Dear Ontario,

If ever any person argued that politics is not like high school friendships, then they we terribly wrong. Like many fellow Torontonians, I have been following closely the preparations for the up-coming two day summit of the G20, and I must admit I am a little more than shocked. How is it that a 'conservative' government can comfortably display the characteristics of a socialist one? There is no doubt in ANYBODY'S mind that money will be spent, but the magnitude at which it is, is what worries us, more than anything else.

In the Words of Jennifer Yang, a Staff Reporter of thestar.com, "What exaclty does $1 Billion worth of summit security look like?"

I think that best sums it up for everyone following the preparations. What the heck does one billion dollars worth of security look like? War tanks, loud sound makers, hundreds of masked soldiers from other parts of the country and walls. For two days of summit meetings, this seems a little much, does it not? I mean, we are not trying to start a new world war- financial leaders are just coming over to discuss money, politics and things. Do they need the reception of...a demi-god from back in the day?

What tourist attraction costs $1.9 Million, when right across the street the real thing is right there? Is our Prime Minister even thinking? I know his skin is probably thick from all the insults he's accumulated over his short reign, but seriously dude! Take down the damn wall and use that money to fix up more community pools or something. The summer is here and you'll still have to face us once this is all over- you don't want to see us pissed.

Sure, Harper can argue that many cities before us, and those after us would try their best to sweep their mess underneath the carpet, but what city suddenly wakes up one morning and squanders everything it has to impress other people in attempt to...gain favor amongst them? Its pathetic if you ask me, and the fact still remains that no cheerleader ever got to be captain just because their mother baked cookies for the team.

People like Phil Brown, the General Manager of Shelter, Support and Housing talk of finding homes for the homeless when the actual truth of the matter is nothing is definite, or clear. He even said, "Since the middle of March, city outreach workers have been working more intensely in the area affected by G20. That includes homeless people and people who panhandle, in order to ensure that they have a safe palce to stay."

We give him credit for sighting the problem, but just how the solution will be administered, no one can be sure. In an article written by CBC News, a homeless man was actually interviewed and he told them that he was warned against being withing the G20 area during the summit days, or else he could face arrest. Talk about being two-faced! On the one hand the government has all the right people in the right places, saying all the right things to the public, but in reality the orders are in place and will be in effect the moment the G20 steps foot on our soil.

All things considered, and knowing that the summit will go on despite all the numerous protests and letters that we write, the reality will shine through: you can't impress your friends with money. From the pen of another commentator who is closely following the events, "It wont work; he will never be a leader of the same caliber as Obama, Sarkozy or the British guy." Its a pity Toronto has to pay the price for this lesson.

Yours truly,

Just Another Mad Torontonian

Love you, miss you, hate you for leaving me...

On Love: 13 January 2010 was the last time we had any kind of contact, or a few days before that at least. Fresh from Rehab, still under house arrest I looked for ways to hear your voice one last time- because I knew it would be just for the sake of one last time.

On Friendship: One step behind my every move, no matter how poorly my judgement seemed at that time, I am still grateful for the unwavering friendship you still bless me with up until today. "A creature unlike any other" is what I once described you as, and surely you are...then you're other crummy friends went right ahead an spoiled it.

On Family: By far the biggest disappointment I have had in my whole life time, still I have to give the due respect owed to each of you for being my blood relation. With no where left to run, I think I have to face you now and only hope that I come out of it alive.

Im and Addict...a Reject!

Lol, so the title might be a little strong, but I'm telling you around Christmas and New Years time, that sounded just fine. Had even a ring to it!

I am a survivor of Rehab, ladies and gentlemen! Yes! And I wont go without saying that I was locked up against my will for no better reason than to separate me from my boyfriend. Now, the Parents could have sat back and sipped on their tea thinking that they had won the battle, but I assure you, they have not won the war.

