Rick Mercer satirising the Drummond report on Ontario. Worryingly, I get the suspicion that it might be based on fact. In which case, I’d better start preparing for a new life as a rodeo clown in Calgary.
The art of self depreciation
I forgot to mention that my impromptu article was shot down in flames by the editor. It was ‘very, very personal’ and readers would be unable to connect with it, he said. The small feature – less than 700 words – merely reflected on how the awkward moments in life can, with the benefit of hindsight, sometimes form a person’s most amusing memories. I thought this tied in well with the magazine’s outlook, which is about happiness and maintaining a positive outlook. As examples, the article listed some of those occasions when I’ve put foot firmly to mouth.
Thinking about it now, the editor was most likely right, although possibly not for the reasons he enumerated. In Canada, I don’t think the art of self-depreciation is as readily understood or appreciated as it is in the UK. Indeed, most Canadians would probably find it strange that someone – other than a stand-up comic perhaps – would want to highlight embarrassing events in their past as a source of amusement. At the more extreme end, I’ve met a number of Canadians who seem to consider their lives almost as an extension of their CV/resume (yes these people also exist in the UK, although not at the same frequency I would argue). For them, humour – if it is to be indulged in at all – should be consigned to bar room talk, with the jokes focussed on the government/economy and possibly, as long as you’re not in the province or surrounded by bear-wrestling voyageurs, Quebec.
At a more basic level, many Canadians in the service sector find it terribly confusing when you decide to go off script and make a light-hearted joke. I’ll give you an example, at coffee shops they now label the strong brands ‘bold’. I can’t remember this on my previous visits to Canada, so perhaps it is a new fad. Anyway, I find the term strange and somewhat silly, and I still remember the the first occasion someone asked if I wanted ‘bold’ coffee.
‘No, I’d like it daring please,’ I replied.
The server looked at me as though I was utterly bonkers.
‘Erm…yes I would like it bold,’ I said, backtracking to avoid further awkwardness.
I can only assume that those who find surrealist humour or dark comedy amusing would be at an utter loss in Canada (they might even be burnt as witches if they went to Alberta or so I’ve been told). Comedy like the League of Gentlemen, the Mighty Boosh, Jam, Brasseye etc would be viewed either with deep suspicion or, missing the point entirely, as documentaries on how quaint but also creepy British life can be.
It’s not all bad
Canada’s contribution to music isn’t exactly laudable. In fact, some might say the country has committed nothing less than a war crime by unleashing the likes of Bieber, Dion, Twain and Adams on the world. But it’s not all bad – the Golden Dogs were a band making some waves a few years back and I love listening to them still. Sadly, I’m not sure they’re a going any more.
Crazy Goose
Canada has secretly been training geese to fly south and attack the dogs of American fishermen. The plot is too detailed to go into here, but I think Glen Beck has already mentioned it in passing. Meanwhile, here’s some video evidence.
Kindle KIA and other worries
March is fast approaching and while my time in Canada has gone quickly, my progress hasn’t been fantastically fast or concrete. This is due to being ill for around one month of my time spent here. I’m still not 100%, and there are times when I have coughing fits and rely on a boost from my inhaler. Not good.
I’m also worrying about minor points and having difficulty appreciating the wider scheme of things. For example, I contacted a professor at the University of Toronto about my oral history project and I’m now worrying if I jumped the gun somewhat. After all, I don’t have anything written from an editorial perspective. I’m also wondering if the decision to even discuss this topic was the correct one – I want to keep this work under my sole control until it is a complete package with my name indelibly stamped on it. I’ve already had one organisation try and secure material from me on the cheap. In-in-all, I’m extremely wary. But in the grand scheme of things, I know this is not a major matter. At worse, I can simply say I got in a muddle – which is not unusual for me!
More annoyingly, my Amazon Kindle has decided to give up the ghost for no reason whatsoever, almost two months after receiving it as a Christmas present. The screen simply went haywire – strange lines and blocks of white running through the title page. It remained unresponsive to the reset methods Amazon advised. Researching on YouTube, I discovered this situation was not uncommon and that many Kindle customers had suffered the same misfortune. Thankfully, the UK Amazon customer service was quick and a replacement will be sent to me – well to my parent’s address. Anyway, let’s just say I wasn’t in a particularly great mood when I discovered it had broken down and it coloured the rest of the day somewhat.
