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Do not put down my city and not expect that I will not defend it.
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Long Post, I sincerely apologize for the amount to read. Read on should you choose :) This post is not intended to have an angry tone, so please do not read that into it. You've put your thoughts out there, here are mine :) That’s what Social Media is all about. I read a post about protecting our regional identities. Well, On that note, I do protect my identity and am proud of my Saint John Heritage. The issue is that my "Saint Johnner" identity is continually put down by people that have moved to this area from another Province, or even another NB City that are adamant to proclaim their culture is better than mine. Well, You're Canadian, I'm Canadian, You live here, You pay the same taxes as me. We're equal. If I travelled to your town, I'm sure I'd find great things to say about your city or town, but perhaps that’s just my personality, not yours? So, I now present my own overheard list: Shit people say about Saint John: 1. Its Dirty -‐ So are cities such as New York, Paris, areas of Boston, or other metro areas. Those places are considered to be desired. Yes they are larger and have more amenities, but they are still dirty. That part gets overlooked for culture’s sake. 2. Its Foggy -‐ Well, we are a harbour town after all. Land is warm, water is cold, because we're near the Ocean. Cold weather system meets warm weather system yields fog :) It’s not a Saint John thing, It’s a science thing :)There isn’t fog in London England or British Columbia (just to pick 2 random cities)? 3. It stinks -‐ Well, Not really it doesn't. It did smell like sulphur years ago. What you used to smell was the industry that built the city. That industry is gone, so is the smell, regulations saw to that. How does a fishing town smell to you? How does a farming community smell to you? 4. Its so hard to find my way around Saint John -‐ Saint John was originally not ONE city. It was Saint John and Lancaster, which of course were later amalgamated. Each "city" had its own street layout plan, and some of the street names were used twice. The roads are "swervy" because much of the city was built on hills that probably should have been blasted away to give us that beautiful flat grid pattern that is so desirable by most major civic areas, that is so easy to put up subdivisions and give us easier access to see into each other’s front lawns. 5. It's so poor here -‐ Saint John used to be a thriving city. Many families moved here for work and decided to leave better places to come and work and live here instead. They loved the city when the money was good. jump to present day, through no fault of you and I, people in lofty places made decisions to move industry out to where They, or the industry owners, decided it should be. It’s not a Saint John thing, it’s a business thing. You came to work here, because you either wanted to work here or there weren't any jobs in your chosen profession in your place of origin.
6. There is no night life -‐ That goes hand in hand with the above point. No Jobs? No surplus of expendable income? No NYC or LA, quality nightlife. 7. It’s so unedjumacated here -‐ Well, that’s the culture we live in today with the internet and the accessibility of everything that is a distraction. Add to that heap, so many days off from school because of rain or snowfall. We certainly can't blame Frosty for education issues. Again, it all comes back to money. If the money isn’t here from jobs, it's certainly not going to be spoon-‐fed to us by the government to provide books, or to curb the behavioural issues that parents choose not to deal with. They send disrespecting children to school and expect the teacher to change all that they messed up? That’s not a Saint John thing, that’s a parental thing. I pause to take a breath here ….. Ok I’ll now resume. :) Long story short….Over and over and over again, the shit that gets said about Saint John, is said by people that really do not want to be here. This city is in a rebuilding phase, rebuilding is very slow and very painful. I am not a political person by any means and I feel for all of the families that had to leave town to provide for their families. We miss them here at home with us! I love Saint John. I love the access that I have to water systems to put my boats in. I love the trails that I can ride my bike on. I love the fact that my city has Heritage as glorious as any other City's storied past. I love the hills that the roads traverse and I love the views as I drive along the coast or along the wooded roads. The weather IS different in one part of the city compared to another. The drive 5 minutes for different weather really does apply! :) I love that! The shit I want to say about Saint John.. is the positive shit, because I still see the beauty and the potential. There are a lot of people that are saying negative things about the city, There are few that say good things. I want to be counted in those that do. :) Long-‐windedly Yours, Dennis