Missing the good in my country

    July 4th!   Today I am thinking of all the barbecues, parades, and fireworks that will take place in my native country.  I love all of the fanfare that accompanies most of our American holidays, and especially on the 4th of July I am proud to be an American. It is rather strange that even though we are less than 3 hours from the U.S. border, we truly are very much in a foreign country.  Canadians, at least those in Quebec, don't seem to care much about national holidays.  They have several that resemble ours, i.e., Canadian Thanksgiving, a holiday to remember their dead similar to Memorial Day, and on July 1st it was Canada Day, which commemorates "Canada's 1867 Confederation".  However, I saw very little excitement or celebration with any of these three.  Earlier this week I asked a native from here about Canada Day. "Oh, we don't really care about that." I read that this attitude prevails here in the province of Quebec because many, if they had their druthers, would like to secede from the rest of Canada. Thus, they feel little allegiance to the rest of the nation.  How different from the national pride most U.S. citizens feel for the United States, even when the government isn't necessarily functioning as we would like it to function.  We celebrate with huge parades, flag-waving, fireworks in every community, big or small.  I saw none of that here last Tuesday.  About the only evidence of a holiday was that there was no mail delivery.  We held our normal English class that evening, and while our numbers were fewer, those who came just shrugged and indicated that this holiday was no big deal.
    In fairness, I must mention that on June 24th it was Sainte Jean Baptiste Day in Quebec.  We were gone, but apparently this is a fairly big deal.  No one from here I talked to could tell me why it is called that, but with a little help from google, I found that this was originally a French religious holiday which has now become a provincial one here in Canada. Because of the Catholic and French influence here it has remained one of the biggest of the year, although, as I said, no one I talked to knew why it is called Sainte Jean Baptiste day, and there is nothing religious about it anymore.
    Besides being "Canada's Birthday" (as it is sometimes called), July 1st , at least here in Victoriaville, is apparently the annual "moving day".   I was told by members of my English class that this is the day when people like to change residences, especially apartments.  Landlords prefer annual leases that run from July 1, for some reason, so everyone who wants to move, does it on this day.  The Elders here spent their day in helping three families move.  Piles of unwanted stuff can be seen outside of buildings on the edge of the street. Its been there since Tuesday so I don't know when it will be removed or by whom.

     From these photos one can see that I inherited my mother's skills in photography- tons of pavement with the item of interest far in the distance.  I would ask Paul to edit them but he is really sick- sorry.