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A little girl
She comes to a land of ghosts
Almost empty streets
She wonders
Where are all the people
No one here looks like her
Within her heart
Emotions stir

It is so cold
Foreign 
Lonely
Where oh where, is the mountain of gold
Her mom and dad they are so bold
Pioneers
Adventures
People of action
Not of words

Hong Kong 
Left behind
A new future to find
They endured the sad
A world not kind

Their crowded apartment
A benevolent uncle stole
To leave the country they paid a toll
Plane tickets in her fathers hand
Brought his family to a new land
The little girl did not understand

The language she knew
Was Chinese
She spoke it with such ease
She thought, she must throw it away
The bits of her culture slowly stripped day by day

Forced to grow up, with blinding speed
She looks after, siblings needs
No time for her
She couldn't play
Duty and honour
The Chinese way

Mom and dad, working night and day
They do so much, for little pay
Food on the table
Their sacrifice
A warm home 
Within a land of ice

Through the years
A life is built
Yet the little girl, she is filled with guilt
She knows, there's been a sacrifice
Beneath the surface, of all that's nice

Many, many, years ago
Her grandfather was here
Away from her dad, for many years
Cooking for men, who worked the rail line
A small comfort when they would dine

Disposable humans
They took the risk
The horrors so many
To long too list
They needed their families
So far away
Yet the politicians, turned them away

The abuse he suffered
With all his friends
It seems now the Government 
wants to make amends
The past and future, are combined
You can't move forward
Without looking behind

The little girl, now grown up
For the past, she gives her thanks
Dreams from ties
She rides their rails
Blood and sweat 
from hammering nails
She hears echoes, from the past
It seems their gifts, were forged to last



My wife went to a forum where the government 
apologized for the awful things that were done
to the Chinese people who came to work in
Canada. So many Chinese men left their homes
in search of a better life for their families. They
were forced into slave like labour to build our
cross country railway. Many of them lost their 
lives in the process. They were not allowed to
bring their families. When the earlier generations 
came they were charged a head tax to move to Canada.
This discrimination was exclusive to Asian people.
This is a sad chapter in our Canadian History.
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