A NAÏVE NARRATIVE OF A FOREIGN LAND

Berlin Lin, BIPH

I attended a Canadian school at around 8 years old. The place was quite “new” to me to some extent even though I had already visited Canada a few times. The climate is different, the people are different, and the language is different. I felt just as intrigued by the experience as I had been when I first went to Canada during kindergarten. After settling there and deciding which school I was to go to, I was immediately sent to school by my parents.

The school was near our house so it didn’t take us too long to get there. I was to go to third grade, but I knew nothing regarding what they had learnt in the grades before. When I reached the school, a teacher greeted me and brought me to her classroom. The classroom was filled with many people of different races, including some Asians. The layout of the classroom was of a kind that I had never seen before. There was a place to hang your bags and clothes by the door, and it was a relatively packed room that had a whiteboard instead of a chalkboard. There was also a pencil sharpener nailed to the wall, which was a really interesting design that I had never seen in any school in China. The people there, at least most of my classmates, were quite nice and caring, but sadly I couldn’t comprehend a lot of the words they said and I just nodded to make them feel like I did. It was quite awkward at the beginning.

Another difference I had noticed at the time was that LEGO was cheaper there than when I bought LEGO in China. My mom told me that every time I wanted to buy a LEGO set in China, and I believed her. It turned out she was right after I did some calculations on the prices, and, at the time, I felt that the kids in Canada were lucky since they could enjoy the “discounts”.

Cuisine is an essential part of the culture of a nation. Most foods I tasted there were quite different from what I had eaten in China, even including the Chinese food there, which were probably changed to better fit the Canadian appetite. Despite the difference, I got used to it pretty quickly. In fact, I cannot recall disliking any food I ate there, except spicy food, which I can’t tolerate. Surprisingly, my favorite food there was Japanese food. The first time that I ate sushi was actually in Canada. To me, it seems that Canada doesn’t really have much food that is distinctly “Canadian”. Most foods were just common fastfood that could also be found in China or the U.S.. It is like a foreigner visiting Shenzhen asking for unique places that they can visit and thinking that it is hard to come up with an answer that isn’t a big shop or the Window of the World. The nation has such a large variety of food from around the world that it lacks its own unique foods.

During my residence in Canada, I had my first chance to experience politics. Before then, I usually couldn’t comprehend what the adults were saying when they discussed politics. As a result, I just left politics in the back of my mind and believed that I would probably understand it naturally after I had learnt more. When I reached 5th or 6th grade in Canada, the social studies teacher told us to do research on political parties and decide which party we would want to vote for. This was my first time ever actually tapping into the realm of politics. I did have a vague idea of what democracy was back then, but I never thought that “little kids” like me could actually vote. My vision of democracy was like the model in Ancient Athens or the Roman Republic, where only citizens were able to vote. With shock, I followed my teacher’s instructions and tried to do research and made sure I didn't make any bad choices that could ruin the entire nation. Then on the day we cast our votes, we wrote down our choices and put it in a box in the small library in our school. After that, I sighed in relief that the process was finally over.

Looking back at my past experience, I can clearly see my naiveness back then. The things that amazed me before don’t amaze me now. The sentiment dissipated as I learnt more about the world I lived in. My view on Canada changed drastically as I gained knowledge regarding geopolitics, history, and militaries. I now notice that it is not as significant as its size would suggest. A lot of its contributions that are praised are, in my opinion, not so significant compared to innovations from other countries. I felt even more foolish when I actually believed that my vote was significant or that we could actually vote. I felt that the whole voting thing wasn’t quite real, as who would collect votes in a library that is smaller than the average McDonald’s? It just doesn’t feel right. Nonetheless, I have never regretted spending three years of my life in Canada. These experiences allow me to really open up to the world and see how colorful the world is, instead of staying in my homeland, being only exposed to a monotone.