When Dreams are Calling (5 page)

PART TWO
Canada, Learning the Art of
Living

“The
great themes of
Canadian history are as follows: keeping the Americans out, keeping the
French
in, and trying to get the Natives to somehow disappear.”
   

                                                                                                   
  Will Ferguson

A
new beginning brings with it

More
hope, more luck, more love within.

It
might be bumpy at the start,

But
once in it, just play your part.

Believe
in it, believe in you,

Hang
on in there and stay true!

Some people look
at immigration as a simple change of countries: you land, get a job,
raise a
few kids and life goes on much happier than before.

But the truth is, immigration is more than
that, it’s building
everything from scratch. It takes not only luck, but also courage, not
only
courage, but also lots of work, not only work but also faith. It takes
everything. But it also gives back confidence, strength and the
ultimate power:
the power of knowing who you are. In my eyes, all immigrants are
winners.

I left Romania soon after Easter with two
suitcases, one thousand
dollars in my pocket, and millions of hopes. I was twenty-three years
old.

During the flight to Toronto, the hours passed
slowly and there was
not a single minute in which I did not doubt the sanity or the
necessity of the
decision.

I was not happy, but excited, not afraid, but
curious, not rational,
but enthusiastic. I was finally the master of my own fate. This was all
that
mattered.

I’ve never been to Toronto and I was imagining
it as a city full of
skyscrapers, squirrels, and immigrants of all nationalities. I could
just see
myself figuring out one by one everything that we take for granted when
we live
our lives in the same place. It was a bit like one of those puzzle
games, both challenging
and exciting.

I was scared, but so was I each time I had to
fly. But this never
stopped me from traveling. Why should it? There is no greater fear than
the
fear of change and there is no greater joy than overcoming it. Thinking
of
that, slowly, I felt some sort of detachment taking over me and a deep
sense of
peace soon followed. I knew one way or another, I would be fine.

“Welcome to Canada,” the immigration officer
said to me.

“Thank you. I’m happy to be here.”

And then, politely smiling at me, he
put the stamp in my passport
and wished me good luck.

“Thanks,” I replied while thinking to myself
that I’ll need plenty
of it.

With my hands still shaking holding the
passport, I went through the
final gates.

I had done it. I was on my own, away from home,
looking for a new
home!

The family I was supposed to stay with and
baby-sit their children for
picked me up from the airport.

“We have two news, a good one and a
bad one,” the guy said to me
once we arrived home. “Which one would you like to hear first?”

A bit surprised and still dizzy from the
flight, I answered:

“I think the good one will be nice to start off
with.”

“You can stay with us for as long as you need.”

“I thought this is a given, not quite news.”

“It is and it’s not. In a nutshell, we brought
a baby sitter from the Philippines, my wife’s arrangement, and we don’t
need you anymore.”

“That’s fine, I think, I hope. I’ll look for
some other job,” I
replied trying to keep my wits together.

“This being said, the house is full and we
don’t have a room for
you. So, I’m afraid you’ll have to sleep in the garage. We’ll throw a
mattress
somewhere there and we’ll try to park the cars outside for the time
being. If
you pay us a few hundred dollars per month it will all work out. You
don’t have
to rush to let me know your decision.”

“But, I do have to rush,” I said looking inside
the garage, trying
to picture myself sleeping there.

I could not process the information, as if my
brain short-circuited.
I could not breathe anymore and I couldn’t tell if my heart stopped
beating
right that second when he uttered those damn words or a few moments
after.
While my mind was looking for a way out, my body needed something to
lean on. I
closed my eyes hoping that next time when they will see the light, the
whole
picture will change. But it didn’t. I was still standing there, in that
long
hallway, with my two suitcases. And they were still rambling nonsense.
I wanted
to cry, but the tears were nowhere to be found. Nothing and nobody
could wash
away my pain. I had nowhere else to go and no one to talk to. I was
exhausted
and all I wanted was a decent meal and a bed, just as I had planned.
Was that
too much to ask for?

“Think, think, think,” I said to myself.

Think of what?
the committee in my head asked
unanimously.

“Yes, you’re right, not much to think of. I’d
better pray. Pray for
a couch.”

I went for a walk around the neighborhood,
trying to calm down.

“You’re a lawyer. Practice your lawyering
skills. Turn black into white.”

Sorry, I’m a Prosecutor. I only know how to
turn white into black.

“You’re a Rooster. Time to dig deep.”

I’m a Hen. Time to find a rooster, lay eggs and
care for baby
chicks. I should go back to Romania.

“Go back? That fast? Give up that easily?
You’re not a Hen, you’re a
chicken!”

Better than sleep in a garage.

“I don’t remember you being too happy sleeping
in a comfy bed
either.”

But even God has limited patience for
whiners. Fed up, He answered
my prayers in His own unique style: I asked for a couch, God delivered
a man.

Some
could argue the offer was way better than
a couch. Looking back
now, I could not agree more. He was not the ordinary kind of man, but
the most caring, generous, and compassionate Canadian I’ve ever
met.

“Hi. I’m Robert. You look a bit  lost.
Can I help you?”

“No, thank you. I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine to me. But, that’s ok.
Just take this,” he said
handing me his business card.

“Thank you.”

“Good talkin’ to ya. Take care, eh,” he said
walking away.

After a while, exhausted from the physical
effort, the lack of
sleep, or the millions of thoughts going through my mind, I went back
to
the
house and fell asleep right away on the old mattress waiting for me in
the
garage.

Next morning, when I opened my eyes, I couldn’t
remember much.

