About Me

 So, you found me, dear guest.

You stumbled onto my site, or heard of me through the grapevine. Either way, I’m glad you’re here. I will do my best to keep you entertained or informed, or both. 

Let’s make the proper introductions. 

Who am I?

I am a recent immigrant to Canada. In 2014, I decided to swap life in downtown Bucharest for an idyllic life in rural Ontario. My fellow settlers would include my Alberta-born husband who had been wandering the world for 23 years, a toddler who had just grown comfortable speaking – in Romanian, and our newborn baby. 

Six years have passed since, and I am ready to tally our experiences here, to weigh the reality on the ground against the expectations that inspired our planning.

So …

With two small children in tow, we hewed a small farm from the wilds of eastern Ontario. We learned – mostly from YouTube -- to fell trees, milk goats, double-dig garden beds, butcher chickens, work a wood stove, ferment green tomatoes, make cheese, use firearms, make bacon from goat belly, boil down maple syrup and raise rabbits. 

All that while getting used to the basics of life in a new country. Does Walmart really sell food here? How does this gas pump work? If you weigh 45 kilos and 7 pounds, how cold is 32 degrees Fahrenheit in an 80 km-an-hour wind?

Well, as it turned out, all that was the easy part …

The hard part left us alternately befuddled and irate, and it largely forms the backbone of this blog. 

The biggest immediate obstacle to our settling in was the constant attempts among the locals to place us on a social scale that we didn’t even know existed. 

I discovered that the Canuck social life and the shared stereotypes that ease someone into a life like well worn slippers were, in fact, as alien to me as snowshoes are to a resident of the tropics. 

I struggled to understand the news in the Canadian media, which seemed to dance around topics rather than cover them. With an innocent question, such as “what were residential schools?” or “Can’t I just pay for medical treatment,” I stepped on neighbours toes that seemed to stretch a meter away from the foot. 

Unaware of the gospel-driven primacy of the Canadian healthcare system, I inadvertently offended Canadians both sick and healthy. I made no friends when I questioned the wisdom of an education system that keeps a 4-year-old kindergartener away from home for 6-7 hours. And a simple word about politics – if it’s the wrong word -- is enough to scorch an entire social life here.

This website is an attempt to make sense of the Canuck world around me. I will delve into topics that interest me deeply and cover the present reality, which often seems eerily disconnected from the reality of my own experience and areas of expertise.

If you are a recent immigrant to Canada or a prospective one, I hope your visit to my nook helps you ease faster into your new Canuck life, with less head-scratching and self doubt.

If you are Canadian born and bred or a long-time resident of this wonderful but mystifying country, I welcome you here too. I need you as a sounding board for some outlandish ideas and you can stick around for a fresh perspective on things you’ve accepted as normal for decades. If you are in the habit of asking “why?” and not being quite content with the official or socially acceptable answers, or if you feel a nagging sense of cognitive dissonance, you are in the right place.

I will tackle some sacred myths embedded in the Canadian psyche (education, healthcare, poverty, etc). Like many myths, some are former truths that have calcified to become, if not outright lies, at least untrue representations of reality. In the process, I will scratch below the surface of things to discover the essence and soul of this country that so many, me included, are proud to call home.

Curious yet? 

Welcome to the nook!