Restarting the Blog

KAPOW! I'm back in action! It's been about two weeks since I got back from Katimavik, and it's time to get this thing back up-and-running.

The trip back to Guelph was okay. They sent me, along with a bunch of other people, home by bus. It was the first time they've transported any of us that way. I figure it's because, now that we're done the program, Head Office doesn't care about us anymore. A slightly more optimistic perspective, given by Grandma, is that, now that we're out of the program, they don't have to worry about taking time out of the program. At any rate, they apparently could have done us one worse. There's a bus that goes from Chisasibi to Montreal. They flew me out of Cree Nation, and sent me the rest of the way by bus.

If you were reading my Katimavik blog, you'll know that I got a magic stick from a cool guy with a mammoth beard, who's lived in the woods for eleven years, raises wolves, and makes a living by harvesting mushrooms. I was real scared that they wouldn't let me take it on the plane. I figured if I could get it through the plane system, it could make it through the bus system. I practiced my limping, so as to have a better chance of attracting sympathies. When we got there, I limped my way up to baggage, and limped over to where my groupwas sitting. A friend of our group said to check and see if I could get it checked as baggage. I was uncertain, because it would seem suspicious for a crippled man to ask for his crutch taken away, but my Project Leader concurred, and I figured that the insight of two elders was probably worth more than my own, so I complied.

Well, they took it! The whole trip would be coloured by anxiety for my stick, though, because we stopped over in Waskaganish, and we had to go through luggage and a more thorough security system, and no bus would allow me to take my stick on board, so I had to worry about it getting cracked as it was packed in with all that loose luggage.

It made it the whole way, though, and maybe my worries for it helped ease the anxiety of leaving my group. It even got a few notable moments. I was just a tiny bit lost in Montreal, and I was approached a Cree person. He first tried speaking to me in Cree, but that didn't work too well (I can say, hello, okay, one, two, three, eleven, rabbit, and fart, in Cree, and that's all), so he said in English, "How is the weather in Waskaganish?" in a sort of cordial, "I-acknowledge-you-as-a-countryman-enough-that-you're-worth-talking-to kind of way, and I received help from him. I think he saw that I needed help, and stuck his neck out, sort of explaining that he was doing so because of this tie. The Cree can be very perceptive. One time, one of our Cree friends told me where to find two of my group members, who I was looking for, and I never told him what I was doing, or even approached me. So, by comparison, being approached because I looked lost is in no way unrealistic.

But how did he know that we had this tie in the first place? I don't think I have an aura of Cree-ness... One month shouldn't do that.

So... maybe it was the stick! He saw this emblem, bestowed on me by a man who is said to have a heightened sixth sense, who does nothing for no reason...and who is known by all in Cree Nation... I was seen as a man who would be given this kind of a stick (It's not just a stick, it's got these funky, red-and-black ropes tied around the top, which might be more characteristic).

Honestly, that's what I've been telling myself, but an annoying part of my brain's been telling myself "He probably saw you in the Waskaganish airport. If he knew the man who gave you the stick, he'd have said 'How's the weather in CHISASIBI'".

Oh well, you still feel pretty accepted by the world when you're spoken to by the Cree in Cree, the French in French, and the English in English.

Going through the Montreal system both ways, the officials would address the French people in French, and the English in English. They never asked what way to address people, and with no knowledge outside a quick glance, the anglophones were left scratching their heads about how they could tell the difference.

Well, I was the only Anglophone to be addressed in French! And it happened every time!

Of course, if you try to reply in French, they'll know your Anglophonic origins before your finish your first words, so I'd usually do something like smile and nod, and they'd realize their mistake, anyway. I'm only French enough to last a first impression...

I adopted a lot of fashion advice from a French participant in my group, and I took on some of his life philosophies and techniques. It was only at this point that I realized the extent his culture was rubbing off on me.

That's not necessarily a bad thing... Sure it makes me kind of like the Vanilla Ice of French culture, but... in the world of women and romance, the very best any Anglophone man can hope to be is a pale shadow of a Frenchman. If you're in a battle of love with a Frenchman, give up.

