What Canadians abroad tend to miss most about their homeland is the feeling of safety. Not the low-crime, leave-your-doors-unlocked kind of safety – those are weary cliches for brand Canada. There are plenty of ways and places and times in Canada to be unsafe in your own way.
No, it’s the mental safety: the prototypically Canadian sensibility in a world of bad news that, actually, you are at home and everything is fine.
Most of us who grew up in Canada have become good at making ourselves feel that way. So many of us came from places we now view with a sense of forlorn pity. And the ones who didn’t come from elsewhere rest comfortably – sometimes smugly, sometimes a little jealously, but always comfortably – in the happenstance that they’re not in America.
Every so often, one of our number breaks the spell. On Sunday, 20-year-old Nathaniel Veltman of London, Ontario drove his black pickup truck onto a suburban curb and smashed it into a family, killing four members from three of its generations, leaving alive only a nine-year-old boy. Veltman sought to kill them, London police allege, because they looked foreign.
They looked foreign because, well, they used to be. The idea that they and others like them are no longer foreign is a national mantra, drilled into Canadians from a young age at school, on TV and in the stump speeches of wide-eyed politicians. The US proudly calls itself a melting pot, but Canada is a mosaic, goes the refrain in grade 10 civics class. There isn’t much debate over what that means exactly or why it’s better.
Sometimes the sentiment is so genuine that it strikes you deep in the heart and you want to cry. When Canada was debating refugee resettlement a couple of years ago, the mayor of far-north, edge-of-the-world Dawson City, Yukon told a reporter: “Canadians are born all over the world. It just sometimes takes them a bit of time to get here.”
It just isn’t like that in the US, which is where I was born and where we tell ourselves all the Nathaniel Veltmans of North America tend to live. When I was an 11-year-old kid there, in North Carolina, from a Muslim family, living in the aftermath of 9/11, I was told by my parents what they were told at the mosque: “keep a low profile”.
The day I immigrated to Canada, I was sent by officers to a balloon-filled room at Toronto airport where every Canadian’s white grandmother had volunteered to greet me and the other new immigrants coming in that day. “Thank you for choosing us,” they said. I wanted to cry then, too.
Flowers lay in memorial at the fatal crime scene in London, Ontario. Reuters
That’s the mental safety I’m talking about – the one Veltman’s victims undoubtedly had on Sunday, somewhere in the back of their minds, as they were out for a family stroll. It’s a stream of messaging that papers over everything – the fact that one third of young black Canadians in Ontario are born in poverty; the fact that Arab Canadians have double-the-average unemployment and below-average wages; the fact that native Canadians are treated perhaps even worse than those of us who just arrived.
Every so often, the messaging doesn't stick. It didn't stick in 2017, when a white supremacist shot dead six worshippers at a mosque in Quebec City. Nor last September, when Mohamed-Aslim Zafis, the caretaker of a mosque in Etobicoke, a Toronto suburb, was stabbed to death by a white supremacist. Nor did it stick for Nathaniel Veltman. Whatever he heard from Canada's system, his victims still looked foreign. They never stood a chance.
Sometimes it doesn’t stick in the immigrant communities either. There have been plenty of young Canadian men from Muslim families over the years who plotted their own attacks at home or joined terrorist groups abroad, some of them acutely aware of how foreign they looked.
The easy takeaway from all of this is that words are not enough, and that Canada must act to heal division and hatred and all of those other societal ills its politicians will name breathlessly in the days to come.
The US proudly calls itself a melting pot, but Canada is a mosaic, goes the refrain in grade 10 civics class
But perhaps, I would suggest, the words are too much. The feel-good platitudes describe the Canada of our fantasies, but not the one that exists today. Better to speak humbly about the Canada that is – a complicated country, like all of the countries from which it is built.
Canadians are not born everywhere in the world, just waiting to join the family they never knew they had in Toronto or Montreal or Vancouver. Many of them were born on the outside and are trying to join a society that is mostly nice, but mostly white – and so they will be foreign to some degree, and that carries a price that cannot be papered over.
The nine-year-old boy Veltman left alive, presumably unwittingly, has paid this price in the form of his entire family. He’ll grow up knowing that a man once thought he, a Canadian, looked foreign. He’ll sit in grade 10 civics class and hear about the mosaic, and he’ll know that it’s missing four pieces because that man thought they didn’t belong.
