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Carlos Velasco
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 02 August 2019
Location: Spain
Posts: 280
Posted: 15 November 2019 at 2:12pm | IP Logged | 1 post reply

I have lived all my life in Spain and never visited any country outside Europe, and I know certain distinguished users of this forum have lived in both the USA and Canada.

As an European, I have some notions. Canada is colder, there are fewer people, more lakes and less guns... and in many areas French is the official language, but... what are the other, more subtle differences? Food, music, politics...

Edited by Carlos Velasco on 15 November 2019 at 3:42pm
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Steve Coates
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 17 November 2014
Location: Canada
Posts: 733
Posted: 15 November 2019 at 3:24pm | IP Logged | 2 post reply

...and in many areas French is the officiallanguage...

Canada is officially bi-lingual (English and French).

I would imagine Alaska can get as cold as any place in Canada.

Fewer people but never less than. 

Lots of lakes, but blame the ice age. 

Guns, surprise! Canada is still in the top 10.


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Eric Sofer
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 31 January 2014
Location: United States
Posts: 4789
Posted: 15 November 2019 at 8:40pm | IP Logged | 3 post reply

Carlos, as I live in Cleveland, there probably can't be many comparisons in low temperatures. We get below zero days and we get blizzards*, so that's kind of a push. Of course, we have areas in the USA that suffer hotter temperatures and flashfires and droughts, which I guess don't occur in Canada. I wish to suffer none of these.

It is said that Canadians are more polite than Americans. But I've seen rudeness up north, and acts of kindness around here. Probably another push.

The governments are a little different, but similar enough that we know the taste of each other's tea.

Some interesting differences in food - poutine is just about unknown in the US, and I'd wager not many Canadians know what grits are.

Canadians seem to follow the European model, and don't add ice to drinks much (fast food outlets excepted.)

But mostly, the USA is a big country, and Canada even bigger. Probably, there are as many differences between eastern and western Canada as there are between the US and Canada.
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Peter Hicks
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 30 April 2004
Location: Canada
Posts: 1879
Posted: 15 November 2019 at 8:40pm | IP Logged | 4 post reply

With regards to food, we are not as obsessed with deep frying everything as the USA is.   Restaurant food costs more in Canada because we pay our workers more.

Politically, we are a full step to the left of the USA.  Yes, we too have some people who hate immigrants, want to ban abortion, less gun control, etc., but that is an extreme right wing view in Canada that does not get much traction in elections.   We have government run health care and nobody is talking about replacing that with a private system.  The last Conservative government dared to raise the age for retirement benefits from 65 to 67 and well, they're not in power anymore.   

When the CBC reporter returned to Canada after covering Washington for many years, he summed up something I had never found the words for: "In the US, there is a crackle of excitement in the air that you never find in Canada."  Maybe it's only because I am a visitor, but whenever I have been in the US, I have also felt a tension of the unknown when I step on the street in the US.  It's as if anything could happen that day: I could invent something and make a fortune; or I could rub someone the wrong way who has a concealed gun and wind up in the morgue.   Canada is jus more predictable than that.

While we still have many gun owners, we just don't have the gun worship or paranoia of the US that fuels the use of guns against our fellow citizens.  And alongside that, our social programs prevent the sort of extreme poverty that fuels a lot of crime and violence.  In 2018, Toronto had 96 murders; Chicago is slightly smaller than Toronto, and had over 500 homicides that year.   

Canada is of course colder.  The majority of our population lives within 100 km of our southern border so that the climate is more tolerable (and economic trade with the US).   

What else do you want to know?
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Carlos Velasco
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 02 August 2019
Location: Spain
Posts: 280
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 2:59am | IP Logged | 5 post reply

Whoa, that was pretty informative! Thanks Peter... and thanks Eric too, I just discovered two new exotic meals: poutine and grits.


Edited by Carlos Velasco on 16 November 2019 at 3:00am
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Philippe Negrin
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 01 August 2007
Location: France
Posts: 2644
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 3:21am | IP Logged | 6 post reply

Peter wrote : In 2018, Toronto had 96 murders; Chicago is slightly smaller than Toronto, and had over 500 homicides that year.  

That is horrifying...similar cities in a relatively close area...such a big difference...
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John Byrne

Grumpy Old Guy

Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132133
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 9:26am | IP Logged | 7 post reply

Trying to define the difference between the US and Canada comes up against one big stumbling block: there is no "Canada". No unified whole, where everything is the same. British Columbia is as different from Newfoundland as Texas is from Connecticut.

Come up with a definition of one whole "Canada" and eight of the provinces will disagree with it.

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John Harrison
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 27 July 2007
Posts: 1441
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 9:31am | IP Logged | 8 post reply

When I was last in Toronto it hard to get used to getting so much coin change.  I ended up emptying my pockets of it as a tip for a taxi driver that did me favor.  I probably gave him 30 loonies and all of the smaller coins.  I would guess that isnt a factor as much now w debit cards and Apple pay etc but at the time it was like they avoided using paper currency as much as possible where as I being from states was so used to the opposite.  
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Peter Hicks
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 30 April 2004
Location: Canada
Posts: 1879
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 10:46am | IP Logged | 9 post reply

"Come up with a definition of one whole "Canada" and eight of the provinces will disagree with it."
**************************************
Canada loves hockey.  *drops mic*

No, JB is right.   Canada is divided into many subcultures:Maritimes, Quebec, southwestern Ontario, northern Ontario, the Prairies, BC, the north.   About the only thing we agree on is how much we all despise Toronto.

But I see the same subdivisions in the US: New England, the South, the Great Lakes, the Heartland, Pacific Northwest, California, those two weird islands in the bottom right of the national map.   

You just cannot have uniformity in countries so big that they have different climates within themselves.  If we have any members from Russia, they would probably tell us about a dozen different regions where people are quite different.  


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Michael Hogan
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 2052
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 11:30am | IP Logged | 10 post reply

In my opinion, the main difference between the USA and Canada is the
bacon. It’s all about the bacon.
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Josh Goldberg
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 25 October 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 2065
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 11:58am | IP Logged | 11 post reply

Fun fact: when watching American TV and movies, I know who the Canadian actors are when they say "project", as in, "I'm working on a very interesting project."

American English speakers pronounce it as "prah-ject"

Canadian English speakers pronounce it as "pro-ject"
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Rob Ocelot
Byrne Robotics Member


Joined: 07 December 2008
Location: Canada
Posts: 1231
Posted: 16 November 2019 at 12:33pm | IP Logged | 12 post reply

Ketchup flavoured potato chips.

That's the only difference.































(and the spelling the spelling of 'flavour')
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