Cultural Differences

I'm currently streaming CBC Radio One through the web. The news is reported every half hour, along with the weather. The announcer just relayed the weather: partly cloudy and 20° in Toronto. The temperature, of course, is in degrees Celsius. The thought rose unbidden, "Hmm. The USA must not import Canadian thermometers..." I don't know why this idea occurred to me. It's probably not right; I mean, just because they use a different system doesn't mean the manufacturers can't put different numbers on the edge of a piece of plastic. But this thought served to highlight the rift between Canada and the United States. Speaking from south of the border, it really is a different country up there. Not just because it actually is... But there's been a mystique about Canada ever since the Vietnam War. It's the stereotype that Canadians are different, so it makes the differences that do exist seem larger.

This realization of my true perspective disgusts me. As much as I try to be open-minded, I do have that element of the "ugly American" in me. Fundamentally, I have to see things from an American perspective. I haven't had the chance to develop any new ones. Just listening to one Canadian radio station isn't that much at all. For one thing, the CBC itself is only one side of the story. There are other radio frequencies out there.

However, taking what I've heard into account, Canada seems as close to Utopia as any place can be. One morning, the news reported "a terribly bloody day in Toronto," because two people were shot dead in the streets. I remember thinking, "Only two?" Murders are so common around here that they don't get that much attention anymore. So much for the Right to Bear Arms. On Canada Day, three men were photographed urinating on a war memorial. The pictures caused a national uproar. This makes me both sad and somehow nostalgic. Memorials can be covered in toilet paper and silly string and other junk, and the maintenence people just sigh and clean it up. I feel like it would be wonderful to live where people care about respecting war dead.

But the other half of the report featured people saying, "Set an honor guard, like America does at the Tomb of the Unknowns! They take care of their heroes." Excuse me while I scoff. It's all political, trying to make it look like the government cares. Under this administration, people are worth more dead than alive. Send soldiers into war without adequate protection, and then make a huge fuss when they come back draped in the flag. Veterans get left to make it on their own, when many have lost their jobs because of the length of time they've been overseas, and others from previous conflicts get screwed over by this new Medicare thing. And still, the news about the war in Iraq usually only reports American casualties. Nobody says anything about the thousands of civilians who have died, unless it's "Another terrible attack, forty dead including three Americans and another seventy wounded," and then some clips of parents who have lost children, crying and screaming. It's sick.

One day I will travel. I will meet people and learn things. Canada seems like a good place to start.