Canadian Appreciation Week – A Quick Thank You
I’ve been horrible. I never referenced the people that started this whole activity.
A big round of applause should go out to Bluemichy and Canadianprariegirl for their warm idea of paying homage to our country.
While I haven’t done everything exactly according to plan, I do admire people that implement good ideas (more on this later).
Photographia Canadiana
In the spirit of being a day behind, I exascerbate the loathing felt towards my horrible punctuality by not even posting any photos here.
Again, I do have a website of photographs, and most of them are taken in Canada.
While everywhere in the world has beauty, I love the feeling I get when I take a photo of a maple leaf. I’m a big softie that way.
So, let’s play a game. Go visit my photography page, go to the galleries, and see if you can tell me where all the photographs of landscapes were taken.
I mean, it should be pretty easy.
You can write your guesses in the comments section like so: Gallery 1, 2nd photo from the top, Toronto, Ontario
Bonus points if you can be even more specific than that.
Canadianisms
Here in Canada, we have so many attributes that others from all over the world point out…
- Patience
- Friendliness
- Willingness to Help
- High Tolerance to Alcohol
- Military Micropower
- Not American
This list is small, and only a few of those items are true.
Rather than go into the typical writ of Canadianisms, I will list the various types of people you will find in Canada that call themselves Canadian (special thanks to Dave for help with this list)…
The Canucklehead – This is the typical, beer-swilling, laid-back person you all know and love. Always in a toque and jeans, this loveable soul finishes all sentences with the typical ‘eh’. You’ll usually find this person on a patio somewhere, drinking Keiths and talking about Hockey or politics. Oh wait, those are the same thing…
The Homesicker – These are people that immigrated to Canada for a better life, and yet do nothing but talk about how awesome their home country was in comparison. Frankly, I don’t understand why these people are here when they are obviously so in love with their previous home. Pride is one thing, but dissing your current locale is not cool.
Alienated Easterner – Perhaps French. Perhaps not. Well, nix the ‘perhaps not’. Separatism is always a threat we Canadians face. Québec leaving would really suck. I don’t know how some people there can feel unappreciated when so many from other provinces flock to Québec to get away from it all. I, personally, have never come into contact with any disgruntled Québecois. I just hear about them on the news and from friends who like to make up stories.
Self-Important West – Again, I don’t think I’ve ever come across anyone from the West who wasn’t friendly and patriotic about the whole country. I wonder if the media makes up stories about how the West takes its financial success too seriously. Seriously enough to want to be their own country. How would they defend themselves? The HMS Haida is in Hamilton! Isn’t that our only defence?
AIA – The Americans In Awe. I have met people from this group. They are folks from South of the border who move up here for a better life and find it. Mind you, these people moved up when one american dollar could buy a thousands-square-foot house in the rich neighbourhoods in any major Canadian city. It’s nice to see people that appreciate the country though. Refreshing.
The Chinese – Probably the largest visible ethnic group [Thank you, Captain Obvious – Dave]. I honestly believe that Canada should be called Chinada. Take a cross section of my friends, for instance, and you’ll find that half of them are Chinese. I hear a lot of people complaining about Hong Kong money and rich kid syndrome and such. However, these ‘rich folks’ were unfairly put to work ages ago building railroads and suffering. Now a lot of them are highly successful because of hard work, either from where they came from or right here (or both!). All of my Chinese friends appreciate living here. Folks from India run a close second in sheer volume and friendliness. Europe is third.
Rick Mercer – ‘Nuff said.
Overly Sensitive People – People that take offence to things in this entry that aren’t meant to offend anyone. Read carefully!
That’s my list. There are many other ethnic groups and such, but this isn’t meant to be a serious entry (except for perhaps the parts that speak of my appreciation for certain things).
A Final Word About the Hug Syndrome
I’ve been noticing people posting long comments usually made up primarily of the word hug.
This is just plain annoying. I referred earlier to good ideas. This hug thing is a bad idea.
I understand the intentions are good, and that people are trying to spread love.
But honestly, I think most people would appreciate that the comments would have something to do with the article they worked hard to write.
I don’t mind the word hug. I’m just saying that maybe there can be some substance to a comment, rather than a simple cut-and-paste message.
Honestly, though, someone’s gotta say something.
People begin to glower at Jorge, thinking him the Grinch of Spaces….
