Glittered Past

My father was an avid reader and encouraged my own love of reading. When he passed away I inherited his collection of German language books. Many were about the war. After all, he might have been part of the Wehrmacht for about ten years, but soldiers had a very limited vision beyond their own circumstances. He read to figure out what the hell had happened between ages 18 and 32 when he finally came out of Soviet captivity. 

 In his collection there was one of my own forgotten books ... Tausend und eine Nacht. 

In my memory, the book, re-published by the Deutsche Buch-Gemeinschaft, had been embossed with glittering gold lettering on the outside.  I remembered that the Ali Baba cave, depicted on the inside covers, glittered with more gold. 

My adult eyes were disappointed to find no glitter … no fancy gold embossing. It's only through the power of my childish imagination, that the images glitter like gold. 

Does that still happen? Do books still offer children that glitter using only plain colours
and words on a page? I sure hope so. 

Scurry Past

The juxtaposition of my sheltered life and Winnipeg's street people is a lingering memory from my childhood. I still see bloodshot eyes leering at me … still feel conspicuous and uncomfortable in my 11-year-old Sunday morning costume. 

Old hotel still stands in Winnipeg's core

Back in the 1960s, our immigrant church was located in the city’s core. Then, as now, the core was a mishmash of poverty and isolated attempts of ‘gentrification’.  After our church moved into the more prosperous suburbs, we’d still have to drive through the ‘Main Street strip’ ... past the seedy hotels and the loitering street people. From the cocoon of our family car, which was washed and polished, like me, for church, I’d stare at the Sunday morning homeless.

The McLaren Hotel was the largest of the Main Street strip hotels.  Others included The Bell Hotel and the New Occidental. Winnipeg’s Main Street strip continues to be a home to the homeless, the hopeless, addicts ... those needing mental health support.  Or maybe, some would just call them ... godless sinners. 

Just like in the 1960s, when my protagonist, 11-year-old Waltraut, scurries fearfully down the side streets to her Saturday morning language school, we continue to scurry past.

The Winnipeg Free Press reporter, Ryan Thorpe profiled Chris Hauch's study in a 2020 article entitled, Out of Sight, Out of Mind. It's a chilling read. 

Old church still stands, too!

Learning about Immigrants and Refugees

Having just written a book about my family’s immigration experience, I started looking around for other novels about the topic to recommend for further reading. I’ll include a small smattering of recent reads at the end of this post. But I’d first like to mention a nonfiction book for young people: Finding Home, The Journey of Immigrants and Refugees by Jen Sookfong Lee. Filled with pictures and interesting facts the book has ageless appeal but might be especially appealing to middle grade students.  Immigration is a universal experience that has been around … literally … forever. I was raised in the Christian tradition where Adam and Eve were exiled from Eden. The first refugees! My mother’s family became homeless because of communism in the former USSR.  My own parents started over in a new country when they were in their mid-thirties because of war.

Over the last six or seven years I’ve supported newcomers to Canada through weekly conversation settings. Becoming fluent in English in a safe café setting, helps newcomers become more confident in an alien culture. All have slightly different motivations for starting over. My South Korean student wanted to escape the stress of perfectionism in her country of birth. My pre-invasion Ukrainian student wanted a better life for her two daughters. My post-invasion Ukrainian student wanted peace and safety. My Iranian friend wanted freedom to be a woman ... equal to a man. My Iraqi friend wanted religious freedom. My Russian friend wanted prosperity and freedom of expression. My Chinese friend wanted to stop being in a rat race.  

My parents wanted a house, a garden and the opportunity to go fishing. They wanted to have kaffee and kuchen on a Sunday afternoon with friends. Friends … I think that’s what all newcomers to Canada want more than anything. To be included and to share a smile, a coffee, a tea or a glass of wine. 

