A decade in Toronto - 7

Che and Mahrukh on our weekly bus ride

Che in his new glasses

Immigration is all about losing one’s identity and gaining a new one. It is about finding oneself in a new environment, making friends, trusting strangers. Often, this process is not easy. In our case, we came to Toronto without knowing anyone here. So, we had no choice but to trust strangers. And, in retrospect, it’s worked out well.

In the middle of the Sheridan program, Joyce Wayne recommended me to Antanas Sileika, the dean at Humber School for Writers, to volunteer for its week-long intensive writing program conducted annually in summer. My co-students never forgave me for what they subsequently described was "blatant favouritism." 

The program was to commence in July at Humber’s picturesque Lakeshore Boulevard campus. I dressed in my best official suit to meet Antanas, but by the time I could reach the campus, a brief but intense rainstorm drenched me to my bones.

Antanas welcomed me to the program and placed me in an all-women group led by author Isabel Huggan. I Googled her name and went to the Amesbury library to borrow Isabel's linked short story collection The Elizabeth Stories. Reading it before meeting her made my interaction with her easy. My new acquaintance with Canadian literature – thanks to having browsed through the two volumes of Canadian literature in English that Joyce had insisted all her students at Sheridan buy – also helped.

The Elizabeth Stories is a fine collection of short stories. Isabel was pleased that I’d read it and liked it. Her group, which I assisted, comprised seven women, all working on their manuscripts and all deeply engaged in the process of creating. Isabel’s approach to writing was introspective. And she also gave me my writing mantra: “All writing is rewriting.”

The one session that remains etched in my memory even though nearly a decade has passed by, involved remembering a favourite photograph from one’s life and looking for what is missing in that photograph.

With the Humber Summer Workshop group

The exercise took all the participants in different directions, and many of them teared up when describing their experience of talking about their favourite photograph and then for the first time ever looking for what was missing in the photo. I guess Isabel’s purpose for conducting this exercise was to make all the participants understand the importance of unburdening one’s emotions and be true to oneself.

There were several simultaneous sessions going on at that time conducted by illustrious authors. They included Wayson Choy, Martin Amis, and Nino Ricci. I couldn’t have celebrated my first anniversary in Toronto any better. The Humber School’s summer workshop was perhaps instrumental in many ways in determining the course of my life.

I’ve written about the experience on this blog as well in the Canadian Immigrant experience. 

If you’re interested in reading more, please click on these links:

Mahrukh at 1440 Lawrence Ave W

Becoming a writer

The Laughing Buddha

All Writing is rewriting (Canadian Immigrant column)

All Writing is rewriting (GAB blog post)

Humber School of Writers Summer Workshop

2009 was turning out to be an extremely fruitful year. My interest in writing had propelled me into a new world and I was making new friends all the time. I signed up for several author groups on email and went to a session of Writers and Editors Network at a nice little traditional tavern in Islington.

Jasmine D’Costa was the president of this association. She is a banker from Bombay and has devoted her life to creating literature since she immigrated to Canada. Jasmine’s collection of short stories was published in May 2009 and it was tremendously well received. 

Over the years, she has consistently encouraged many of us newcomers with aspirations to become writers. She published extracts from my novel as short stories in two volumes she edited.

(Read about Jasmine here: Asian Writers; I used the term ‘Asian’ to describe South Asian writers, without realising then than Asian in North America only meant people from the Far East or South East Asia).

At Jasmine’s event at WEN, the main speaker was Robert Morgan, the publisher of BookLandPress. Subsequently, Robert held a workshop on publishing at the Runnymede branch of the Toronto library. Yoko and I participated in the session (Robert Morgan’s tips for writers).

I learnt that BookLandPress conducted an annual novel competition, which was decided on the basis of the first 50 pages of the manuscript. I decided to build my short story into a novel, by giving a backstory to the four main characters.

I fished out an incomplete manuscript that I’d started several years ago in Bombay when I decided to write fiction after reading my friend Richard Rothman’s collection of phantasmagorical short stories. In a small way, I was instrumental in egging Richard to get his stories published.

