I vaguely remember the time my Japanese mother became a Canadian citizen. It was 1974. I was ten at the time and in elementary school. I vaguely recall her studying for the citizenship test — learning the provinces of Canada, finding out about the how parliament worked, reading about the history of Canada’s formation. She probably knew more about Canada than I did at the time! I don’t recall ever attending a ceremony, although she tells me she did go to one at a federal government office downtown.
The Day I Became a Canadian Citizen by Jo Bannatyne, illustrated by Song Nan Zhang (Tundra Books, 2008) is the story of how a Chinese girl, Xiao Ling Li, and her family become Canadian citizens. The ceremony is held on Feb. 15, National Flag Day. Xiao receives a gift of red shoes from her Aunt T. Red is an auspicious color for the Chinese as well as being a representative color of Canada, so everyone wears a bit of red to the ceremony. It is held at Xiao’s school gym in Toronto.
The judge, Dr. Williamson, who presides over the ceremony was himself an immigrant from Scotland twenty years ago, and he happily grants citizenship to Xiao’s family. Other recipients include the Nguyen family, and two friends of Xiao’s — Sophia and Maria — whose family were refugees from Ethiopia. At the end of the line of recipients of the citizenship certificate is a woman whom the judge gives an extra big hug to. Xiao wonders who it is. The judge remarks afterwards that it is his wife — a new Canadian originally from Greenland!
Being born a Canadian, I don’t know what it feels like to become one. But reading The Day I Became a Canadian, I got a child’s glimpse of what becoming a citizen must be like — a bit of an adventure in discovering oneself in a new identity yet to be forged. As Judge Williamson says, “Very few Canadians share a common past, but all of us share a common future.”