Here’s a few more books I've been reading:

For Youth: 

Belonging by Nora Krug (graphic novel)

From Anna by Jean Little, MG

Uncertain Soldier by Karen Bass, YA

The Land Beyond the Wall: An Immigration Story by Veronika Martinova Charles

For Adults:

In Other Words: a memoir by Norbert Ruebsaat

Being German Canadian edited by Alexander Freund

Next-Generation Memory and Ukrainian Canadian Children’s Historical Fiction: The Seeds of History by Mateusz Swietlicki

Land Deep in Time, Canadian Historiographic Ethnofiction edited by Weronika Suchacka/Harmut Lutz

The New Girl by Cassandra Calin (graphic novel)

Call Me Al by Wali Shah and Eric Walters 

Finding Home: The Journey of Immigrants and Refugees by Jen Sookfong Lee

Dandelion: by Jamie Chai Yun Liew

Power of Names

Bishop Grandin ... the man behind the street

Winnipeg is a city that likes to use place names to honour people. Our city’s history is reflected in its names. Because of this we revise street names as our view of history changes. Other cities, like say Edmonton, use numbers. Personally, I like to rely on visual aspects of a place. The road along the river becomes River Road, the street with the big elms becomes Elm Street, etc.  Renaming streets creates confusion … but it does give us a glimpse at how dynamic our history is. 

Bishop Grandin Boulevard, a major Winnipeg roadway, was recently renamed Abinojii Mikanah meaning Children’s Road in Ojibway and Cree. This is meant to reflect the lurid history of Residential Schools.  It also reflects Canada's growth as it recognizes colonialism for what it was ... an invasion. 

Bishop Grandin, the man who designed residential Schools, has been disgraced. Rather than honouring  the man who was one of the masterminds behind their creation we want to remember the victims.  But we shouldn't forget this man. We should look at the banality and humanity of evil and realize that it looks very ordinary ... that you can't judge actions by faces.

History in names: former Frauenburg in Poland
Name change reflecting Hitler's defeat

The right to naming is the gift of power. Exploring my mother’s history was made more difficult because of the name changes of her childhood villages. Federofka became Kaliniwka, Kreuzburg became Slavskoye, Königsberg became Kaliningrad. Maybe we could try hyphenated names? But that might only add to the confusion. 

In my new novel, Waltraut walks with her mother down Churchill Drive. Churchill’s name adorns streets, towns, ports, schools. What’s in a name? A lot of meaning … a lot of history and a lot of politics. There are no Hitler Drives … anywhere in the world.  

Old Houses

Our family's house buried in snow back in 1966 ... 'Just like in Siberia' my mom liked to quip

Drove by the house my parents bought brand new back in 1964. It’s modelled after a show home featured in my upcoming release, Waltraut. My mom sold it after my dad died in 1993.  

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I meandered past last week, trying to be inconspicuous as I spied on the place. I took note of the changes but also the similarities. Some of the perennials, like the Maltese Cross, are still going strong and that must be the same evergreen my parents planted, sixty years ago.  Most noticeable were the Canadian and Ukrainian flags above the yellow and blue painted bistro set. How fitting that my Ukrainian-born mom has a Ukrainian flag fluttering above her dear old house. No doubt, she’d be speechless. Ukraine wasn't a country for most of her life. While it struggled for its identity around the time of Mom's birth, back in 1919, Ukraine never regained independence until 1991.

Scooting down the back lane, I spotted an SUV in the open garage my dad had built back in the sixties. The SUV had an “AirForce” license plate. My father, the former Luftwaffe pilot, just might be grinning his head off. What serendipity that this little dream house my parents bought back in 1964 continues to be a home to pilots and Ukrainians. 

1970s 
My parents liked to host German soldiers training at CFB Shilo

A few days later, overcome by curiousity, I found the courage, went back, and rang the doorbell. The owner was home and shared her background and her pride of the backyard garden where she grows tomatoes and cucumbers.  Her great-grandparents came from Ukraine about 1914 (that explains the Ukrainian flag) and her husband was in the Canadian Air Force (that explains the Canadian flag). And so, the once new house for new immigrants continues to be a home for former pilots and for gardeners. I bet her pickles taste yummy.

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