I live in Malaysia 11 1/2 months of the year. I get 17 days in Canada. And as much as I love Malaysia and its people, especially the staff and students at CPU-Taylors where I work,  there is no place on earth like Canada.

There is no other country so vast, so unspoiled, so rich in natural beauty that at every turn it can take your breath away. There is no other country so noble that it would turf a sitting prime minister and reduce his 160+ seats in Parliament to just two in the following  election on the suspicion of corruption! No other country that has never fought a war of aggression and yet has stood with its allies and friends in every just conflict. No other country that has withstood an unprovoked war on its own soil by the United States, and having driven them back across the border and re-established its sovereignity over its own land promptly re-established diplomatic and friendly relations with the States.

Canada was the first modern nation to outlaw slavery in 1798 as the first act of the first legislature ever convened in this country in Niagara-on-the-Lake, thirty years before William Wilberforce in England and 60 years before Abraham Lincoln in the States proposed similar legislation. Canada was the first to propose a peace-keeping force of the United Nations and has participatesd in each one of its initiatives since conception, often at the tragic loss of Canadian lives.

Canada has a free press and a free people. We do not carry guns and we do not advocate violence. We open our border to immigrants and students from around the world and do our best to understand their customs and their ways. We are a loving, just and generous people, and in a world of war, deprivation and corruption where people are persecuted for their race, their faith, their gender and their political opinions, this country is a testimony to the potential for decency in an often degraded world.

Canada is also the home of my friends, children and grandchildren, all of whom I hope to see shortly. I have missed you all dearly,  and although by God’s good design and purpose I must live far away from you at present, you are never far from my thoughts. See you all soon!