Although a fore warning was issued, I never thought it would actually come to pass. But it did! So two days before Christmas I was packed off and driven to a small duplex compound that I swear coulda gone for 250,000/= a month at most (about $100) each. Behind wimpy iron gates, I didn't even wait to hear the sound of the car leave, or look into the faces of my triumphant father and distraught mother.

I must admit, at first I was just disgusted. Thinking to myself, that I have probably 24 hours before they came picked me up and that was that. Nope, they left me there for the Christmas and New Years and I am sad to say I wouldn't have asked for it to be any different! Not only did I get to meet other 'clients' but I also left that Rehab after I had imprinted on it some of my Nali-ous characteristics.

That female nurse was right to complain to the guards, before she was sacked, that the Director shouldn't have brought in a couple of Muzungu's (white washed blacks). Its not our fault that she didn't have the best toilet mannerisms, and couldn't understand a word of English we would say when we heartily kicked her out of our private bathroom and forced her to share with the guards. Its not our fault that we took more attention from the boys than her. Its not our damn faults that we had an actual interest and certain seriousness about the drugs being randomly distributed. And for crying out loud, its not the damn girls' fault that Nali was added to their pool.

No more blindly taking drugs before bed time. Hell, in fact it was no more drugs period! Out with the zombie looking clients, in with the fresh full of energy people who could sit and hold proper conversations without falling asleep mid way! No more survival tactics, we became a family- and by God the bond we made can only be tested over time.

The only thing that bugged me the most was the fact that, like my own parents, Ugandan mothers and fathers have no clue how to take care of their own. I mean it. There were these four boys, age 15/16 and I swear two of them hadn't ever tasted a single drug, let alone drank any liquor. The other two were well into their experimental stages, and you could see that it was something they would eventually learn to moderate or drop in the near future. I mean, come on! The worst bit was, they had just been pulled out of boarding school for the holidays, straight into this 'facility' until they were ready to go back to boarding school of the remaining advanced years of their high school.

Talk about not wanting to take responsibility for your own. No wonder these kids grow up, angry and hateful. Then they get their chance to fly off and never come back. What parents don't know, is that those teenage years are the ones we need them the most. They make the greatest impact on our lives, and if that impact is going to be made by another hopeless looking, shitty feeling individual branded an alcoholic, who is to say these kids wont go bar hopping to find the kinds of friends they have been labelled to be similar?

Rehab is no kind of bar to set for your kids, take it from me people.

That's when I kind of lost it for Serenity Centre. How desperate could they be to actually admit these kids, tell them everyday that they are alcoholics and counsel them to be better recoverees? Recoverees from what? I wondered. That's just fucking insane, I'm sorry. But if the Ugandan society is comfortable going down that lane, then I'm telling you we are in for it in the long run!

Now, having promised myself that Id refrain from directly attacking the Centre's pathetic programs and methods, at least I can say that as Addicts...Rejects we gave those people a friggin run for their money. Not only did we manage to escape twice (while I was in there), but we also snuck in a good deal of cigarettes and happily smoked daytime or evening.

As a student of Psychology, I think this trip was a crucial and beneficial one for me to take. At least I have a clue how it feels to be on the other side of the table, and I now know what not to do should I ever want to start my own Rehabilitation Centre in Uganda.

To all those clients that were there the time I was, you can only be reading this if you are successfully out of that damn program. My advice to you is to keep your activities to yourself and in firm control, heed only to the words of strength and growth that we were told. Throw those pills (I know you hide them), that nurse's image, and all those damn ideas that you have a disease that cannot be controlled, out the damn door. Its high time you took responsibility for the damage that you choose to do, you're in no way close to being as messed up as they said we were.

That is just not an excuse anymore.

I love you all, except of course Mr. PeePee who made our lives a living hell, and hope to see you bright and wiser in the future. To the old guys, don't forget us when your writing your wills, we walked you around when your feet were too damn swollen to get you to the bathroom!

From one Addict...Reject to another,

God bless your soul!

