Lorn Curry
West Coast National Reporter
There's a game a lot of Canadians play that involves figuring
out how many fractions they can break themselves into based on
their family tree: one third ziluanian on his mother's side, three-fourths
Arthurian legend on his second cousin's side, four-fifths of gin
on his uncle John's side. That sort of thing. Me? I'm half Acadian
on my mom's side and half Lebanese on my dad's. Unfortunately,
I never got to know my paternal grandfather - a general store
merchant. But I do remember, as a child, discovering grandfather's
handwritten order books which my dad kept as mementos. I'd never
seen anything as fascinating! I had no idea what the words meant,
but the arabic handwriting was so beautiful, so exotic... I don't
know what ever became of those family artifacts, but I still remember
the lesson I learned from them: that the world is a lot bigger
and vastly different than even the wildest imaginings of a little
boy can conjure up. And I think we should all celebrate that fact.CLOSE THE WINDOW