I asked him if he was a student at the nearby Sheridan College. He said that he had actually just graduated from high school. He's from Caledon, a town north of Mississauga, And he planned to go to a technical architectural school. He said he is skilled at drawing, and he's thinking about taking an Autocad course. I told him that was a good idea, since drawing is still important, no matter how technical these fields get. I told him I know this from experience, since I have studied design.
He said he was off to the library just across from the fountains, after his breakfast, .
He was pessimistic about job prospects. "It all because of immigrants" he said to me. "The government is shipping them here, educating them, and giving them the jobs, which they take at really low salaries." I was surprised at his forthright manner. I let that go for a while.
He also said that he might go into social work. I couldn't figure out why he decided on this. Later on, I looked him up on the internet,and here is his profile. Here is what his "counselor" says:
Miss Andrew: Ian is a caring individual who works to make others happy. He struggles with putting others needs before his own, however he is getting better at asking for support when having a rough day. Another difficulty that Ian struggles with is his attention span. Ian has worked hard to come up with strategies to help with his attention and is able to focus when he needs to.She now has this young man thinking he has some kind of psychological problem, and has pulled him into that victim's world, all geared up to help other "victims."
This sounds like a typical, female, "empathetic" teacher, the classic diagnoser of "Attentions Deficit Disorder," which is the great mental health fabrication of the ages, meant to put young men on a leash.
I told him to concentrate on the architecture studies. That these days, we need good buildings. "Look at the horrible high rises cropping up all over. Look at what we have in front of us."
I asked him what he thought of "Celebration Square."
He liked it: "It seems a good blend of nature, design, architecture and recreation."
I agreed with him. I also said that the yellow brick is a traditional Ontario stone, mined from quarries in northern Ontario. Older Toronto homes used this brick.
"And all this glass, what do you think? Some are even falling!" I said. I told him about the Royal Ontario Museum, designed by a German architect, Daniel Libeskind, where falling glass became a joke around town.
He agreed with that too. And mentioned some other buildings in downtown Toronto where potentially falling glass has been a problem.
I told him that there are designers who are working on durable glass, and also glass that doesn't make the interiors into ovens, with sun and heat coming in.
I went back to his original outburst of "it's the immigrants."
"What do you think of Asian students who are filling up university technical fields? It isn't enough to be skillful, it is important to be creative as well. Like the windows. To build the kind of "open" space people like these days, one should be able to invent glass that can prevent people from looking in and maintain privacy, and keep the heat from the sun turning the interior into an oven. And to make them durable and unbreakable. Do you think Chinese have this skill and creativity, and invention, to produce such kinds of structures?"
"Asians have the skills, but equally important as skill is creativity and inventions abilities, and I believe Asians aren't up to par with white students."
He looked relieved that someone was talking to him about these things. He is barely eighteen, but he looks like he had the weight of the world around him. He said his family history is of welders, iron workers, and those who managed construction sites. He got his idea of architecture from that family background.
I asked for his email and promised to send him some of my posts and articles on architecture, and the changing landscape of Toronto. I said I would like his feedback. He seemed happy about that request. I told him to hang in there, and to work at his talents. "We need good buildings," I told him.
He excused himself to go to the library.
I hope I run into him again.
I think whites are beginning to realize that they have been duped! And smart, young ones like Ian (when I asked him for his email, he actually spelled i-a-n for me, as though no-one knows how to spell that name! As though it is Mohammed, or even Kidist!) are beginning to figure this out. I think his "social work" ideas were actually to help those like him, who have been made to feel, by teachers, the media, their society, that they are no good.
And when I think back on his forthrightness when he talked to me, I think he is reacting to the current news, the racial horror in Ferguson, the Mexican illegals in Texas and Arizona, and Islam's war on the world, and especially the West.
I think he will figure things out.
