‘Scarberia’
This is my chosen place of residence: Scarberia (Scarborough, Ontario). After over 10 years living in different areas within Scarborough I can only say it certainly does not live up to its negative moniker, in fact, it has become my favourite area in the GTA if only for the sheer amount of excellent food options; East-, South-East Asian and Caribbean being among my favourites.
On the other hand…I wouldn’t call this a walkable neighbourhood. It’s a typical North-American, mostly car-centric, zoning by-law defined area which took some getting used to coming from the European continent. Within the decade I’ve spent here I’ve seen strip mall after corner store disappear, making way for cookie-cutter high rises with no discernible and hard-to-access commercial replacements below ridiculously overpriced, tiny apartment units.
Incorporated in 1850 and amalgamated into Toronto in 1998, Scarborough has always been an immigrant city from the moment it borrowed the name from it’s twin city in the UK. The current population of around 630,000 makes for a plethora of ethnicities present; from Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai, Filipino and Japanese to Indigenous, Indian, Iraqi, Somali, Ethiopean and Caribbean – and many more. In my first few years here I did a lot of driving around (as one does), discovering restaurants, shops, lively neighborhoods and dead-end streets, but there’s much more to do and see in Scarborough’s many parks, lake-side beaches and cliffs and other entertainment venues and festivals. Which is a good thing – especially in summer – because it does get cold and much more desolate than the big city here in winter.
‘Scarborough’ is much older than this. And Scarborough is (obviously and unfortunately) not a First Nations name – the closest Indigenous name being “Chi Sippi” for the Rouge River, which means Large Creek in Anishnaabemowin. The area has been settled for at least 10,000 years, and the appropriation of land through (gunshot) Treaties is still contested to this day as for 97% of that time, First Nations were in sole possession of the region.
This project hopes to give you a peek into the diverse identity of Scarborough and will be updated sporadically, with a printed work planned upon completion. Subscribe to the Sneakerzoom Bulletin to stay updated of its progress.