Dear 99,

Its been 23 years now since you helped bring me to this world, and I only have utmost respect and gratitude for that. And that is about it.
Seeing as your a professional mind reader, I should give you the benefit of the doubt when it comes to how you chose to raise me. I bet most daughter's do at some point. But by now we both know that I am no where close to what 'most daughters' are, and I certainly do not conform to their actions, weather I agree or disagree to them.

I never really took the time to write anything to you that held any emotion before. I'm not even really sure why. Part of me thinks it's because I learnt earlier on that you are incapable of expressing any form of 'love' for anybody, even yourself; while the other half of me thinks it's because I never really cared enough to 'let you have it' so to speak.

23 years have come and gone, and for some odd reason I feel I am compelled to calling you off your highly perched stool to tell you a little about yourself no one has ever dared to. Just as you feel like it is in your every duty to call me out, I feel as a daughter I am obligated to correcting your poorly matured personality for the sake of you having people at your funeral.

Yes, I know you can sit there and say you don't care, you have every right to pull that childish defence tactic: 'sticks and stones may hurt my bones, but words will never break me'. Heads up, this message is in no way meant to 'break' you in any form. Yet, if there is one thing all human beings must learn to ultimately accept, its that words are the most powerful weapon on this earth. So please, read on carefully.

Your need to be 'in control' of everything and everybody around you is so unbecoming and beneath you. Sure, you exude calmness and self-ease, but behind closed doors, you cannot really hide your real self from the people you live with at home. I'm not quite sure if it's just because you see that life is beginning to pass you by as the universe continues to push you along into the 'old people' bracket; or if it's because as a child you never were in control of anything, but whatever it is, I will not put up with it anymore.

Years living under your roof has taught me how to be annoyingly tranquil when it comes to dealing with personalities such as yourself. You see all, know all, and hear nothing but the sound of your own voice. Should the outside world throw you a curve ball, oh hell, you'll just go home and take it out on them!

Can you surely deny the many days in the when your favourite past time was picking quarrels with me? As a behavioural scientist, could you please explain to me exactly what that was all about? Even if you try to be as objective as you can, I'm sure there is no valid explanation beyond the fact that you have unresolved 'daddy issues'.

Let me jog your memory a bit to the days when you enjoyed picking other people's personalities to pieces, cornering them with self doubt and insecurity. What kind of person is able to uphold a fight with someone thirty years their junior and be beaten at it? Don't you not think that it is high time you took your pen and paper and gave yourself an evaluation? Heck, you're even lucky to have me in your life. Give me a couple years to get that doctorate, I'll gladly take you through it- F R E E OF CHARGE!

Go ahead and try to deny the fact that you are the kind of person who always has to point the finger at somebody else. I find it so hilarious that you should be so good at it. In fact, you are so expertly good that you forgot what you told me about finger pointing: remember that there are always four other fingers pointing back at you. I may sound like a spoilt child in a fit of rage aiming back at her father, but dude, it's high time you heeded to your own advice for once.

You amaze me with the way your whole entire life has evolved into one huge contradiction. I may not be as wise as the your past, but I am your ticket into a comfortable future and there will come a time when you will have to trust your entire well-being in my 'irresponsible' hands. Weather or not you like it.

If there is one thing I can promise you; its that I will give you what you deserve. Nothing more and definitely nothing less. You can have all the material comfort in the world, but at no one period in whats left of your miserable life will you have spiritual and emotional peace.

This promise I keep glowing in my heart is what gives me serenity at times like these. Times when I just want take that baseball bat you so trustingly keep besides your bed at night and use it as a sledge hammer to smash your head right into your pillow. Times when I want to mix up a dose of something lethal and slip it in your dinner while you stare at me like I was the worst thing that happened to you in your life. The truth of the matter is I just want you out of my way, but the promise I hold in my heart keeps me from doing any of this. The promise in my heart holds so much more satisfaction of watching you suffer at my will. The promise I will eventually turn into a reality will take me another couple of years until the day I will implement it; revengefully getting back at you for all the wrong you inflicted on me.

