Robert Brehl: Kate and Wills should feel at home in PEI

By  Robert Brehl, Catholic Register Special
  • June 22, 2011

The upcoming royal tour by Prince William and his new bride Kate is sure to be an exciting spectacle for Canadians, monarchists and non-monarchists alike. This young and vibrant couple has energized the increasingly stodgy royal family, and Canadians are eager to get an up-close glimpse.

Our family will be in Prince Edward Island when the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge arrive there July 3. My wife and 12-year-old daughter have already mapped out their “stalking route” to see the royals.

I predict the royal couple will find the tiny island, which is half Catholic, to be the most unique place on their tour. Nothing against Ottawa, Montreal and Calgary, but they’re cities — all with at least five times more people than the entire population of PEI. Urban areas are nothing new to this royal couple.

But PEI is different, even a little quirky. And that’s what we love about the place and why we bought a cottage there. Take honesty, for instance. Two years ago, PEI honesty made international headlines after a gust of wind knocked a $10,300 bag of cash out of the hand of a rental property owner on his way to the bank. Cars stopped. People jumped out of Charlottetown restaurants and stores. Everyone scurried to the street to collect the money. But no one pocketed a thing. Every last dollar was returned to the fellow. How’s that for honesty?

I am lucky to have my own PEI honesty story. Last summer, unbeknownst to me, the clasp broke on my expensive Cartier watch I had won in a charity raffle (I could never afford to buy one) and the watch fell off while we were walking along the beach. A young man found the watch, came up to me and asked if I had lost a watch. I described it and he handed it to me, declining a gift of gratitude.  Kate and Wills may not lose a watch or cash (Royals don’t carry money, according to Academy Award winner The King’s Speech) but they’ll get a sense of this honesty in the eyes of the people. There is sure to be a warm welcome to the future head of the Church of England and his bride, even if they happen to be “FA”s.

FA, as in “From Away,” is anyone not born on PEI. Nothing removes that label. I’ve been going there two or three times a year for 15 years and I am still most definitely an FA. Heck, an elderly woman who was born in Boston, moved to PEI as a little girl, lived her entire life on the island, recently died in her 90s and the newspaper obituary referred to her as an FA. In PEI, things slow down — way down — compared to the hectic pace of big-city life. One time I called a golf course for a tee time. The fellow said he had a spot at 11:30 to which I responded it was already noon. After a pause, he said, “Where do the day go?” This slower pace will allow the royals to relax and show off their regal realness.

Visitors tend to change when they cross the Confederation Bridge or land at Charlottetown airport. “Big” problems just don’t seem so big. I bet something similar happens to the royals. The island charm has to touch them, even with a large media entourage in tow. Another thing the royals will notice on their first trip to the island is that the people use the English language a little differently. They will say maysil when what they mean is might as well, as in “Your Royal Highness, maysil leave Charlottetown now for Cavendish to see the Green Gables homestead.”

Or, they’ll say they’ve lived their entire live on the oyland, instead of island. When they talk about going “up west”, they are most certainly not talking about the part of the royal tour in Alberta. That is “out west”. Up west is Summerside or further west on the oyland.

Kate and Wills will have a great experience on Canada’s gentle, but windy, island. Prince Edward Island is named after William’s great-great-great-great-great grandfather (Queen Victoria’s father) so the royal couple should feel right at home on the oyland.

They’d be welcomed to stop by for a cuppa King Cole tea at our little cottage, just a half hour up east from Charlottetown!

(Robert Brehl lives in Port Credit, Ont., and cottages in St. Peters Harbour, PEI.)

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