Canadian Identitiy and the 2010 Olympics.

(Written in December 2010)

In trying to answer just what the Canadian identity, I had to ask myself just what I do as a Canadian. I classify myself as one and had to run through so many things before coming to a dead conclusion.

I have never questioned my citizenship, it's legal. I was born in Hong Kong and got my citizenship when i was around 5 or 6 (i think). Although I'd love going back to visit family and shop a bit; staying there for longer than a week might kill me. The amount of people, the amount of culture clashes, and the amount of strangers trying to talk to me in Cantonese (and ultimately forcing them to realize their english is below par) are all what repels me from ever going back.

I am Canadian. No matter how many many Asian friends I have, and how little non-Asian friends I have, I am Canadian. I have never been able to understand why I felt so white with asian friends, and so asian when around non-Asian people (I feel like being an immigrant Canadian has to do with it). It's hard to always feel like your not close with anyone.

But my closest friends are just that. They acknowledge their cultural background and love it to some varying degree, have their citizenship, and will more likely stay in Canada than go back to their 'homeland' for work. They have been in Canada for a huge portion of their life and can't imagine losing their citizenship suddenly. But at the same time, they do Canadian things, but have no idea just what our identity is.

Maybe something that would help with the answer would be the games that happened from February 12 -28, 2010.

They (and everyone on Facebook) cheered with me and looked on as Canada owned the latest winter Olympics (which I was a huge fan of). And never have I felt so proud to be Canadian. We don't have the army, the international presence, the money, but at least now we have the 2010 Olympics. It was so sad to see the Olympics end and seeing it take the energy around the country. The only consollation was that we showed the world, and ourselves, that we are proud of our country, and we'll show it when we have to.

Just don't expect us to flash our ego as often as our Southern counterpart, we like to be a bit more classy than that (only a bit). 

It's been almost a year since then and I still wear my red Olympic gloves, and when I see other people wearing the same thing it just reminds me of how amazing those 2 and a half weeks were for Canada.

Still, we know Canadians have pride in themselves, but what is our actual identity? A lot of people outside of Canada classify us as 'nice'. But as my friend said,

Nice is bland, nice is not exciting

So is that it? Is 'nice' our identity? Or is there something more, and we just have to take more time to find it? 

Edit (July 1, 2011) - I thought it was quite fitting to publish this on Canada Day. I need to go out and buy a huge Canadian flag and wear it like a toga one day.

-Canon Ma