On the drive back, I was in a car with Nehal and Lionel. Lionel, if I had to guess, is probably late forties to fifties. Nehal I would guess at early thirties. With Nehal, though, I know how old his wife is, so it isn’t as hard. 🙂 So we’re talking, and I come across two attitudes that I find a little disturbing.
The first. It’s the government’s fault. Everything! No exceptions!
Yeah, let’s not bother taking personal responsibility for anything in our lives – then we’d actually have to do something about it, eh?
So it’s the government’s fault you’re all a bunch of lazy gits who never show up for anything on time and take no initiative to getting a job done? Really? You actually believe that?
I didn’t actually ask that – couldn’t get a word in edge wise during his tirade. If I could, that’s what I probably would have asked.
See, if people here started with just those two things – doing what they say they’re going to do, and then use some initiative to get a job done – and outside of the usual parameters, even – the economy here would blossom. People would start earning much higher wages – they’d be in a position to command much higher wages. They wouldn’t get sacked as often, or be yelled at by their bosses, and all that other stuff.
Just do that – see what happens – and then complain and say that the government’s at fault for everything – if you dare!
Whatever.
That guy had a lot of anger coming out on that one, let me tell you!
The other attitude is the whole "Canada and the US are the land of milk and honey."
Oh go cry me a river.
Yeah, you’ve got it so hard here. You’re right.
Okay, that’s sarcasm. In case you didn’t guess.
I’m not saying that people here don’t have a hard life. Some of them do. But it’s not like everyone in Canada is free from a hard life. Give me a break.
I told Nehal about soup kitchens and food banks, surgery waiting lists six months to two years long, high taxation rates, and a bunch more stuff.
At first, he was angry that I’d have the nerve to sham him. Nope. No shamming.
He didn’t believe there were food banks and soup kitchens and homeless people in Canada. His first comment when I said there are poor people in Canada was, what, no mercedes? No BMW’s? I said, no, no food. No shelter.
He couldn’t believe it because here, even the poorest of people have food. Well, sure, but that becomes easier when your climate allows for year round cultivation of food crops. Not so in Canada, especially the north where you get what, two months of something that doesn’t quite resemble summer? It’s easier when here, you actually can grow food in your backyard or your balcony or whatever. Not always doable in Canada. And food here IS significantly cheaper than it is in Canada.
Eventually, I think he finally caught on. Canada’s not perfect. It’s still got its problems. It’s just that its set of problems are different than the ones Sri Lanka faces. There is no country in the world that is perfect or is that much better than everywhere else, no matter how much you fantasize. It’s just a matter of finding a country, or an area, that has a personality you like and enjoy and going with that. Or, perhaps, being comfortable enough with yourself that it doesn’t really matter much where you live.
