Felicitous Canada Day

As I write this the country in which I am currently present within is celebrating it's Day. It is currently 15:49 local time and the extent of the celebrations in the local town (Banff - lovely) seem to extend only to a general redness of clothing and various enthusiastic people wearing national dress (Canadian kit from various sports - hockey, american football, proper football, tiddlywinks) and also cruel/humourous parents putting the uniform of the Canadian mounted police on their overweight children (I am not in a Mountie uniform as I dressed myself today). Some particularly pro-Canadian enthusiasts have decided to wear small Canadian flags in their heads, which is either admirable or silly.

Since today is such a celebratory day I thought I would add a surreptitious burst of cynicism, by detailing a few of the observations that were observed by me in the course of my observing Canada so far. I certainly think there is an abundance of fresh-faced naivety and enthusiasm present in Canada (Banff especially) that isn't present in the UK. This may have a lot to do with their extreme weather conditions (blazing sun in the summer, snow in the winter) and also the abundance of actual wildlife (bears, wolves, moose, eagles) that simply aren't present in Britain, where grey drudgery is commonplace all year round and a curmudgeonly goat is the most feral of the indigenous fauna. As a native of the Royal Kingdom of Cynicism I find the chipper "hey there!" attitude of the Canadians (the ones I've met at least) refreshing, though mostly grating and aggravating. This lack of cynicism manifests itself most succinctly in the naming of the shops in the area, my particular 'favourite' being The Unique Rocky Mountain Souvenir Store Ltd, which is of course unique inasmuch as its products are indistinguishable from the products of every other shop in the area.

As a short aside I would like to vent my annoyance at a tube located in the bathroom of the establishment where I am staying which bears the words Green Tea | Conditioner. My problem with this product is that I feel these two items are mutually exclusive, it is either conditioner, and therefore for your hair, or green tea, and therefore for the bin. I used my powers of deduction and concluded that since it is in the bathroom it is most likely a product for your hair, but I feel nothing should be taken for granted whilst in strange lands.

One thing Canada has aplenty is mountains, you can't turn around without seeing a mountain. Because they are huge. I suppose if you are indoors, with the curtains drawn, you might not be able to see a mountain. Unless you live on top of one and have opted for a natural floor. But that would be stupid, and cold. My main problem with the mountains (apart from them being marketed as 'Bear Country', is it still Canada or not?) is the ample warnings you are given by jutting wooden plaques to "Stay on the Path". The justification given for this is that by not using the path, hikers will cause erosion of the mountain, and the signs also admonish that previous hiking has already left much scarring on the mountainside. My main issue with this is that mountains, as a rule, are made out of rock. As in from the phrase 'rock-hard'. I appreciate that erosion will eventually have an effect on the mountain, but from the rather harsh weather the mountains have had to withstand I hardly think a couple of monkeys clambering up its side is going to have such a huge effect. Especially since the mountains are the habitat of bears and goats. It is the term 'scarring' that I find quite intruiging aswell, as to avoid scarring, hikers are being advised to stay on the path, which is, unless I am very much mistaken, a huge scar gouged out of the mountainside. Instead of scarring the mountains, please use the scars provided.

Another aspect of Canada which clashed quite massively with Britain is its take on alcohol. To appreciate the death-grip of alcohol in Britain it really is necessary to travel elsewhere. Alcohol, in Britain, is sold almost everywhere, in Canada, almost nowhere. Convenience stores in Canada do not supply alcohol, though the age limit is not far different from the one in Britain (though this varies from province to province). I also got ID'd in a restaurant, despite having a beard. I was most annoyed by this because of how amused my mother was, there's nothing like a hysterical mother to entice a thunderous lock-jawed grimace onto a face. If you want to buy alcohol in Canada, you can't. That isn't actually true, I just thought it would be amusing to write. Is it? Off-licences and liquor stores are the only stockers of alcohol (that I have found, I could be wrong) in Canada, and what dens of strangeness they are. The liquor store that we have discovered here in Banff is named A Liquor Store, which is either idiotic or brilliant. There was roughly an inch of moving space in the store, as the vast majority of it had been fenced off with a chain. The delights that hid behind the chain were bog-standard alcohols, which is disappointing for me as a Brit. If alcohol was restricted through the use of chains in Britain I would expect nothing less than the presence of a monstrous carafe-melting brew, guarded over by a denizen of the underworld. Ironically, the creature serving in the shop was certainly from a different realm, possibly arriving on direct link from the imagination of Bill Bailey. This is not to say he looked like Bill Bailey, more that if Bill Bailey ever got thrown into the children's TV show Penny Crayon, this was the sort of creature that would be born thereof. One word that Canadians cannot handle in a Welsh accent is 'Cider', which is inconvenient for me, as a cider drinker. Restaurants simply do not serve cider, and if you ask for any the serving people give you an incredibly perplexed look. The look you receive is the one I imagine I would receive if I had ordered "A drink of televised justice in a decanter of dreams". The strange hypocrisy of Canada however means that it suffers from a Cider Dichotomy. Not even knowledge of cider in restaurants, every cider ever conceived of in the off licence (and even some that were never imagined, that's Off-L Space for you). Apple cider, Pear cider, Peach cider, Blueberry cider, Blackberry cider, Lemon cider, even Bread cider (No). I was intrigued by Glacier Berry cider, and dutifully bought some to sate both my curiosity and my liver. Upon returning to our place of sleep, I utilised the wonders modern technology to do some speed research into glacier berries. What I found was startling; they do not exist. Somehow, the amazing alcoholiers of Canada had concocted cider out of a concoted fruit. I feared there was cidermancy afoot. My eyes darted as swift as a swift using the pokemon move swift to the side of the bottle, scanning as fast as a really fast scanner to discover the ingredients of the drink. I was worried by my findings. Ingredients: Cider, Natural Flavours, Carbon Dioxide. That list is surely not exhaustive, and almost certainly in contravention of rules somewhere along the way. "What's in your cider Gilder?" "Well to be honest, mostly cider." If you are interested, in Canada play-doh is made out of play-doh. That's secrecy Willy Wonka would be proud of.

That is it for now, as I have been supping on my Fakeberry Cider during the writing of this and I am now in no fit condition to continue.

I hope you had a nice Canada Day, I did. Well, it was alright.