When most non-Canadians think of Canada, they think of snow, hockey, and free health care. But there’s a whole lot more that Canada stands for, and a whole lot more that defines Canada. Today Canada has 10 provinces and 3 territories. It is a multicultural, bilingual country home to three different nations: English-speaking, French-speaking, and the Aboriginals, and has increased its diversity by opening its arms to millions of immigrants from around the world. How did we get there?
This was a land inhabited by Aboriginal people known as the Inuits and Metis, long before British and French colonization. There were many Europeans reported to have set foot in what is now Canada since 985. However, the 16th century when European fleets began to make annual visits to the Eastern shores of Canada to cultivate the great fishing opportunities. Beaver fur in Canada became a valuable commodity and Europeans began looking into establishing settlements.
On August 5, 1583 Humphrey Gilbert, armed with letters from Queen Elizabeth I, formally took possession of Newfoundland in St. John's harbour on behalf of England. The French then began making similar colonization attempts. After several failed French colonization attempts, The French explorer Samuel de Champlain arrived in 1605 and established the first permanent Canadian settlements at Port Royal and Quebec City in 1608. Quebec City became the capital of New France; This illustrates Canada's importance.
As the French and British colonies grew in what is now Canada, the French and British began to wage war to gain dominance over fur trade. After many battles, the Seven Years War ended with France giving up all its territories in North America to the British in 1763. As for the French settles who still lived in Canada, predominantly around the Quebec area, the British gave them complete religious, social and political freedom. Once the British had total control over all colonies in North America, they began to raise taxes to establish their authority, which set the pretext for the American revolution.
When the American revolution began, the Canadian colonies remained British loyalists although they were sympathetic to the cause and hundreds of thousands of men from Canadian colonies joined the American army and fought for U.S independence. The U.S gained independence and the formal borders between the US and Canada were established in 1783.
In 1837, rebellions began in Canadian provinces. These rebellions were eventually crushed but led to the unification of what is today Ontario and Quebec into a single province called the Province of Canada by the British in 1840. In July 1st 1867, the province of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick were united into a sovereign, self-governing state. Ontario and Quebec were split. This meant Canada originally had 4 provinces. The rest of the colonies remained under British rule. The first Prime Minister of Canada was John A MacDonald and he began expanding the country west and north, and in 1870 and 1871 and 1873, Manitoba, British Columbia, and Prince Edwards Islands joined Canada as provinces. In 1885, the Canadian transcontinental railroad united all the provinces from coast to coast, allowing trade and transportation to flourish. In 1905 Alberta and Saskatchewan were formed from the North West Territories and they become provinces of Canada. In 1949, Newfoundland became the 10th province to join Canada.
This is how we got to Canada as we know it today. 10 provinces. 3 territories. A country inhabited by three nations: British, French, and Aboriginals. Each had their own land and did not need to be part of Canada. They could have had their own independent countries. But they chose to be part of Canada. Nearly 20% of Canadians today were not born in Canada, coming from every country under the sun. Each bringing their own beliefs, cultures, and stories.
Why does that matter? Three different nations living within a border of the same country? This is a story not often told. What divides other countries: Languages, race, cultures, religions has not divided Canada despite a few times when it seemed like it would. It’s different from seeing blacks and latin Americans in US. Blacks and Latin Americans migrated to the US or were brought to the US. It’s different from EU where there still are borders and different states. Each country in the EU is still self-governing.
And Canada has been in existence for over 140 years. In that time, countless new countries have formed based on differences in languages, religions, race. But Canada has stood as an example to the world that it is possible for several nations to live within a single country, a single parliament, a single government. It is a high level of empathy that has allowed us to stay as a country, despite different nations within the country viewing the country very differently from one another. And beyond hockey and free health care, that example of empathy is what Canada has to offer to the world.