Robert’s BookLandPress didn’t accept my submission, but that was only to be expected and by now, I was serious about working harder on my fiction. I got Mahrukh to edit the short story that I’d been working on for several months now and submitted it to the Diaspora Dialogues, a Toronto not-for-profit that promotes creative expressions in diverse people, for the short-form mentoring program.

I submitted the short story (The New Canadians) in May 2009 without any expectation of being selected for the mentoring program. But I was pleasantly surprised when I got an email in June 2009 informing me of my selection. It was a moment that I’d been waiting for. 

The Diaspora Dialogues group 

I was among a select few aspiring writers selected by Diaspora Dialogues for the mentoring program; the list included a great group of creative people who have gone on to become acclaimed authors Leslie Shimotakahara and poets such as Michael Fraser, and among them was Dawn Promislow, who is today a dear friend.

Helen Walsh, the head of Diaspora Dialogues, has since then been a constant support in all my efforts to become an author. On several occasions, she has provided me with a platform and put me before an audience. She got Diaspora Dialogues to audio record my blog about my first Christmas in Toronto; she selected me as a speaker at the fantastic Spur festival that she organises annually; she got me interviewed recently when she relaunched Diaspora Dialogues.

And, of course, she’s also had an indirect role to play in the publishing of Belief, but I’ll talk about that later. Julia Chan, then at the Diaspora Dialogues, was also extremely supportive.

I remember when my submission was under consideration at Diaspora Dialogues, I was reading The Assassin’s Song (2007) by MG Vassanji, which I’d borrowed from the Amesbury Park branch of the Toronto library. It is one of the finest novels that I’ve read, and in my humble opinion, one of Vassanji’s best. The In-Between World of Vikram Lal (2003) and The Book of Secrets (1994) got him the Giller Prize. 

Serendipitously, Vassanji was to be my mentor. Mahrukh declared, "Allah only listens to you!" (Needless to say, that assessment riled my atheist sensibilities comprehensively, but for once, I wasn't complaining).

Not entirely unexpectedly, Vassanji turned out to be a tough mentor. He was a Guru in the true sense. I consider him my Guru even today; a status that, I’m sure, he’d find deeply embarrassing, if not entirely offensive.

He’d little patience with niceties, clear, incisive and blunt in his comments. And I was the eager student.

Here’s an extract from the first email I got from him: 

“This story, to be honest, is in the ‘good immigrant’ or ‘grateful immigrant’ mode. It has a message about citizenship. But it is not realistic; it does not dig deep into human motives and behaviour. This, of course, is how I see it. It is the kind of story that may find a place in a community or government magazine. I don't know what you have in mind.”

My interaction with him started in July and continued till September 2009. By then, the story had metamorphosed into a completely different being, vastly improved, with much depth, nearly all the excrescences removed, or at least so I thought. 

In a later episode of this memoir, I’ll write about how he made me rewrite this story, which had become the first chapter of the novel, more than 17 times, and even after that remained dissatisfied.

Read about this unique experience here: Write Stuff (Canadian Immigrant column)

By October 2009, I’d to submit the completed story to Diaspora Dialogues for consideration in its annual short story publication – TOK: Writing the New Toronto. I wasn’t sure whether it’d be accepted, considering there were so many good aspirants. It seemed a long and agonizing wait although it was only two months before I learnt in mid-December from Helen that my story was accepted for TOK 5: Writing the New Toronto, the collection was edited by Helen.

2009 was turning out to be a year that I’d remember forever. Thanks to Joyce’s efforts, I got an internship in Ontario government’s ministry of community and social services. It was a temporary job that held the promise of being turned into permanent after some years. I was out of the internship within a month.

Mahrukh in her Medix uniform

And, it was now Mahrukh’s turn to go to school. She decided that she’d do a program in social work and joined Medix College in October 2009. I’d never seen her as excited as she was when she began her program.

Mahrukh has always remained an unassuming person, who shuns any sort of limelight, and never pushes herself upfront to let the world become aware of tremendous and varied skills. She’s highly educated, has remarkable editing skills, and is a natural people’s person; one of the most affable persons. For the first time, she was determined to get what she knew she deserved.

Of course, she can be completely horrible with me when she gets mad, but that’d be true in any marriage that has lasted two decades and more, and one shan't talk about it now. 

