Sometimes our Canadian multiculturalism goes a little too far, even for a Chinese Canadian like myself. Here in Toronto, Canada and especially in Scarborough, my area of the world is biased towards Chinese, especially from the Mainland. Nofrills, a local big box grocer, decides to put Billy Bee Honey, 1 litre bottle on sale for $6.88CAD. This is high quality Canadian honey, which I have used for many years without issue. At the store I pick up four bottles and head to the cash, only to find that those I picked up are not the ones advertised on sale. The difference between the two: the advertised honey has an English-Chinese label and the one I picked up has an English only label. It was annoying to have to drop my bottles of honey at the cash, reenter the store and purchase what Nofrills calls “ethnic” Billy Bee honey. I am all for ethnic but please do not discriminate against English only labels and products. Nofrills, intended or not, you need a smack upside the head.
Billy Bee Honey: Bottle on the right called ethnic is on sale, the one on the left is not
GUM Red-cote disclosing tablets tint plaque bright red, showing your kids where they missed brushing. I want to buy some.
My little weed, when it comes to brushing his teeth, is really lazy. Other more interesting pastimes attract his attention, such as watching tv, fighting with his older sister, playing with whatever, anything is more interesting than properly brushing his teeth. Our dentist can attest to his lack of vigilance, which also reflects on the parent’s vigilance. That would be me. Disclosing tablets are chewed and use a red dye to colour plaque a brilliant red, showing my little weed where he was hasty. Recommended both by my family dentist as well as orthodontist, I cannot seem to find GUM Red-cote disclosing tablets here in Toronto, Canada.
So Canada is much better off than all other OECD countries? We have economic growth of supposedly 2%. How can this be? Statistics magic saves the day. Lose well paying full-time jobs, gain low wage part-time jobs, and call it even. Unfortunately your average citizen here in Canada knows first hand that job and economic statistics do not put food on the table. Long-term joblessness, as I know first hand, is a common and growing problem. We need to overstate that this personally decimates the job seeker but society overall. The negative implications long-term joblessness or unemployment are widespread and damaging to society in general. The newly jobless scale back discretionary purchases. The long-term jobless change their philosophy of life and spending, resulting in radical systemic changes to our retail and marketing environments. Health deteriorates, resulting in higher long-term health costs. No matter if you are currently employed, long-term joblessness will affect you directly or indirectly.
Hallowed Eve, or Halloween is an interesting tradition in North America, where kids of all ages dress up in scary costumes, and knock on neighbour’s doors for candy and treats. The kids will exclaim “Trick or Treat” and will expect some kind of treat. Halloween is a North American farming tradition where ghosts and other scary monsters call on your house. They will leave you in peace and allow you a good harvest season if you give them a treat. Here are some guidelines to follow for Toronto, Canada for parents of Chinese kids.
AT thus summer’s G20 meeting in Toronto, Canada, over a 1,000 fellow Canadians were illegally arrested, detained. About 900 of these were eventually let go without charge. Clearly our right to assemble was trampled to bits by police boots. These people should not have been charged in the first place. There is an ongoing call for a G20 public inquiry by many but it seems to fall on deaf ears. I will not and cannot forget this travesty of injustice and will remember the G20 the next time I vote provincially and federally. Here is an article excerpt from the Toronto Star from the Canadian Civil Liberties Association. I would like to read the complete report but have not found it:
Successful Rob Ford Mayoral campaign: simple, effective, and grassroots
Democracy works by allowing anyone to campaign for a political position, and the person who gets the most votes, gets the position. Apart from a couple of years living in China, this is all I have known. Here in Toronto we have a new mayor who campaigned on the platform of cost and waste reduction. Roughly a third of all councilors were swept out, replaced by fresh faces and ideas. We have “polls” that predict the outcome of the election before election day. These polls are akin to taking the pulse of a patient, an indicator of events to come. Using scientific and statistical analysis one would think that these polls would be quite accurate, but in the case of Toronto’s mayorality race, the polls were very wrong, by a large margin. It turns out that the offline community, those that do not have internet access or those that spend very little time online, threw the polls off, so much so as to question the benefits of polling all together.
It is with great dismay that I have been reading news reports that the recession in Canada has been over for many months, yet I still cannot find work. I consider myself to be an intelligent fellow, very well educated with work experience to match, but somehow I’ve lost my golden touch. Really, that is putting it mildly. Logically speaking if I had not been fortuitous enough to live a frugal and stable life in the past, today I should be in bankruptcy, living off food banks and be a beggar in the street. Smart strategies and a whole lot of luck in the past have saved me this fate. Or was it typical Chinese values. One will never know.
New employees at Toyota Motor Corp. attend a welcoming ceremony Thursday on their first day of work as President Akio Toyoda speaks at the firm's headquarters in Toyota, Aichi Prefecture.
Jiucai (garlic chives) in bloom, growing at our front doorstep, Sony H4, macro 4x zoom
This hardy Chinese herb seems to grow everywhere near our house in Toronto, Canada, self seeding without assistance. Jiucai is also called garlic chives. Put it into soup, stews, omelets, and jiaozi. You chop it down but leave the roots and it will grow back, multiple times in a season. Somehow this dainty little plant has moved to many sections of our backyard and have proliferated, but the most convenient is a clump near our front door. So handy yet tasty.
Something happened at my local Tandy Leather, Scarborough, Canada and the manager Ryan Wright was removed, the store taken over by head office. I’d like to get into contact with him and ask him what happened. Ryan is a very nice guy and I wish him well.
Ryan Wright, Mount Albert (just north of Newmarket), Ontario. Leather worker, blacksmith, archery, metal work and primitive arts and crafts, larper (live action role play) with Epoch Toronto.
