Evil Panda Blues by in Books / November 6th, 2006
Over the last few days, it has rained a lot in Victoria.
Sorry, that doesn’t quite express it properly. It’s rained so much that it reminds me of Tokyo in the fall, where there are puddles so big you know there must be at least half a dozen people missing in their depths. Our local grocery store (which we just found out is being shut down at the end of the month because the landowners want to tear down the building so they can delay making overly-expensive condos) had a moat around it on Saturday… today the puddle looked so big I’m sure it must be flooded inside.
However, unlike Ottawa in spring, I haven’t been splashed by busses taking puddles at full speed yet! Relative victory!
On Saturday a scary man on a bus started verbally abusing my wife and kids with racist and sexist remarks. Upon being berated with “stupid Chinese… we should kill them all”, my little one apparently turned to my older daughter and said in English: “We can speak English and French and Japanese but not Chinese. How do you kill a language?” Thank god for youthful ignorance.
Eventually the fool was taken off the bus by transit police, but it was a very unfortunate experience all around. There have been subtle moments where people treat my family differently because they are overtly trilingual, but this is the first time someone’s been really mean about it. On the plus side, it was pouring bloody rain when he was kicked off the bus, and I bet he had a long way to walk. I’m petty and mean, I know.
All this is to say: I still don’t have a good picture for the Panda book yet, and there are 16 pictures to make. If I don’t get into the swing of things soon, I’m going to miss my deadline, and centipedes will come and devour my eyeballs. Or so I hear.
In my quest to overbook myself, I think I will commit to writing at least two outside-linking blog posts every day. To keep in practice while not causing myself bodily harm. I just have to find things to write about. Is there anything going on in the world these days?
Tags: panda, racism, rain, victoria
November 6th, 2006 at 7:26 pm
Keeping a healthy blog is definitely one way to waste a lot of time you could be otherwise spending doing … well, anything else.
Of course, I’m one to talk — I stay up late posting “yeah but who cares about that?” stories and I’m busy commenting on yours when I’m supposed to be writing technical documentation. Oh well.
I’m sorry to hear you had a run-in with an ignorant prick on the bus. I know it hurts but you guys are old enough to know the problem is in his head, not your family; I’m more worried about the little ones. I hope everything is okay; next time you spot the guy you can mutter something about whether anyone else smells Kraft Dinner and Ketchup or not.
November 7th, 2006 at 3:16 am
Sadly, I wasn’t on the bus at the time, or I would have been throwing him out before it stopped. I was not amused at all.
The kids are wonderfully oblivious to it all. I don’t think they know enough about the world yet to realize when people are being mean to them. I wasn’t especially worried about that mental development in their lives… but now I wonder if they’re going to be in for a rough time, even in this day and age.
If only they’d take an interest in learning karate… they could kick the bigots’ asses.
Sigh.