Che at his school concert

Che was already a Canadian and was talking like one. When we told his school teacher that he was now speaking with a Canadian accent, she corrected us and said, “No, he’s losing his Indian accent.” Sometime later that year, he also had to start wearing glasses, at approximately the same age as when I’d had to wear glasses. But, of course, Mahrukh blamed me, claiming that it was my preference for warm lighting in our home that'd caused our son’s weak eyesight.

Finally, we’d commenced our process of settling down and setting our roots in Toronto.

Inspire - Toronto International Book Fair

Hindi Writers' Guild

Anindo Hazra & Ted Goossen (seated) with other participants

Sheniz Janmohamed

Inspire – the first Toronto International Book Fair was a major success, both in terms of the participation of authors, publishers and readers.

The three-day festival saw some big name authors discuss their work, they included the perennial favourites such as Margaret Atwood, and also rising stars such as David Bezmozgis.

The festival attracted 400 authors, and thanks to my friend Meenakshi Alimchandani, who was part of the organizing team, I had the privilege of being associated with the festival, facilitating the readings of Canadian South Asian authors.

The authors who read at the South Asian kiosk included Cheran, Cheryl Antao-Xavier, Kumkum Ramchandani, Braz Menezes, Farheen Khan, Samreen Ahsan, Vicky Bismillah, Kwai Li and Fong Hsiyng, Meena Chopra, Tula Goenka, Jasmine Sawant, Sheniz Janmohamed, Anindo Hazra, Pushpa Acharya and the Hindi Writers’ Guild led by Shailja Saksena. Eminent diplomat and author Navtej Sarna also read from his works, but at a different venue at the sprawling Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

The festival gave me an opportunity to meet and make friends. I met the suave Antanas Sileika, who gifted me a copy of his novel Underground; and I also met the enterprising Robert Morgan of Bookland Press.

South Asian panel
{l to r: Jasmine, Anosh, Manjushree, Anirudh, Priscilla (at mike)}

The main South Asian event at the festival was the collaboration between Inspire and the Jaipur Festival. The panel comprised AnirudhBhattacharyya, a veteran journalist-turned novelist; Manjushree Thapa, novelist; Anosh Irani, novelist; Jasmine D’Costa, novelist; Priscilla Uppal, poet, moderated the readings.

Anirudh read from his debut novel The Candidate, which is a breezy satire on the crazier than Rob Ford world of Indian politics. Anosh Irani read from Dahanu Road, and Jasmine D’Costa read from her collection of short stories Curry is Thicker than Water. Manjushree Thapa read from her new novel  Seasons of Flight.

Here’s an excerpt from Manjushree’s novel:

Being Nepali

An American woman, a schoolteacher, earnest and frizzy, once came up to Prema and asked, ‘Mind if I ask where you’re from? Originally, I mean?’ But when she heard the answer she just stammered, unable, perhaps, to admit that she didn’t know where that was.

Most Americans did better. They would say, ‘Oh’ or ‘Wow’ or even ‘Cool’ and nod in a friendly manner. Sometimes Prema would help them out by adding, ‘It is near India,’ or ‘Where Mount Everest is’ or ‘You heard of the Sherpas?” so that they might say, ‘Geez, that’s real far,’ or ‘I could have sworn you were Mexican / Italian / Spanish,’ or ‘You speak very good English.’ And then she would smile: ‘Thank you.’

Every now and then, though a response would stop her. One day, a woman on the bust heard her say Nippon and expressed her disgust at the practice of eating raw fish: ‘That’s like eating you-know-what!’ she exclaimed. Another man, a dark-skinned grocer, South Asian himself, baffled her with, ‘Aren’t you usually from Pakistan?’ It was Prema’s turn to stammer. She had also learnt that to the foreign ear, the country’s name could sound like ‘nipple’. More commonly, though, what Americans heard was Naples, as in: ‘I love pasta,’ or ‘My husband and I went to Rome for our honeymoon, but we never made it to Naples.’ 

Canadian Voices Volume II

Canadian Voices 2 Launching at Supermarket Art Bar from Imelda O. Suzara on Vimeo.

