When I think of restau­rant areas, the down­town part of Bank Street isn’t the place that comes to mind first. To me, Bank Street equals great bak­eries and a long string of cof­fee shops—not great food. But on a cold Fri­day night, my favourite foodie part­ner and I didn’t want to walk too far so we ended up at Taste Ramen+Fusion, a new restau­rant that took the place of the old Ichibei.

For the first two years I was in Canada, it was fairly obvi­ous I was new to the coun­try. Not only I didn’t speak Eng­lish very well but the North Amer­i­can way of life was a nov­elty to me. I didn’t know the local cus­toms, prod­ucts and cul­ture. I never really researched Canada the way a lot of prospec­tive immi­grants do because I just hap­pened to land in the Great North Strong and Free by chance.

Most places in the Byward Mar­ket are over­priced and cater to tourists. Planet Cof­fee is one of the excep­tions. The court­yard is quiet and the atmos­phere very relaxed. While there seems to be a big turn-over of staff (that or I really don’t have a good mem­ory for faces!) it still feels like a neigh­bour­hood cof­fee shop.

Thanks to glob­al­iza­tion, no mat­ter where you go these days, you will prob­a­bly expe­ri­ence a lesser cul­ture shock than the great explor­ers did a few cen­turies ago. Famil­iar brands and fran­chises took over the planet and local cus­toms and lifestyles were exported well beyond their orig­i­nal bound­aries. But it’s not always the same. Or rather, it’s the same… just dif­fer­ent. Here are a few exam­ples between France and North America.