Write a short story (600 – 1000 words) that describes your sense of home; write about the values and the stories that you use to connect yourself to, and to identify your sense of home.

At the start of my experience in university at UBC, I found myself stumbling on this very question. I’m not particularly familiar with my own feelings, but I found it uncomfortably easy to transition from my lifestyle of living at home, to living alone in a dorm. It made me think why my personal experience may have differed from what I expected my reaction to be. The more I grew through the first couple of weeks at UBC, the more I realized that my personal definition of home drastically differed from the same word that I was taught all my life. Home, a familiar or usual setting: congenial environment also: the focus of one’s domestic attention, webster’s dictionary, noun, meaning 3a. I came to know why I didn’t feel homesick, and it was because I didn’t feel apart from my home at all.

Many people say that home is where the heart is, and I can’t say that I disagree with this statement. What gives me a sense of home are the people that I am surrounded by. As a child, I often moved around because my parents were busy, hardworking and aiming to find an appropriate place to live. I would find myself spending a good chunk of my time with my grandparents in Taiwan and another chunk of time with my parents in America. Not once during this time did I feel out of place or homesick, and I understand now that, that’s because I never left home. Coming to UBC made me realize what was important to me, and what I should treasure. I didn’t care that I was living far away from my house because I could still talk to my parents, siblings and friends. I didn’t care that I didn’t eat the same things as I did at home, because I could still sufficiently feed myself. And I didn’t care that I couldn’t go to my old park, because there was a wonderful rose garden to sightsee when I get stressed from work.

I found the time that I had during my first year of UBC to be one of the best experiences I had because if this revelation. During my time up until that point, I always became anxious at the fact that I would leave home, but the whole fact of leaving home to go to UBC made me realize that it’s impossible for me to ever leave home. Because home, and the idea of home is fluid to me. No matter where I live, or who I live with, or what I live in, I will always be at home if I cherish the memories of my family and friends. A story my friend told me during my first year of university made me realize how far my sense of home differed from the sense of home that was taught during my time in elementary and secondary. She told me of wonderous places, of planets and worlds distant in solitude. She explained that a girl in this world found sadness that her home burnt down in a fire, and the girl grew up, but she never had a home again. I question my friend why the girl never found a home in her time growing up, and my friend explained that the girl lost her mother and brother in the fire. She explained that without a part of her family, she also lost a part of her home, that left her empty. No matter what place the girl tried to find, to live in, and to call home, none of them could be considered a home without her mother and brother.

I’m bringing up this story because my friend learned it from her mother who had a different background from the western philosophies of Canada. Throughout her life, she refused to say that she is moving home, because, to her and her mother, there was never one physical home. Home is where she takes herself and where she is with her mother. And that made me realize that my sense of home is also different. Home is where I can connect to my family and friends, no matter the distance.

McAndrew, T. Frank. “Home Is Where the Heart Is, but Where Is “Home”?” Psychology Today, https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/out-the-ooze/201508/home-is-where-the-heart-is-where-is-home, Accessed 26 January 2020.

Bologna, Caroline. “What Happens To Your Mind And Body When You Feel Homesick.” Huffpost, https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/what-happens-mind-body-homesick_n_5b201ebde4b09d7a3d77eee1, Access 26 January 2020.

The Origins of Evil

There once was a tribe of storytellers, nomads, and travelers who graze along the lands while collecting stories, spreading their wisdom as they moved. They were artisans of their craft and cultured future generations in the same manner. There were elders who knew the oldest stories, parents who knew the best stories, and children who knew the most fun stories. However, there was always a problem. Because there were so many people, almost everyone knew every story. They became solemn, for there were no new stories to be told.

The elders, sages atop their thrones of wisdom, called for every member of the tribe for an important meeting. “We need new stories! These which we hold dear, have become old,” the elder said. He told all the children, all the adults, everyone -to go out and look for new stories to tell. Outlandish stories, love stories, creation stories, anything, and everything was accepted. As time moved on, it became a tradition that every year, the tribe would go out and scour the lands for the best stories. Once they return, the member who told the most unique and compelling story would be crowned the best storyteller for an entire year. One child, Leema, desperately wanted to be a great storyteller, so he searched far and wide for a story that no one had told before, one where it would surprise even the elders!

After days of searching, Leema had found the most unique story in the world, but when he told it to everyone, Leema didn’t receive the response he had expected to hear. “Young child, that story is very unique, and you recited it with elegance and grace, but you must not speak of it again.” Leema was puzzled. He had told the most unique story in the world, but the elders do not seem happy about it. Nonetheless, Leema was crowned the best storyteller for that year; however, following the events of the storytelling ceremony, things around the tribe became odd.

