Life has a way of throwing us into unexpected situations that reveal our true selves. If you asked me a month ago where I thought I'd be, this wouldn't be it. My name is Suleiman Barre and I'm a young Somali man living in the City of Ottawa, Ontario. Got one hell of a story to share with you folks. This tale took place during Canada Day 2015 in the City of Ottawa.
Want to hear something funny? Canada Day also falls on the day that we Somalis celebrate our independence as a nation. Canada Day to most Canadians is a fun time when you come out and celebrate while wearing red, drinking beer and singing the national anthem. I was born in the City of Ottawa, at the Civic Hospital to be exact, to a Somali immigrant father, Ismail Barre, and a white Canadian mother, Isabelle Janice Tremblay. My parents divorced, and to this day, I am shunned by my father's side of the family because I am not "pure" Somali.
What do I mean by that? Oh, let me explain. There are a lot of Somalis in Canada, mainly in cities like Ottawa, Montreal, Toronto, Calgary and Edmonton. The Somalis are a tribal people, and the fact that they live in Canada hasn't changed their mentality. Lately, a lot of Somalis have been marrying interracially, and it's mostly Somali girls marrying Arab guys. Apparently, Somali males aren't like black men of other nationalities. They aren't big on marrying outside their culture. Guess my father Ismail Barre is an exception.
My pops often told me that his decision to marry a white woman from a Christian background didn't sit right with his conservative Somali Muslim family. Of course, the white side of my family isn't exactly welcoming either. For my mother's French Canadian family, I am a constant reminder of their failure to stop their precious blonde daughter from marrying a black Muslim man from the Horn of Africa. Welcome to my life. You can understand why someone like me gets pissed when some white folks ask me where I come from. I was born in Canada's Capital and have never even left Ontario. Got it?
My father Ismail Barre is a devout Muslim, and my mother Isabelle Tremblay is a proud Catholic. Me? I am an atheist. I think all religion is bullshit. If people paid attention they'd notice that shit too. All the wars that people have fought over religion, and people still subscribe to that bullshit. Mankind is truly the dumbest species on the planet Earth. Oh, well. Mother nature must slap her forehead sometimes when she looks at what we do to ourselves. We can't all be winners, right?
Anyhow, where was I? Oh, yeah. I was about to tell you about an incident that occurred on Canada Day 2015. Typically, on July 1, every dull, boring and asinine person in the vastness of Canada gets drunk, puts on something red and goes howling on the streets. Most of the time, they're harmless. Sometimes, just sometimes, they can be quite dangerous. Stupid people in large numbers can be quite dangerous, folks.
