Ontario’s Cottage Country

 

(Written May 21) I believe that today the first time I’ve been back to Southern Ontario’s cottage country since I first went to Mexico 4 and a half years ago.  It’s as beautiful as I remember it!  The winding roads, the forests of rugged pines, and tall spruce, the hills and stony cliffs, and, of course, the many beautiful, small lakes.

As I sit here on a deck overlooking one of these lakes watching the lights of the cottages turn on as the sun sets over the trees, and shores become dark, I realize I still love this part of Ontario, just as many other Ontarians do.  There’s only a few sounds; the water lapping against the small, wooden boat dock, the chirping of a bird now and then, and even the call of the loon.

It’s a part of the world that I miss, and I hope to bring my wife and children some time soon.

Renovation, the Canadian Way

My brother, myself and my dad, hanging drywall

In Mexico, drywall, wooden beams and insulation have nothing to do with house construction or renovation.  Here's a picture of my father, my brother and me working to hang drywall on a ceiling of a room that we're renovating.  My wife, who took the picture was fascinated by all of this stuff, and by seeing me with a drill in my hands doing renovation work; I'm not the do-it-yourself sort when it comes to home renovations, whether the Canadian style or Mexican style, so the rare chance to see me do this stuff was a delight for her.

Growing Up in Story Book

When my wife first got to know me, to her I looked like Tom Sawyer – or at least the way she imagined Tom Sawyer.  I think she imagined me as a boy, running around in a picturesque little town, barefoot wearing denim overalls and messy, curly red hair - like in story book.

Visiting, and now living, in Canada has only confirmed her imagination.  Seeing the Mennonites’ horses and buggies, rustic bicycles with large baskets leaning up against old, red-brick store buildings (without locks) and the little red-haired, freckled children (to her, we all look like we have red or blond hair) run around in the large, open, fence-less grassy spaces of our village has made her more convinced than ever that I grew up in a story book.  I didn’t grow in the village where we live now, but my hometown (Elmira) is still small, and to her still looks like it’s from a story book.

When I tell her that this is just normal life in these towns (until the kids become teens), and those who live here find nothing romantic about it, it again reinforces her suspicions; only those who grew up in a story book wouldn’t find it romantic - just like her grandparents, aunts and uncles find nothing romantic about growing up in an adobe house with a mud floor in Mexico’s isolated hills.  As you can tell from my blog posts (see “Grandpa”), I also think that their life was charming.

I haven’t yet been able to convince my wife that I wasn’t Tom Sawyer at some point during my childhood.

Springtime in Canada

While living in year-round warm weather sounds (and is) attractive for many reasons, there’s something wonderful about the passing of real seasons – seasons you can see, feel, smell and even hear.

I love the weather in Mexico – especially places like Cuernavaca – but the seasons really only pass on the calendar, and the change between sunny and rainy or hot and really hot (in the case of Playa del Carmen) really don’t match up with the traditional northern seasons I love so much, besides the fact that the complete appeal to all senses isn’t so noticeably present.

Today my wife, who can’t stand weather colder than 20 degrees Celsius, told me that there was something extraordinarily beautiful in seeing gardens full of freshly blooming flowers, bright green leaves just beginning to sprout from their buds, and lush, green grass, all against a sunny sky, on a day that’s finally warm enough to take off your sweater – after so many weeks of cold, grey, rainy days, with spring battling to emerge from a unseemly long season that resembled late winter more than anything else.  You can smell the flowers and freshly cut grass.  You can hear the birds singing in a sort of relief, a proclamation of the coming warmth.

Getting on an airplane and flying somewhere warm just doesn’t have the same rich appeal to the senses.

There’s is something very beautiful in this changing of the seasons in Canada.  I love every season in Canada just because it is such a beautiful contrast to the one that proceeds it.

The Other Mexicans

A few days ago, my wife and I met a relatively tall, white woman who was wearing a long, dark dress with flowers on it, and a head covering.  She speaks both English and Spanish, with a very heavy Germanic accent, and, of course, a dialect of Low German.  When my wife told her she was Mexican, she replied:

“Well, so am I.  I’m Mexican.  I was born there and I lived there all of my life.”

She is a part of the Old Colony Mennonite culture, which has grown so strong in Mexico, that many people informally call these people Mexican Mennonites.

I am very familiar with this culture, since my parents grew up as part of the Old Colony community in Mexico, and I grew up with close contact to the community in Canada; my parents have also retained a good number of the cultural traits, such as making cheese (see my post 2 days ago about Mennonite cheese) and the language.  However, I was still a little taken back to hear this woman call herself Mexican without any hesitation.  I’m also officially Mexican, but my first and also official nationality is Canadian (I was born here.)