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Why I Love Germany
German history and culture has inspired and intrigued me since I was little. I would talk about Germany all the time to anyone who would listen or pretend to listen, memorize the dates of every major event in German history, and only buy German products as much as I could. Then came adulthood and I became less conspicuously obsessed with Germany. However, the influence of that obsession shaped much of my personality and many of my life decisions and it’s only now that I have truly begun to realize it. My obsession with German cars is what got me into engineering. My admiration for German efficiency is what inspired me to become good at time management. My fascination with German organizational excellence is what motivated me to be organized with all my activities. I could go on forever.
Interestingly, my love for Germany did not spawn from reading books or watching documentaries or meeting Germans. It all started in the 1994 soccer world cup in which I was impressed by how organized the German soccer team was. They were never the most skilled, flashy, or exciting. However, they were very organized, and played really well together as a single unit. To me, that was much more impressive than individual brilliance. Juergen Klinsmann became my favourite soccer player and I remember hoping he’d one day beat Gerd Muller’s and Pele’s records for most goals scored in a soccer career.
As time went by, I began to love everything German. Boris Becker became my favourite tennis player. I’d drool over every Mercedes and BMW I would see on the streets. (At that time, I did not know much about Audi’s. Today, I drive an Audi and I will happily strip in -30 degrees weather for an Audi). For the longest time, I thought Bon Jovi was German and used to listen to him just because of that. Claudia Schiffer became the hottest woman in the world in my eyes. I would only buy stationary that was made in Germany. I even came up with a German version of my name: Akhmann Badztrudder. I would immerse myself in history books, and remember rooting for Germany in World War I while reading even though I knew they lost the war. I’d flip through pages hoping something would change, history would be rewritten, and Germany would prevail in World War I. I still remember cringing when Bismarck resigned as Chancellor of Germany due to disagreements with Wilhelm II. Now that I am older, I realize how stupid that was.
So I guess this was a long time coming, but I finally visited Germany for a week and a half in January as part of a solo EuroTrip. It seemingly felt like going back to my roots, or some of my roots, to a distant heritage I longed to make my own, to a land that bred men who inspired me, to a nation I wished to be a part of. Setting foot in Germany for the first time, I began to love it even more. Talking with and meeting German people broke the stereotypical image I had of stern-looking, antagonistic German people. In my mind, I had images of a Helga, with long, blonde, braided pigtails on either side that were impeccably symmetric, wearing a white, methodically tailored dirndl dress with a fluffy, white blouse and a matching wrinkle-free apron. She would be quiet, keeping a very straight face, one that had not smiled in days. I had images of a Hans, a tall, blonde haired, blue eyed man who walked fast and made no eye contact. What I saw was very different from that. Those images were replaced with truer images of German people. People who were friendly, helpful, and polite. The women were gorgeous. And what I find most impressive and respect-worthy is the strength and resolve with which they deal and live with their dark history: World War II and the atrocities committed by the Nazi, not just against the Jews, but also against homosexuals, communists, and even ordinary Germans.
It’s important to get a few facts straight here and not judge the German population of the 1900s to the 1950s as we were not in their shoes, under the extraordinary circumstances we hope no one would have to live through again. Firstly, Germany did not start World War I. Everyone wanted that war to happen. France wanted to avenge their loss of land in the Franco-Prussian war. Britain was threatened by the unification of Germany and its rapid advances in technology, especially in naval technology. Every major European power already had military plans created for World War I and was spending most of their national budgets on their military years before the war started. There were atrocities committed by both sides. However, at the end of World War I, Germany was asked to take the full blame for World War I, pay back a ridiculous amount of money every year as reparation, and was asked to disarm. They could not build any technology that could be used in battle. BMW started off as an aircraft engine company but was banned from producing aircraft engines and therefore decided to become an auto manufacturer.
