In Retrospect

The movers arrived today. Nothing makes my upcoming trip more real than seeing my stuff being boxed and carried away. Five days more.

I am taking a break right now from all the packing and preparation and try to stay still for the remaining hours of the night. I am just taking all this in for now. And while I'm trying to take stock of everything that's happening, I remembered this post I wrote two years ago when I celebrated my first year in Canada. I also recycled some parts of this post in an article I wrote for a local magazine back home. My year in review. My mindset in 2009. Somehow it helped erase the few remaining doubts I may have about my crazy plan of going to Iqaluit. I am meant to do this.

Thought I would repost this here to serve as reminder and maybe a sort of baseline for me to monitor how Iqaluit can change my mindset and perspectives.


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Random Takes: 365 Days in Calgary
I've been told that my first year as an immigrant in Canada could be the worst time of my life. While I can easily conclude in a very Dickens way that my first 365 days in Calgary was the best of times and the worst of times, I also realize that I cannot just oversimplify my experience here by defining it as either of two extremes. Looking at the much bigger picture, we know that the best of times..though it makes us happy and fulfilled, also makes us prone to complacency and when we want to stay in a certain comfort zone or get stuck in a happy place, we cease to grow. And the worst of times on the outset can cause a lot of misery and suffering but it also pushes us to a certain limit that we thought we could never reach, we are motivated to do whatever's necessary just to extract ourselves from a not too pleasant life episode. And because all our senses are put on high alert level and because we are exposed to rough roads that cause us to trip, fall and rise again..we realize that in the end, these are the times when we learn, we grow and I can never say this often enough.."what cannot kill us, can only make us strong". Having said that, I can now reiterate that I cannot just label my first year as an immigrant as either the best or the worst of times.

Someone once said that "the purpose of life is to live a life with purpose" and that is the premise I would like to set as I attempt to finish my sort of "year in review". We are not born into this world with a complete manual of instructions that would tell us what to do with our lives or a map that would tell us where to go. The map and the manual would definitely make things easier for us but it would deny us the chance to experience the essence of being human - having free will, being able to make choices, make mistakes and realize that they weren't really mistakes but opportunities to learn, build a comfort zone and leave it to plunge into a deep unknown...and through the twists and turns of our lives we end up realizing why we are here in the first place..and though we traverse rough roads and highways, cross oceans and climb mountains..everything comes full circle when we become who we are destined to be.

One unfortunate hallmark of being human is constant discontentment..everything that is out of reach, distant, absent or unavailable is always better than that which is within grasp, real, already there. People back home may say, I wish I am where you are, have what you have or live the life you're living..while those who have left would always have the intense longing for home. People always ask so is it better there than here? It's amazing how we insist on comparing things that are devoid of common ground...what is with what has been or what is with what will be or here with there. And we always end up being miserable with the answers (or our self constructed conclusions)..and that's the desired effect isn't it? Because once we realize the futility of what we're doing..we have to face the fact that when we measure life in terms of where we are or where we're going ...where we are headed or what we have left behind..we are just, in a profound way, wasting our time.

After spending long hours by myself..on a train, on a bus, in an empty room...I have this realization about migration..or what it means to be an immigrant.

We all know that migration is a natural phenomenon that is vital for the survival of species. When I'm at the train station in Marlborough I would often watch birds in flight. Sometimes I envy how they can just escape winter and fly south. I would also think how the process of migration is much simpler for them than for us. I am pretty sure they no longer think about trivial things such as which continent would feed them best or from which river they would get much satisfaction. When we see birds in flight we do not question their motives in terms of lack of patriotism, or imagine the drama that comes from leaving home or starting over again. We know that it's their survival instinct that cause them to do this. And nature, true to form, takes care of its own. Maybe when we say, "free as a bird" it may not necessarily be just in reference to their ability to fly but more because of the fact that they can take flight..migrate..without looking back.

