All Posts Tagged With: "Markham"
Back in the true north
Asian-dominated suburbs: the best cultural decompression chamber
As I sat down to write this blog, I got the chance to practice my Mandarin for the first time since returning to Canada three days ago. Already feeling cooped up in my parents’ house in Markham, I decided to find a café to try and write. One of great Taiwanese past-times is bringing your work and laptop to a café for hours and sitting next to your friend/boyfriend/girlfriend in silence while they do the same thing. In Taipei one of my favourite Sunday rituals was taking a five-minute walk to Café Belgie, in a quiet corner in the Shida night market, and grabbing some Belgian trappist beer while attempting to do my homework. In Markham, I contemplated riding my bike but settled on taking the bus to Green Grotto Tea Room in one of our great suburban plazas. When I walked in, the waiter asked me in Mandarin if I wanted take out or not. I managed to stutter that I would be staying. It took a great amount of effort–partly out of surprise I was being asked in Mandarin and partly in a struggle to remember how to pronounce the word “sit.”
Markham is one of the biggest Little Hong Kong’s of the world. It’s home to Pacific Mall, North America’s largest Asian indoor shopping mall. You can probably get by in this town speaking only a handful of English words–that is if you if you speak Cantonese. So identified are the Cantonese with Markham, they complain about feeling invaded when new ethnic groups (mainland China, Indian, Taiwanese, Tamil) move in.
Green Grotto is across from Metro Square, a mall I have been told is a Taiwanese mall. This meant nothing to me whenever I first heard it. It was just another Asian mall in Markham. Being back here makes me want to seek out all the Taiwanese in Markham and talk to them about Taiwan. Like how most people (local and fellow foreigners) assumed I was Taiwanese in Taiwan, I’m guilty of assuming people in Markham are Cantonese.
I can tell I have already developed that connection to culture you get after living there for a short time. It’s like how every time I meet a Dutch person I can’t let the opportunity pass without discussing the country and my favourite quirks about its people. I can see myself gushing about Taipei in much the same way except in broken and mispronounced Mandarin.
There won’t be much time to make Taiwanese friends, at least here in Canada. Yesterday, I went to the French consulate to apply for my long stay visa. From reading the language assistants’ online forum, it’s unanimous that French bureaucracy is a slow and inefficient nightmare. (When my arrete arrived in Canada back in July I found, after some inspection, some of the documents were dated in May.)
After handing over my documents, I was told that decision would take 10 days to make. After the waiting period, I should email them for the answer. If yes I would have to make another appointment to come in for the visa and if no, well, I guess I will be taking an extended French vacation and a slightly more imminent existential crisis.
The consulate official gave me back my passport with a slip of paper inside with my request number. I asked the consulate official if the wait was 10 business or just 10 days. “Just 10 regular days,” she assured me. I left the office and rode the elevator down to go reacquaint myself with Toronto. As I stood in the lobby putting away my things I took out the slip of paper in my passport. “10 business days.” it said.
Merci beaucoup.
Lost in pinyin
A place where “Chinglish” involves English and two types of Chinese
I have an estranged relationship with the Chinese language. While my first words were in Cantonese, preschool sped up the inevitable. By the time my parents enrolled me in Chinese language classes in at age five, English had usurped the title of my native tongue and I could feel a mutual grudge building.
I grew up in Markham, a Toronto suburb with a high population of immigrants from Hong Kong. You may know us for Pacific Mall, bootleg DVDs and raids by the RCMP on Pacific Mall to crack down on bootleg DVDs. Like any typical suburban youth, I harboured a certain disdain for my hometown and, in my case, by extension, the Chinese culture there.
When I told my friends I was going to learn Mandarin, I was met with the same reaction: “But don’t you already speak Chinese?” Toronto loves to pride itself on its multiculturalism. It’s our default catchphrase when explaining the city. So I was surprised to find out they didn’t know the difference between Mandarin and Cantonese and then once again at how difficult it was to explain it myself.
I’m Chinese but I’m no sinologist, but here is my rough explanation. The language spoken by the majority of Chinese people is Mandarin, which when literally translated means national spoken language. Regions have their own local dialect but everyone is taught to speak Mandarin at school. Cantonese is the language spoken in southern China’s Guangdong province and, mostly notably, in Hong Kong. Written Chinese is the same regardless which variety you speak–sort of. In mainland China they switched over from tradtional characters, which is still used in Taiwan and Hong Kong, to simplified characters, which have fewer strokes and easier to write.
As a Cantonese speaker, I can’t understand when people speak Mandarin. There is a lot of crossover in terms of grammar and vocabulary, but the pronunciation is often completely different. When I started to learn reading and writing in Chinese school, I felt there was almost no connection to the way I talked. As a Cantonese speaker, the best way I can think to describe the difference is that Mandarin feelings like speaking the way I’d write a formal essay. Having learned a little bit of Mandarin, Cantonese, especially the Hong Kong kind I grew up with, now feels like talking entirely in street slang. The language you learn in school is always very formal and correct but still I’d be impressed if local Mandarin could touch the dirty depths of Cantonese.
Learning Mandarin has unearthed a Cantonese cultural identity I didn’t know I had. Everyday in class I have a “eureka!” moment when my teacher says a new word and I can match it with its Cantonese cousin. However, sometimes comparing the languages sometimes gives rise to “that’s not the way we do it” type sentiments. Half the time I can translate things directly from Cantonese to Mandarin and impress my teacher and the other half, she laughs at the things I come up with. Then there are times when I’m trying to think of a Mandarin word while I’m talking and the French one accidentally slips out.
The way foreigners instinctively stick together here (I am no exception) gives me new appreciation for how difficult the immigrant experience is. Suddenly the smallest errands become epic journeys that require seeking help from online forums or your friendly neighbourhood English-speaking Taiwanese.
Being here has made me realize I feel most like myself in English. Not being able to communicate verbally robs me of a big part of my personality. I realize now this played a big part in why, at a young age, I already felt turned off by Chinese culture. Now I wonder who I would be if I surrounded myself completely with non-English speakers. Often I feel like I could never be fluent or as comfortable in another language as I am with English. The biggest obstacle might not be a matter of practice or time, but just a matter of letting go.
