Lady Lee

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Posts by Lady Lee

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  82

  Canada To Let Quebec Go?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/28/us-secession-idusbre90r15n20130128.

  ok, not yet....... but this could be a move in that direction.. things are gonna get weird.. metatron.

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  Lady Lee

  I did too Satanus Still have a couple of them in the house too.
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  82

  Canada To Let Quebec Go?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/28/us-secession-idusbre90r15n20130128.

  ok, not yet....... but this could be a move in that direction.. things are gonna get weird.. metatron.

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  Lady Lee

  excuse me. I am half French. Did you read that my mnother didn't spoeak English until she was 16? Did you read that my grandmother, uncles and aunt all livind in Montreal for decades? They all spoke French as did my step-father. Did you read that my family can trace its roots back to the late 1500s - all them from France? Did you read that I took and passed college level French courses?

  I also spent 2 1/2 years in a French language congregation. I have no problems with the French people, their lnaguage or their culture. I do have a problem when some people are marginailized even through they have every legal right to full citizenshias Canadians.
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  60

  My Son and I have about 5 Months Left

  by bavman in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  hello, i haven't been on here in awhile and it looks like a whole new crowd.

  i disassociated myself about 8 years ago.

  went through a divorce and shunning from most my family.

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  Lady Lee

  sorry to hear that
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  20

  Can some good come from abuse?

  by NoRegrets in

  1. jw
  2. experiences

  i'm referring to abuse in all it's forms: emotional, physical, sexual, mental, spiritual, whatever.. i.

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  Lady Lee

  Abuse is never good, especially for the victims and for those who look on with dusgust.

  But abuse can help some people realize how bad things are and that they need to make a choice to stay or to leave. It always boils down to the choices we make. I could have chosen to maintain a relationship with my JW mother or husband or religion. I believed, as most victims do, that there was no choice.

  One day I was talking to a friend and he said: "Not making a choice IS a choice". Wow! I had to sit with that for almost a week before I realized I didn't like the choice of not choosing. Sitting on the fence is a hard place to be. I waited until it was a life or death choice for me. And I didn't want to be dead so I left.

  I think abuse forces the hand that would otherwise remain still, content with the status quo.
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  82

  Canada To Let Quebec Go?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/28/us-secession-idusbre90r15n20130128.

  ok, not yet....... but this could be a move in that direction.. things are gonna get weird.. metatron.

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  Lady Lee

  I must admit I do love a good poutine and I miss them.
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  82

  Canada To Let Quebec Go?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/28/us-secession-idusbre90r15n20130128.

  ok, not yet....... but this could be a move in that direction.. things are gonna get weird.. metatron.

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  Lady Lee

  Quebec is a dictatorship. ...

  Totally untrue. The very fact that Quebecers can debate and vote in a referendum on separation is the proof that democracy works. In several Eastern European countries the very same issues resulted in wars and ethnic cleansing. I have yet to find anyone being deported from Quebec for voicing diverging political views and I have not found concentration camps for the evil "anglophone". Lady Lee even admits she was free to leave, although some of her basic human rights may have been baffled...I know French-only signage is such an annoyance...almost as bad as Chinese-only signage in Richmond BC or English only signs in the rest of Canada...I am also glad that she has found refuge in a province that uses the same form of government as Quebec.

  Ever tried walking down the street with a Canadian flag? Or flown one on your house? I won't even visit Quebec with anything that has a Canadian flag on it. Quebec has its own version of ethnic cleaning. Make the English as miserable as possible. make it extremely difficult to get medial help in English, force them to speak French whenever they step outside their door. Get rid of the language police that forbids signs from having English written on them or at the very least only allows it as long as it is harder to read and fines store owners for putting up Enlish signs in stores and in any advertizing.

  French only signage is more than an annoyance. It deprives people of their Canadian rights to services in English. I have been from one end of Canada to the other and seen French signs. Quebec loves to hold onto the myth that they can't read anything in their own language when they leave Quebec. It makes it much more difficult for tourists to get around and find what they need. That is big bucks but if they want it they have to make people feel welcome.

  A few years ago my husband and I were visiting my daughter in Laval (just north of Montreal) We went into a restaurant to order and we were refused service until my daughter spoke French. No way to treat visitors.

