Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Conversations

CSO: Have you ever heard of a famous chef from Canada?
FWP: No, but it's you who follow the "food news," not I.

CSO: Maybe it's because they don't have a cuisine.[1]
FWP: Sweetie, Canada is basically known for being a country full of very nice, very polite people. They export a couple of actors and singers now and then, but that's about it.

CSO: Oh? Then what was the deal with that Vancouver-Calgary brawl the other night?
FWP: Hey, every country needs a safety valve. Theirs is the hockey brawl.

CSO: That's how they let off steam, huh?
FWP: Yup. If it weren't for that, they'd be at war with every other country on Earth. Just think of the pressure: all those decades of perfect, uninterrupted politeness.

CSO: Yeah. That would make me want to kill somebody.
FWP: For sure.

[1: We were told this in 1995, by a Canadian: the concierge on duty at Toronto's Royal Crown Hotel. A very polite young gentleman, and entirely unarmed...as far as I could tell.]

2 comments:

pdwalker said...

For a more extreme example of this behaviour, consider the Japanese.

Weetabix said...

I used to drive through western Canada from the continental US to Alaska regularly but infrequently. The "cuisine" could maybe best be described as ill-prepared, leftovers of starch, fat, and unidentifiable protein.

I didn't care for it.