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Mike W. Bryant
Staff columnist
Wednesday, January 2, 2008
Visiting family down south over the Christmas holiday I was struck by a notion that is often and unfairly applied to our fair city.
That is, Yellowknife, third coldest city in the world according to the Time Almanac, is a bumpkin town full of parka-clad hicks.
I recall one column published not so long ago in a Kelowna newspaper where the writer expressed his extreme relief at finally escaping this city with its buck-toothed women and dim-eyed blokes.
An Edmonton Sun cartoon published last fall prior to a visit by the Edmonton Oilers rookie training camp took a shot at Yellowknife by showing a rickety little sign surrounded by endless void, reading: "Welcome to Yellowknife." The managing editor of the University of Alberta student newspaper, meanwhile, suggested that sending the team's players here perpetuated Edmonton's "Arctic" stereotype, and Saskatoon, of all places, would've been a better place to send them to change that.
So there you have it, this is how many in the south ponder Yellowknife, if they do at all - an empty waste populated with dentally-challenged denizens, our brains too frozen to realize what a sorry address we've made for ourselves.
When I am down south, people are generally polite about it when I confess my postal code.
"Wow, it must be cold up there," is the most common reply.
But I also hear a fair bit of, "man, that's the sticks. I'm glad I don't live there."
Parka-clad this city may be but hickish I think not.
Our skyline should be the instant giveaway.
There are plenty of cities in this country with populations over 100,000 but not a building taller than five stories. We have several.
Our per-capita income, education levels, and standard of living are among the highest in the country. If anything, we are a mini-metropolis, thriving with riches, big cars, box stores and hordes of bureaucrats and professionals who will not sit idly by without satiating their demand for regular Monday morning mochas and salsa lessons on Thursday.
We also have many of the same problems afflicting larger urban centres down south.
We have crackheads, street people, downtown rot, and urban sprawl. The only thing we don't have are escort listings in the Yellow Pages, although that almost changed a few years ago when one particular madam attempted to persuade council to allow her to open up a brothel.
Anyway, I was in a bar in Goderich, Ont., Boxing Day night when all this came to mind. I was so used to thinking of myself as a small town boy when I looked around to realize - in my Christmas designer long sleeve shirt and corduroy pants - that myself and my crew were positively the most urbane looking bunch in the entire place - this despite only being two hours from Toronto.
It was crowded to the rafters with young and old, but mostly young, as a cover band rocked out to Nazareth and the Tragically Hip (Another band in the area is called the Practically Hip. They are huge I was told).
These folk were the sons and daughters of farmers' folk for the most part. Most boys wore baseball caps backwards and T-shirts with beer logos on them or hunting vests and camo pants.
Many of the girls teased their hair and wore lacy, frilly things that would've been quite out of place in a social gathering here.
My cousin, who often summered in Goderich growing up, told me the people there were quite proud of their hickish ways, and took delight in pointing out and laughing at the silly mannerisms of the city folk when they came to town.
It was quite obvious to them that we were not from there, and I suspect immediately labeled us Torontonians, which some of us were.
Maybe I should bring up some hunting stories and talk about guns, I thought momentarily.
But I gave up. I'm from Yellowknife and I just wasn't hick enough.
- Mike W. Bryant is Assignment editor for Northern News Services