  As I sit here in Ontario I look around my apartment at things I have bought from stores here in Ontario. Every package, box, jar bottle and even DVD has both English and French on it and neither is smaller than the other. It was the same in Winnipeg and Victoria BC.

  As an English speaking person ever tried going to a St. John the Baptist day celebrations? It almost feels wrong to type that in English. It is meant to be a Frech only celebration and heaven helkp you if you speak English there.

  I would argue that Newfoundlanders have just as distinct a culture as Quebec - including a unique language.

  Another well documented comment here… and I guess the language you are referring to is Newfieneese. Along with First Nations and Britain, France is a founding nation of Canada and Quebecers have every right to preserve their distinct identity and language. Without a legal framework the French minority would simply vanish. Acadians had to flee to New Brunswick and as far as New Orleans to avoid religious persecution and save their culture and they have to constantly battle to remain a people. It is no different for Quebec.

  I have no problem with the Quebec desire to preserve their idnetity. But they don't have to trample the rights of other people to do it. That is just nonsense that their culture would disappear if they allowed other people their rights. Hmmm now just what culture are they teaching to people who come to Quebec from Asia? Do you really think an Asian family will surrender their cultural rights to live the way they want when they leave their homes. Or Italian or Greek? All these immigrants develop their own communities and continue to live their own culture. The only time they have to deal with the Quebec culture is when they step outside their small cultural communities. They aren't adding anythign to the Quebec culture except to speak the French language as spoken in Quebec because it is a far cry from French from France.

  It's interesting that Lady Lee has pointed out how the average Quebecer has been kept under control. I thought that was only true of the Duplessis years, but on reflection - it is continuing.

  The average Quebecers was kept under control by the Catholic Church which in turn was in bed with Duplessis. For good French-Canadian Catholics sex was for procreation only which explains the very large families and the end result was that, except for one child who may become a priest or doctor, every other child would receive very little instruction. English-Canadian who were in majority protestants had smaller families and children benefited from a better education. With time English-Canadians held most of the managing jobs while less educated French-Canadians were mostly labourers. That slowly started to change in the 1960’s during “La révolution tranquile” of Jean Lesage. The Catholic Church gradually lost its hold on the population and, with smaller families, more of the children were able to pursue their education. Big money was no longer accessible by English-Canadians only. Today government and Church are totally separated and even school boards are non-denominational . The very fact that Quebec wants to attain independence is the evidence of a people fully emancipated.

  Gotta shake my head at this one. You do know we are in 2013 now? Right? You make it sound like a free education in Quebec was unheard of in Quebec until after 1960. Quebec has had the constitutional right to education for their population since 1867. YES 1867. The FRENCH Catholic Churches are what kept the French population under control. Not the English. But somehow the English are blamed for something they had absolutely nothing to do with.

  In 1852 Quebec got its first university, Laval University. Yes 1852. That was before they even had a constituational right to education the French population. Oddly it was the royal charter who founded the university.

  Did the English community prosper? You bet we did. But that wasn't our fault. We worked for it. And you make us pay for it over and over. Hence the great exodus of big business from quebec and into Ontario the States or anywhere else they could conduct business without jumping through linguistic hoops.

  Quebec does not want emanicipation. It wants a divorce with the rest of Canada footing the bill.

  Thank you jgnat for the charts...Quebec is not such a moocher after all!

  ah yes the money. Because that is what all this boils down to. Quebec wants the money but they want zero accountability for it. Right now the Canadian government gives provinces money to do certain things with - like education, health care, and pensions. When the Canadian govenrment gives money for specific things it wants to know that the province (all of the provinces, are spending the money for the reason it was given. Quebec doesn't want that. They want the money for sure. But they want to spend it the way they want to without having to account for where the money went.

  And no In this new century Quebec is not getting more than the other provinces although they are complaining about that. Equalization payments were always meant to be to help the less poor provinces come up to the standard of the more wealthy provinces. Quebec no longer falls into the cash poor provinces. In fact it is doing fairly well. The money now goes to the other provinces that need it. But Quebec will stomp its feet and whine and complain that they were trampled on by English Canada since 1867 and they need to be remunerated for it. Forever.
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  82

  Canada To Let Quebec Go?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/28/us-secession-idusbre90r15n20130128.

  ok, not yet....... but this could be a move in that direction.. things are gonna get weird.. metatron.