This had a deep economic and social impact to the German people. Nonetheless, Germany began to revive its industries and began to produce goods of high quality and low prices. It was exporting its goods to many countries, including the USA. Times of prosperity were here. However, in 1929 the stock market crashed and Germany was hit hardest due to the debt it accumulated to be able to pay back the reparations. Unable to feed their families, Germans had to pick between two ideologies: Nazism or Communism and the Nazi party was seen as the party more likely to help their bottom-line. They attained 24% of the seats against 19% attained by the communist party. The rest is the history we all know. The Nazi party created concentration camps to imprison all their political enemies, thus achieving absolute power. Through the Enabling Act, Hitler was able to strip German civilians of basic rights. 25,000 volumes of books conflicting with the Nazi ideology were burned in public. World War II started and millions of people, including Germans, were tortured and humiliated by the Nazi’s. Throughout this time, many Germans tried to stand up against Hitler but were quickly eliminated. Most Germans, and the entire world, did not even know about the concentration camps until after the Nazi’s were defeated. I went to Daccau, the first and most significant concentration camp, where young Germans, 16-18 years of age, were trained to terrorize prisoners. An unknown number of people died there, and towards the end were cremated as the Nazi’s were running out of space. It was the one of the most unnerving experience I have had. Those were the darkest hours of German history.
German people, not just of today but those that lived through those times are not to blame. They were starving, freezing, and made the best judgement they could, given their extraordinary circumstances at the time. Americans voted George Bush in 2000 AND 2004, not knowing he would do what he has done over the past 8 years. George Bush opened concentration camp (Guantanamo Bay) and passed the Patriot Act stripping civil liberties, strikingly similar to the Nazi’s actions.
The difference between the Germans and the rest of the world is how they have dealt with this dark history. They deal with their history very bravely and openly. Every other country in the world has tortured and killed innocent people but has hid it from its future generations. Every superpower in the world has had concentration camps but the Germans keep them alive as a reminder. As a way to say, “Yea we fucked up. But we won’t fuck up again”. Every high school kid in Germany is required to go to concentration camps at least two times so they can learn from past mistakes and not repeat them.
I went to the book burning memorial, to the Jewish memorial, to Hitler’s bunker’s site, to Nazi ministry buildings, to the Nazi headquarters. I went to the street were Hitler first marched with a band of armed Nazi’s in his failed coup attempt, to the spots were Nazi’s shot prisoners at point blank distance, to the cells where men who stood up against Hitler were imprisoned, to the churches that gave refuge to the Jewish population when it was oppressed. All of these sites are kept alive as reminders to learn from. And this is not just for German people, but for all of us to learn so history doesn’t repeat itself. The German parliament building today, the Reichstag, has a glass dome through which the public can look down and see the parliament as a symbol that the German people will always be watching.
Even after World War II, in which most major cities were bombed and 70% destroyed, the German people had to deal with having their country divided and Germany as we know it today is only 19 years old because the Berlin wall fell and West Germany reunited with East Germany in 1990. Since then, Germany has continued to progress and now is back to being an economic superpower and a leader in environmental sustainability. Out of all the countries I visited in Europe, Germany was the only one with recycle bins. In England and France, I sometimes had to walk for a few blocks to find a regular trash can. And it wasn’t until 2006, when the soccer world cup was hosted in Germany and a brave and young German soccer team was fighting its way to win the world cup, that the German people began to wave their flags publicly. Ironically, the team’s coach was Juergen Klinsmann, my favourite soccer player when I was little.
While I got to see a lot of Berlin and Munich, I feel like there’s still so much more I want to see and learn and I plan to go back to Germany within the next 2 years, to visit cities I haven’t been to, to explore little towns I have never heard of, and to return to Berlin. Berlin! Berlin was, by far, my favourite city in Europe. The architecture was amazing and diverse. Old, historic, restored buildings stood right next to and blended with sleek, modern, glass buildings. Hundreds of memorials were dispersed around the city, each with a strong message and a lesson. I was more impressed by Kurfurstendamm (Berlin’s shopping/entertainment district) than I was with Times Square. Because the city was divided for so long, East Berlin grew much different from West Berlin; East Berlin became more artsy while West Berlin became more modern. Therefore when Berlin was reunited, both parts of the city began to fuse into a new unique Berlin. A large city with entertainment and attractions increasing faster than one can experience, inhabiting a diverse population with people from over 195 distinct countries, and boasting a history that would take a lifetime and more to absorb.
