To stay in my little scheme of writing about Canada, I would like to reflect on one of my most memorable trips I have ever taken. About five years ago, my parents and I took a big, 2-week Trip to Quebec, Toronto and Montreal. It was rather a big deal for my family, since it was the first time they “showed” me Canada, the place where my mom grew up and where my parents got married. I remember little me being incredibly exited, I only knew Canada as the country of bears, snow and maple syrup. A very present memory I have still have is when we visited the ice hotel in Quebec. I was very impressed, a whole building build out of ice! I recall the highlight being drinking apple juice out of ice glasses, and I remember feeling like Elsa from Frozen. My parents told me all about their marriage in that hotel. I also still hold very lovely memories from Quebecs old town, where we walked in the snow for hours. The snow was like nothing I had ever seen before, and I was so in awe of the meters of white cotton candy that I suddenly found before me. Thinking back, I realise I most of my memories from Canada took place in the snow. A thing that I still dream about today, is a beautiful husky sleigh ride that we took in some lost forest, a couple of hours outside of the city. The landscapes that we admired from our cozy seats were spectacular. Even though it was almost a near death experience for me, since I spent 3 hours in -28 degrees not moving, I have never done anything alike since then. The whole trip was an amazing experience and I promised to myself I would come back to that awesome country as soon as I could – and look where I am now!
Author: Olivia L
IRJE #2 – The Long Exile
I started “The long exile” by Melanie McGrath a couple of days ago, and have found this book to be very interesting. The Plot takes place in 1923, when the Government forcibly removes Inuit people from their homes in Hudson Bay to the artic landscape of Ellesmere Island. The story follows “white” man Robert Flaherty, who has lived in the middle of the Inuit people for a couple of years, working on his mission to make a sellable movie of the life in the Artic. He finds a lover there, and soon he has a half-Inuit son, Josephie Flaherty, son to him and to Maggie Nujarluktuk. Josephie takes over as the main character, but I have yet to find out how his story continues.
“Displays of rage, frustration or depression are so disapproved of among the Inuit that many grow up without any conscious sense of having these feelings. “
I chose this sentence because I think it represents well what the book has mostly been about: to teach about the different and alternative lives that the population far up in the north leads. Between the fur trades with the southern Canadians, their main contact to southern civilisation, the Inuit people live very differently from other nations, living with unique and unusual nature conditions. They have adapted to that live style, but as Robert found out when he was living with them and experiencing their way of life; what makes people stay alive in harsh times and conditions is learning to live together, all as one, caring as much for your neighbour as you would for you.
Reflection on War Essays
The first essay I would like to focus on is “The Moral Equivalent of War”, by William James. James argues that despite wars brutality, it still creates positive qualities in the soldiers, such as discipline and courage. His idea is that even though war is destructive and ugly, its qualities such as comradie can be used for good deeds. He is of the opinion that the aggressiveness that can be found in every person, that it was left there for us by our ancestors, essentially making it a part of the human nature that cannot be removed (L.16-18). He says that, without war, life would be “insipid”; that it would be boring. But is war really what makes life worth living, what makes it interesting? This is what James seems to say: “War is, in short, a permanent human obligation” (L. 42-43). Nevertheless, he acknowledges war´s savagery, and mentions that peace cannot be achieved without “preserving some of the old elements of army-discipline” (L.58), saying that discipline and order is men need.
In “Can real men live in a peaceful society?” by Eric MacKnight, he argues about how much war is really needed to let out “hyper-masculanity”, as he calls it. He uses that term to describe a “strong, handsome warrior that loves the battlefield even more than he loves women.” The same can be said for hyper-femininity: “beautiful, sexy, and unfaithful.” (p.3). He describes the idea of a new “bad boy” as a result of the 20th century, saying that he combined the “traditional masculine virtues with a dedication to home and family” (p.2). As James did in his essay, he also mentions his idea of a mandatory conscription for all young men, to maintain the discipline of the war and let out this hyper-masculine side of them in a beneficial way. Men were once raised with the idea of chivalry, which was originally invented to “tame the violence of the men”, since only prison or castration seemed to work to appease mens violent nature. But this idea seems to fade, which leads to the question – will war and violence remain with us as long as we are human?
PW #2 – My Time In Canada
Today I am officially celebrating half of my time here. While it feels surreal that I have already spend so much time in Canada, I am equally as exited to go home again. I already know that these months will change me – since I came here I realised a lot, and I reflected a lot about my life. I have talked to many students here who told me about their homes they are trying to escape, about their worlds they just wanted to get away from, and how they simply couldn´t endure anything anymore and had to get away. Even though I also have my reasons for being here, I have, probably for the first time in my life, realised how incredibly lucky and fortunate I am to have people who miss me, and a safe and loving home I cannot wait to get back to.
My time here has also been a reminder to celebrate and appreciate the little things in life. I’ve tried to see as much of the area as possible, and the beauty of BC overwhelms me every day anew. The magic energy of the massive forests, the deep blue water of the ocean right next to where I live and the fresh, clean air – it shocks me how my local friends think all of this is natural and normal. I can say with confidence that, even though I have travelled a lot, I have rarely seen nature as breathtaking as this one. I am more than exited to share it with my family when they come here.