BookLand Press organised the launch of Canadian Voices Volume 2 at the Supermarket Art Bar on September 20. 

It was without any doubt the most rocking book launch events I have attended in Toronto in the last couple of years that I’ve been here. 

There were writers everywhere – Fraser Sutherland, Katherine Govier, Dawn Promislow, Farzana Doctor, Mariellen Ward and Kevin Lobo, among many others.

Writers and poets whose works are in the volume were there in good numbers, too. As Zohra Zoberi wrote about the event, “people were spilling out on the streets.”

Robert Morgan and Jasmine D’Costa had put together a rocking event.

..whoever said writers are boring?

Coming Soon: Canadian Voices Volume II

Adventures with Camera and Pen

Anthony Dalton is a great speaker. I heard him recently at an event organised by BookLand Press, the publisher of his book Adventures with Camera and Pen. 

Anthony is a natural storyteller in the oral tradition and can hold his audience spellbound for hours, talking about his excursions across the world. 

His talk at Ben McNally Books was peppered with fascinating anecdotes – from being guided to safety by a penguin on Falkland Islands or walking through a minefield.  

I've just finished reading Adventures with Camera and Pen.  

Anthony is a great writer, too.  And let me explain what I mean by that. In today’s world, travel is commonplace, even to unaccessible and exotic places. 

There are many who fancy themselves as great travel writers. A million websites are a testimony to such fallacious thinking.

But, merely traveling and then writing about the travel doesn’t make the writing interesting. For that the writer should depict word pictures and successfully transport the reader in time and to place so that the s/he is able to live the adventures vicariously.

Anthony does this with alacrity and fineness; yet his prose is simple, straightforward and easy to read and enjoy. His adventures – which include a trip to Timbuktu, walking along Schelde, a roadtrip to Ghazni, a boat ride on Sitilakhya in Sunderbans, and yatching across the Panama Canal – kept me interested often because of his deadpan style.

However, for me the most fascinating part of the book was Anthony’s adventures in Canada. I’ve been here 20 months, but I've not been able to travel outside Toronto (except a trip to Niagara Falls). This is true for most newcomers. 

What I haven’t been able to afford to do because of my preoccupation with life, Anthony does for me, and then narrates his experiences in a deft, unobtrusive manner.

His trips to the Canadian Arctic and risky encounters with musk oxen, to rock climbing and photographing the Bugaboo range, and fishing expeditions in Manitoba gave me more than a glimpse of this in this vast and varied land.

The best piece in the book is his adventure on the Niwhaniwha, his home made boat. I won’t ever do it, but I sure know what it feels like to be riding the surf in a boat. 

Sample this: “For a fraction of a second we balanced on top, with the outrigger just skimming the rock, I learned forward as Bruce drove his paddle hard and down the slope we went. Our stomachs caught up with us a few moments later.”

BookLand Press’ Robert Morgan, publisher of Anthony's book, was also present at the reading session and gave his own insights into the difficult business of publishing.


Image: Invitation from BookLand Press

Canadian Voices

Earlier this week I attended a book event at an odd sounding restaurant – Supermarket Art Bar.

The place was overflowing with people. All gathered to participate in the launch of Canadian Voices, an anthology of prose and poetry by emerging Canadian writers.

Published by BookLand Press, the book is the first of its kind in Canada. This is Volume One. Others will follow over the years.

Publisher Rogert Morgan introduced the concept of the collection saying the idea was to encapsulate some of the best contemporary writings in Canada by emerging Canadian writers in a single volume.

A quick look at the table of contents page showed a multicultural diversity the Morgan’s publishing company has put together into one book – it brings together nearly 50 prose writers and poets.

Short story writer, poet and novelist Jasmine D’Costa introduced some of the writers who read their work. The launch was simulcasted on the web, too.

Despite my tight schedule, I managed to read some stories and many poems from the book.

The best way to read such anthologies is to randomly select a story and start reading it.

The first story I read was Professor Z. W. Shen by Hailun Tang. It read like a memoir – a touching tale of a professor in China who despite persecution during the Cultural Revolution, fearlessly agrees to teach English to two students; one of them is the writer of the story, who ultimately immigrates to Canada.

