Running head: MY NEIGHBOURHOOD NARRATIVE 1

My Neighbourhood Narrative

Name of Student

Affiliate Institution
MY NEIGHBOURHOOD NARRATIVE 2

A Night to Remember

Ever since my Mom and I came to Toronto four years ago, life had been quite
exciting, especially in my neighbourhood. We bought a house just next to our Chinese
neighbour’s house, who had earlier upon our arrival to Toronto rented us their basement for
some time. There was a Christian church across our house, with a park southeast of it. I
would take a stroll through the park after having my lunch. Sometimes I would walk to the
Parkway Mall for my favourite cocoa milk tea. The plaza that was right at the back of our
house had supermarkets, banks, fast food joint, and a shopping mall. There was also a
Chinese supermarket not far from the Expressway 401 highway that is further west where I
used to buy my Chinese snacks.

One Saturday evening as I was on my way to the Parkway mall for my coco milk tea,
I felt something was a bit off, at the moment I couldn’t put a finger on it, I went ahead for my
tea, less observant of the drastic change in the atmosphere. I chose the table next to the
window facing Victoria Park Avenue, where I would enjoy the taste of my creamy beverage,
sliding down my throat as I watch fitness enthusiasts running towards both directions along
Victoria Avenue.

Lost in my glorious moments, a violent vibration, as it felt, made me spill the tea on
my thighs, I dashed off my table petrified not knowing what had just transpired. To my
disappointment, it was my phone ringing. Mama had just arrived in the house from work.

“Hello, Mum!” I answered the phone disheartened, I had not fully recovered from the scare.

“Where are you?” she continued in an outraged tone.

” I’m at the Parkway mall”, I answered.

“Come to the house quickly, are you not seeing the brewing storm?”, she said.

At that moment is when I took notice of the heavy dark clouds that seemed to hang loosely in
the sky, causing a sea of darkness, it started getting windy (winds around 45 or 50 mph). I got
scared and took to my heels heading home.

Leaves from trees started flying everywhere, branches started breaking off the trees. I
struggled through the mighty wind as I tried to get home, I almost gave up. Lucky enough I
managed to get home, I found mum trying to cover the rare window with an old bed we had,
MY NEIGHBOURHOOD NARRATIVE 3

the heavy wind was howling at the window. Lights flickered, a loud gust blew causing
windows to rumble, at this point, mum got terrified. Two hours down the ordeal, the winds
got even stronger, making squealing noises, we went silent for a while. Suddenly, the lights
went off, the whole neighborhood had lost power, I could hear sounds interchanging between
a howling wolf and a train. We were all scared to a point that I hid under the bed as Mum
locked herself in the closet, we were waiting for the world to end that night.

We stayed in our hiding places till around 5 am when the winds had finally faded
away, the heavy rain that had joined the party was now reduced to drizzles, things were
slowly coming back to normal. We stayed in until the morning light then we went out to
assess the mess. Objects scattered everywhere, power lines crisscrossed along the road, trees
in the park bent to all possible angles, others snapped in half.

Together with our neighbours, we started cleaning up clearing the pathways, each
household narrating their experience. All we shared in common was the fact that we were still
alive.