Reader's Digest Canada April 2022

Until not long ago, students were taught that John A. Macdonald was a great man: a founder of Confederation, our first prime minister, the visionary who connected the country with a railway. Their lessons didn’t mention how he also imposed a head tax on Chinese immigrants, that he promoted Indigenous assimilation and the residential school system, or that those schools are where thousands of Indigenous children died. While this side of Macdonald was never a secret, it’s only now openly recognized and discussed. That’s why the cities of Charlottetown and Hamilton have removed Macdonald statues and why several municipalities are looking at renaming public buildings and streets. For now, he still grimaces on our $10 bill. This reckoning was a long time coming and has prompted a re-examination of other so-called greats,…

HOLIDAY RUSH The editor’s letter (“Merry All the Way”) in the December 2021 issue gave me a chuckle. Your grandmother and I have a lot in common. I also prepare early for Christmas: I shop, clean, wrap presents, write cards and shop yet again while still working full-time. My saving graces are my retired husband and eldest son, who are in charge of dinner. I bet your grandmother really enjoyed that glass of wine at the end of the evening. — KIM LITSTER, Freelton, Ont. ONGOING DEBATE I was very surprised to see “The Long Fight” (October 2021) in the magazine. Over the many years I’ve been a subscriber, each issue has been filled with messages of love, hope and bravery. Seeing an article about the divisive abortion issue has left me truly disappointed. —…

WINNIPEG’S MURRAY DUFTON could muddle his way around a computer. The 75-year-old often used one as a project manager in northern Manitoba. But since he retired, he couldn’t quite keep up with rapidly changing technology. In early 2021, he spotted an e-newsletter in his inbox from a local community centre. Connected Canadians, an Ottawa-based organization that went national during the pandemic, provided senior citizens with tech help from volunteer mentors. To Dufton, it sounded like a great opportunity. Emily Jones Joanisse, 42, and Tasneem Damen, 38, decided to start Connected Canadians in 2018. The pair of friends found it rewarding to help the seniors in their lives overcome tech challenges. Joanisse, who is director of experiential learning at Carleton University’s Innovation Hub, and Damen, an independent software architect, wondered, what if…

CATCHING A GLIMPSE OF THE STARS KENYA As a child growing up in Nairobi City, the astronomer Susan Murabana didn’t get much encouragement to look to the stars. The solar system wasn’t a big part of her school’s curriculum. Her disappointment turned to wonder in her early 20s, when she encountered her first telescope and spotted Saturn and its icy rings. “Seeing something I had only read about in a textbook, it made me realize how small we really are.” In 2014, Murabana, now married, bought a telescope with her husband. Inspired by how studying space had opened up her life, the couple decided to give kids the same experience. They called their program The Travelling Telescope, and circle around Kenya bringing astronomy education and a portable planetarium to schools and communities. So…

Boston, a city synonymous with Irish-American culture, is also home to more than 130,000 Latino residents, who make up nearly 20 per cent of the city’s population. When professional mariachi performer Veronica Robles decided to settle there with her husband 22 years ago, however, she noticed that the Latino community suffered from the effects of cultural dislocation. Every day, they also encountered racist stereotypes about Latin-American culture. “They were afraid or ashamed of saying they were Latino,” says Robles, who was born in Mexico City. To help Latino immigrants reclaim their sense of self and a connection to their cultural heritage, the couple began offering night classes in the art, music and dance of Central and Latin America at a school cafeteria. Then, in 2013, Robles and her husband, using their own…

After more than 20 years delivering babies, you switched to performing assisted deaths. How come? I’ve always been interested in the intersection of medicine, ethics and law. Working in maternity care, I was able to engage with those topics in terms of women’s health and reproductive rights. Meanwhile, I was watching the evolution of assisted dying legislation in Canada. I started thinking, well, yes, the law might change, but who is going to do this very important work when it does? You mention Canada’s decriminalization legislation. When and why did that happen? In Canada we had some landmark cases that challenged the blanket prohibition of assisted dying as a violation of charter rights, and the Supreme Court agreed in a unanimous ruling. Bill C-14 was then introduced in 2016, creating a number…