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  Lady Lee

  My father was a Newfie. I wouldn't say that he spoke another language. Rather is is a form of English that blends a lot of Scottish and Irish. Being an island that only joined Canada in 1949 they have remained pretty isolated although many of the young people leave as soon as they can to find jobs somewhere else. My fahter and some of his cousins were among those young people who left.

  You could say the same about New Brunswick or Nova Scotia and the Acadian language probably a blend of the above 2 along with French.

  I remember listenign to my mother and grandmother speak to each other. They had this liquoid way of blending both languages into a sentence which is weird when you think about it because the syntax is different for each language. My grandmother had a French accent when she spoke English and they would start a sentence in French, switch to English for a few words and then back again. I know many French and English speaking Canadians who communicate this way in informal settings. It is interesting to listen to and I guess I do it too when I am stuck finding the right French word.

  Most of my education was in Toronto and French was not on the curriculum until grade 7 or 8. But the year before that I had spent living with my mother and grandmother and my 3 u8ncles and an aunt and I had taken French in school one year. (I failed French that year because everyone else already had 3-4 years of French. Then I went back to Toronto and passed the French clesses with ease.

  But speaking French is a challenge to me. Shortly after I moved to Quebec (I was 12 yrs old) my mother sent me to the store to buy milk or bread. The store owner started yellign at me and threw me out of the store for not speaking French. That experience really traumatized me. Although I can manage to read French relatively well, speaking it to some one in Quebec was extremely difficult. In college I took course and was able to pass them but put me in a real situation and forget it. I can't think of the words.

  Before I moved away form Montreal in 1999 it was hard to find work in any government service.I worked on my own for many years.At that time a tourist who stayed in the tourist areas could get service in English. But I have had a lot of people, including both my daughters who say that the atmosphere has gotten much worse in the lkast few years. Even the tourists are treated badly and refused service if they only speak English. That is no way to increase the economy that you might attract through tourism.

  If you travel to any town over 200 miles from Montreal you will find communities of exclusively French speaking people. Most people think that if Quebec leaves the whole west side of the province (Montreal-Oka-Gatineau/Hull) will refuse to separate. I don't think I have ever heard what this rather large area will do. Join Ontario? Create their own little province?

  When you talk about distinct societies I would say the native population is far more distinct but so is Nunavit which has finally become a province and the Northwest Territories and the Yukon. The entire northern part of Canada is extremely distinct. We actually know very little about it. The closest I came was speaking with people from the reservations that had to be flown to Winnipeg for health reasons and stayed in the honeless shelter where I worked.
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  82

  Canada To Let Quebec Go?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/28/us-secession-idusbre90r15n20130128.

  ok, not yet....... but this could be a move in that direction.. things are gonna get weird.. metatron.

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  Lady Lee

  Gatineau which the city across the river in Quebec has CANADIAN flags flying on amm gov't buildings I see more Canadian flags flying across the river than I saw in all my years living in Montreal

  I am told that if Quebec ever does leave western Quebec will opt out and stay in Canada.

  Mirabel is Quebec's white elephant - an airport that never took off (excuse pun) Eventually it closed down to all passenger flights and now is used for cargo - at least the last time I heard. It was a disaster from teh very beginning requiring a highway to be built for all the supposed traffic that would come their way. it never happened.

  Quebec's nuclear power (yes they have 2 plants)

  Gentilly Nuclear Generating Station (Centrale nucléaire de Gentilly in French) is a Canadian nuclear power station located on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River in Bécancour, Quebec , 100 km north east of Montreal.

  The Gentilly site contains the only nuclear power reactors in Quebec [note 1] and comprises two nuclear reactors; Gentilly-1, a 250-MW CANDU-BWR prototype, was marred by technical problems and shut down in 1977, and Gentilly-2, a 675-MW CANDU-6 reactor operated commercially by the government-ownedpublic utility Hydro-Québec between 1983 and 2012.