So, for now publicly ridiculing you on a personal blog will have to do. It seems to be the best remedy for my anger these past few years. I don't really care if you come across it or not, I'm sure others have read and internalized previous posts before. Nothing seems to stop these words of mine, clearly nothing ever will. I'm just sorry that the rest of the world now sees behind that phoney act to what you really look like. I could almost feel guilty...or NOT!

Sibling Rivalry

One can only begin to break down the complicated bond between a brother and his sister, more so if the two were forced to grow up in a household with no other sibling to fall back on. The many years in which they spent bickering and making up intertwine themselves into an intricate ball of emotions that should best not be tampered with by the outside world. But how far should any sibling go when trying to correct a fault of another, how harsh should their language be when attempting to drive a point home, how brutal should their efforts seem to keep the other out of harm’s way?
My devout readers, this brings me to today’s posting- which has no doubt been a puzzle piece in my mind’s eye that I just cannot seem to place. When does sibling rivalry turn sour, and when it does, is it a bitterness one soon adapts to? I won’t lie; I myself don’t have the answer to any of that. The best I can do is roll it around and offer it back to you my audience and see what you make of any of this.
Now, we all know that the internet is a vast encyclopedia, full of different websites for this particular topic among others. I found that when tackling this topic most of them were more geared towards targeting parents with children at opposite ends, but what about the person experiencing it first hand? After endless hours of pouring over what different blogs and Parent Help Sites had to say about this, I landed on a short article written in Wikipedia which simply summed up- as well as helped me understand a little more- this whole business.

Knowing that sibling rivalry is basically a type of competition amongst brothers and sisters is only one side of the coin. As I have been told many times before, I like to find the cause of most of the things that occur in my life time. Well, Wiki put out some pretty interesting reasons for it ever occurring including birth order, different parental treatment, personality and the like. The bit, however that caught my eye, was where it was noted in black and white that the more intense sibling rivalry was more eminent between siblings of very close age, same gender or… get this… where one child was more intellectually gifted than the other.
Bingo! That just about did it for me and lifted my emotional state without dampening my spirits. I know I am one to be criticized of holding my esteem in the highest of regard, but this time how could I have possibly been wrong if a well known child psychologist came up with that?
Could the answer to all my stress these past couple of weeks be lying in the mere fact that intellectually I am stronger than my brother? Maybe this is his way of 'measuring up' to my might. Still, loosely throwing about harsh words like ‘slut’ and false accusations of me not being able to keep my ‘panties up’ should not arise in daily conversations should they? Should this younger sibling of mine be telling me how much to drink and smoke as though he himself does not waste himself silly every chance that he gets?
Despite his weird efforts to keep his sister ‘grounded’ I honestly think this kid needs to be taught a lesson, which no one else but me can give him. Sadly for him, he has no other sibling other than me and if he were to piss me off at this stage in our lives- I pity the remainder of his existence. Still, I must take my place as the older one and continue to guide this erroneous fool through the path called life with as much love and care as a bear would have for its cub. I just do not know how much longer I can tolerate this pompous nature, ill-mannered behavior, disrespect and all together explosive view of his own slightly chauvinistic ego that has all manifested itself in what used to be my very sweet brother.
If my own brother were an avid blog reader (or any other kind of basic reader for that matter) then I would be in slight fear of posting this particular piece up- fear of letting him in on what really goes on in my mind. Seeing as he probably has about three more good years before he develops the slightest love for reading blogs I think I’m pretty safe.
Now, back to the fun stuff!!

