The Painter at the Gas Station

The car is quiet for a moment before the next ride request appears, just the hum of the engine and the glow of the dashboard lights.

Out here, every few minutes someone new steps into the story. In a way, that’s Canada. For more than 150 years this country has grown wave by wave, people arriving from somewhere else and stepping into the larger story of the nation.

Sometimes those waves feel like something you read about in history books.

And sometimes they’re standing at a gas station waiting for a ride home after work.

I’m Christopher M. Michaud, editor at The Canadianist. I’m also the leader of the United Canadian Centrists.

Earlier in this series I explained why I started driving rideshare. I didn’t do it as a side hustle or a stunt. I did it as a way to listen.

Living in Toronto, you see the world every day. Different languages on the sidewalks. Different cultures woven into the fabric of the city. But seeing it isn’t the same as understanding it. If I’m going to speak about this country, propose ideas, or advocate for a direction forward, those ideas can’t be built on headlines or polling data. They have to be grounded in real conversations with real people.

So I got behind the wheel.

Last time I shared three conversations that stayed with me. What struck me wasn’t anger or extremism. It was something quieter. People who still believe in Canada, but who are quietly reassessing where they stand in it.

Today the journey continues.

Some nights begin the same way. Coffee in hand, phone mounted on the dashboard, I sit for a moment before starting the engine and thinking about the route ahead. A few hours of rideshare driving usually means a few hours of conversations, though you never really know who you’re going to meet. That uncertainty is part of the rhythm of nights like this.

You pull away from the curb, merge into traffic, and somewhere out there the first ride request appears.

A few minutes later my phone buzzed.

The pickup wasn’t at a house.

It was a gas station.

It was late afternoon, the kind of hour when work crews are wrapping up the day and figuring out how to get home. As I pulled into the lot I saw a small group of men standing near the edge of the station. Paint-splattered clothes, work boots, the relaxed posture of people who had clearly just finished a long job together. Several of them were on their phones calling for rides.

For a moment I thought again about that earlier line that had crossed my mind.

Sometimes the waves of immigration feel like something you read about in history books.

And sometimes they’re standing at a gas station waiting for a ride home after work.

One of the men stepped forward and climbed into the back seat.

He looked tired but he was smiling, the kind of smile people have when the workday is finally over. The first thing he asked me was where I was from.

I gave him the short version of my story. I was born in Canada. My mother’s family has Italian heritage and my father’s family is Québécois.

He nodded, but it quickly became clear that language was going to be a challenge.

Before reaching for my phone I tried the only Arabic phrase I know.

“Turki Arabi?”

At least, that’s what I think it means.

For a brief second I wondered if I had just said something completely ridiculous. Fortunately I hadn’t. He smiled immediately and a moment later we both pulled out our phones and opened translator apps.

Just like that we had a system.

The entire conversation unfolded through our phones, passing them back and forth as the apps translated. Between that, a little broken English from him, a few broken Arabic words from me, and plenty of hand gestures when neither of us had the right word, we somehow managed to have a real conversation.

In fact it worked so well that within a few minutes we were both laughing about the whole process. What started as a language barrier turned into a kind of teamwork between two phones, two languages, and two people determined to understand each other.

His name was Nabil.

He’s originally from Egypt and has been in Canada for about a year and a half. He came here with his wife and their two children.

As we talked it became clear very quickly what mattered most to him: his children.

His son George is studying electrical work and learning a skilled trade. His daughter is at university studying to become a veterinarian. When he spoke about them you could hear the pride in his voice. That’s something you notice quickly when you meet people who came here to build a new life. Their hopes are often focused on the next generation.

Nabil works as a painter right now. It’s hard work and long days, the kind of work many newcomers take when they first arrive because responsibility comes first. You provide for the family. He told me that one day he’d like to study a trade himself, maybe electrical work or plumbing, but for now his priority is making sure the family is stable.

At one point in the conversation he told me something interesting. During his immigration medical interview he asked the doctor a question.

“You examine my body,” he said. “But is there anyone who examines my mind? Is there anyone who wants to know what kind of person I am?”

He wasn’t saying it critically. What he meant was that character matters. Values matter. Whether someone believes in honesty, responsibility, and respect for others. To him those things matter just as much as a medical exam.

Later he told me something else that stayed with me. As a Christian in parts of the Middle East he had experienced discrimination and pressure because of his faith. Canada, for him, represents something very simple: a place where his children can live safely and build their future without fear.

By this point in the ride I had noticed something about Nabil. Every few minutes he would come up with another thought that made me pause for a second. You could tell he had spent a lot of time reflecting on what it meant to leave one country and start again in another.

Sure enough another one came.

At one point he said that if someone made him the king of Canada he would protect the country with his life and his heart and never allow anyone to harm it.

You might smile when you hear a line like that, but when someone says it with that kind of sincerity you realize something important. Sometimes the people who appreciate a country the most are the ones who had to leave another one to find it.

Before he got out of the car he said one more thing. People who come to Canada, he told me, should respect the country that gave them security and opportunity. If someone cheats the system or abuses the freedoms here, he believes that’s wrong. In his words, that would be stealing from the country that saved them from poverty, hunger, racism, and sectarian conflict.

When we reached his stop he thanked me for the conversation. He stepped out, closed the door, and disappeared into the evening.

For a moment the car was quiet again, the same hum of the engine and glow of the dashboard lights.

Then the phone buzzed again.

Another ride request. Another pickup somewhere across the city. Another person about to step into the story.

Because out here, every few minutes someone new does.

And sometimes, if you’re paying attention, you realize that story is also Canada.