Standing on my Soap Box

Don’t fall off your chair

  • Sheila Rempel, Author
  • Writer, Southeastern Manitoba

Have you ever moved to a new country? I have been witness to what it is like to come to Canada with some new people coming from another country. Wow culture shock for them, apologies from me.

Let’s say you live in a country where it is always hot, and you leave home and it is plus 35. You arrive in Winnipeg and it is midnight and minus 18. You are going to say “Holy Crow (or worse) where have I gone”.

Then you rely on people you don’t know to take you places you’ve never been.  To top it off your driver takes an electrical cord and plugs in her vehicle into a plug in that is located in the parking lot.  SHOCK is the nicest way to put it.

How about food… at McDonald’s we have fries and burgers, other countries, such as india don’t even serve beef, or they eat rice instead of fries.  Then your “new friend” (me) in another country laughs at your choice of food.  Sorry, I didn’t mean to laugh, I am Canadian through and through, I eat bland monochromatic food (food that is all the same colour).

Or your new friend (me) talks so blasted fast that even her husband (Richard) doesn’t always understand her, and has to tell her to slow down. Yet I expect you to understand me. Actually I have told our new friends to tell me when I talk to fast, and that they are having a hard time understanding me.  I will slow down and I will not be offended.

I could not imagine leaving my country and my extended family in order to have a better life for me and my family. I know that I am blessed beyond measure. God has given me a life that is abundant and “more than I could ask or think”.

What about you? Are you thankful that you were born in a country of opportunity? Are you making the best of everything God has given you? ARE YOU THANKFUL? I am (now).