The Blue Notebook

When Lina arrived in Toronto from Manila, she carried two suitcases and a small blue notebook.

Her aunt met her at the airport, speaking quickly in a mix of English and Tagalog.

Lina smiled and nodded, although she understood only half of the words.

On her first day at school, a boy asked her where she was from, and she did not know what to say.

In Manila, she had never thought about that question.

Here, everyone seemed to want a clear answer.

After class, she sat alone and wrote in her notebook: 'I am Lina.

I am from Manila.

I am also here now.' Writing these simple lines helped her feel less lost.

A girl named Grace, who had moved from Vietnam two years earlier, invited her to join the homework club.

Grace said she still kept a notebook too, full of words she was learning.

Slowly, Lina began to add English words next to her Tagalog ones, and the pages started to look like a map of her new life.