Ninth grader Melissa Nie has a Canadian passport. Her passport has been well-used by her family’s many moves from Vancouver to Nova Scotia to Iowa to Edina, Minnesota and finally to St. Paul following mostly her father’s position, among other things.

“Canada’s colder, but more hippie,” Nie said, describing the country she lived in until she was five. Like any true Canadian, Nie knows and loves her national anthem.

“All I remember from it are the words ‘Oh Canada, our home and native land‘,” she said.

Although a life of drawing, cello, and accelerated math through UMTYMP keeps her too busy to miss Canada too much, Nie will return to her home and native land in the future to fulfill a lifelong plot.

“Right before I die, I’m going to move back to Vancouver so my obituary says ‘Born in Vancouver, died in Vancouver’ and people think I lived in Vancouver all my life,” Nie said.