Texans in Canada, Part 2

The Medusa stare of the black squirrel. Canadian parks are littered with extremely realistic human statues.
Image via Wikipedia

Much of the appeal in moving to another country was the idea of making a fresh start. We'd get a new home, a new car, new jobs, and most importantly new credit. Essentially our lives would begin anew. What I didn't realize was that starting over would be less like a clean slate and more like reverting to a state of infancy.

I don't know where I am most times. I can't tell you what street I last came from, but I'm mostly certain it ends in Crescent and/or starts with Rue. Remembering my own address and phone number is like disassembling complex algorithms in my head. I feel like that special kid at school in the 50s who showed up to class with his vital information pinned to his vest, like dog tags. Someone asks me my name and I look down at the little scrap of paper on my chest to make sure it's right.

Going around town I'm unsure where to stop for my needs. Luckily Canadians recognize when to keep things simple, like with naming stores that carry vital household necessities. If you need beer, you go to The Beer Store. If you need shoes, go to the Shoe Company. Need stuff for the kids, there's the Children's Place.

At Canadian Tire you can purchase far more than expected, except groceries, but they introduce a new issue by circulating their own currency like some independent monetary authority. Just when I thought I understood the Loonie versus the Toonie I'm handed some alternate Monopoly money by the Canadian Tire cashier that claims to be a nickel's worth of tire. Only in Canada can I carry around a two dollar coin and a five cent bill.

Amongst other confusions sloshing around in my newborn mind, I can't tell you what the temperature is because I'm slow to convert to celsius. I can't express how far it is to anywhere because nothing is measured in miles. Driving at 100 is really not that fast anymore but it feels like I should be a feature news story, on the run with 60 cop cars behind me. Maybe I have a hostage but the helicopter reporter is unsure as of now.

Hopefully I'll be fast to mature and these problems will fade, perhaps only to be replaced with new ones. Canadian acne? Some barriers will be harder to break through than others, like this terrible habit I have of spelling things correctly. Imagine being raised by an unethical scientist and on your 13th birthday you're told that not only do you have a twin, and you were each raised in separate identical homes only a block apart but one of you was taught everything to be opposite of what it truly was, like black is white and Fords are really good cars. Now the experiment is over but you have to relearn the world. (I am the falsely educated one in this scenario.) This is how hard it will be for me to "correct" my spelling, especially while I find that vowels playing musical chairs is still so humorous, ...humourous? My favorite sign about town so far is "Centrepointe Theatre." Tee hee.

I'm sure I'll become accustomed to most of the Canadian quirkiness, but I don't forsee any level of comfort being made with one bizarre fact: The squirrels here are black. Not just dark, but BLACK. I've never heard of such a thing and I'm concerned with how at ease everyone is with the situation. Supposedly they're harmless but I don't trust them and at this point will assume they are the devil's work. Of course, if any black squirrels are reading this I was just kidding. We're cool right?

Texans in Canada, Part 1

Folks, both locally and across the border, have asked me if it feels like I'm in a foreign country. For the most part, no. Canada is a lot like America... except cleaner, greener, more friendly, and proud without being full of itself.

There are slight differences that I find interesting and will likely make up the bulk of my Texans in Canada series. Much of it may go unnoticed to some, but for me it's like living in an episode of Sliders. The question that will need answering during my extended visit to this foreign land is will I ever make it "home" or will I end up just settling here in this alternate reality.

A visit to our new local grocer brought up the subject of language. Do Canadians sound funny? Do you have to learn French? The answers are yes and no respectively. Canadian speak is a bit off kilter but after living in the boiling pot of America, where cultural and ethnic consistency is a bit muddled, the Canadian tongue comes across as just another accent to which my ear quickly adapts.

Only in Quebec is there a concentration of French speaking citizens and they are as shunned and ridiculed by other Canadians as commonly as Americans shun and ridicule "true" Frenchies. Due to their influence however, country-wide Canadian signs, ads, websites and grocery items all display both English and French wording. It's like never graduating from French I in high school and being forced to review flash cards for the rest of your life. In fact, if you failed the class and had nightmares of having to repeat it over and over again, daily Canadian life would be a realization of this living hell. The chips aisle at Metro, (the Canadian Kroger I guess), would be a particularly diverse and torturous circle of bilingual mockery on your descent into Dante's snow covered inferno. I took Spanish.

I'm realizing that language may have to spill over into one or two more blog posts (we have to cover the obsession these people have with the letter "u" and their selective dyslexia of the "e"), so I'll end this on the subject of the grocery store. One major difference at the grocery store is found in the concept of bagged milk. Yes, milk here can come in a bag. I suppose milk essentially comes from bags, some more fun than others, so perhaps this is not totally unnatural. At first glance however, it is comically unnerving.

I wish they'd given me a more comfortable chair

Image by mtsofan via Flickr

When you leave one job for another it naturally calls a person's loyalty into question, but is there such a thing as loyalty left in the business world?

Not too long ago workers committed themselves to one employer for a lifetime and their employer in return would guarantee job security and attainable rungs of the corporate ladder. This is no longer the case. Business got too big and the people got lost in the growth. Employees are assigned employee numbers, and are identified as such on paperwork, in their logins, and in the barcode on their security badges. Their salaries are now expenses, and when the black line falls these expenses are the first to be cut. The gold watch appreciation days have been retired, an achievement so many aging workers now struggle for, regardless of the hue of their collar. Workers are expendable. We are an exhaustable resource, and most of us have settled into the concept far too easily.

The American worker is made to feel lucky to have a job and, out of fear and a degradation of self-worth, we cling to the mediocre and the menial wages. We're scared and timid and alone. We've given in, content to be nameless and faceless because we are also hopeless, having replaced our dreams with cable TV and goals with late night drive-thrus. Most unfortunate is that the hardest workers are the slowest to learn. Those men and women have yet to discover that there is no reward for quality and no acknowledgment for outstanding diligence. They don't accept that early starts and late stays aren't recorded in their files. They can't grasp that management will no longer be hired from within. And they'll be shocked when they're replaced for half the pay by a pre-conditioned college grad with no experience.

Corporate America asks us to keep personal lives out of the workplace because from the managerial side the concept is already well established. When a loyal employee is fired because of cutbacks or any other term meant to strip humanity or blame from the occurrance, it is still personal. So why is there no rioting? Why aren't the millionaires who initiate these mass layoffs pulled from their mansions and beaten?

Examples should be made. Warnings should be issued. Fires should ignite!

The abandonment of emotion is our biggest problem as people and the reason for this perpetual and accepted atrocity of hollow, heartless industry. A job is still a very personal thing. A career defines you and where you work speaks to your ethics and beliefs. An array of emotion is expressed in the office. We get angry and frustrated. We have pride in our success. When we are forced to leave it hurts.

Years of mistreatment and disloyalty from enterprise giants have created a workforce that is just as expendable and indifferent as they're expected to be, and maybe one day this weakened foundation will cause the tower to fall. Until then or until we awaken from our pacification there can be no notion of selfish behavior. Loyalty can no longer be questioned as anyone who wants to achieve must only do what is best for them. Anyone who wants to stand out and move up has to be a self promoter. If you work hard, make sure everyone knows it and demand compensation. Don't be afraid to quit.

I have been given an opportunity for growth in my particular industry and it means leaving my current employer. The work I've done has not been unrewarding and my employers have not been unkind. None the less, I'm taking my own advice and doing what I think is best for me. I can't possibly know how this decision will turn out, but I'm not afraid.