“Where am I? Am I dreaming? Or have I died?”

Fortunately or less fortunately, you are alive.

“Thank God, heaven cannot be that bad!”

I looked around me confused and one
by one it all came back to me,
the landing, the discussion, the house, the stranger met down the
street.

Thinking of him made me warm inside. He looked
like a good-hearted
person. He had a pleasant smile and seemed concerned of my well-being.

“He’s a guy! Sure he must seem like that if he
wants you!”

Want me? Why would anyone want me now? I’m not
an asset, I’m a
liability.

“You’re both. All of us are both our entire
life, one way or the
other. But should we be with someone who thinks like an accountant?
Maybe he
genuinely liked you.”

Maybe he did, maybe he did not! Who cares about
all this now! I’m
not dating him! I need him! He’s my only hope. He cannot be worse than
those
people!

And so, I called him, gave him the address, and
showed him my place
in the garage.

There are some moments in life when the right
words can make all the
difference, and there are others when there are no right words, just
facts,
plain and simple facts. This was one of the latter ones.

After Robert asked my so-called hosts for my
money back, we started
to look for a place to rent on my own.

With no previous references and not too much
money, finding
something was if not impossible, surely a bit of a challenge. After a
bit of
driving around, from nice neighborhoods to less and less nicer ones, we
found a
shabby building with a shabby sign in a poor neighborhood: “Cheap rooms
for
rent. No references required.” And this sight which once upon a time
would have
never met my eyes, now it filled my heart with joy.

After hard negotiations with an old Greek lady
speaking neither
Romanian nor English, I ended up renting a tiny bachelor apartment,
disgusting,
unfurnished, at the basement. However, it was all mine and for now it
was much
better than a garage.

And this was how my Canadian adventure started.

We are never alone. Even when we want to be
left alone or when we
cry in despair thinking that we are all alone, even then, we are not
alone.
Just blind. I made no exception. After my first night in my new
“glamorous”
apartment, during the wee hours of the morning, I met my new comrades.
They
were a healthy bunch of happy cockroaches running around, eager to
multiply and
always there to keep me company.

Such an offer! Who could refuse it? I could!
And I did!

From a peaceful woman, I transformed into a
vengeful serial killer,
declared war, and focused all my energy and knowledge on winning.
Probably they
would never know what they had done wrong. But, I knew: they sneaked
in, in
large numbers, totally uninvited. And, after a few weeks of playing
dirty
tricks on them with different kind of poisons, I became the sole happy
tenant,
proving once more that the power stands in the brain, not in the
numbers.

Sleeping straight on the floor, although it
might have been good for
my back, was never one of my favorite things. With no money to afford a
bed, I
ended up buying an inflatable small mattress.

From the comfort of a very nice house it was
quite a change, and
although it was way better than being homeless, it was not too far
ahead.

So, I figured some fresh paint on the walls
would make me feel a
little bit more cheerful. As during the day I was too preoccupied on
running
around looking for jobs, I painted my burrow at nighttime. Afraid
someone might
break in, like I was on a secret suicide mission, I kept all the
windows
closed. As expected, the strong smell of the paint made me faint and
for the
next few days I was high, for a completely different set of reasons
than one would wish
to be.

I don’t remember ever having as many
discussions with myself as back
then. It was almost like two people were residing inside my head: one
was
always upset, scared, frustrated and wanted to go back to Romania; the
other was always trying to be the cheerleader, fiercely determined not
to give
up. It was hard to say which one of them was more convincing. They
seemed to
take turns and each day when I woke up I could never tell who will be
the
winner of the day:

“So, tell me, was it smart to leave my legal
profession, my nice
house, my friends and my own country?”

Obviously not. But hold on, things will
improve. All in good time.

“Sure they will. It’s not that hard to get
better than this. How
much better, this is a totally different question. It is bad. That’s
the truth.”

Just make sure that what you call truth is not
a produce of your
mind, but of reality as is. A happy life is not necessarily a secure
one, but
an authentic one. This is what you wanted, isn’t it? Now, don’t be
picky and
impatient.

“Picky? You call this picky?”

If not picky, then surely prickly.

“I know the drill. You want me to be grateful
for everything I have,
every day I live. No questions asked. I am sorry to disappoint you, but
I am
not.”

I want you to keep trying; to believe in
yourself, in your destiny,
to believe that everything will be fine. Because what you believe in,
this is
what will happen.

“What does not kill you makes you stronger.”

And if it kills you, you are no longer
.

“That’s always a possibility.”
  

As much as all this bickering back and forth
was OK in Romanian,
outside my head everyone spoke English or something that resembled to
it. More
and more, it became quite obvious to me that if I want to find a decent
job, I’d
better do the same.

Together with my Canadian savior
and two huge dictionaries, I
started to learn proper English. It was a long, frustrating process,
which was
taking place all the time: while eating, cooking, taking a shower,
crying or
looking for jobs. Soon, my body was entirely covered by self-made
temporary
tattoos, depicting not some forgotten lover or dead pet, but just plain
English
words. Not being able to say what I wanted, the way I wanted was
incredibly
frustrating and made me think for a second of those unfortunate enough
to be
born without a voice.

“Maybe it’s time for me to learn the sign
language,” one day I said
to Robert.

“Sorry, sweetie, but even the sign language is
not universal. I’m
afraid you’re stuck with English. And with this pineapple that you’ll
have to
eat today if you don’t want to become a ghost. Later on, we could go
and feed
the angry geese or just listen to Michael Buble.”