Then I read Pratap Reddy’s In the Dark, a story based on the power outage that North American experienced some years ago. Reddy skilfully turns the tables on the reader who expect something to happen between Anne and Dev, the two main characters who meet in the subway.

The short length of the each of the stories makes for an easy read.

Among the poems, I liked The Red in Poetry by Cassie McDaniel

It doesn’t take much to be a poet
you need a red book
hide-away hide-out don’t-look
warning, dangerous words
It doesn’t take much.

It doesn’t take much to be a woman
red mouth
red-words red-eyes look-out
heavy, breath like gravy
red gravy.

It doesn’t take much to be a poet
you need a big hurt
deep pain, like Peguis canyon
in Mexico, off the main roads
swoop and dive, like a red-tail
arrogant and lost.

And Val David by Jasmine D’Costa

I stand on the street at Val David holding your hand
on the tired road beneath my feet.
In the distance, the hills blue-green stretching sleepily,
fade into distant colours.
Undoubtedly, the road ends there
And beneath endless pines, the forest path
is defined by the lone traveler
I look around for you
But all I see is the straight road to the hills
and nothing beyond

For the first time ever, I promoted this blog directly.

When I bought the book at a side table from Robert Morgan, I scribbled this blog’s URL on a piece of paper and told him, “I’ll write about this book on my blog.”

He looked at me bemusedly, and then smiled.

Before I left for home, I went across to Jasmine D’Costa to get her to autograph the book. She did and so did writer Zohra Zoberi.

Robert Morgan’s publishing tips for writers

Saturday I attended a workshop on ‘How to approach publishers and get your manuscript noticed’. Robert Morgan, Publisher of BookLand Press, conducted the workshop. I had participated in an earlier workshop that Morgan conducted for the Writers and Editors Network in mid-May. But the time he was allotted was rather short, and he had to rush through his material.

At Saturday’s workshop, held at the picturesque Runnymede public library, Morgan spoke uninterrupted for three hours. He answered a range of questions from the participants that comprised a mix of Canadians and immigrants from different age groups and backgrounds.

Why this sudden interest in book publishing?

There are two reasons. The main one is my fascination for book publishing as a process. My only inheritance from my grandfather Harischandra Bhatt is a collection of books. Among them are manuals on printing and publishing, and on typefaces and fonts. Harischandra had a publishing house – Nalanda Publication– for a brief time and published books on a range of subjects.

The other reason – and I feel oddly reticent admitting to it – is that I’m in the process of writing a novel. Actually, I had begun writing this novel after I had encouraged Richard Rothman to publish his book of short stories (Intelligent Endings). That was many years ago. 

As it happens with most of our creative efforts, life intervenes and interrupts. We leave behind what we love doing to attend to our immediate needs. The needs then multiply and we forget about our writing. 

2009 is a year of revival for me in terms of my reading and writing. That happened primarily because I joined Sheridan College’s journalism program. I was introduced to Canadian literature. This is the first time ever that I'm studying literature. I also started this blog. 

Then a couple of months ago, Joyce Wayne introduced me to Antanas Sileika Artistic Director, Humber School for Writers. I will be meeting him in July for Humber School for Writers’ summer workshop. In preparation for this interaction, I began writing my novel.

I fished out my old manuscript. But I found only some parts of the earlier version interesting. So, I started to build upon a short story that I had entered into a competition. 

In about two months, I have written close to 18,000 words. I don’t know if it is good or bad. What I know is that I’m enjoying the process of writing. I get up early every morning, and then sit for a couple of hours at least to write my book. 

Mostly, I’m rewriting and the pace is extremely slow. But it is so engaging that if I had a choice, I’d only write.

I know a few friends who are writing a book, and I know a few others who should be writing a book. 

I’m reporting a few interesting aspects of Morgan’s presentation that I think writers will find interesting.

• Do your research on the internet to select the right publisher for your manuscript – target specific publishers who publish your genre.
  
• Check submission guidelines – every publisher has specific guidelines.
  
• You don’t need a literary agent nowadays – especially if you’re an unpublished author.
  
• Don’t send generic cover letters – you’re a writer, and the publisher is a literate person. Write a personal letter.
  