I always say, I am where I am ought to be at this point in my life. Every immigrant has a different reason for leaving his country of origin but whether it was an opportunity, a plan, a personal motivation, a perceived luck/chance/coincidence, an invitation..whatever stimulus it might have been..it was but an instrument..for a destiny to be fulfilled. I am now in Canada (for whatever reason) but if this experience is dissected down to its core I know I would understand that this has nothing to do with Canada at all. This place is not an endpoint or a destination..but a phase or that another life lesson I need to learn is here. If this is my final stop, let it be. If this road takes me back home, let it be. If it will lead me somewhere else, let it be. But I won't leave this place without finding out what I am supposed to fulfill here in the first place.

I have never been gifted with a scientific mind and there were times in nursing or medicine that I felt like an impostor make believing that I can understand a foreign language being spoken. The only time I can understand these scientific concepts is when I can see them as some form of metaphor. When that happens, I always feel that a window to another dimension is being opened..one that I find familiar..one that I can understand. That happened one time in medical school when I was reading about neovascularization and the example given was how retinopathy in the newborn occurs. That in order to survive, a premature infant needs to receive high levels of oxygen..and the body feels the need to accommodate this sudden increase in oxygen levels so it wills itself to develop more blood vessels..but when oxygen therapy is discontinued the new vessels could no longer be sustained..they eventually necrotize and become nothing more than fibrotic tissues that serve no purpose. It dawned upon me that the same thing can happen to us at a higher level. I was born and raised in Iloilo. I spent the last 36 years of my life there...it's a place I know like the back of my hand. The place I worked was also where I spent my life as a student...where I know my way even when I'm blindfolded..walking backwards. Every other random person I bumped into was somebody I knew..I was safe there..it defined my comfort zone. And with this familiarity I realized the absence of growth..there was the lack of motivation to be more than I was because I was already comfortable with who I was. When I became an immigrant there was a rapid onslaught of stimuli coming from all over and I felt new nerve cells growing overtime just to process these barrage of things - information, events, culture, experience, rules, policies, language etc - headed my way. I was sort of going through my own version of neovascularization. And I know that once this strange place transforms into a comfortable zone, with the absence of new stimuli - my own growth and process of discovering who I am would, likewise, cease...and that would be time for me to move on again. Not necessarily to another new continent but to the next level of learning. It's not making sense when put into writing..that's why life has to be lived not read.

Yesterday, I received a letter (among other things)that informed me I was now eligible to work as a Graduate Nurse after having completed the required courses needed for me to be "recognized" as a nurse graduate who can take the licensure exam for nurses here. I don't know why after having passed three licensure exams and after having taught in nursing school, this acknowledgment that I am now "eligible" to start all over again as a nurse still has an overwhelming effect on me. Maybe because I still have the notion that I am an alien needing recognition..or affirmation that I am competent enough to practice my craft here. Or maybe because this door was closed on me several months back and the acknowledgment is now the window of opportunity slowly being opened. It maybe only a year but disregarding the concept of time, it was still a long journey leading to this acknowledgment of eligibility. But still, I cannot define it as my "worst of times". I was reading a magazine the other day and one celebrity was quoted as saying, "happiness is enjoying the view on a detour". I was struck by this statement because this was precisely what I did these past how many months. When I was forced by virtue of technicality and policies to make a detour, I allowed myself to wallow in a few hours worth of semi despair before I did the things needed to be done to get back in the right track. And I realized that my oft worn out battle cry ("everything happens for a reason") still holds true after all. I had to go back to school and this gave me a small dose of "Canadian Education", I met people and listened to stories that connect with my own..forming a lovely, intricate pattern...the web of life. I loved the bus rides because I literally enjoyed the view...this detour that led me to the right path. Yes I am where I am meant to be at this time of my life.

365 days in Canada. You can call me an immigrant, a traveler, a pilgrim, a wanderer or even an accidental tourist..it would all depend on my story for the moment. If I were to be asked if it was indeed the worst (or best) time of my life, I would respectfully beg for the question to be rephrased for when you are living the life you are meant to live, with the hopes of discovering your purpose for being..it's never a question of being worst or best. It is because it is and it's meant to be. When all these roads I follow lead me to know who I really am and why I am here..then I can finally say, I am home.