Filed under: General Dialogue, Ponderings, Rants, Spaces Archive |
Barking Space 
I love what you’ve said about those comments. I don’t know any seperatists either. Actually, since I had the privilege of working for our parliament, where I met with senators and members of parliament on a daily basis, and had colleagues that literally came from every corner of the country, I can honestly say that I love the makeup of our country. I think it’s great that at parliament there would be swarms of people, and you couldn’t tell the Canadians from the tourists, because we come in all sorts of packages. And I do think that a big deal is made about the divisions between provinces, but I have family in Vancouver (though sadly, I’ve never been) and family in the east coast, and friends sprinkled everywhere in between, and we may have a few bad apples but for the most part, this is a great place to live and a great people to know.
OK, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that all your landscapes were taking in Algonquin Park. (Please don’t call it the Gonk….sounds like a disease!) Did I win? What do I win? hehehe I agree with you on the hug thing. While I think it was started with the best of intentions and it is definitely nice to get hugs (real or virtual), they just don’t seem very sincere when you copy & paste the same (BIG) block of text into the comments section of 10 or 20 blogs. I’ve said it before about those who just go around and write something like “just blog hopping” or whatever, I’d much rather see a comment that has some relevance to the blog entry I’ve written. Peace, Cat
Merry Meet Just sending out well wishes Hope that your day is going well.. Hope that you stop in at «~*The Majestic Realm*~»
St-Martini-of-the-Vodka — you should definitely come out to Vancouver to visit your family! Vancouver rocks! But I wouldn’t recommend coming right now, as it’s raining… it supposed to clear up next week tho, or so they tell us….
Jesus H…. See what I mean?
Overly sensitive people … *Karen raises her hand in the air with the faintest blush across her cheeks* lol
LOL ditto on the hug thing! I will check out the photos, however it is 3:20 am right now, I just finished clearing out my basement due to a minor flood from the now 6 days of rain in CT!! You post gave me a good chuckle I needed that tonight! oh and this is just for you hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug,hug, hug,hug ect..ect..ect ect…still hugging………..yep Im still hugging you…..hug….hug….ok going to bed now LOL see ya around! oh btw hugs :)~evil grin
Hi Jorge…. Thanks for popping in and saying all the sweet things about my tribute to Ian’s space…. you too have a great space…..and I tell everyone to pop in and see your stuff…. about the hug thing…oops I think I may have also done that a few times…..hope you forgive me…. Have a magical weekend…. Cheers… Diana
I’m with you on the hug thing… it’s a nice gesture… but READ my BLOG! 🙂 THEN give me a hug… Heh… my Nona and Zizi (Auntie) are displaced Europeans… they complain BITTERLY about AMERICAN politics. It’s funny. I wonder if they realize that we ARE NOT AMERICAN!? They continuously rant about how much better life was “back home” in Italy. It’s funny. because it’s really NOT better back home in Italy! They’d probably just be complaining there too. It’s like, their favourite past-time. That and trying to FEED ME TO DEATH… which I am NOT complaining about. 🙂
With you on the hugging thing….. I rather enjoyed this particular entry. 🙂 YAY!! Hope you’re having a great weekend, I’m off to clean things. Linette
Can “Majestic” please take foot out of mouth? Clearly this individual didn’t read what you just wrote. *sigh* 😉 Cat
aw babe, you’re not the grinch. although it could be a fun goal. the one we all love and tolerate depite his grinchiness. lol true dat, rick mercer IS ’nuff said. hehe, glad i was part of the ‘good’ things list. and with that; ‘hugs’ and hearts. (HAHAHA, dont hate me because im sarcy!) *winks* me.
I’m always clarifying. 🙂 Essentially, I know that everyone succumbs to the hug weakness every once in a while. For example, if Cat posted “Have a great Day” and that was it, I would most likely not really get pissed about it, because she’s a regular reader. It’s the people who post nothing BUT impersonal crap that I’m referring to. Just so you know. J
Canada rocks, anybody who doesn’t think so should be kicked in the shins!
Love, An American
I’m still hugging you!!!! oh whats this?….oh look its another hug! LOL
You need to get a patent for the rip cord furniture!! youll be rich!!! LOL i havent laughed that hard in a while, its nearly 2 am it was the last thing I expected to read. thanks for the laugh kelly
You take amazing photgraphs! It inspires me to take a photo of something beautiful (or weird, for that matter) instead of either trying to remember it or somehow taking the object (i.e., picking a flower instead of photographing it). I think I’ll start bringing my camera with me more often.
Well put Jorge. And I agree – the hug thing is a little too much…but then again, I do like to ramble on, so maybe I’m just jealous of the space it takes up…hmm
Oh My God Thank You. Someone had to say something about that hug thing. whew! Q