With the Kindle now KIA, I’m relying on ye olde printed material, which I’ve added greatly to with the arrival of two packing boxes I’d sent out from my parent’s house before I left the UK. Incidentally, getting these cleared through customs wasn’t too tricky because I’d already declared them on arrival at the airport. However, it was necessary to secure a final customs receipt/clearance for the goods once they’d arrived. This entailed visiting a strange, non-descript building close to Pearson airport where the paperwork is stamped and approved. You do this by approaching a desk manned by four customs officers wearing stab-proof vests – which seemed a little OTT to me, especially as it was just us and one other family in the building. With my documents stamped, I headed to the building’s third floor and dropped them off in the shipping company’s pigeon hole. I was then able to arrange a drop-off at my house a day or two later. A fairly simple procedure, although Maria’s advice helped a great deal; she had already gone through this process when the bulk of our goods arrived in Canada just before Christmas.
Anyway, the only bright spot over the past couple days – there’s been too much stress, illness and obsessing about trivia to make me feel at ease – was my father-in-law’s birthday. We all went to celebrate at my brother-in-law’s house. Maria brought a cake that was made up mainly of soft icing. I was groaning from the sugar overload after just one slice. Like a fool, I went back for seconds and I’m still trying to recover this morning.
Take the tram
Yesterday was interesting: I got to ride on Toronto’s famous tram system for the first time. I was off to see a Polish veteran to interview for my oral history project. He lives some way out of town but close to the 501 tram route. Let’s give this method of transport a go, I thought, when researching how best to reach him. Torontonians call it ‘riding the rocket’; but it turned out to be more akin to ‘shuffling on a damp squib’.
I arrived downtown to get my tram connection; it’s hard to get your bearings in downtown Toronto because the buildings are so high and I’m not familiar with the landmarks yet. I presume there’s an easier way of finding out whether you’re facing east, west, south or north – one that every Torontonian worth their salt knows – but I’ve yet to discover it. Perhaps everyone carries a small compass, the type you sometimes get in a luxury Christmas cracker. A number 501 eventually turned up and I got on, asking the driver if he was going to Islington.
‘Nope, you need to go the other side of the road, I’m heading east and you want west.’
I jumped out and headed in a westerly direction until I spotted another 501 that was going the right way. Downtown tram stops seem to be irregular and people often run up to the vehicle’s doors when a tram has halted at some traffic lights. The driver appears fine with letting them on. Imagine if it were London bus drivers instead! Those guys (and gals) take a perverse pleasure in not allowing you on unless you are at a designated stop when the moon is in the third quarter and the month has the number four in it.
I clambered aboard and again asked if it was going to Islington.
‘No I’m only going as far as the Humber. You can get a long-branch tram from there,’ the driver said.
‘You mean I can get a follow-on tram that goes on to Islington from this Humber place?’
‘Yes.’
I was glad to have started my journey by getting a transfer ticket. This little stub allows you to travel on to any destination on the transport structure no matter how many changes you need to make. A British example would be buying a train ticket from Clapham junction to Waterloo and then using the transfer stub to take a bus to Oxford Street. So it’s a real benefit and I suspect many Torontonians grab a transfer stub just in case they might need it.
At Humber we were kicked off next to an unheated waiting room. Another tram came up the line, but it too was looping back round. Eventually, after 20 minutes standing in the cold, a long-branch tram arrived. I’d been travelling just over two hours by the time I reached my destination. In a car (if I could drive) it would have taken 40 minutes. However, I’d only spent $3, so I suppose it wasn’t too bad. And in the grand scheme of things, getting used to the trams wasn’t too difficult either.
Heading back from the interview, I decided to go the same route but in reverse. Yet again, the tram halted at a loop area, with the driver telling us to alight. This time the wait was shorter and another 501 tram arrived soon afterwards. Really it was a bit silly – why they couldn’t have just let the original tram take us onwards I’ve no idea.
About two minutes later a very odd looking chap came on board. He had long white hair around the side of his head but was completely bald on top. His coat was a dark blue padded type, while he was wearing jogging trousers tucked into hiking boots. I knew he was a une nutter du premier cru at first glance. My assumption was immediately confirmed when he stood just behind me and started muttering:
‘He hee hee; let’s scare them. Let’s scare them…’
As the tram got underway, he started to make ghost noises:
‘Woooooooo! Woooooooo!’
He did this for about five minutes, until he caught someone laughing at him.
‘Why are you laughing? The little demons told me to scare you!’