  The Gentilly reactors were constructed in stages between 1966–1983 and were originally part of a plan for 30-35 nuclear reactors in Quebec. [1] [2] A third reactor, Gentilly-3, was scheduled to be built on the same site but was cancelled because of a drop in demand growth in the late 1970s. [3]

  On October 3, 2012, Hydro-Québec CEO, Thierry Vandal announced his intention not to proceed with the refurbishment of the Gentilly-2 facility and its closure on December 28, 2012 for economic reasons. At that time, a decommissioning process will proceed over a period of 50 years and is expected to cost $1.8 billion. [4] The permanent shut down and decommissioning of the power plant follows an election pledge from Quebec's newly appointed premier, Pauline Marois. [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gentilly_Nuclear_Generating_Station

  Another well-thought out plan from Quebec

  Most of Quebec's power comes from water. It is a water rich province - hence hydro-electric power they can sell to the US
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  82

  Canada To Let Quebec Go?

  by metatron in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/28/us-secession-idusbre90r15n20130128.

  ok, not yet....... but this could be a move in that direction.. things are gonna get weird.. metatron.

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  Lady Lee

  Lived in Montreal for 39 years

  sammieswife - we could be related. My family goes back to some of the early Montreal settlers in the late 1500s

  Few people realize that when you go to Quebec all employees in service industries MUST address you first in French. Only if you respond in English can they switch languages. Computer software must be in French only. Movies cannot be released in Quebec until a French translation can be made available. Immigrants who choose to stay in Quebec cannot send their English speaking children to English schools unless they can afford to send them to private schools. French speaking children are not permitted to go to English schools. As an English speaking person I had to get papers from the government to prove I had gone to English schools so that I could send my children to an English school.

  A vast number of English speaking people had left the province which is probably why they separation vote was so close.

  One of the complaints of the French population is that they cannot get jobs if they leave the province of Quebec. I found it odd then that when I moved from Quebec to Manitoba I had to get my driver's record. The person in a government office in Winnipeg phoned Quebec to get my records. She initially spoke in French tot he person on the other end of the line. When she realized that person could not speak English the woman in Manitoba immediately switched to fluent French. OK so it is one example. But if you went into any government office in Manitoba you would see huge signs saying services were provided in both languages. I couldn't get that kind of service anywhere in Quebec.

  Shortly after I arrived in Winnipeg I went to the zoo. I heard French spoken all around me. I heard it where I worked, on the streets, in offices and shopping malls. French was everywhere. In fact Winnipeg Manitoba has the highest French speaking community outside of Quebec (St. Boniface) Most stores are bilingual, services are bilingual, signs are bilingual. Any French speaking person who went there would have everything they wanted. I could go into any hospital and receive services in either language. Heck they even have their own hospital, St. Boniface, which I went to and heard both languages being used.

  My mother's family comes from northern Ontario. She did not even know or speak English until she left home and moved to Toronto. Due to the exodus in the late 70s many French speaking people left Quebec to get better jobs across Canada. Many moved to Toronto. I went to visit a friend who had moved there. She was bilingual. She said almost the first person she talked to was her upstairs neighbors -2 French guys.

  As much as the powers-that-be in Quebec have tried to keep the French people down by limiting their education, they have failed. The French are leaving - no jobs. Learn English go anywhere. Now that might seem like the opposite of what I just said above but we live in a global economy. The more languages you know the more opportunity to you.

  Quebec is a dictatorship. If you look at how they control people, lie to them, deprive certain people of basic human rights then they are no different than any totalitarian group. This one happens to be political and I am damned glad to be out of there.

  I now live right across the border and if I look over the top of my computer monitor I can see Quebec on the other side of the river. But we are miles apart in ideology.

  Will they leave Canada? They can't. Financially it would be their downfall. What they want however is a divorce where the spouse with the bucks keeps paying alimony in ever increasing amounts

  The US would not put up with their nonsense and about the only thing the US gets from them is hydro-electric power. They have nothing else to offer but demands to be treated special.
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  55

  Were you popular in your congregation or district?

  by Emery in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  not to start some form of popularity contests here but i was wondering how popular some people were?

  how far did your network go in this organization?

  this question also pertains to those who are actively fading..

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  Lady Lee

  As an elder's wife we knew a lot of people. As an interpreter I knew a lot more people and had a regular fan chub at assemblies and conventions. Some would approach me after. Grace/Mouthy usually sat where she could be sure to watch me and always had something nice to say.

  But years before that, as a teen people pretty much ignored or avoided me.