A note from Rana Bose, Co-Editor Montreal Serai I first met Tanya Bindra, an alumna of McGill University, during a cultural festival in the Philippines in 2011. She was there with her backpack full of lenses and camera gear photographing rappers […]
The Concert Pianist Through her half-open window, she lets out a series of sweet notes, the melodious raindrops, repeats and repeats till a lively mountain stream comes to life in the opening of the concerto she has chosen to […]
‘Jahaz’ is the Punjabi word for a ship. On the 23rd of May, 1914, Nanak’s Ship, also known as Komagata Maru made it all the way to Canada. In Japanese (a friend told me) Koma Gata stands […]
Adele Shtern embraces her calling as a multi-disciplinary artist using traditional and digital media. She takes pleasure in discovering visually interesting sights in diverse loci. Her creative process involves opening herself to the revelation of seeing the familiar in new ways. […]
This summer 2015, from June 23-June 26, the Simon Fraser University English Department’s France Field School will be in full swing with special guest speaker Professor Norman Cornett, from Montreal, introducing the students to Paris’ international jazz culture. Professor Cornett […]
“REMAPPING HISTORIES & EXPANDING TERRITORIES” March 7 2015- THE ARMORY ART SHOW CONFERENCE ON THE MIDDLE EAST, NORTH AFRICA, AND THE MEDITERRANEAN (MENAM)- NY March7-8, 2015, NY Is there only one story of modern art? Is it not […]
I keep trying to write a story about a woman I saw once in the metro. It was crowded, probably sometime around rush hour. All I can remember about that day was that it was raining and cold; I […]
For seven years from 2005 to 2012, I was enrolled in ceramic sculpture courses at the Visual Arts Centre, Westmount, and at the Town of Mount Royal culture centre. I was uniquely interested in hand building pieces, not […]
Editor’s Note: This issue of Montreal Serai — “Old Age and Youth in a Changing World” — has featured two pieces of writing by young people, Savannah Stewart’s story “Alzheimer’s” and Meghri Doumanian’s essay “War is a Wrong Kind […]
We (the editorial board) struggled with the theme for some time – Old Age and Youth in a Changing World. We tried to find the balance between keeping the theme open and general enough to allow for interpretation and limited […]
SéKAI SéKAI is a Canadian artist for 30 years based in Montreal. His creative development began in Nova Scotia and PEI. A mixed racial background inspired him to explore the world through painting, dancing, theatre and literature. For over […]
Given the number of years that have elapsed since my birth, I could be considered an “expert” on aging, at least an experiential expert. Therefore, it should have been simple enough to come up with a few hundred words on […]
I was twenty-three and living in London for the first time. I should’ve been fulfilling my father’s dreams for me, which had me doing a qualifying teacher training year in some grimy Midlands town. Instead I was working for […]
Author note: Written in 1993 for a wellness conference sponsored by The Gazette, Montreal. It was one of ten winning submissions. Many people aspire to a ripe old age, but when they reach it, they spend most of their […]
Dr. Daya Ram Varma August 23, 1929 – March 22, 2015 Dr. Daya Ram Varma, died Sunday March 22, 2015, at his home in St. John’s surrounded by loving family and friends. Daya was born in a small […]
It’s Algebra Tibe! If someone only likes you 6 out of 10 you can tutor them to like you more. Sinbad Richardson is a Montreal animator and filmmaker. He has filmed numerous shorts and also directed/created music videos for many […]
“Wrinkles should merely indicate where the smiles have been.” ― Mark Twain “No, that is the great fallacy: the wisdom of old men. They do not grow wise. They grow careful.” ― Ernest Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms […]
[Montreal April 6, 2015] Greece – Ελλάς or Hellas – is a place that for many people has existed only as a sunny spot visited from some monstrous cruise ship, or perhaps a mental image of a make-believe […]
The temperature had finally settled down to a mild -15 degrees in Ottawa when Louise Crandall and I sat down to discuss the new Supreme Court Ruling over Physician Assisted Suicide. Louise has worked for three health organizations including […]
About RECAA: RECAA, Resources ethnoculturelles contre l’abus envers les ainéEs; in English RECAA translates into — Respecting Elders: Communities Against Abuse. RECAA was founded in 2003 by elders from the cultural communities with a stated mission to raise […]
“Audrey, you have visitors,” the nurse says to me, looking me in the eye while pointing to the door. A man stands in the doorway; he is tall, standing with his shoulders tense. A younger woman stands slightly behind him. […]
“Don’t tell my husband I touched a white man” — our interpreter, Rajat, speedily translated the language of a woman farmer in a field in rural Rajasthan, India. She had quickly recoiled after her initial interest. It was […]
First there is nothing, then a sign there might be something comes like a sudden flinch a flash in the night an economic crash the death of a friend the bolt of a deer before […]
For as long as I can remember I have considered middle age to be fifteen years older than I am. When I was five, twenty was definitely middle-aged. At twenty, middle age clearly began at thirty-five and by the […]
American journalist and author Chris Hedges’s War is a Force that Gives us Meaning places war under three categories: war, he says, is culture, myth, and crusade all at once. He explains that war is often a tool for the […]
Rethinking AGING. Growing Old and Living Well in an Overtreated Society. Nortin M. Hadler, M.D., The University of North Carolina Press, 2011. “The days of our years among them are seventy years and if, with special attributes of […]
That Which Drowned with Narcissus Where there was once a lake Is barren land now From there can be heard the footsteps of Narcissus Even today She has gone there Looking for flowers bees and butterflies For many other […]
En ouvrant les yeux, je vois la neige légère accumulée sur le bord de la fenêtre. Je crois qu’elle se dissiperait si je soufflais dessus, mais je n’ai pas la force de le faire. Tourner simplement la tête […]
I am tired now. I sit at a table and write cursive. Tables are something taken for granted. They live such a long life, and as a rule, aren’t discarded for disease or wear, but for fashions sake. […]
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