Toronto's slightly confused autumn
Almost thirteen drops of rain after a very hot day. Or maybe fourteen drops. One has to pay attention at midnight in the deserted, low-end neighbourhood that we live to hear the timid raindrops hitting the ground. Cars parked in the open shine reluctantly but there is no one hurrying home in Toronto's confused autumn. Fall arrived a couple of days back but the weather is summery and warmth is promised deep into October. We were here this month the last year and remember the cool, cold weather and the blazing red and browns of the tree leaves. But green still hangs on. A few maple leaf trees have turned partially red and look like the mop of middle aged men who dye their hairs but left it too long for a recolouring. Winter and summer share the leaves, the weather blows hot and cool and arctic ices are melting more swiftly than ever before. An ice free arctic in the summer is just a matter of a decade or two. Climate change? World leaders met at the UN on the 25th and as usual promised much. Many are critical of the Canadian PM Stephen Harper's plans. In a land where they have more weather channels on TV than entertainment ones, they are slight behind any serious level of concern. Canadians dying in Afghanistan is eating into them not the climate. Roja here The good old Ramzan popularly titled roja came and went. It was very visible in this part of the town - in the Bangla shops of Danforth Avenue, Toronto's deshi heartland. In grocery shops named Dhanshiri, Banglatown, Marhaba, Sarkar groceries, etc., one can buy much of what Dhaka can offer. Around Iftar there was the familiar buzz as eaters and shoppers gather to have and to hold. With fast breaking at 7.30 in the evening, there was not much time left afterwards except to pray and rest I suppose. One did get Peanzu, beguni, jilapi, halim, chola, muri and other stalwarts of the iftar menu. The quality was not Dhaka but the prices are Toronto. Two peanzus are a dollar, a small pot of chola dollar one. The rest can be estimated. But people do buy if only to taste delicacies which smell of a distant muddy home. About four years back, while visiting Ottowa, a Pakistani friend and I missed spicy food so much that we were invited by the very kindly Chair of the Sri Lanka Association who fed us rice, curry and tons of chili like a mother hosting children visiting after many weeks. A memorable feast. Spicy curries haven't caught on yet in snowy Canada. The food is North American, whatever that means - burgers - and unless the shop is Lebanese or Mexican, the food is bland even for me who has chronic ulcers and hasn't tasted chili in years. The lady at the Lebanese shop where I buy a Pita veggie wrap was so shocked when I passed the chili sauce that she asked me twice. At 2.98 the lunch is a bargain and like all Lebanese eateries I have been to, food is served with friendship. Wait ! In Dhaka, my blood pressure doctor could see me only after three weeks. In Canada, an MRI tests can take months. Apparently the lucky ones are the dogs whose waiting time for an MRI is only one day. This waiting time is the biggest crisis in the health system. You have to wait and wait and that could run into weeks and months. Going by what grumpy sick people say in the letters column and columnists add on, even emergency cases take months. A well-known lady politician, famous for wealth and other matters recently went to the US for her cancer treatment. Eyebrows raised and patriots mumbled by this attitude but Canada does have huge backlogs and immediate caretaking of the seriously sick isn't routine. US visiting is rising so do add some sodium to the halleluiah of the Canadian health system, say those who scribe. Apparently because hospitals are free, everyone tends to drop in demanding health attention critics say. Make them pay and the problem will listen. Hmmm…. Many white Canadians prefer the US whether for employment or medical treatment leaving the second-generation Chinese and Indian medicine people to take care of those Chinese, Indians, Pakistanis and Jamaicans who can't afford to leave Canada. By the way, the Canadian and the US dollar now cost the same. So more Canadians are going to visit the US but the incoming tourists are not going to be happy and an export slump is inevitable. China has beaten the Canadians for the first time as the main supplier to the US. Oh, globalization! Postscript: Eid came and lo and behold on a Saturday, which meant the huddled and toiling masses could officially stay at home and celebrate. On the eve of Eid the Bangla market shops bustled with people buying it up at their possibly fantasy hometown shops. Peshta, kishmish, shemai, curry powder, morich... 'Mr. Bangladesh' , the name of an exclusive meat shop in Banglatown, the Toronto version of Brick Lane, sold out their stock of chicken, beef and mutton. The owner with a permanent scowl continued to scowl even more as he expertly sawed off the drumsticks from the breast meat with a humming electric meat cleaver. The day itself was coldish with a decent wind chill and yet Bangladeshis did their thing - visiting, eating, visiting - in kurtas, kameezes and children in tow. The colourful kurta has finally overwhelmed the 'safed punjabi.' Here was one day that belonged to a people confused by location and migration. Now it is puja time. Afsan Chowdhury is a writer and journalist currently living in Toronto
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