Passages: Welcome Home to Canada

by Michael Ignatieff

  “I see it’s a big city today.”

  He shakes his head. “Not yet. I’m used to finding all kinds of things at any time in a big city, and we’re not there yet in Montreal … New York is a big city …”

  “Paris too,” I say.

  “Ah, Paris,” he says. “Paris is … Paris. But I like the people here. They’re not pretentious like they are in Paris. I go back to France less and less often. I don’t like the life back there any more.”

  “Here, it’s only the accent that bothers you, if I understand correctly …”

  A pause. He seems to think about it.

  “I’m ashamed to say it, but I miss the real bread too. Especially when I’ve finished working around five in the morning, if I could find some good bread, I would never think about France again.”

  “Some real bread, an interesting cheese and a good bottle of wine …”

  “I don’t ask for all that—only some bread.”

  “One day it’ll happen …”

  “I don’t despair.”

  10. I arrive at the home of a friend I knew in Haiti. He lives in a small room on Saint-Hubert Street, just behind the Terminus Voyageur. He is cooking. I look at him a moment. It is the first time I have seen a Haitian man cooking. He’s been in Montreal for eleven years.

  “Who taught you how to cook?”

  “You’ll never guess,” he answers. “A Quebecker. She had married a Haitian and her mother-in-law had taught her to cook Haitian food.”

  “It’s not like in the United States, here. The Quebeckers, I see, marry Haitians easily.”

  “They don’t think we’re black. Here, we’re Haitians instead. Actually, Quebeckers call themselves the White Negroes of North America.”

  “Yeah? You mean they’re not racist?”

  “Not at all. One of the reasons I left Haiti is the racism. I didn’t understand such violent racism between people of the same race. Each spits on the one who’s more black than him.”

  “It’s the colonial heritage.”

  “When someone sinks a knife into my back, I don’t want to know if it’s because of his unhappy childhood.”

  “Meanwhile, it was a white Quebec woman who taught you how to cook Haitian food.”

  “Exactly. They love Haitian cooking. And since they’ve been eating Haitian dishes, they’re starting to get Negro bottoms. And, old man, that’s all they were missing.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “When I arrived here, the girls were magnificent—face, hair, legs, all perfect. But no bottoms. From behind, they looked like Chinese taxi drivers. Then they started to eat yams, plantains, pork, sweet potatoes and lots of rice. So, as the years passed, they started to get bottoms. Real white Negro women.”

  “And the Haitian women weren’t happy?”

  “They went into a terrible rage, but the harm was already done.”

  “I don’t understand why you prefer a white Negro woman, as you say, to the real Negro.”

  “The Haitian woman, before this competition, had an unbelievable arrogance. You had to marry her to be able to kiss her, and when you married her, you had the added responsibility of a large and demanding family overnight. But since the Quebec women have joined the game, they had to start taking it easy. There’s nothing like a little competition to ease the game.”

  “I’m hungry.”

  “We’ll eat in a minute.”

  11. I discovered the well-to-do suburbs of Montreal with Paul, a friend with whom I did Canada World Youth. His parents were friendly. The father was a fierce Péquiste. The mother was interested in nothing but her family. It was in this house that I learned about politics in Quebec. I thought people here didn’t discuss politics; that the head of state was a good father, Catholic, who ran his country like his family. I quickly learned that it’s much more complex than it appears. Don’t trust the innocent face, the country fragrance or that kind of farmers’ honesty (at first I thought Quebeckers didn’t know how to lie) that floats in the air.

  Upon arrival you get the impression that this is a country without a past. But no, they too had a strong man who dominated their conscience (for me it was Duvalier senior; for them it was Duplessis). Duvalier reigned in Haiti with the help of voodoo, by playing on the people’s ancestral fear; Duplessis counted on the help of the Catholic Church. Duvalier often relied on nationalism to stay in power; Duplessis as well. Fortunately, Duplessis didn’t have any Tontons Macoutes. The difference lies in the methods used by each of the two peoples to get through this era of great darkness. Haitians, obsessed with history, wanted to deal with the problem only on the political front. Quebeckers carried out a Quiet Revolution based on education and the secularization of the public authorities—and on culture too. They ended up opening the windows wide. Fresh air rushed into the house. Haitians are still wading through the mud of dictatorship.

