Canadian Adventure - Week One Comes to an End

Yorkdale Mall, Toronto Canada

That was a fast week!  Can you believe it folks?  My first week of my Canadian adventure has come to an end?  And what a week it has been.

Yesterday Pat took me to the Yorkdale Mall.  This is thee high end mall in Toronto.  Think King of Prussia Mall with class and that's Yorkdale.

One thing that continues to amaze me is the multi-cultural diversity of folks up here in Toronto.  White, brown, yellow, black and all the colors in between.  Maybe it's me, but I detect none of the always present tension of racial animosity that I live with every day in the states.  

Toronto subway train - all races, clean cars, nice people - no tension - civilized

Toronto has a large Indian (as in Bombay India) population, which is right down the street from where I'm staying.  Also a Vietnamese, Korean, Pakistani, Chinese, and on and on.  Everybody goes about their business without those looks that mixed racial couples often receive where I live in the states.  I even see gay couples who cause zero ripples.  Even in Rehoboth Beach, two men walking together will at minimum evoke the look from some straights afraid their town will turn from family to Sodom and Gomorrah if the gays take over.  The last time Pat was down in Delaware, we were walking back from my friend's house on Laurel Street when a car load of young guys passed us and all gave us The Finger.  Somethings never change although I do have to admit they didn't holler the usual "F__king F__gs!", an epitaph that I've had hurled at me more than once in my lifetime when doing the simple act of walking with a friend down a street.  

Yours truly riding a troller through Little India. Even though I was riding with another man no one paid us a whit of attention.  Refreshing!

Pat had told me that Toronto was very diverse but I didn't expect this much freedom.  The last time I experienced this feel good emotion was the first time I visited Provincetown, Massachusetts in the Seventies.  That was the first time in my life that I felt normal.  That I didn't evoke disproving stars just because I was walking down the street with another man.  The first time in my life I felt totally free.  

Taking the trolley car back to Pat's house - a global community of travelers

So this aspect of my Canadian visit is an unexpected and pleasant surprise. Now maybe it's because I'm in a large city and maybe the hinterlands are like the hinterlands of the states where diversity is hated and discouraged.  That might be true but for now, I'm totally into this feeling of freedom.  

Pat in front of the Indian restaurant in Little India where we had lunch with Dr. Spo and Someone on Monday

Pat's out doing chores now.  I'm here catching up on my blogs, e-mails and checking out the news of the states.  I don't miss the international news at all.  What?  Another cease fire in the Middle East and Putin continues to act like a Putin.  What's new?  I don't miss it.

Something else interesting that I've discovered during my Canadian visit.  Canada, especially Toronto, appears to be very rich.  The prices of the houses and condos and products.  All expensive and the taxes are high.  Sales tax on everything expect having sex.  I was in a quandary for a while wondering "How do they do this?" then I realized they're not the World's Policemen.  Sticking their noses in places where they shouldn't be, just to show their might.  Canada doesn't have to spend a lot of money on defense because they have that big muscled neighbor to the south.  So that's how they're doing it.  By the way, Canada does't appear to have an immigration problem either even though most of the Canadians I've seen here in Toronto appear to be from another county.  But then I don't know what an average Canadian looks like.  Yesterday at the mall I actually did see a young, white, blonde couple with an adorable three year old boy.  They looked so out of place and frankly, they looked lost.  What I haven't seen AT ALL is one of those ignorant, hateful Tea Baggers. Thank God for small favors.  And to think I'm going back in that miasma in only a show week.  Oh well, I'm having a grand time now and thoroughly enjoying seeing human beings of all colors and races interact in peaceful harmony. Canada has it over on us in this aspect folks. 

There is no way this man is moving from his home in Toronto.  He's got it made.  Consider: Toronto or Rehoboth Beach, Delaware?  The answer is obvious.  

Diversity in Action

Bill explaining how the tractor works

Yesterday Bill gave his beloved Wheel Horse lawn mower away.  


Bill bought the Wheel Horse from my brother John for $1,000 in 1980.  John was preparing to move to South Carolina and didn't want to take his tractor with him.  


Bill used that Wheel Horse to mow our lawn in Pennsylvania for 26 years.  


He brought the Wheel Horse with us when we moved to Delaware.  He continued to use it to mow our lawn for the past four years.


A couple of weeks ago our neighbor (who happens to be a Pakistani Muslim doctor) across the street from us told Bill he was selling his house.  He asked Bill if he wanted to buy his John Deere tractor.  Bill jumped at the offer.  Our neighbor doesn't live at his house and only used his tractor a few time before he and his family moved to Philadelphia.


Now Bill had two tractors.  What to do with the Wheel Horse?  


Bill decided to ask the man who mows our other neighbor's lawing he wanted it.  That man is Hispanic.  We don't know if he is an illegal or not but it doesn't matter to us.  Every time we see him mowing and trimming our neighbor's lawn we have always been impressed at how hard he works.  He obviously has his own business.  We did have that little incident this past summer when his little boy got into one of my bluebird houses but I have since moved past that.  He hasn't brought the kid back since I complained to him. 


He said he wanted it.  He was very happy.  Bill explained to him how the lawn mower worked and gave him the papers with instructions.  I don't know how much good those instructions will do because they're so old, they're only in English (unlike instructions these days which are in both English and Spanish).


Thus we had a successful, friendly, neighborly transaction yesterday.  


Now would this transaction have been possible in the kind of country that the Tea Party wants?  Consider what has happened here:

1. Mr. Hameed, our Muslim Pakistani neighbor offers his John Deere tractor for sale to Bill.
2. Bill is gay.  
3. Bill offers his Wheel Horse tractor to the Hispanic (Guatemalan) man who mows our neighbor's lawn.

So consider what happened here, a Muslim neighbor sells his tractor to his gay neighbor who, in turn, gives his old tractor to a Guatemalan man.  

What in the world would Christine O'Donnell think about this activity? 

Would Carl Palidino approve?  After all a gay was included in this transaction and as Carl said yesterday, "being gay is not an acceptable lifestyle."

Would Sharron Angle look on in askance?

Would Rand Paul condemn such an action as being unpatriotic? 

Would Jan Brewer have someone check the Hispanic man's papers?

Just goes to show you what happens when you live in a diverse neighborhood. 

People being kind to one another and working together.