Interviewer: But like yeah, I- don't-know, your frosh week won't be as much fun I guess. Speaker: But this year is the double cohort, so everybody's all worried about admissions and things like that. We were planning the prom, the, grad night, and that too was.

Interviewer: You know Jalal, he wants to be a math professor. You two should go at it. You two should be the first math professors. That's what you want to be right? A math professor? Speaker: Or like a math teacher. The thing is, with U-of-T, I have the double cohort, right there, and I think that sucks. And if I'd applied to it this year, then there would have, I could have.

And uh so every year I take one- one or two courses that are a year-ahead, so you-know more than uh fast-tracking, because uh they don't really let you do that now, well with the double-cohort and what-not, but uh I 'm just kind-of trying to keep my options open, 'cause uh from what I hear, you hand in your top six uh your M marks-

... when I was in high- school, um, cause you were like, you have, you take different classes but you generally see the same people all the time because um, there was only like forty people in my grade and then when I graduated, there was a hundred-and-fifty cause of double-cohort but then, there were lots of cliques there so I- I- I got to know so many people. And at the beginning, like in grade nine and ten, I'd be close to one person for one week and then, close to another person the second week.

... the sense that people are stepping over on other people's backs to get what they need or want and um that didn't happen. There wasn't any of that um I- I had an imaginary sense of competition just- just because like the double-cohort and everything but um, there- there was never really any like um stepping over other people's backs or anything like that.

Interviewer: Are there a lot of rookies on the team? Speaker: Uh actually there are this year because of the double-cohort but I have to say there's probably about like seven or eight which is a lot compared to like last year, I think the turnover was two so.

Yeah, even though I lived so close I missed a lot of school and that wasn't very good considering well mainly my last year because it was the whole double cohort and I'd probably should have been--went to school more often. But now I 'm going to school in Mississauga. I am actually going more often which is kind-of a surprise because it's so far.

Speaker: And then school started and then I guess it was all- all the concern about double- cohort year oh, how am I going to get into university et-cetera, et-cetera so all this worrying and panic and I found that mm people generally around me were very unhappy, people were always stressed out about marks ...

Interviewer: And how do you feel about double cohort and grade thirteen being over and Speaker: I don't know um, they already started the double cohort right? Interviewer: Yeah. Speaker: Um, well we're the only cla-- the g-- country or province or that had it so I think it was bound to happen. It was just unfortunate for the students who got trapped in the-

Speaker: ... I obviously didn't get into the downtown campus right? For that couple of percent. Interviewer: Yeah sheer numbers right? Speaker: Well yeah because of the double-cohort right two grades going- whereas you-know in previous years I'm sure I would've gotten accepted. Interviewer: Right. What do you feel about them stopping grade-thirteen? What do you think of that? Speaker: I'm just a little upset that you-know it's my year you-know ...

Oh we were- well we were here. I remember when they- they dredged out the- the lake like for the big boats to go (inc) and um, I was living here then. (coughs) Sorry. 'bout, say about forty-five years ago?

I convinced Sam to dress up in like a suit, to the nines, and wear a fake-moustache.

Speaker: Oh well it was a means of getting from here to there (laughs) Interviewer: (inc.) exciting? Speaker: Not really, because, ah, it was- it was uh a lot of work having to clear all that snow away. Oh yeah the snow was huge- huge drifts. Interviewer: W-- Well what about the summertime? What was the summertime like? Speaker: The summer was lovely, just very much like we have now- I don 't think- I don 't recall it being as hot as it is today- now. No.

We had no income, nothing and so it was very scary for a few months until all of a sudden like a pile of money came in from you-know my freelance work and the E-I backdated from like you-know three months and so- and in between that I 'd done freelance work and I 'd done um lots of work on me because I 'm a constant- I found out I had A-D-D when I was twenty-three and it 's something

Yeah. I finish-- I graduated high-school just barely. Thank God the ah, the teacher's went on strike. Um, 'cause then we didn 't have to write our exams one year, or something happened where I- don-'t-know, I- that 's how I graduated. I-mean, I just barely eked by. But I, I started smo-- smoking pot like when I was sixteen and it kind-- kind-of became a habit.

Speaker: Yeah, same connections all at Newtonbrook and um, extended-French and French-Immersion. Emma Thrombly's in that and so I ve had a class with her as well. So I've known her through that.

You-know Newtonbrook is said a lot of times to be let's say more Russian but I was in the extended-french-program and there we were getting a lot of um, it was just a huge mix there. Um, however if you go to something- some of the clubs that are more like a softball or Scouts I found that it was a lot more middle-class-white.

Interviewer: She goes to Newtonbrook? Speaker: Yeah. She's in extended-French as-well. So yeah- Interviewer: Why was it important- I guess for your parents- that you learn French? Speaker: No, not at all actually um, it was more when I went to Newtonbrook I do pretty well in school and I was looking at the regular program and I thought Id be kind-of bored. And so I sat down and my mom had sat down and this other thing about extended-French. And so I sat down with this and I was like, "Oh, this is kind-of interesting."

Interviewer: How long have you been taking French? Speaker: Um I started extended French in grade seven and I did extended French in high-school as well so I took nine courses in French. I took um geography, history, civics, careers, computers all in French, and, including my French courses.

... after that I went to King-Edward-Public-School which is right at Bathurst and College. Um, so I went there for grade-seven and eight and I-think that was probably not a very good experience overall. Like it was okay like- a-- education-wise. Like I went there for extended-French and-all-that and I met some good friends there but I-mean, lots of like sort-of social conflicts started to happen ...