  12. This morning, I am sitting in front of Paul’s father at the breakfast table. Paul is sleeping off last night’s drinks.

  “But really! Really! I never would have believed this: Claude Ryan asking us to vote for the Parti Québécois in his editorial in Le Devoir.”

  Le Devoir is Quebec’s big intellectual daily newspaper. Someone has recently explained to me that Le Devoir is to Quebec what Le Monde is to France. Paul’s father passes me the newspaper. A long, copious editorial full of nuances and reservations, saying he is opposed to the raison d’être of the party for which he is asking people to vote (in the pure Jesuit tradition). In Haiti, you think of nothing but physically eliminating your political adversary. Here, you’re asked to vote for him if it seems reasonable: reason. In Haiti, a political adversary is an enemy: passion. Good Lord! I’m not going to fall for Senghor’s formula which asserts that “Reason is Greek, and emotion, black.”

  “What’s the importance of an editorial like this?” I ask.

  “Huge. When your worst enemy comes around to your side, there’s no better propaganda.”

  “And what will happen when the Parti Québécois comes into power?”

  “They’ll finally ask the question. They’ll ask Quebeckers if they want to live in an independent country or stay a province.”

  “Well, in Haiti we had a national war to gain our independence. I never thought a country could become independent simply by asking its citizens: do you want to be independent?”

  He looks at me worriedly. I have just spoiled the pleasure the editorial in Le Devoir provided him. What a misunderstanding! I am in total admiration of the founding work done by the Quebec people. I prefer the calm morning to the bloody twilight.

  13. A Haitian woman, about forty-five years old. Chickens on sale in a local supermarket. Very good price. Only two chickens per customer. She had taken five, and it seemed impossible to make her understand the rules of the game. The manager of the supermarket had called the police.

  “Madame,” said the policeman calmly, “you can’t take more than two chickens.”

  “Really, sir, I’m not taking the chickens, I’m buying them.”

  “Fine. You can’t buy more than two chickens.”

  “I’m not stealing, I’m paying with my own money, and I don’t know why a policeman should get involved. We’re a democracy here.”

  Note that people who’ve lived under a dictatorship are always very sensitive to the idea of democracy, especially when it’s in their interest.

  “If you aren’t happy, madame, you can return to your country.”

  And the retort came instantly. “At least I have a country.”

  The policeman lightly stroked his cheek. I felt he was within an inch of exploding. The problem is, this woman has only one thing in life, but it’s the one thing that so many Quebeckers would love to have: an independent country.

  14. I spent Friday night with Paul’s friends. We went to a small island with a few cases of Molson beer, some marijuana and a little music. Guys and girls. It took me some time to understand that for the guys, the point
of the night wasn’t to sleep with the girls. We mostly talked about Surrealists. Poets: Breton, Éluard. Painters: especially Dali. I didn’t understand. The father completely obsessed with the coming election; the son saturated with Surrealism. Where’s the link? I tried to smoke a bit. It was no use. It did nothing for me. I’m told that the first time, it doesn’t happen right away; you have to wait. I waited. Nothing.

  So I started to look at the girls and to listen much less attentively to the debate about the difference between Dali and Picasso. I quickly spotted a tall, thin girl who also seemed not to care about Dali. I went to sit beside her. She was sweet and kind. I took her hand, like that. I pretended to read her heart line. At a given moment she bent over to kiss me. My whole body was trembling. It was slightly chilly, mid-November. We kissed for a long time. My first Quebec kiss. I liked her smell. We had made a fire, and her hair smelled of smoke. And also that smell that I couldn’t determine. The smell of the other. I myself must also have a particular smell. The accent or the smell—nobody can escape it. No perfume can mask your intimate smell. She started to caress me. I felt a bit embarrassed in front of the others, who were watching us.