• In Canada, publishers receive on an average 800 to 1000 submissions every month. So, don’t expect a prompt response from publishers after you submit your manuscript.
  
• A good business relationship is essential between an author and a publisher for the success of any book.
  

These bullet points are just a glimpse of what Morgan said during his presentation. He conducts these workshops twice a year, and charges a nominal fee from participants. 

The proceeds are donated to Canadian Aid Charity. He also informed the participants about Canadian Aid Charity’s literary contest where the first prize is a trade book publishing contract. Check out the details here. The deadline is September 1, 2009. 

Asian Writers

Multiculturalism in Canada is like secularism in India – preached more than practised.

In the Indian context, it means that the government says the minorities (Muslims, Christians, etc) are equal to the Hindus in India. What it really means is that they must fend for themselves.

In Canada, officially, the governments – both federal and provincial – are committed to multiculturalism. Again, as with the minorities in India, the immigrants are to fend for themselves.

That’s not a politically correct thing to say, I know. However, that’s been my experience as an immigrant in Canada in the last ten months that I’ve been here. 

Even if they generally keep quiet about their situation, that is the experience of most of the minorities in India.

But let's get back to being politically correct. Being polite is to be a Canadian.

One of the happy fallouts of the official policy of multiculturalism is the celebratory recognition that each ethnic group receives from the officialdom.

May, for instance, is the Asian heritage month. February is the Black History month (my friend Mike Odongkara guided me to Morgan Freeman’s views on the subject that have been posted on the youtube; take a look).

Earlier this month I attended an interesting event at the North York Central Library (branch of the Toronto Public Library) on New Asian Writing.

Aparita Bhandari, CBC’s Metro Morning What’s Going On columnist, anchored the show. 

She was both vivacious and studied – an essential necessity in any anchor hosting a show full of writers, for an audience that comprises wannabe and published writers.

If she wasn’t both, she would have either bored or embarrassed the audience. By being both, she made the evening seem short.

The show began with a fabulous dance recital first in the Bharat Natyam style and then in Odissi style by the members of the Menaka Thakkar Dance Company. 

For a brief moment, I didn’t feel I was in Canada, and this is despite the Canadian accent of the young dancer of Indian origin who introduced the dances and the danseuses.

The writers who participated in the event included Kerri Sakamoto, Saleema Nawaz, Devyani Saltzman and Jaspreet Singh. 

I found Saleema Nawaz and Jaspreet Singh’s readings from their works (Mother Superior: Nawaz and Chef: Singh) evocative because they effortlessly created vivid images in my mind of their characters and the settings.

I may be creating an erroneous impression by singling out one or a couple of writers from the group that participated in the show, because all of them had different experiences to narrate as writers and different stories to tell.

I approached Singh and Nawaz after the show and requested them for an interview for this blog on the craft of writing. 

They said they would get back. They didn’t.

Probably because I’m unknown, anonymous. They are published writers.

Then, a week ago, I attended the Writers and Editors Network (WEN) meeting. 

I wanted to meet Jasmine D’Costa, an immigrant from Mumbai, and a banker-turned-novelist whose Curry is Thicker than Water is making waves across Canada right now and is certainly going to be among awards and prizes. D’Costa is the president of the WEN. 

The breakfast networking session that morning had a star speaker – Robert Morgan, Publisher with BookLand Press. Morgan discussed Publishing Tips for Authors from the Publisher's Perspective.

The endearing part of the meeting was interacting so many aspiring writers, and so many of them of Indian origin – some born in India but raised elsewhere; some whose parents were born in India, had no first-hand experience of India, and yet seemed to love the idea of India. 

That morning the idea of India did appear to be shinning bright – Sonia Gandhi had won the election.

Mybindi.com is holding D’Costa’s book launch on May 27. Click here for details, and attend it to meet a very interesting personality. 

Images: Singh: http://www.ufv.ca/MarCom/UFV_Today/090223.htm

Nawaz: http://www.freehand-books.com/authors/saleema-nawaz.html

D'Costa: http://www.wildsound-filmmaking-feedback-events.com/images/jasmineanitadcosta.jpg