Sulaiman Hakemy is opinion editor at The National
Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks at a vigil for victims of the deadly vehicle attack on a Muslim family in London, Ontario on June 8, 2021. AP
Friend's of Yumnah Afzaal, 15, who died in the attack along with her parents and grandmother, gather at the vigil. AFP
Prime Minister Trudeau is greeted by London, Ontrario's mayor Ed Holder. AFP
Women attend the vigil. AFP
New Democratic Party leader Jagmeet Singh speaks at the vigil. AFP
Prime Minister Trudeau condemned Islamophobia. Reuters
The lives of the four victims 'were taken in a brutal, cowardly and brazen act of violence', the prime minister said. AFP
Mr Trudeau places flowers on a memorial. Reuters
The prime minister greets mourners. Reuters
Thousands of mourners attended a vigil at the mosque the family attended. AFP
Pandemic restrictions were eased to allow mourners to attend the outdoor vigil. AFP
Imam Abdul Fattah Twakkal called for a commitment to end racism during the vigil. AFP
Total fights: 32 Wins: 28 Wins by KO: 26 Losses: 4
Abandon
Sangeeta Bandyopadhyay
Translated by Arunava Sinha
Tilted Axis Press
'Of Love & War'
Lynsey Addario, Penguin Press
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
Funders: Oman Technology Fund, 500 Startups, Vision Ventures, Seedstars, Mindshift Capital, Delta Partners Ventures, with support from the OQAL Angel Investor Network and UAE Business Angels
The Vile
Starring: Bdoor Mohammad, Jasem Alkharraz, Iman Tarik, Sarah Taibah
Director: Majid Al Ansari
Rating: 4/5
The bio
Favourite food: Japanese
Favourite car: Lamborghini
Favourite hobby: Football
Favourite quote: If your dreams don’t scare you, they are not big enough
Tackling money goals one at a time cost financial literacy expert Barbara O'Neill at least $1 million.
That's how much Ms O'Neill, a distinguished professor at Rutgers University in the US, figures she lost by starting saving for retirement only after she had created an emergency fund, bought a car with cash and purchased a home.
"I tell students that eventually, 30 years later, I hit the million-dollar mark, but I could've had $2 million," Ms O'Neill says.
Too often, financial experts say, people want to attack their money goals one at a time: "As soon as I pay off my credit card debt, then I'll start saving for a home," or, "As soon as I pay off my student loan debt, then I'll start saving for retirement"."
People do not realise how costly the words "as soon as" can be. Paying off debt is a worthy goal, but it should not come at the expense of other goals, particularly saving for retirement. The sooner money is contributed, the longer it can benefit from compounded returns. Compounded returns are when your investment gains earn their own gains, which can dramatically increase your balances over time.
"By putting off saving for the future, you are really inhibiting yourself from benefiting from that wonderful magic," says Kimberly Zimmerman Rand , an accredited financial counsellor and principal at Dragonfly Financial Solutions in Boston. "If you can start saving today ... you are going to have a lot more five years from now than if you decide to pay off debt for three years and start saving in year four."
8 UAE companies helping families reduce their carbon footprint
Greenheart Organic Farms
This Dubai company was one of the country’s first organic farms, set up in 2012, and it now delivers a wide array of fruits and vegetables grown regionally or in the UAE, as well as other grocery items, to both Dubai and Abu Dhabi doorsteps.
Founded in Australia, Modibodi is now in the UAE with waste-free, reusable underwear that eliminates the litter created by a woman’s monthly cycle, which adds up to approximately 136kgs of sanitary waste over a lifetime.
From brushes made of plant fibres to eco-friendly storage solutions, this company has planet-friendly alternatives to almost everything we need, including tin foil and toothbrushes.
One Dubai boutique, Re:told, is taking second-hand garments and selling them on at a fraction of the price, helping to cut back on the hundreds of thousands of tonnes of clothes thrown into landfills each year.
Offering filtered, still and sparkling water on tap, Bubble Bro is attempting to ensure we don’t produce plastic or glass waste. Founded in 2017 by Adel Abu-Aysha, the company is on track to exceeding its target of saving one million bottles by the end of the year.
This company offers refillable, eco-friendly home cleaning and hygiene products that are all biodegradable, free of chemicals and certifiably not tested on animals.
This bricks-and-mortar shop and e-store, founded by a Dubai mum-of-four, is the place to go for all manner of family products – from reusable cloth diapers to organic skincare and sustainable toys.
CDU: "Now is the time to control the German borders and enforce strict border rejections"
SPD: "Border closures and blanket rejections at internal borders contradict the spirit of a common area of freedom"
Tank warfare
Lt Gen Erik Petersen, deputy chief of programs, US Army, has argued it took a “three decade holiday” on modernising tanks.
“There clearly remains a significant armoured heavy ground manoeuvre threat in this world and maintaining a world class armoured force is absolutely vital,” the general said in London last week.
“We are developing next generation capabilities to compete with and deter adversaries to prevent opportunism or miscalculation, and, if necessary, defeat any foe decisively.”