  “Your brother looks angry,” I said to her.

  “That’s not my brother, it’s my boyfriend.”

  “You mean your lover.”

  “If you want,” she said, while kissing me as though she were going to devour my mouth.

  I opened my eyes to find the guy still looking at me.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I can’t with this guy in front of me.”

  “OK,” she said, guiding me to the other side of the island.

  I had the impression I was her prey, an unknown sensation for a young man in the Caribbean, except with a rich older woman. I learned so many things in just one night. And from the same girl.

  15. I find the group again in Paul’s cellar. They are listening to music. Heavy metal. It’s the tradition here: the more the parents’ music seems policed, the more the children’s music has to seem barbaric. They’re still passing around the marijuana, asking themselves if one day they might exhibit their paintings.

  “Why don’t you show them here?” I ask.

  “Where?” Paul asks me.

  “Here, in the sitting room. There’s lots of space.”

  “But we can’t!”

  “Why?”

  “It’s not a gallery.”

  “Big difference! You hang the paintings on the wall. People come to see them. You offer refreshments. And if someone wants to buy one, you give him a price.”

  Silence. Suddenly, a cry from Paul: “This guy is brilliant!”

  Despite the marijuana, the heavy metal music and the fact that young Quebeckers can spend the night with anyone, I get the impression that, on a deeper level, young Haitians are freer. Let’s say definitely more responsible. When poverty is mixed with dictatorship, it gives people a more precocious sense of responsibility.

  They become interested in me.

  “Are there painters where you come from?”

  “We do nothing but that. In Haiti, painting is a popular art. All my neighbours paint to earn a living. Our main goal isn’t to have social status as a painter, but to live from this work.”

  “And music?”

  “It’s only for dancing. We never sit like you’re doing to listen to music. Music goes with the body. There’s a direct link.”

  “What kind of dancing?” asks my friend from last night, who seems to be a dancer herself. It’s true she has a body made for ballet.

  “You cling to the girl and try to become one with her. Dancers can kiss, too. In fact, they make love standing up, to the music. It’s called vertical fucking.”

  “I could never do that,” she says. “For me they’re two such absorbing things. When I listen to music, it’s as though I were living in a universe of pure sound. When I dance, it’s the same thing but with colours.”

  “Three things,” her boyfriend says calmly. “Johanne, you’re forgetting love.”

  “That must be something, to dance while making love,” says another girl, Sylvie, giving me a languorous look.

  “We do this in Haiti only because there’s a lack of space. Port-au-Prince is an overpopulated city. It’s in the crowd of dancers that you generally manage to find a certain intimacy.”

  “That’s something I’d like to try,” says Sylvie.

  What I immediately understood when I arrived here is that the Quebec woman is more open than the man, more apt to plunge into a new society. The man refuses to leave his familiar place, as though he were constantly in danger, from a cultural point of view, while the woman seems more audacious. She’s capable of penetrating into the young immigrant’s bedroom. She wants to know everything: what he eats, his music, his dance and also his way of making love. Integration is a fundamentally masculine idea. It seems to me it’s very close to sexual penetration. The immigrant must let himself be penetrated by the welcoming country’s culture before being accepted into the tribe, while the female body is made for welcoming—to be penetrated. The woman is therefore North America’s soft belly, and our only chance to keep a part of our past alive.

  16. In a Haitian taxi. Montreal. November 16, 1976 (the day after the victory of the Parti Québécois).

  The driver turns towards me. “You’re Haitian?”

  “Yes,” I say.

  “You watched the election yesterday?”

  “Magnificent! The Parti Québécois is finally in power.”

  “How long have you been here?” he asks in a fairly brutal tone.

  “Five months.”

