Bigger or better
An international student discusses Canadian cats and hamburgers
December 6, 2006
Ricky Lin
“It’s big.” That was the first English sentence I said in Canada. The year was 2003. I had just finished high school in Taiwan, and I decided to go abroad and study at a Canadian university. As I stood in the customs line, I saw a Canadian police officer. The words, “It’s big,” naturally came out of my mouth. But because of my poor English, my cousins asked, “What’s big?” I said “policey” (I actually meant to say, “He’s strong”).
We left the airport to drive to my home-stay. As we were driving, I saw a field and said, “It’s big.” The driver asked me, “What’s big?” but I could not understand what he meant because he spoke fast.
In the following few months, I had said, “It’s big,” almost every time I saw something: cats, people, housing, land, ants, parks, and parking lots. I was like an innocent child seeing a new animal at the zoo, but I said, “It’s big,” instead of something like, “Wow, that’s cool.”
Of all the new things I experienced on my first trip to a Western country, three things really shocked me. The first thing was the size of the cats. When I first saw a cat I thought, “What’s wrong with that cat? He needs some exercise.” Usually, the cats in Taiwan look thin and long, like skinny potatoes. But Western cats are round and fat like balls.
The second thing that shocked me was the moon. Based on what I learned in my high school science classes, I thought the moon would be the same size everywhere. I actually thought that the Western moon was not a real moon. It must be something else, because it was larger than I was used to.
Lastly, the McDonald’s hamburgers shocked me. When I saw them, I did not say, “It’s big.” When I first ordered a McDonald’s hamburger, I did not eat for several minutes because it was so incredibly small. Do not believe Super Size Me. Usually, the hamburgers in Taiwan are almost twice as big as Canadian hamburgers.
After having those exciting new experiences, I still keep finding interesting things in Canada. But now my view of things has changed. I thought the police officers were so strong, and I was too small. But, like my thoughts, my weight has changed, and I am actually getting bigger.
Last year, when I went back to Taiwan, I felt that everything had shrunk. My house was smaller, the roads were smaller, and even my sister looked skinnier than before (which she was happy to hear). Even the cats looked different: they looked like sticks. Back in Taiwan I thought the moon should be bigger.
But when I went into McDonald’s, the Taiwanese burger that I had was amazing because I could say, “It’s so big!”
Now you go...
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