During my haircut in Manhattan this morning (at 07:30... can you believe that?), the barber asked where I'm from and I replied, "Calgary, Canada."
Barber: "How far is that from here?"
Me: "About 4 or 5 hours flight."
Barber: "That far?"
Me: "Calgary's in the west. It's north of Montana."
The barber's co-worker overheard this and explained to him, "It's French Canada that's close to here. American Canada is further."
The co-worker continued, "It's easier to get into Canada... as long as you have $50,000, you're in. They have a lot of wood-working jobs up there, right?"
I thought about it and commented, "Yep, there probably are."
For those who don't get it, the term is usually English Canada. This is definitely the first time I've heard it referred to as American Canada.
Why did this happen? Are we not putting in enough effort to portray an accurate image to the rest of the world? Interesting...
Fight Comics!
12 years ago
1 comment:
Dude! Good to see another blog among my peeps! New York looks amazing. I have to admit I'm a little jealous. I really only see the inside of my house, my school and the twenty minutes or so of sidewalk in between, and you're out seeing the sights in the Big Apple. Interesting note about the reflective globe that you said was a gift from Italy...when I was in Italy they had an identical sculpture in the Vatican (or maybe that's the same one). Kinda cool, at any rate. I have pictures of it when it was still there.=)
As for the 'American Canada' comment...I don't want to imply that all Americans are ignorant, because I know that's not true, but they do have a tendency towards more cultural insularity, and as such I think that lack of understanding is more common than perhaps it should be.
Anyway, digging the blog! It'll be good to hang out this weekend (provided school has not done me in by then).
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