This woman would have no other nationality to be if she weren’t Mexican.  Her grandparents were probably Canadian (the Old Colony Mennonites in Mexico came mostly from the Canadian Prairies), but until a few years ago, she had never been here, and would have no official claim to being Canadian, and only a weak cultural claim.

So, although Mexicans themselves would probably have trouble acknowledging it, and even many Mennonites erroneously refer to themselves as “Germans” (this claim would be like Australians calling themselves British,) they are in reality Mexicans.  A very different type of Mexican from the typical, but nevertheless Mexicans.  They speak a different language, wear different clothes, eat different food (although they are adopting some Mexican cooking traditions) and they are definitely not touchy-feely like other Mexicans.

Furthermore, Catholicism has nothing to do with any part of their life – Mennonite is also a group of Christian churches.  Almost every Latin Mexican is either Catholic or decisively non-Catholic, being very conscious of what they are rejecting, since just about everyone else around them is at least nominally Catholic.  Old Colony Mennonites have held their religious culture for centuries and have long since lost the cultural background of Catholicism to pit themselves against. (More on this will soon come in my other blog, Imagine)

This reflects a point that Mexico, despite our perception of a single culture, is actually multi-cultural in a way, and a melting-pot in another way, having adopted and adapted elements of a variety of cultures brought by invaders and immigrants.

More to come on multiculturalism in Mexico and Old Colony Mennonites.  Since it’s my own ethnic heritage, I’m fairly intrigued by it, and being back in Canada, I’m coming into more contact with it again.

Canadian Visas for Mexican Citizens

A relatively recent event in Canadian-Mexican relations is the implementation of a visa requirement for Mexican citizens to enter Canada.  2 years ago, Mexicans could enter Canada with only a simple passport.  Apparently, too many Mexicans were falsely claiming refugee status in Canada after arriving as tourists, and thus the visa – I problem I most certainly agree needed to be addressed.  Unfortunately, though, from what I understand, it was actually Canadians who, in many cases were hiring out (illegal) services to Mexican visitors offering to show them how to gain refugee status in return for an absurdly large amount of funds.  This really is sad that Canadians themselves would be undermining our own immigration and refugee systems (both important and helpful when they are run properly), helping to create immigration problems.

I’ve also heard that the main point of the Canadian visa was really to make sure Mexicans weren’t sneaking across the border to the U.S., using Canada as a stepping stone.  Who knows.

In any case, the little annoyance for me is that twice now we had to apply for a Canadian visa for my wife, getting all the documents together, paying the fee, etc.  The first time, we were unaware that the visa would last only as long as the passport; my wife’s passport expired in 6 months along with the visa, even though we had paid double for a multiple entry visa. She now has one valid for 5 years.  This contrasts to the U.S. visa, which continues to be valid even if the passport has expired.  Her U.S. visa is valid for 10 years.

I’m happy about 2 parts; one is that the Canadian visa is a thorough process, requiring a fairly complete set of documentation – if we’re going to have this, it might as well be done right.  The second is that the people in the Canadian Embassy and the visa processing office are very organized, quick and helpful.  For example, for the first application, we forgot to send 2 forms from the application package.  They called us the day the application arrived and informed us.  Of course, they are very professional, and say nothing about the application itself, but simply being informed of the missing forms so quickly was encouraging.  We sent them the next day.

I hope some time down the road whatever the problem was that required a visa to be implemented will be cleared up and Mexicans will be allowed to visit with a passport again, but if not, it’s not the worst thing in the world.

Mennonite Cheese - A Favourite in Mexico, and at Home

My mom heating the whey, after curdling.

 One point I don't think I've mentioned is that my family actually has a history with Mexico; I grew up partially as an Old Colony Mennonite, also informally known as Mexican Mennonites because of their strong presence in the states of Chihuahua and Durango in Mexico.

The curds and whey.

In Mexico, the cheese that these people make is famous.  The cheese is delicious.  I've been fortunate enough that my parents, who grew up in Mexico, know how to make this cheese at home.

The pictures in this post are some pictures of cheese being made in my parents home.  This was today.  The cheese will be ready in about a month; my dad gets a little impatient, though, and starts eating the cheese before its ready.

My son and I pressing the cheese.

Oh well, the cheese is delicious anyway, as anyone who has bought it in Mexico will know.