  “OK, I’m going to tell you something. This country belongs to the Haitians. We’re everywhere. In the schools, in the hospitals (and not only as patients), in the factories, everywhere. With the taxi, we control the road, day and night. We know exactly what’s happening in politics before everyone else. Last week, I drove Premier Bourassa in my taxi twice. And we talked at length. Mr. Bourassa understood that the importance of Haitians in Quebec shouldn’t be minimized. But he understood it too late. My brother-in-law, last month, drove Trudeau. Trudeau is a trickster. You can never tell what he’s thinking.”

  “If you’re so powerful, why don’t you work in management positions instead of driving taxis?”

  “Those who really have power should never let themselves be seen. You saw the Italian community. They showed too much strength, and today you never hear about them. But …”

  “But what?”

  “We’re in danger right now. If we let them do it, the Quebeckers will take this country from us.”

  “You just told me that real power should never show its face.”

  “This is different. Action is needed. Take my card. Call me. We have a meeting tonight in the basement of the Notre-Dame church.”

  Here’s the big difference between Haitians and Quebeckers. Quebeckers think about politics solely in terms of independence, while Haitians think only of power. Each Haitian taxi driver firmly believes that if he really wanted to, he could become premier of Quebec while waiting to become president of Haiti. Having the power in Quebec is only a pastime for the boring days of exile.

  17. I learned to cook quickly enough. It’s a good way to catch girls: a good spicy Creole dish, an old bottle of Haitian rum (Barbancourt is the best Caribbean rum, according to Haitian nationalists, myself included), Tabou Combo (my favourite group at the time). Everything went very well. We ate well, we drank, we danced and we made love. Perfect plan. We fell asleep in each other’s arms.

  All of a sudden she shakes me sharply. I wake up with a start.

  “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t understand,” she says, a little frightened. “You were fighting with someone in your dream.”

  “What was I saying?”

  “I don’t know. You were speaking Creole. You were yelling, fighting, it scared me—but I’m sorry for having woken you up.”

  I know ve
ry well what’s going on, but how to tell this comparative literature student that I was dreaming about werewolves? They were trying to get me once again, and like all the previous nights (it’s why I rarely ask girls to stay the night) I had to fight to keep them from carrying me off. But how do I explain that to this young North American? The devils from my country never leave me. As soon as the lights are out, like cockroaches, they gather around my bed. To be afraid of devils at my age is equivalent, here, to an adult who wets his bed. Full of shame, I decide to scare her.

  “It’s you I was defending, you know.”

  “Oh, good,” she says, vaguely worried.

  “The thing is, I’m married to a very jealous voodoo goddess, so when there’s a woman in my bed, she sees red.” Voodoo, I know, works every time.

  “And …”

  “Well, I have to fight so that she won’t hurt the woman.”

  A long silence.

  “I have an exam this morning, I have to go review my notes,” she says suddenly. “I’m sorry.… We’ll see each other tomorrow night.”

  I let her go, knowing she’ll never come back. I had a choice between giving myself the reputation of a ridiculous seducer who still dreams of devils or passing as the husband of a jealous voodoo goddess. I’m sure there are still those reckless enough to want to dethrone the bloodthirsty goddess Erzulie Dantor.

  I don’t know why we continue to have such nightmares. Our demons follow us. Dreams play an important role in the life of every human being, but even more in the life of someone uprooted. Each night, he does the journey back. It’s the only way to escape from the madness. At the same time, he needs to get rid of his devils if he hopes to embrace the present. North American life takes place by day, not by night. All conquest is done during the day. Night is for rest, desire and alcohol. The newly arrived immigrant must confront the Western machine by day, and at night, the tropical devils. Finally, he’s an exhausted man.

  18. People from the north believe that winter, especially snow, is the main event of the journey. It’s true that it’s a big part of it. But it’s the move on the social ladder that fascinates me. You go abruptly from the enviable status of intellectual middle class in Haiti to that of worker. And it’s not a summer job like for young North American students.