The name is Jacques Monpoint. I'm a big and tall young Black man of Haitian descent living in the city of Ottawa, Canada. People say I kind of look like the actor Michael Clark Duncan. These days, life is okay though it could be better. I recently moved here from Boston, Massachusetts. It's definitely a change of scenery. Ottawa is a lot more diverse than I thought it would be. I thought I'd stick out like a sore thumb as a Black man in the Great North but that wasn't the case at all. It's the last days of November. In January I will begin my classes as a junior at Carleton University. First, I've got to adjust to life in a new city. Luckily, my family has sort of been helping.
Black Canadians are an odd bunch, let me be the first to say it. Seriously. So many of them have this naive, happy-go-lucky attitude that I thought only white folks could have. I guess racial relations might be slightly better in Canada than they are in the States. Now, this is 2009, and America's got a black President and two black Governors, but that doesn't mean everyone is open-minded. Bigotry still runs deep in America. As a black man, I've learned to be cautious no matter where I am. The majority of Black Canadians have this constant optimism that would have made them feel quite out of place among African-Americans in the United States. Maybe it's because they live in a country where the government seems to actually care about the people. Every American knows deep down that the government is more like Big Brother than Mother Theresa. In Canada, things seem to be different. There are many things I miss about the U.S. Things like Black Enterprise, a magazine I've been reading since I was much younger. Not many Black Canadians seem to know of it. These people need some culture, and quickly too. I'll just refill my subscription online and have my monthly zine delivered to me in Ottawa, Canada instead of Brockton, Massachusetts.
The ladies of Canada are something else. I especially love black women. Around here, there seems to be an endless variety of them. Somalians. South Africans. Zimbabweans. Haitians. Jamaicans. Cape Verdeans. Ethiopians. Cubans. Brazilians. And most of the time, they're not just fine-looking, they're also educated and hard-working. It seems like Canada could be a black man's paradise if he's looking for sexy, educated and hard-working black female professionals. Unfortunately, a lot of black men in Canada got "White Chick Fever". I've never been into white chicks. I like black females. White chicks can't relate to what I go through as a black man in a racist world. They're too busy benefitting from white privilege, something so many of them deny exists. Whatever. I've got one life to live and I prefer it on the simple side, you dig? Cool.
I recently went to the bar scene in a mostly black and quite lovely neighborhood of Toronto for some fun. That's where I met this truly amazing couple. James and Rita L'Archange, a black couple from the city of Brampton. James is a tall, good-looking brother in his late twenties. Kind of reminds me of the actor Lee Thompson Young. He works as an accountant in downtown Toronto at one of the big firms. His wife Rita is a tall, curvy and big-bottomed, absolutely sexy sister. Kind of reminds me of the comedienne Sommore. She's a schoolteacher. I must say that they're the best-looking couple I've seen in ages. They're of North African and British stock, mostly. They were both natives of North London, England, who decided to move to Canada. The offspring of North African immigrants who had been living in London for generations. How about that? It's not often that I found myself in such fine company. I bought them both drinks as they regaled me with tales of their travels. I've done some traveling myself. Countries like Santo Domingo, Cuba, Haiti, Canada and the U.S.A. are well-known to me. However, I've stuck to the New World in my travels. Europe is unknown to me. James and Rita sweetly regaled me with tales of growing up in the surprisingly diverse city of London.
I told them about my life back in the states. Until I started talking to them, I had no idea how nostalgic I was for my hometown of Brockton. I missed its racially diverse population, its unique culture and its obsession with its professional and collegiate sports teams. I left America just when it was starting to get better. A black man got elected President of the USA. A woman got elected Mayor of Brockton. An openly gay black businessman got elected City Councilman in my town. A black man got elected Chief of Police. How cool was that? Oh, and it's predicted that in twenty or so years, African-Americans, Middle-Easterners, Asians and Hispanics combined will outnumber white people in the USA. Progress was being made in the United States of America just as I left. Is that strange or what?
