Canadian/ Quebecois

It has been about 2 weeks since I’ve been back to Alma. After recovering from a horrible flu of 2 weeks, which have never happened before to me before, I was ready to come back to finally finish up my 2 months remaining in this job. I had to cancel my flight twice, thinking I was ready, but I really wasn’t and lots of things happened at home during this time too. I was actually thankful I was there to help while spending some time with my family.

Anyways, as I reflect on my Quebec experience, I thought I will do a Top 10 Interesting Fact that I have found most interesting while living here.

#1. Alma is part of the Lac St Jean region. This is the the heartland of the Quebec sovereignty movement and where Parti Quebecois first begun. Most of my population here still associates Quebec as a separate region apart from Canada.

#2. Montreal is the cultural capital for English Quebec. Almost half the population are Anglophones which has made separation very difficult today, as Montreal has the largest population in all of Quebec.

#3. Although Alma is considered a town to me, 30 000 people in the Lac St Jean region is already considered to be the ‘city.’ Many of the surrounding areas are real villages and towns, very similar to cottages and sometimes only consists of 1000-2000 people. That is unbelievable to me.

#4. People still mostly speak French here and have little knowledge of English. Besides my students (in my arts school) and my English teachers, I mostly have to use French to get around the city. Deep learning curve.

#5. Lac St Jean is one of the lucky regions to have an English Intensive program in grade 6. For six months students only learn English everyday. My teacher do not let them to speak anything else except English in the classroom. It’s a perfect age to learn.

#6. Marriage is not common in Quebec. In fact, most of them are common-law marriages, even having families. For their entire life, they will call their significant other ‘chum’ (boyfriend) or ‘blonde’ (girlfriend), even when they have kids who are grown up.

#7. Before coming here, I expected to be the only Asian person in the region. I was proven wrong when I saw two Chinese girls in my grade 6. I was excited until I found out they were adopted. In Quebec, adoption (especially for Chinese girls) seem to be common, in result of China’s one-child policies and the greater desire to have males vs. females. I’ve also met a few from Vietnam.

#8. In Quebec, you will see more of the Quebec flag rather than the Canadian flag, even in Montreal.

#9. Quebec has the lowest tuition in all of Canada, because they fight endlessly with protests. In 2012, the Quebec student protest was called it “The largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian History. It was on the news daily.

#10.If you never lived the real Winter, Alma is definitely an experience. The temperature this year has dropped up to -55 degrees yet in the summer, it was so humid and went up to 40 degrees. This is deeply affected by the St. Lawrence river which causes extremes in temperatures. I had Snow Days for too much snow and too much ice to survive.

For someone who do not live in Canada, we do actually have a French part in Canada and that is called Quebec. 55% of bilingual Canadians are Quebecers and Montreal would be one place that speaks both languages. But as a whole, I would not say Canada is a bilingual country (although in terms of government, all documents are in both languages).

Hope you thought these facts are interesting! Have I missed anything? Let me know!

Everyone has a story. This is mine.