Now he changed tack. He started talking about Ozzy, asking why he’d been made into a man. I was wondering if he meant Ozzy Osborne perhaps. Then we arrived at Ossington Street, which is where he got off. So he was obviously referencing his stop. Most people breathed a sigh of relief after he left but I felt sorry he’d gone, it had enlivened the day somewhat.
After this, the tram driver announced we couldn’t go any further east and that we’d have to take a detour across such-and-such route because of a protest rally. It was enough for me to wonder why I bothered. I got off at the next stop and walked. I was close enough now to get on the metro system anyway, so it wasn’t too much of a hassle.
I later found out that the protest was a bunch of people from the Democratic Republic of Congo upset about some election or other in their country of origin. They burnt a US flag and a European flag. Then they tried to rush the US consulate but were stopped by Canadian Mounted Police. In the news report, some were running at police lines holding toddlers. Personally, I was disgusted: these people should have been arrested for endangering their children. Mind you, the Canadians seemed to take it in their stride – a protest that had nothing to do with Canada interrupting the heart of the country’s leading city. All normal it seems. And never mind the poor English chap, seething that he’d forgotten to get a second transfer ticket after leaving the tram in haste. Those protesters cost me an extra $3 when I got to the metro station! Now that’s a real crime…
Service with a smile
Happy Valentine’s Day; I’m finally feeling better. Acute bronchitis is ghastly and it couldn’t have come at a worse time – exactly when I was working on a major freelance project. What should have been finished last week was finally submitted yesterday. Talking of Monday, it was one of those days where very little gets done and roadblocks seem to be in place at every turn. This frustration stemmed from my failure to apply for an Ontario Health Insurance Plan card.
Taking the subway, I went downtown to a Service Ontario centre. I had my passport, my permanent residence paperwork and a letter from my bank. I also took the letter confirming my Social Insurance Number, with card attached. On reaching the reception desk, I was treated as though I’d just crawled out from beneath a rock. With no emotion whatsoever, the woman at the desk told me I hadn’t got the right proof of address. She then pointed to a pamphlet, saying it was no can do unless I had the identification expressly asked for on a particular page. Never mind the fact I had paperwork with my name and address from another branch of the Canadian government!
I started to ask what was wrong with my proof of address; if it was good enough for the Federal Government then surely it should be good enough for Ontario? I quickly stopped myself: there’s no point even debating with these people. For them, it really is a case of ‘computer says no’. So it seems state-employed morlocks are not just a British problem. They have no initiative or, indeed, human identity (I’m sure they have lots of Province identity). It was on the tip of my tongue throughout Monday, but it was only today that I remembered the word I was looking for was ‘gormless’.
What I wanted to say was: ‘Look, I know you are in a soul-destroying job and that the parade of faces passing you by means nothing but a grim procession of dead eyes, but can’t you at least show some initiative – some independent thought and human intelligence. Or are you simply a ventriloquist dummy for a backwards-thinking bureaucracy?’
Instead I said thank you, which is a very British response I suppose. I set off home $6 down and my time wasted. I also realised that my flies had been undone all day. It’s not a good look, especially when in government-run offices.
Meanwhile, I’m still trying to shake off the malaise that came with being ill. I’ve sent in a couple of article proposals, with one shot down in flames. C’est la vie. The publication is mostly made up of rehashed work sent in by publishers anyway. I also wrote a small commentary for another magazine, although this was on spec – which is something of a no-no. You should always pitch first. But in the grand scheme of things, these are only tiny stop-gap measures. I need to get to grips with securing more semi-permanent freelance work that pays a fair rate at regular intervals.
On the positive side, I’ve just finished a rather romantic and tasty Valentine’s Day dinner cooked chez moi by moi. On the menu was sirloin steak, baby potatoes and garden peas all from the supermarket Loblaws (it’s quite posh, say at a Marks and Spencers level). I asked an attendant and then, when this failed, a family butcher if any peppercorn sauce was available. Both reacted with blank stares and bemused looks. It was as though I’d asked for something hideous. Do Canadians not have peppercorn sauce? So I settled for a three-pepper marinade instead and it was lovely – as was Maria I might add!
Great Canadians: No.5 Rubber face
The man with the rubber face, Jim Carrey was born in Newmarket, Ontario, in 1962. He started performing stand up in 1979 at Yuk Yuk’s in Toronto. During the 1980s and early 1990s, Carrey made a name for himself on the North American comedy circuit. His big break came in 1993 when he was cast as the lead in Ace Ventura: Pet Detective. The film was released to critical acclaim in 1994. The Mask, Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls and my favourite Dumb and Dumber soon followed.
