One Person, Two Lives: Half-Breed, By Maria Campbell

One Person, Two Lives
Introduction:
Travelling abroad becomes common gradually in today’s society as long as having a passport and the visa of the country which people would like to go. Compared with travelling abroad, living abroad is more challenge for people, especially teenagers without parents surrounding. I have been Canada for almost two years. Life is difficult when I first came to Canada. Language is the biggest issue for me, even though I began to learn English from primary school in China. In addition, my knowledge about Canada was less. The only thing which I knew about Canada is that Canada is the second largest country in the world. However, after taking English and history courses, I gained a wealth of information about Canada.
The reason why I chose this novel is that this novel talks about Metis people’s life in the past in northern Saskatchewan, which has a detail of First Nations history. During the novel, I found that there is little connection with me. In the novel, the protagonist Maria experienced different life in her childhood and after her mother died. When Maria was a child, she lived with her family in the Metis community. She did not have to be concerned about her life and the neighbours were friendly: “in my childhood I saw glimpses of a proud and happy people. I heard their laughter, saw them dance, and felt their love” (Campbell 9). Therefore, she was carefree in her childhood, with no problems and worries. Unfortunately, her mother died. With tears in her eyes, Maria had been told that “[She] would be responsible for the little ones and for Daddy” (Campbell 77). This is a turning point for Maria to change her life. Instead of living unworried, Maria began to be independent and responsible for her family, even to marry with a guy she did not like for supporting her family’s economy. As Maria moved with her husband to another city in Canada, her life became more and more tough. After their marriage, Maria got pregnant. It supposed to be a beatific vision, but instead Maria’s husband left them. With all the pressure from raising a baby by herself and despaired of the leaving of her husband, she started to use pills and drink. As can be seen, the two parts of Maria’s life are totally distinct. Likewise, my life in China and Canada are different. In China, I always relied on my parents about everything. I even would blame them, if they did something that I was not satisfied, even though the things are what I supposed to do. However, after came to Canada, I had to do things on my own, because others did not have the responsibilities to replace me to do anything. As same as Maria’s mom died, coming to