parva sub ingenti
Prince Edward Island is located in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, off the shores of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, on the East Coast of Canada. It is composed almost entirely of iron-rich red sand and sedimentary rock; the South Shore has tall russet cliffs, and the North Shore has hot, white-pink beaches.
Prince Edward Island has a population of about 140 000 (138 928 in the 2000 census). It has two cities, Charlottetown (its capital with a population of around 35 000) and Summerside (with a population of around 10 000). It has the highest population density of any province or even most states (24.5 duders per square klick), though that's not saying much because we're right small: 5 660.38 square kilometers. There is no wilderness; it's all either town, suburb, or farmland. (For American scale reference, Long Island is about 4 463 sq. km, which means PEI is about a quarter again bigger.)
It is divided into three counties, which are named (from west to east) Prince, Queen's, and King's.
It is represented in the federal Parliament of Canada by four ridings, named (from west to east) Egmont Riding, Malpeque Riding, Hillsborough Riding, and Cardigan Riding.
It is the traditional Mi'kmaq chieftainate of Epelwik, and has two nations, named (from west to east) Lennox Island First Nation and Abegweit First Nation.
Other historical names for Prince Edward Island include "Minegū," "Epelwik" (Mi'kmaq for "Lying on the Waves"), "Abegweit" (Mi'kmaq for "Land of the Red Soil"), and "l'Île-Saint-Jean" (St. John's Island – on some old Spanish maps, "Isla de San Juan"). Oh, and the hundreds upon hundreds of Japanese tourists we get every summer call us "Purintsu Edowādo Tō", which may or may not mean "MONSTER ISLAND."
Also known as P.E.I. In 400 years of history the only celebrity we could cough up was Lucy Maud Montgomery.
'R accents muyt naw' be as t'ick as dem up in Newfinland, but dey kin still git ruyt t'ick at tuyms, eh.
This is how they talk up in Tignish. In Charlottetown we at least have the grace to say our "th's." That's pretty much the only difference.
Some stoopit soundin', eh?
Any wonder so many Islanders are ashamed of it?
Many (but not all) inhabitants of Prince Edward Island suffer from a strange phenomenon I call "delusional island antagonism syndrome" or DIAS for short.
Visitors to P.E.I. (or "the Island") generally fall in love with the rolling green hills, the rich red clay, the hot white beaches, and the picturesque cityscape. Those who were born and raised on the Island, though, tend to either overlook this magical scenery, or view it as tied to the oppressive and ignorant agrarian society they hate. These sufferers of DIAS consider PEI a prison to escape, not someplace to which to move.
These poor souls often operate under the (false) belief that big cities have higher proportions of cool people. This just isn't the case. Big cities do have more cool people, but only because they have more people, more people of every sort – and therefore more ignorant, rude, stupid people as well. I've met lots of cool people that were raised in weird back-corners of a rural community or even a small city; I've also met scores and scores of incredibly uncool people who were raised in the big city.
To be sure, there are some places on P.E.I. I would never want to live. There are some places here where I would never want to raise children. And I've already acclimated myself to the need to move away, to a big city, in order to go to graduate school, and it is unlikely I'll ever live on P.E.I. after that. But P.E.I. is still one of the best places in the universe to live.
In order to make the most of living on P.E.I., you need the following things:
1. A good job that you like that pays fairly well. These can be hard to come by on P.E.I., but they do exist. Basically, you have to be able to do something and do it well, and love it. P.E.I. is expanding its Information Technology industry, so if you can program like a dervish, design and code bind-mogglingly spectacular HTML or Java script pages, or if you know hardware, and you can prove it, then you can get in good with a small company that may soon become an international corporation literally overnight – I've seen it happen. If you already have a bitch-ass job whereby you can work at home (like if you're a writer), then you can also make it great on P.E.I. Things might be a little more tough if you're academia, like a professor (my target career), since P.E.I. has only a single university, but I think that there's actually more business for universities in the Maritime provinces than is actually being tapped right now.
Noder's Note: The economy right now (2002) isn't so strong, so this is a bit harder to attain right now. Still, if you have serious skills you can get a decent job.
2. Internet access. P.E.I. has several great service providers with Island-wide (or almost Island-wide) coverage. This will keep you connected, and help fight the winter doledrums.
3. A credit card. People often complain that you can't get the best music or books in P.E.I. stores. Well, get a credit card and order on-line. It's not going to be all that more expensive, and the money you save on lower living expenses on P.E.I. will make up for it.
4. Something to do. On P.E.I., adventure doesn't come to you; you must go to it. Road-trips are fun, parties are fun, concerts (when they come) are fun, HomeGrown Productions theatre is fun. Keep busy.
In the immortal words of Luquid: "There's nothing wrong with P.E.I. that wouldn't be fixed by replacing everyone here with 150,000 immigrants." The cultural and racial homogeneity of P.E.I. is pretty much the only real count against it. It's a joke in Ontario that Islanders are a bunch of rednecks (though that myth disappears the further West you get). But I'm so anti-cultural that I don't even notice this white-bread hickdom; I'm not fond of my own culture, and I'm not really all that fond of anybody else's, either. That's a problem I'd have to deal with anywhere else just as much as I'll have to deal with it here.
Everyone loves P.E.I. in the spring and the summer; it's only when autumn and winter roll around, when everyone cool leaves for Nova Scotia or Ontario or British Columbia or Massachussetts, that DIAS starts to manifest. I'll give you this: Winter is pretty boring on P.E.I. But it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, see. Everyone decides that winter is boring, so they don't do anything and many people move away. If enough cool people stayed through the winter, Charlottetown could be party central of the Maritimes.
I think that P.E.I. should be declared The International Coolness Experiment (ICE). Interesting people with usefull skills and thoughtful perspectives from around the world should all move here. Then we'll see how redneck we are!
Other places to find Island-related stuff:
The Everything People Registry : Canada : Prince Edward Island
P.E.I.
.pe.ca
Charlottetown
Charlottetown Accord
University of Prince Edward Island
Comic Hunter
Touristy things to do when visiting PEI
Prince Edward Island Golf Courses
You know you're from Prince Edward Island if...
Top 10 Reasons to Live on Prince Edward Island
escaped islander
Anne of Green Gables
Dalvay-by-the-Sea
Baba's Lounge
Cedar's Eatery
Victoria Row
Café Diem
Brennan's
Peter Pan
silverorange (ansomatica is angry)
The marriage of Gluko and Watheria (I made it)
George Godfrey