Demographic trends are something I pay close attention to. I have it on good authority that White Canadians are having far fewer offspring than their African, Arab, Asian, Aboriginal and Latino counterparts. The future of Ontario, Canada, is colorful rather than pasty, if you catch my drift. Must be why so many Euro-Canadian bozos in the City of Ottawa, Ontario, hatefully stare at my fine Nigerian ass as I walk around downtown like I own the damn place. There's absolutely nothing they can do about it.
Stephen Harper, the Conservative ex-Prime Minister and champion of racist, middle-aged 'old school' Canadians was roundly defeated at the polls, and now the Canadian government is more racially diverse than it's ever been, with a Liberal at the helm. I like where the country is heading. Racial diversity is here to stay. All someone like me has to do is wait for the dinosaurs to die of old age or retire and play bingo, and the country shall be mine. Of course, it won't be that easy but it's good to have goals, wouldn't you say?
My name is Norma Soyinka, and I'm a young Nigerian-Canadian woman living in the subur of Barrhaven. It's the most affluent area of the City of Ottawa, Ontario. My parents, Noel Soyinka and Justine Adewale-Soyinka moved to provincial Ontario from the City of Makurdi, Central Nigeria, in the summer of 1987. I was born three years later in Mississauga. These days, I'm studying civil engineering at Carleton University. Yes, I know that civil engineering in North America is typically a very White and largely male occupation but I am not letting any of that get in my way.
You've got to be ruthless in this world if you want to advance. I'm not above tripping up White males who get in my way. Hey, the way I see it, if someone is given every advantage in life just because of who he is, fighting dirty against him is the way to go. Nothing personal, but I'm ambitious and it's not easy for me out there as a smart Black woman. Let's face it, many people in Canada, including other visible minorities, are intimidated by a Black person who has intelligence, a Canadian university degree and a lot of ambition.
My father Noel Sayinka told me what to expect in the Canadian workforce. These people are passive-aggressive, mean as hell, and find creative ways of excluding anyone who doesn't look like them. Dad came to Canada with his business degree from a Nigerian school, only to be told that it wasn't valid in Canada. Dad had to go back to school, and earned a Bachelor's degree in Accounting from the University of Toronto, and an Master's degree in Business Administration from York University. After this, he still had to go on a waiting list before he could find employment with the Canada Revenue Agency.