Want statistics? Not any French man, or French woman, in all five groups my group was associated with, did not hook up with at least one person. Want another, weirder statistic? Not any Anglophone hooked up with another Anglophone, and there was only one double-French couple. There was at least one couple in each group... In total, there were... seven public couples, and they all but one went Anglo-Franco.

Okay, so that makes it sound like a wiser technique would be to go super-Anglo, and hit the streets of Quebec as hardcore English as possible, but in practice, that's not how things work...

Anyway, we were talking about my stick...

In the Toronto bus terminal, a girl sits across from me. She looks at my stick, then looks me in the eye and holds gaze. I hold gaze. A slow smile crosses her lips, I return it. She murmers "Nice stick".

I respond "Thanks! I got it from a man who's got a beard down to here, who's lived in the woods for eleven years, who raises wolves, and picks mushrooms for a living! He lives near a Cree village in North Quebec, they say he has a heightened sixth sense and doesn't do anything for no reason, he only gave one to me, and he offered for me to live with him for a month! I just came back from there, and I never thought it would make it this far!!!!!"

She looks at me kind of confused and says "That's.... awesome?"

And we sit in silence until my bus shows up.

The stick gets a third response, but ti's actually too emotional to post publicly.

I rode a double-decker bus, for the first time in my life, from Montreal to Toronto, and I sat on the top deck. Once the novelty wore off, it was pretty much just like a regular bus.

Coming back home was surprisingly not awkward. Mom and Bro haven't changed a bit, and I don't think they think I have, either. I asked them if they thought I'd changed, and they said something along the lines of "Kind of... you have a beard!"

My cat still remembers me... Didn't even punish me for being away by ignoring me, like he would normally do if I was gone for two weeks.

I've been to my old employment centre and seen one of my old counselors, went to the Food Bank where I used to volunteer, and went to a stag and doe, held in honour of my Karate sensei and his fiancee who also worked there as a teacher, that was located in my old dojo. I, and one other guy there, were the only non-black belts. That would not have been an ideal place to get drunk and pick fights! Everyone so far has recognized me. The Food Bank people didn't even flinch!

Coming back from Katimavik, in my full regalia, I appear as a typical flannel-wearing, suspender-sporting, flapjack-binging, axe-savvy Lumberjack. That doesn't sound French, but it is. My French friend was a pilot. Being French is like playing dress-up, but you take it real serious.

I haven't been back to Karate. Coming back to Guelph, it seems like I felt a release from duty, and I just dropped all the toughness and durability I'd displayed in the program and fell to all the little damages I'd acquired across my journey. A guy who managed to go through something that had been described as "A trip to Hell" with a smile on his face comes home and manages to wreck his ankle doing something which, at it's coolest, could only have been walking. And I think I did it sleeping. I've taken short walks outside and developed blisters. I get up in the morning and hear my bones crack and pop. I became so brittle!

But the only thing holding me back right now is my ankle. It feels like I did something seriously bad to it.

This is also the furthest South I've been in six months, and I'm feeling it in the heat.

Looks like that place I was taking those online writing courses from went out of business while I was gone. I think I'm going to take it off my resume. I only did one course, and it was kind of like one in a set of four. IfI'd done all four, I might keep it on, but as-is, I don't think so...

Going to Toronto next Tuesday to see my Dad and his side of the family, my grandparents, some old friends, and maybe my Aunt. Gonna be gone for two or three days, and I might do some work at that ice cream manufacturing place.

I was talking to the friend I planned to see from my old pre-employment program on the phone, her roommate walks in, and she says "Guess who I'm talking to?! ------- -------!" (I won't say my name on this blog again, I don't like how many times it shows up onthe front page of Google for unsettlingly non-cryptic phrases).

Turns out, she's living with someone I know from high school! Blow my mind! Two people from such separate aspects of my life are living together in such a remote location!

Can you believe I have more to say? I've got reviews and struggles with airline services at least still on my list, but I've been writing for long enough...