Gifted Jazz

Bumped into a Gifted group on Facebook and it got me really excited, and reflective and defensive all at the same time. Here I was scrolling down the pages, reading the words of other gifted individuals, most probably more than myself and I couldn’t help but throw my up my defense when I read the words :
“I like to think that being called "gifted" means you went to a gifted school.”
Without even thinking I must have written a five hundred word essay telling this ignorant mind off and I wasted no time posting it. How dare he imply that the only gifted are those put in institutions that recognize such individuals? Should that mean that Einstein and Beethoven were all not gifted because they, too, never went to a so called ‘gifted’ school?
It must be almost absurd to still feel the tinge of anger only now ebbing in my soul, three days later! Still, I just want to get it out there that such biased statements, unashamedly put forward are meant only for the Non-Gifted who can only try to understand the complex and unprecedented nature of a gifted person.
Should I break it down for you, Her Royal Naughty-nez Style?
First thing that popped into my mind was that this self-proclaimed so called ‘gifted’ person shat (past tense of shit, lol) in his own pants the day he publically stated who was and wasn’t a gifted person. Who even says such things? So would that mean that a whole bunch of us are not gifted simply because we didn’t wake up every morning, get dressed and walk into the doors of a building built to accommodate other people like us?
I know for one thing, that as a result of this ‘gift’ we tend to think very highly of ourselves. We think we’re superior to everybody and everything around us, including other gifted beings. Does that mean, therefore, that we all have the right to thrust our chest outs and trample over other people’s egos as we boast our elevated intelligence?
Save for lack of human emotion and humility, where do people get off on this kind of thick arrogance?
I sat back in my swing chair and thought about what was whizzing through my mind for a second. It’s not unusual for me to get all heated about something without thinking things through- and before I got off on telling this person on the web what I thought, I had to make sure I at least had reason to be offended. I thought about people in other countries around the world, other gifted people who were not recognized in their uniqueness. Apart from the fact that you can boast of your academic journey in an institution full of beings uniquely different, what else was there? Nothing.
Personally, I think the truly gifted person is one that sticks it out with the non-gifted. One that is so well masked that to the world; they are just another pupil sitting in their classroom with nothing more to offer. I believe that, to contain yourself in a shell so much smaller than your own, to have that kind of discipline, tolerance and all together meekness yet still believe in yourself enough to develop your gift is ultimate giftedness.
Just because you’re a little different from the person seated next to you in the bus, doesn’t mean that he/she should tremble at your feet every time you open your mouth to say something. Sometimes being gifted isn’t all about you; sometimes it’s about what you have to offer the next person besides you.
One thing is for sure though, just because you started playing Piano when you were six doesn’t mean I’ll appreciate you more than another person who spent their whole lives practicing and studying it. Who knows, I could have started playing it when I was five! We gifted people have to know that we have a co-existing relationship with the non-gifted. Who will appreciate our talent if we don’t?
Keep it in mind that: No man is an island, hmmm?

Lonely

Ever noticed just how much we complain whenever we’re in a relationship with somebody? Ever wonder why we’re there to begin with? The answer is quite simple folks, it’s because deep down inside, we all just don’t want to be lonely. Even the hard muffins out there that don’t want to admit it will just have to agree with me on that one.

I haven’t had a real relationship in what almost feels like a decade, so naturally I turn a jealous eye whenever I see my friends in one- be it good or bad. My last attempt at loving somebody, ended two weeks into our bliss, he had to run off to Canada to pursue the life he had before he met me. Sometimes I want to just kick myself in the ass at the thought of how vulnerable I made myself, other times I smile and remember the way he made me feel inside. That was that anyway.
Being single has its perks, however, let’s not deny it that. For one, I don’t have to answer to anybody; I do as my soul pleases. Free to wear what I want, associate with whom I want, go where I want when I want to; still the thought of restriction, I must admit, is increasingly appealing to my mind’s eye.
Getting back into the dating game, now that’s the problem. With so many fish in the sea, I’m feeling very much nauseated at the entire variety I have at my disposal. Of course I’ve turned over a couple dead and rotting ones; we all do at one point or another in our lives, and trust me I got rid of those stinky carcasses faster than any girl could scream “eeew!”
As I pause to recollect my thoughts and whip u another paragraph of half-baked sense, I have to confess that the reason I’m writing about a subject so delicate, so unlike me to discuss, is probably because I feel loneliest at this point in my life. Having just finished University and watching most of my friends move on in their intimate lives, I can’t help but long for one of my own.