And of course, nothing would be the same without my amazing friends that I have met along the way. I am so grateful to have met so many kind people who I can be myself around with and who are there for me. I have never been in a place for this long with this many cultures, and I can see how it has been an eye-opening experience for me. Some of my best friends that I have made here are from the other side of the world of where I live from, and it has been nothing but extraordinary to live alongside these people. Even though I almost can´t imagine how it can get any better, I am looking forward to the second half of my stay and to all the memories we will create.
IRJE #1 – le garçon d’encre – Olivia
I started a new book today called le garçon d ´ encre by Marie-Christine Chartier, an Author from Quebec. The title of the book translates into the ink boy, although I have not yet come to the part where the book title makes sense. The book is fictional and the plot is about a young women, Maxine, who finds out that her dad has passed away and now has to come back to her childhood village for the funeral, the village she so desperately fled all those years ago. She is forced to face all the awful memories she connects to her home, also thinking of her depressed mother who suicided herself when Maxine was only 17. But coming there, she hears about the strange conditions of her fathers will: In order for her to access the fortune he left behind, she has to live for two months in her childhood home with a man she has never seen before, a man was who was apparently very close to her father before he passed away. The book is written in a mix of her present life, and in flashbacks of her youth.
” I think that the problem is spending your life thinking you are incomplete. Instead of hoping to meet one person who’s going to be everything for us, I think it is more important to develop relationships with more than one person, to assemble all of that affection to steady yourself. For me, loving is not needing someone to complete me. Love is the glue that makes sure that the already complete person that I am can be happy.”
This is a quote, translated by me, from Alex, the mysterious man her father knew and she now has to live with, when she opens up to him about the feeling that she is incapable of truly loving someone, in part also because of the lack of love she received from her parents. I think it is an interesting paragraph, mostly because it shows the modern point of view the author has about love and self-identification, which she transfers to her characters. You can tell that the whole book was written recently and that the author is relatively young by the words and expressions she uses, but also in the way she makes her characters think. I also think this paragraph is beautifully honest and true, romanticising in a poetic way that you don´t need to “wait for your second half”, but rather recognise that you are already complete by yourself.
PW #1 – color poems that I did with a friends
As the ultramarine blanket
wraps itself around me
I feel the world going quiet,
the storm inside my head
pausing for an instant.
A wave of calmness comes over me
as I stare into the navy blue sky.
The grass tingling beneath my weight,
the midnight breeze giving me shivers
Every year it is the same,
the olive trees
announcing life and a beginning
gifting me again with new days
PR#01 – Prose Readings
I´ve had the second world war in multiple classes and over several years, I have read books like Anne Frank´s diary and watched movies like Schindler´s List, and have heard numerous stories about the cruelty and barbarism of the German Nazis. But the first World War?
Even though I had it in school before and knew about the incomparable suffering and pain of the soldiers, I never fully realized what “war” meant to them. I never realized how their society forbid them to show emotions, or even the slightest mental impact, about their experiences at the front.
Reading “all quiet on the western front” and the diaries from real life French and German soldiers, taught me more than any school lesson or museum ever could have.
Not only did I learn about their horrifying living conditions and diseases that I never would have imagined even existed, like trench foot, but I also gained a deep understanding of how the returning soldiers were mentally, often as well as physically, completely broken and simply overlooked by their society. I now understand what torture the survivors went through, even though I know that it is beyond my Imagination to fully comprehend the conditions and abuse of the war, and that I never will.
To read about the war from the soldier’s point of view was an entirely new perspective, one that allowed me to learn about aspects of the war I had never really heard of before, like the comradeship between the soldiers and how that was often their only string to keep them, at least a little bit, from losing their mind. It also taught me what war does to humans: How after a while, most realize that in order to survive it, they have to “shut off” their humanity and let the most animalistic side of them take control.
Looking at the war from a modern point of view, I am simply horrified at how anyone could ever survive that, or even have the will to survive it. It is a mystery to me how the leaders and generals of the war were able to be as cold-blooded as they were and send thousand, one after another, to their certain death.
I know that I will take this and much more with me from the world war 1 readings, and that I now have an improved insight and knowledge of the war.
About Me
Hey everyone in this class,
My name is Olivia Lucas and I’m half French, half German and live in Berlin. Even though I wasn’t born there, I´ve lived most of my life in and outside of Berlin, benefiting from the urban city life and countryside at the same time. I´m an only child and love spending my time doing different sports such as karate, running and swimming, as well as reading and spending quality time with my friends. I also have the world’s two greatest cats that I adore and miss dearly.
This is my second time in Canada but first in BC, and I´m more than satisfied with my choice, as I believe I could not have chosen a more beautiful city in Canada. I came to Brookes to make new experiences and meet new people, and I´ve done nothing less since I came here almost three weeks ago.
The school and boarding life is nothing like I expected it to be, but I love it and am grateful to study and live here at the same time, something I have always wanted to do. I look forward to all the memories that I will bring back home with me and I am exited for the next few months at this school.