Carrey shifted gear somewhat in the late 1990s, securing the lead roles in The Truman Show and Man on the Moon. His stock then remained high throughout the early 2000s, starring in How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Bruce Almighty and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Since then, the good gigs appear to have dried up somewhat; last year he starred in Mr Popper’s Penguins – hey it’s Carrey and he’s with animals again (freakin penguins!), and kids love penguins right?
Carrey took US citizenship in 2004, although maintains dual citizenship. I presume he lives south of the border and comes up to Canada for family reunions and the odd promotional gig (so many famous Canadians do this, I wonder why?) Anyway, let’s forget the last 20-plus years and watch Carrey in his prime.
Canadian Kermit
Canada’s answer to Kermit the Frog, a purple muppet called Larry who treats his housemate like a doormat and comes up with useless get-rich-quick schemes.
Your call is important to us
Today has been ugly. My cough has become impossible to handle and leaves me light-headed when I start hacking away. Plus I have low-level headaches, sinus problems and constantly feel clammy. In general, it’s not good.
So I decided to bite the bullet and see a doctor today with Maria’s help (by-the-by, she’s also sick). Thankfully, my father-in-law knew a chap who could fit me in at short notice. Great, I thought, all I need now is a file number from the travel insurance company I’ve paid to cover me until I apply for and then receive my Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP) card.
But what I thought would be a simple phone call with some quick advice and insurance protocol turned into a marathon session of phone call after phone call, being bumped from one department to another and then put on hold forever and a day. Whenever I spoke with a company operative it always ended with them saying: ‘Okay, I’ll put you through to the relevant department.’ I’d then face another 20-30 minutes waiting for someone to pick up. Nobody did.
It was getting so bad that I asked for Maria to help. I didn’t want to miss my appointment because of some damn insurance company bureaucracy. She had the same treatment, although she eventually got through to an operative who was slightly less indifferent than the rest. She told us that the right department would now call us back shortly, which they did after 40 minutes or so. I started to talk with them, explaining my situation.
‘Ah… I’m sorry we’re not the right department,’ the operative said. ‘I’m going to have to put you through to another department to handle this.’
By now I was almost banging my head against the table from frustration and the feeling of being unwell.
‘Look all I want to do is see a doctor; I’ve spent hours trying to speak to someone. Just tell me what I need to do…’
Hovering beside me, Maria grabbed the phone and promptly read them the riot act, taking names and employee numbers and demanding to speak to supervisors. Eventually, under a hail of complaints, they put us through to the right department immédiatement.
So I finally spoke to someone who knew what they were doing; I was given a file number and told a claim form will be sent in the post. As I suspected, the actual process of notifying the insurer and receiving the right instructions took about 15 minutes. But getting to this point took me from 12 pm to around 3pm. Or should I say it took Maria, as she was the one who really achieved the right result.
Thinking about it now, I believe telephone operatives are told by the company to answer calls and then place customers into a holding pit where someone, somewhere might answer at some point. Or maybe not; perhaps the service is designed to exasperate people so much that they cease calling. This leaves the insurer free from bothering with customer questions and (more importantly) free from incurring any expenses and claims.
To cut the story short, I got to the doctor on time, was checked over and given a prescription. I’ve got bronchitis and, for the first time since I was about 12, I was prescribed an inhaler along with other bits and bobs. Now I have to wait for the claim form to get my money back. Hopefully, I can also start getting better faster. I can’t afford to be this ill now.
Tonight I’ve been reflecting on how this system of insurance, securing a file number and making a claim is what often takes place in the USA. Frankly, it seems damned dangerous. If the insurer I had to deal with is anything like the US ones, then I suspect the ill are left shambling in telephone limbo at best. At worse, they give up and then suffer in silence. And some of these people may have something much worse lurking beneath the visible/audible symptoms. All told, it’s a situation that suits the big companies and no wonder they don’t want reform. Why kill the (steroid-injected) golden goose that keeps on laying? Incidentally, Maria also visited a doctor today. She was seen fairly quickly and secured a prescription. All of it was under the OHIP system and cost…next to nothing. Okay, she pays with her taxes, as I will, but the process was smooth and, most importantly, fair.
