Is our country too big? So my friend moved to BC to go to law school and he says people are different. He finds the people there... difficult. Difficult to get to know, uncomfortable with familiarity, clic-ish... distant... etc. And I wonder, is it true? He's lived around (Toronto, California, Vermont, Halifax... that's all I can think of...) so he has some basis for this judgement. Are they different? Are they stand-offish? Are we *too* friendly, *too* familiar on this coast? Are we different enough to be seperate countries? Are we more like Maine and Boston then those Van City ilk?
I hope not. I'd like to believe that's not the case. This is clearly an irrational impluse based on some external and ill-fitting nationalism. Canadian's don't have a national identity. That's our national identity. And I think that's pretty cool. This post-referendum Canada with the panicked national identity is mildly interesting rush job. It's like a parade or fireworks, interesting momentarily but quickly forgotten. It won't stick. We all kind of know that. We are happy the rest of Canada is out there, glad we are there, glad not to be struggling to belong. Mostly, we are quite pleased to be defined as 'not Americans.' That's our strongest bond.
Well, except the Reform party, er Conservative party, er whatever, they want to be Americans. I think that's why they will never win.
Today's Song of the Day is 'Strange Town' by The Jam off their 1983 album "Snap!"
Crazy Fact: Hugely popular and influential in England, the Jam are hardly recoginzed in North America. weird.
njoy
2 comments:
It's true it's true! Everybody says so. Even I, mr go out and steal their hearts, am having a much easier time blending into Berlin Germany than I had in Vancouver. And I did extreme things. I did a bloody tri-athalon and couldn't get anyone to share a beer with me. I didn't really care, I just thought it was kind of sick. I mean it was really hard! Normally you celebrate surviving a kind of thing like that, you build a bond!
I advise 'leb to hit them. I think they need to get hit. Just gently, just enough to shock them into realizing there are other people in the room. Whack.
Germans are more social, and that's whack. Northern Germans anyway... But Californians are cool, at least the ones who travel to europe...
Nationalism is defunct. That's one of the things I like about Canada - we are proud of being humble. We give a parade to a bronze medalist (hockey notwithstanding).
I think it's absurd to think that the artificial lines we draw across the face of the globe somehow unite people that are living thousands of miles apart. Nations and empires are things of the past.
The internet unites like-minded people much more than any political party ever will. Just look at the audience of your blog. People from all over the world carrying on a sporadic conversation.
I'd love to see Canada join the USA. We would fuck their shit up.
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