so many people that I meet here dream of immigrating to Canada: in Bangladesh, people are fiercely proud of their culture (not surprising when you consider the fact that they had to fight for the right to speak their native language less than 40 years ago in the liberation war against Pakistan), and they hope that when they move to the cultural mosaic that Canada is known to be, they won't have to sacrifice that.

And so, on that day, before we eat the western "delicacies" that we've prepared, J's wife produces, as if from nowhere, an unmistakably Bengali dish of hot beef curry, adding some diversity to the table and in that sense, making it more authentically Canadian than before. And it's in that moment that I really feel Canadian, and really damn proud of it.


Tagged with christmas, motivation, canadian, poverty, bangladesh, food, raksha, vasudevan | Comments (11) |