Graphically speaking I really don’t find the city of Toronto to generally have its sh!t together. I have a much larger post about this but it has been interesting to see the difference. Copenhagen was good. Dubai was better. London was best.

🚗 Part of the joys of moving to a new country means that I seem to always need to constantly sort out driving licenses. Canada is no different. Today I got onto the second rung (there are three in total). Slowly life is starting to fall into place. Next getting a house.

Rory Stewart is easily my favourite politician (even though I really like Obama). This video is an excellent introduction on an articulate politician, who’s politics I don’t subscribe to but, who’s tone, manner and thoughtfulness I fully admire.

It started off with Jamal’s death. Our holiday to Greece was cancelled. As a result I have not seen my parents since the summer of 2019, when we left Dubai and moved to Denmark. A week later we were in Tampa. A city neither myself or Yasmine had ever heard of. In fact, the only reason I had even heard of Tampa was because of Crossgen comics. There was a period of mourning and sadness and uncertainty in the house. I tried to keep it hidden from the boys and let them enjoy the summer. 2 weeks in, my mother-in-law’s appendix burst - caused by the pain from loosing her son.

IRCC Fiasco

There is no better way to say this other than the IRCC shat the bed over the summer. Our waiting times went from 1 week to 23 days, to 35 to 45 to 55 to 66 and we finally got the ok at day 73! To not fall foul of any visa issues, I flew out to the US and brought the kids over without their mother. That was a tough decision predicated on a complete leap of faith. The kids would only be separated from their mother for a few weeks maximum.

We were ready for Canada. Sadly, Canada was not ready for us.

The biggest irony in all of this? Of everyone in our family, morally Yasmine has the biggest claim to entering and staying in Canada. Turns out her grandfather was Canadian. Two generations later his granddaughter has to jump through hoops to re-enter. The world we have created has so many fucked up rules.

Hurricane Ian

I am reminded of the final scene from Argo (spoiler alert if you’ve not watched it, you really should). My wife left Tampa 4 hours before they shut down the airport. She was in Tampa for over 3 months and escaped a 1 in 100 year hurricane by 4 hours.

A New Start

It is completely surreal experience for my entire family to be here in Canada with me. We have a lot of living to get done.

Otavio Cordeiro‘s Micro.publish plugin for Obsidian is coming soon. Obsidian makes my windows experience tolerable and this adds yet another feather in its cap.

🌀 You cannot make this shit up. Yasmine got her passport at 11am today. Which is great. She is booked to fly out tomorrow from Tampa and finally the summer of disruption can end…unless Hurricane fucking Ian has different plans and the flight is cancelled.

I’m sure others share the same frustration.

Amanda Gorman at the United Nations

I only ask that you care before it’s too late, That you live aware and awake, That you lead with love in hours of hate… Above all, I dare you to do good. So that the world might be great.

It’s not every day that the boys and I spend the evening watching Spider-man Into the Spider-verse. All three of us were glued to this movie. Could this finally be the start of sharing the canonical art list? Could be.

🇨🇦 Finally! Wife’s visa came through yesterday, after waiting for 73 days. It’s been a colossal disruption that has meant the kids are likely going to miss out on the first month of school (making their transition harder), but it’s a short term pain for a long term gain.

On our way back home tonight, Zane noticed a man sleeping on the floor. His first thought was to ask if he was ok. Thus began an awkward conversation about homelessness. Being a child born in the gulf and raised in Copenhagen, this type of thing isn’t something he has ever encountered before.

The truth is that I don’t know enough about the situation here in Canada. Why is it prevalent? Are there any government plans and how robust are they.

We both agreed that it was incredibly sad and Zane’s parting words on this was that he wanted to help this man and that he should fight for his life.

I have been unusually quiet recently. That’s because I don’t want to complain. We find ourselves beholden to the Canadian government that has totally failed with regards to the simplest of visas. No priority system or any granularity to know where we are in the system means we can’t make clear life decisions. It’s so shit. So so shit.

As if he knew I was cheating on him with another book The Hoff publishes his own How To Make The Best Coffee At Home. Yes please.