Canada Here We Come

Buckled into the flight on Air Canada I hear French. Really? We are on the runway at SFO poised to travel to Nova Scotia. Wow.  EVERY  message is given in French and English on Air Canada.  Exit/Sortie.  Delayed/ retardé  Refreshment/ rafraichissement    My god, Canada IS BILINGUAL.

I strain to pick out the words that I can understand. The cheerful music of the spoken French feels oddly familiar, as if I am recalling a dream. Ahh…Now I remember, this is the language I heard as a toddler. My grandmother Lillian Dionne spoke this lilting French.   My mother Marie answered her in French.  Mon Dieu!   French feels both foreign and familiar. 

I wonder if it takes twice as long to do anything in Canada because all communications must be  translated... given in  English and French.  Along the way we discover that Canada seems to be slower. At least the Canada of the Maritimes. People are friendly. They take time to talk. They are surprised to learn we are from California. Really?  The Bay Area, isn’t that near Oakland…where there are so many murders? They all know Oakland.  So many guns. Canadians see our country as extremely dangerous. Some mention that they are not traveling in the US… not while Trump is president. We agree. We are not in traveling America. We are in Canada.

This excursion to an ancestral home is to celebrate my 70th birthday. Traveling is how I like to spend time. New flavors, exploring new territory, discovering new things vs. hostessing around a noisy table eating a lot of desserts that I don’t need. The plan was roughly to hit the beauty spots of the Maritimes and Quebec. I am hoping to see the towns that held personal history for my family tree.  Port Royal, Minas, Beaubassin, Grand Pre, Riviere Canard… then onto the Quebec’s Saint Lawrence river towns:Trois Riviere, Cacouna, Isle Royal.