Canada is my home, but so is Trinidad and Tobago

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Inside my conference swag bag was a sweatshirt that proclaimed “Home is Canada” in large white print on a black background. It was a lovely gift and just in time as the weather was starting to turn cold. Still, it gave me pause. I quickly put it out of my mind as I moved on to other goodies – popcorn, dark chocolate, decadent bread, vegan cookies, a branded notebook and a water bottle. But my eyes settled once more on the sweatshirt. Was I expected to wear it? In a virtual conference?

As a pre-teen transplant from Trinidad and Tobago, I wondered if wearing it meant definitively declaring that Canada was my only home? Twenty-seven years after landing here from the Caribbean, I find myself occasionally referring to Trinidad as my home. For example, when I talk about travel plans, I invariably talk about visiting Cuba (we love the beach and the people there) and New York and heading “home” to Trinidad to spend time with dad and relatives.

I am a Canadian citizen. I remember as a teenager attending the Citizenship Ceremony with my mother, brother and sister and alternating between feelings of excitement and excitement. I love this place. I work here, I pay my taxes, I own property, including a cottage (which is quintessentially Canadian in my opinion), and yet, it felt almost like a traitor to wear that sweatshirt.

On the first day of my virtual conference, I wore a bright yellow hoodie with “Empowered” and three daisies plastered on it. I imagined that most if not all of my 500 colleagues were wearing their “Home is Canada” sweater and I was like a rebellious teenager, trying not to conform. The sweatshirt was hanging in my closet. From the moment I received it until the day of the conference, I visited it, touched it, admired the craftsmanship, but I could not understand the doubts that the wording gave me. It caught me by surprise. I had to reflect on these emotions that seemed to have morphed out of nowhere.

I have a wonderful daughter who was born here and would not understand my feelings as she embraces her Canadian citizenship. Despite immigrating to Canada at the age of nine from Sri Lanka, my husband also does not have these feelings of uneasiness about the meaning of “home,” and so I did not share my uneasiness with him. While I have standing instructions for my ashes to be thrown into the Caribbean Sea when I die, he insists that his ashes be deposited in the lake at our cottage. (A consensus will have to be reached at a later date. Hopefully we’re still decades away.)

I attend Canada Day festivities and wave my red and white flag. I embrace every season (as much as I can!) though I look forward to bass season starting in June. I kayak. I watch hockey, occasionally. I love maple syrup, poutine and Beaver Tails. I have been to the eastern and western provinces and plan to visit the rest in between. I enjoy a wide variety of stereotypically Canadian activities. And yet, I hesitated to say that Canada was my home.

By the end of the first day of the conference, I was able to point out the real issue: Canada was not EXCLUSIVE My house. Trinidad had been my home for 12 years, my formative years. My culture, my early upbringing revolves around my Caribbean heritage. My father lives there along with 99.9 percent of his family. My maternal grandmother and 80 percent of my mother’s family remain there. They are also my home. My safe space. My people. My roots. my anchor

The call of the Caribbean Sea is sometimes too much to bear. The promise of sunny days, the smell of hot asphalt (we boast the largest natural asphalt deposit in the world), the rhythms of soca, calypso, parang and chutney music live in my soul. Songs such as Orlando Octave I love you like this, Savannah Grass from Kes and David Rudder’s Trinity at De Bone are part of the playlist of my life. You can find me, my daughter and my husband dancing to these beats in our kitchen attesting to our “This kitchen is made for dancing” dish towels. Trinidadian foods and drinks pepper my kitchen, now more than ever, as I make a concerted effort to pass on my culture and traditions to my child.

So how can Canada be my only home? Ideally, the sweatshirt should have said, “Home is where the heart is.” And for that, I would have shouted: Yes!, because my heart is divided into two nations and has been for almost three decades. I expect it will be forever.

Like Canada, Trinidad is multicultural, with a population of East Indian, African, Chinese, Portuguese, Spanish and American Indian descent, to name a few. I only have to walk out my front door in Markham to realize that I am lucky to live in a place that accepts me for who I am. A city that embraces diversity and encourages authentic expressions of self. Here I can attend the Toronto Caribbean Carnival, otherwise known as Caribana, which is similar to the Trinidad Carnival. I can listen to radio stations where Dr. Jay, “de Soca Prince” plays the latest and greatest soca, and I can be thankful that pandemic relief funding meant millions of businesses, including West Indian restaurants, continued to bring a taste of home. those who desire it. The list could go on and on.

The national anthems for Canada and Trinidad and Tobago speak of freedom and belonging. “We are on guard for you,” in Canada and “We Pledge Our Lives to You,” in T&T’s Forged by the Love of Freedom. I break out into joyful yet solemn song every time I hear one.

I am grateful to belong to two countries, so I wore the sweatshirt on the second day of my conference. I have worn it many times since then, with pride and a sense of peace knowing that while my roots are firmly anchored in one place, my branches have spread to another.

Stacey-Ann Suharrie lives in Markham, Ont.

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