Time passes, and the state of the tribe grew worse and worse. Leema didn’t know what was happening however and found it troubling that everyone was acting differently. Finally, Leema was visited by the elder one day, “Leema, it was an honor to hear your story on the night of the ceremony, but you must take it back, for the state of our people has become unstable because of it.” Although Leema had not known what the elder meant, he tried his best to take back the story. Days, weeks, months, and years pass… “I can’t take it back elder, I’m sorry,” Leema said. Unknowingly Leema had unleashed the stories of the wicked, of disease, of rot, of mortality, of fear, and many others. On that day, the tribe learned a new story -or, more accurately, a lesson. They continued as nomads and travelers who graze along the lands, collecting stories, but never once did Leema tell his story again. For once you have told a story, you can never take it back. So, be careful of the stories you tell, AND the stories you listen to.

Storytelling is a skill that I find quite amusing and valuable. In my personal time, I often write small snippets, short stories, or even quite synopses of events that I may string together to create a narrative later. As such, I much appreciated the way King moved through his stories, as well as his lessons of stories. I would be lying, however, if I said that I did not have trouble creating a story of my own when rewriting King’s convention of witches. As a consumer of stories, it is always a fact that I am deeply affected by the writings I read, and it influences how I see the world. Like a lens, it may become foggy or clear or even alter my perception or thinking.

During my time rewriting King’s story, I was influenced by the story of Pandora’s box, as I have deep-rooted fascinated by ancient Greek myths. But I was also influenced by the story of Eve and Satan in the fact that the evil was unleashed by an outside being. Nevertheless, I settled on something in between where Leema, an innocent child, had unknowingly released the stories of evil, in his pure innocent intents. This mirrors Pandora’s innocent in some of her retellings, and it mirrors Eve and Satan in the fact that Leema himself did not create the evil, but it was found instead. Lastly, I was influenced by King’s story of stories. Instead of a force that plunged evil into the world, such as in the case of Pandora’s box, or Satan, evil came from the knowledge that Leema spread in his stories. Akin to innocent bliss, stories can reveal to us things that we may prefer to keep hidden or unknown. For example, the Iliad had pathed the way for Alexander on his conquest.

Stories are hidden powers that people hold. During the retelling of the story itself, however, I found it quite challenging to remember the exact details themselves. I found myself changing the sequences of the events, as well as the minute details. Just as a story transforms as soon it is released into the wilds; I found myself changing the story during my time reciting it to myself. For example, the story had made Leema find a storybook in the wild, instead of discovering a story. Or, in another iteration, I hade made the elders exclude Leema from telling the stories, imprisoning him so that he could not spread the story anymore. I found these variations of the story too close to other archetypes of the origins of evils myths, so I wished to change it. I found that storytelling become more and more cumbersome depending on who I was telling the story to, as I had not wished to step on or impede on the cultures of others. However, at the same time, the limitations that I put on myself, as a result of reading King’s book made me look at a different way to tell the story of evil. Instead of following the western styles that I know of, where power exists because of a omnipotent source, I found it interesting to describe the origin of evil from the powers that humans hold. It made my look at cultures and origins in a different light, and the experience was mind opening.

Works Cited

Puchner, Martin. “How stories have shaped the world.” BBC, http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20180423-how-stories-have-shaped-the-world. Accessed 22 January, 2020.

N.S, Gill. “Understanding the Significance of Pandora’s Box.” ThoughtCo, https://www.thoughtco.com/what-was-pandoras-box-118577. Accessed 22 January, 2020.

Question: Write a summary of three significant points that you find most interesting in the final chapter of If This is Your Land, Where are Your Stories?

The topic of this week’s blog post is with regard to Chamberlin’s book, “If This is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories?” and how the points made in the last chapter connects to the culture, impressions and philosophies of today. As a general overview of my personal impression of the chapter, I found it quite stunning in both the literal and figurative sense. It made me think about how we process the interactions we have in everyday interactions and literally made me pause for a brief minute. Taking into account the standards society has set upon itself, as a primarily empirical system, it becomes quite difficult to stray away from this mode of thinking once we are met with something new or different from what we grew up with.

The Significance of storytelling
I think I speak for most people when I say that, as children, we are brought up with a very imaginative mind, creating, exploring, extrapolating, and examining the world around us. In our mind, reason that our tooth falls out is because tooth fairies exist to collect them and the reason that rain falls is because the sky is sad and is crying. These stories serve to help us to understand the world as we currently know it, in our own unique way. This can be said the same thing with the empirical sciences and the cultural stories of the First Nations people. As Chamberlin explains, two painters can paint the same thing, but from different angles. This becomes the same for modern society and the First Nation’s stories. The stories of the Gitksan and the Mediik grizzly bear, rampaging through the mountain valley, and the clay deposits found in the mountain valley both illustrate the same picture, but from different perspectives and for the same reasons, that is to warn future generations of mudslides and their dangers.