I love Berlin. I think I left my heart in Berlin.
Friday, December 11, 2009
What I learned by playing guitar this year: Feeling vs. Thinking
Part of the reason life is moving at a much slower pace now is I have much more time on my hands now that I'm not playing in a band. The entire band project took three months and I remember the frenzy of having to manage 50-60 hrs a week of work, 15-20 hrs of guitar playing a week, 5-10 hours a week of YPIN work, and the wild social life. I was getting an average five hours of sleep a night for over three months. I remember days when I'd come home from work at 10pm, play guitar till 4AM, then be back at work by 8AM.
The most important thing I learned from this experience was Feeling vs. Thinking.
Fast rewind to May 2009. I was in the EMP "Staying Alive" program where in six weeks, ten people with varying musical abilities got together in a band and created a ten song set for a performance at EMP to family & friends. We called the band Genre Whore. Although my competency level was way below where I am at today, it was a great experience. I got to play with and learn from some amazing musicians. At our last band practice, I asked our lead guitarist Tim (a phenomenal guitarist!) if he had any advice for me to help me take my guitar playing to the next level. He said "I think you sound good. But you count a lot. As you play more, you'll learn to start feeling the music and knowing what goes where by feeling it rather than counting it".
At the time, the concept seemed alien to me. I always knew to count the beat in my head to know what to play where (and even then I would be off the beat!). Also, I've got an engineering background. The only way my brain knew to make decisions was by thinking. Little did I know what impact that advice was going to make to my guitar playing.
When I started playing with Speedbird 49 in August for our gig in November, my guitar playing was still pretty close to where I was at during the EMP project. I couldn't do the complex guitar solo's I aspired to do but I was assigned the lead guitarist role, primarily because I was the only one available. One of our first songs was "Turn The Page" and I was really excited as it is one of my all time favourite songs. The first weekend, I spent over 20 hours working on just that solo. I got to a point where I had something mediocre for the next practice.
About a month went by and we were making slow progress with our songs. I was trying to learn every solo note for note from the tabs. However, our band practice on August 23rd was an inflection point for my guitar playing. I was really getting into the music that day for some reason. And right about the point when I was to do a solo, something weird happened. I was deep into the music, I stopped thinking for a few moments and my fingers played a solo faster than anything I've ever played and different from anything I've ever practiced. It sounded and felt pretty good. I had no idea where it came from. It was the first time I ever improv'd a solo. And as we played more songs, I kept trying to do that. I'd close my eyes, feel the beat, and just let go. And somehow my subconscious mind would take over and play something that sounded alright.
I started having a lot of fun with my new learned style of playing. Over the next month, I improv'd several of my solo's and in the process I discovered new licks. It opened frontiers, boundaries, and horizons. However, it was inconsistent. Sometimes it would sound good, other times it would sound horrible. I had a general idea of how I wanted the solos to sound so they wouldn't be completely different each time I played. But that's when I decided to figure exactly how I wanted the solo's to sound so I could practice them the same way each time. I left some solo's as is and played original and used my creativity with other solo's. The majority of the last month before the show was spent fine-tuning the solo's. Some took major re-work even a week before the show.
None of that would have been possible if I was still "thinking" and counting. It took hours of listening to the music, trying to feel the emotions that the original artists were trying to project, and then in my head trying to feel a solo that would go with it and trying it out. I took lessons with Chris Griffin, who runs Spotlight Studio and put this entire project together and setup the gig at Big Daddy's. I really resonated with his style of playing and teaching and he expanded my knowledge of scales and taught me how play my licks faster. We actually spent most of our time just talking about theory. And I started using the knowledge I gained from those lessons to make my solo's more complex and interesting.
