It’s a grand sight – Torontonians stumbling about in the warm air, blinking with astonishment. 13 degrees on Nov. 29th! It’s minus 13 in Britain, apparently. Here, people out in shirtsleeves and shorts. It’s a first. “It’ll come,” people say gloomily, but in the meantime, let’s get out there, into the warm bath of November air. And try not to think about the polar bears.
I have completely regained my equilibrium, though it hurts still to read the papers, hard to do so without raging. But I’m trying not to rage. What’s the point? History will judge this vile, intolerant, childish, dishonest, reprehensible man and his friends.
Several things to tell you. First, went yesterday to see Arrival, the new Denis Villeneuve movie that’s about a linguist meeting and translating for aliens in Montana – but which was shot entirely in Montreal, as the long list of French-Canadian names in the credits attests. It’s a wonderful movie, though I did have to check reviews when I got home to be sure I got it all. Thoughtful, dense and complex, with a big twist at the end. Excellent – about so much more than aliens. Though I do hope when aliens land in Montpellier, they call my linguist friend Lynn to come and translate.
Second, I have asked permission of one of last term’s students to write about her. When the classroom door opened and she walked in, I wondered how this would work – my first student wearing a niqab, completely covering her face and head, her eyes behind glasses, in a memoir class about being nakedly honest and telling the truth. I have always felt – as those of you reading here know – that the niqab is a medieval horror, a denial, ordained by men, of a woman’s most basic right, to have a face in the world.
My student turned out to be warm, honest and open, friendly and smart and a good writer. At the end of term, I wrote telling her that she had countered my prejudice. She wrote back, “I started wearing the niqab 14 years ago, at age 22, much to the consternation of my husband and both sides of our families as no one covers to this extent. I felt and still feel that it makes me closer to Allah. I find the niqab liberating and dignifying. It gives me a sense of strength; I choose what you see.
