This past Saturday, La Presse mentioned that Montreal had floated the notion that the UN’s headquarters relocate from Manhattan to Montreal. Even though within the article there was a small mention that the UN was seriously disinterested and laughed it off… the multi-page feature, full with plans and outlines of the compound would lead a reader to think that Kofi Annan could soon be spotted on Crescent street…
Truth is, such a thing is beyond folly, and picking up La Presse’s English counterpart would remind us all why: on the front page of The Gazette ran a story about how somewhere deep within La Province, a bunch of bigots were going on and on about reasonable accomodation.
For what it’s worth, people coming to live in Montreal and Quebec should learn to speak French (we should all have ponies, too, while we’re at it…), but everyone in Quebec should also learn to speak English because the entire world speaks some English… sit down folks: especially those who work in the fields of business and diplomacy.
In fact, even the smart ones who speak English are trying to get a basic understanding of Mandarin… but I digress…
The point is: only in a province like Quebec is the learning of English seen as a bad thing, and only here do we still have to put up with this garbage years after the world’s gone global… and yes people, if by global it means [today] English and next year it means Mandarin and the year after that it means Bengali, so be it…
The reason why the UN would never come to Montreal starts with the fact that no self-respecting diplomat would give up living and working in NYC for Montreal, but it also has largely to do with the fact that Montreal and Quebec are so stubbornly resisting to be global. Which, by of itself is awfully ironic given how European Montreal is.
I love this city, but not a day goes by where the small-mindedness of the province doesn’t make me want to hit the road.