While polishing my solos during the last two weeks before the show, I started worrying about whether I could hit each note of my solo on the beat that I wanted to. I wondered if I could hit a high note each time the drums crash. How do good guitarists do it? I started analyzing Kirk Hammett's solo's and he is on the beat every time no matter how fast he is going. I analyzed Tim's (lead guitarist from EMP) solo's and he hit the beat every time as well. I went to Jason Parker's , our instructor at EMP and an extraordinary musician, jazz performance at the UW jazz walk and observed how each musician in his quartet was on the beat, even during long solos.
It's very powerful when each note in a solo is on the beat, but I decided to make peace with the fact I won't be able to do that. When I counted and tapped my foot to hit notes on the beat, or in other words, when I was in 'thinking mode', my solo's lost their emotions or what I wanted to project through those solo's. When I played my solo's in 'feeling mode', I wander off to this other world where I can't hear, see, or feel anything except me and my guitar and what I am trying to communicate through my guitar. That's how I wanted to play live, at the expense of being off-beat.
Finally, the long-awaited big day was here. November 19th 2009 at Big Daddy's in Woodinville. My adrenaline was higher than anything I've ever experienced in my life. My heart was racing, my anxiety level was high, my blood was pumping faster than ever. I left work at 2:30pm because I couldn't concentrate. Chris recommended I make a cheat sheet with all the songs and chords and where I was planning to start my solo's. The idea was to put it on the floor on stage in case I forget, because even till the second last practice I'd start playing the wrong scale in a couple of songs. Instead, I decided to keep the following sheet of paper:
There's no feeling like being on the stage and performing. And once the show is over, you get one of the most fulfilling feelings in the world. You practice for hundreds of hours just for that one hour of playing live and just for those few minutes of fulfillment after the show, but it's worth it.
I made several mistakes throughout the show. Not hitting every note I wanted to. Not being on the beat every time. Screwing up one of the breaks that I never missed in any of the practices. My fingers were shaking till the seventh song even as I played some really fast licks in my solos.
Friends, co-workers, and former band members, who graciously took the time to come see me play had great things to say, which made me feel better. Rich did a fantastic job recording the show with his camera. I started watching the videos with a less musically-critical mind and I was surprised I was able to hit the beat over 95% of the time even though I wasn't counting or tapping my foot. I was just feeling the beat. Before every solo, I would stop playing for a couple of bars, feel the drum beat, close my eyes, wander off to that world with just me and my guitar, and somehow still be on the beat most of the time.
People were surprised I was able to get to my level of playing in just 2 years of playing and without any prior musical training or experience. Former band members and experienced musicians who've been playing for many years began to tell me I'm naturally musical. I've started taking singing lessons and my teacher says the same thing. Sometimes, I wish I had picked music up way earlier in my life. I love rock music and I love the sound of the guitar. However, what comforts me is that I attribute less of that to innate abilities, and more of it to having learned how to FEEL music. I think that was the real game changer. I close my eyes and my mind visualizes sound waves, harmonics, notes, pitch, rhythm, many components of music I don't even understand. I've never even owned a metronome. It was FEELING the beat that really improved my timing.
The "What's Next?" question began looming, and I had decided towards the end of the Speedbird 49 project that I was going to take a break from playing guitar for a bit. Part of it was because I was worried about getting burnt out trying to manage it with work, YPIN and my social life. I had sprained my fingers and several nerves on my hand trying to play fast without warming up. The callouses on my fingers were so deep I was worried some day my fingers will just start bleeding. Nevertheless, I still pick up my guitar everyday. But now that the pressure of practicing for a gig is gone, I'm free to explore, to create new beats, to play new chord progressions, to compose new solos.
Another part of me wanted to figure how to manage the two personas. Corporate life rules one persona. Music rules the other persona. Corporate life pays the bills and gives me challenging work. Music allows me to explore my creativity. I've come to the conclusion that both personas will continue to exist. It's a matter of finding the right balance, in the hope that the sum of the two personas is greater than the parts.
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