Cana­dian Bear Bought In Winnipeg

I know that I’m still a lit­tle bit French, but as time went by, I also adapted to my new home.

I offi­cially became Cana­dian this sum­mer and I have been liv­ing in this coun­try for a lit­tle while now. I changed. I’m now a mix of two cul­tures, more even if you con­sider all the lit­tle quirks we picked up here and there while traveling.

Like many in Canada, I embrace the North Amer­i­can way of life while keep­ing some of my cul­ture. Cul­tural inte­gra­tion, not assim­i­la­tion.

Here is the list of ten clues that show my increas­ingly Cana­dian side.

PS: the bear wasn’t harmed in shoot­ing this picture.

Weather Fore­cast: I watch the Weather Chan­nel and actu­ally care about the fore­cast. I even dress accord­ingly. In Canada, the weather is an impor­tant mat­ter and can make a huge dif­fer­ence in your day. Weather changes are often bru­tal, from extremely hot to extremely cold, from mini-tornadoes to snow storm.

Casual Appear­ance: back in France, the first thing I used to do in the morn­ing was to put on make-up. Only after that I would get up, pack my bag and go to school. I find Cana­dian women much less picky about looks. We dress warmly because it’s the only way to sur­vive dur­ing the win­ter. It doesn’t mean that we look ugly, but let’s face it, cute lit­tle dresses and designer shoes are not gonna help. At work,  a lot of places are now scent-free, so for­get about per­fume. My skin is so dry in the win­ter that putting on make-up is a chore. and I’m afraid that if I wear mas­cara dur­ing the cold­est months, my eye­lashes will stuck together.

Gro­cery Shop­ping: if I want wine, I go the LCBO, if I want beer, I head to the Beer Store. Any­way, I know that booze isn’t sold in super­mar­kets. I know that milk comes in bags, I use maple syrup to sweeten my yogurt and pecan pies are one of my favorite del­i­cacy. And I can’t remem­ber the last time I bought a baguette — oh, let me think… yep, must have been on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.

Credit Cards: like a true North Amer­i­can, I have credit cards. It started with one, and then the bank gave me another one. I have some crazy high lim­its on both of them even though I barely use them and my annual salary isn’t great. I pay my bal­ance every month so that makes me a bad cus­tomer I guess. I don’t have debts and don’t want to cre­ate any.

Cana­di­an­ism Knowl­edge: I cel­e­brate July 1^st and know that our Thanks­giv­ing is before the Amer­i­can Thanks­giv­ing. I know who Terry Fox, Pierre-Elliott Trudeau and Wayne Gret­zky are. And I know bet­ter than men­tion­ing the 1995 ref­er­en­dum to a die-hard Que­bec separatist.

Apol­o­giz­ing: I have been told that Cana­di­ans apol­o­gize a lot, and I’m really sorry about that. Eh. I’m so Cana­dian that I lost my French bitch­i­ness: when I go back to France, peo­ple jump the queue in front of me and I apol­o­gize about that. I even caught myself say­ing sorry to some­one who had stepped on my foot in the sub­way in Paris.Canadians are used to this kind of over-politeness but French think I’m weird and not assertive enough.

Cig­a­rettes: I smoke Cana­dian brands unless my friends are nice enough to bring me car­tons of Amer­i­can cig­a­rettes when trav­el­ing. Not Native brands though. Amer­i­can cig­a­rettes can’t be find eas­ily here and they don’t taste the same. So I’m stuck with a whole range of weird, absolutely unknown local brands such as DuMau­rier and Play­ers.

Eng­lish and French: I can speak both at the same time. Like “I take a deci­sion about going to the dépan­neur now or later”, or “j’vais dri­ver down­town anywé”. And peo­ple under­stand per­fectly. Some­times, it’s actu­ally the only way to be under­stood by people.

Hockey: although I’m not the biggest fan around, I have been to a few hockey games, have cheered for a team, I know the rules and the lingo. Con­sid­er­ing hockey is a sport that most Euro­peans (not includ­ing Scan­di­navia) don’t know, it is def­i­nitely a proof of my canadianization.

Daily Life: I know that there is no mail deliv­ery on Sat­ur­day. I’m com­fort­able going shop­ping well past 7:00 pm because shops are open, unlike in France. Hell, I even shop on Sun­days! Phar­ma­cies are open 24/7 and they even sell food and drinks. There are hun­dreds of TV chan­nel to choose from, not just five… but the num­ber of com­mer­cial is pro­por­tion­ally higher and more annoy­ing. I can turn right at the red light when dri­ving and I can shovel snow if need. I know life in Canada!

For this meme, I tag Blue­fish, our new Cana­dian expat in Denmark!

Related posts:

1. 10 Clues I’m Still French
2. Seven (Cana­dian Win­ter) Facts
3. Cana­dian Souvenirs
4. A Cana­dian Mind­set (8÷10)
5. 10 Cana­dian Expressions