The Reality of Dichotomous Cultures
When we speak of cultural stories, we should understand that there isn’t a right or wrong when it comes to the empirical sciences and the historical traditions and stories of people long past. The reason stories exist is to warn and educate the newer generation so that they can learn and grow from the mistakes of the older generation. Just because the method in which this is done through is different, doesn’t mean it should be discredited.

Take, for example, a story my mother use to tell me. I would always be told that I should not swallow cherry pits as it would start to grow in my stomach and cause me stomach aches. As I grew older, I knew that this was false, but learned that swallowing cherry pits can still be dangerous, especially to young children, due to a toxin called cyanogenic glycoside (Government of Canada). In this sense, although the stories do not match, the purpose of both stories lead to the same result and function in the same manner, that is, to protect and warn children.

The Truth on Contradictory Truths
The idea of contradictory truths is something that is also explored in Chamberlin’s writing, and it appears in the story I explained above quite brilliantly. Despite the fact that my mother’s story seemed more imaginative, it isn’t necessarily wrong either. Chamberlin urges its readers to separate ourselves from thinking culture as different from each other, using the pronouns “us” and “them” as a result of this separation. For example, let’s take religion in the sense of different cultures. In ancient Rome, they believed in the great goddess Venus, of love and fertility. Meanwhile for the ancient Greeks, they believed in Aphrodite who was also the same goddess. Despite their different interpretations, they are both stories of one and the same thing. In fact, the origins of Aphrodite lie far back into the ancient Babylonian days where the present-day Aphrodite was known as Ishtar. In reality our stories and beliefs shouldn’t discredit the other, and are one in the same.

Works Cited

Government of Canada, Canadian Food Inspection Agency. 2019. Natural toxins in fresh fruit and vegetables. Retrieved from https://www.inspection.gc.ca/food-safety-for-industry/information-for-consumers/fact-sheets-and-infographics/products-and-risks/fruits-and-vegetables/natural-toxins/eng/1332276569292/1332276685336.

Overly Sarcastic Productions. “Miscellaneous Myths: Aphrodite.” Youtube, commentary by Red, 15 Feb. 2019, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIUq0pfAskU.

Good day, and welcome to my blog of English 372, Canadian Literature. This is my first time running a blog, so I am both nervous and excited to engage in this particular area of learning. I hope that I can meet all of you throughout this course, and I can’t wait to get started!

Who art thou?

Unexpectedly, I am an English Major focusing on language and literature. Currently, in my 3rd year, I hope to pursue education as my post-graduate degree to work in the field of high school education. During my time off-campus, I frequent the nearby park to reflect and relax. I’m also working towards my volunteer hours for my bED application at a nearby high school. Subjects that I enjoy outside of English include philosophy (of morality, meaning, and religion), psychology (neurological processes for communication/consciousness), and geography (mineral deposits and lattice formation).

What do I anticipate learning in this course?

Over the next 13 weeks, I hope to delve into the discourse of First Nations people and develop a critical eye for the historical progress of Canadian canon. As the course has laid out, I anticipate opportunities to gain an understanding of connections between colonialism and literature, recognizing text for their significance beyond the scope of Western thinking, and I hope to explore new ways to improve the future of literature in Canada. For instance, such misconceptions or lack of understanding of literature, limited to the scope of western culture, have led to the alienation of the Turtle Island people. In this read, I found the myths of the First Nations people questionable at first, but further reading and rereading have opened my mind to just a little bit of what their culture is and how the predominant western culture masked it. 

Why am I interested in this course subject matter?

The focus of my future involves the education of the younger generation. As such, I find it pertinent to my endeavor to familiarize myself with Canadian literature. However, the scope of the course offers so much more, which I find more valuable than merely the history or significance of Canadian literature. More recently, I have noticed that students have become desensitized towards First Nations, in both culture and the strife that they went through (and continue to go through). Instances such as the case with the missing First Nations women and girls, which was a semi-recent issue, were unknown to them, and I felt deeply bothered that such media isn’t prevalent in both popular literature and social media stories. Being able to connect, identify, and decolonize Canadian literature is an asset that I wish to pass down to my students in the future. 

Thank you for reading my first blog post! I hope that I will get the opportunity to connect with many of you.

Works Cited

Brant, Jennifer. “Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls in Canada | The Canadian Encyclopedia.” Thecanadianencyclopedia.Ca, 22 Mar. 2017, thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/missing-and-murdered-indigenous-women-and-girls-in-canada. Accessed 8 Jan. 2020.

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Didlick, Nick. Indigenous Leaders and Environmentalists March in Protest against Morgan’s Trans Mountain Pipeline in Southern British Columbia, 10 Mar. 2018, www.macleans.ca/news/canada/trans-mountain-politics-and-first-nations/. Accessed 8 Jan. 2020.

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Mclaren, David. Encountering the Other: Racism Against Aboriginal People Chippewas of Nawash Unceded First Nation Report to the Ipperwash Inquiry. 26 Feb. 2007.

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