What are some interesting or quirky differences between Canada & the U.S.?

the government: Canada is a constitutional monarchy with the Prime Minister as head of government and the Queen as head of state. there is a balance of power US has the president which is both the head of government and state. there is too much power vested in one person Canada has universal healthcare where all Canadians are entitled to health care without any payments Americans die each year from a curable sickness just because they don't have insurance In Canada, we don't have that huge problem Americans are having with the economy, selfish corporations and banks, with the way our government is formed, it is FAR more effective in representing the needs of the regular citizen than representing the needs of the upper class.

Our Thanksgiving is usually about a month before the American's.

Accent.......the way cdns say 'about'

We sell milk in bags.

Americans say "eh" and "y'all". Canadians say "right?" and "umm".

It's legal in USA to poison the citizens with obesogens in the food such as carcinogenic rBGH in all commercial meat and dairy (yes milk) and the reason why Americans are huge and men develop breasts whereas rBGH has been banned in Canada (and pretty much all over the world). It's legal in USA to poison the citizens and their babies with BPA in plastics (such as children's toys, baby and water bottles) whereas BPA has been recognized as a potent carcinogen and endocrine disruptor and has been banned in Canada (and all over Europe & other civilized countries). There seems to be a small circle of actors in Canada who turn up in most TV shows. Everyone appears to have worked with everyone, whereas in USA there's like "6 degrees of" in Canada it's more likely to be "2 degrees of". I think in Canada they measure the weather in Celsius (or Centigrade) whereas US it's in Farenheit and I'm pretty sure Canada mainly uses the metric system so your height will be in meters and centimeters rather than feet and inches.

In Canada, "off duty " cops don't carry a gun. Hand guns are VERY hard to get a license for, AND no one carrys one around the mall. We actually do what we SAY we will do, as a country. We encourage Immigrants to keep their own language, while learning English, when they come here. As a result, when the Canadian Government sends a trade mission to China, we send Canadian citizens who SPEAK their language, instead of having to depend on paid translators. Makes it a lot easier to do business, internationally. We INVENT a lot of things that you use every day. Zippers, garbage bags, INSULIN for diabetics, the concept of a ICU in a hospital ( Toronto General 1960 ) heart lung transplants, seat belts in all cars made in Canada 1969. A Canadian wrote the United Nations Charter, the basic document that the UN operates under. One of our past Prime Ministers , Mike Pearson, suggested the idea of a UN Peace Keeping Force, in 1956, to calm down the Suez Canal Crisis, and ever since then. Canada has been a major contributing force to the UN military intervention teams. Pearson one the Nobel Peace Prize for that idea. There are very FEW Canadian Forces members who have NOT served on UN missions, over the past 50 years. We wrote the book on how to get two armed sides to back off and stop killing each other, from Lebbanon, Cyprus , Lebanon Golan Heights to Cambodia to the China _India border, our guys have been there, using moral persuasion , combined with minimum militrary firepower, to acheive peace. And of course, we rule hockey world wide, as we say here " Its OUR GAME" WE invented it. With cold weather outside for 7 months of the year, its kind of obvious that we are never going to be the beach volley ball world champs . ( grin ) Jim B Toronto.

Canadians do not boost as much about inventions and hero's. You have probably never heard of zippers basketball,Blackberries. or telephones.Canadian singers probably never heard of because they are not World Famous Celine Dion, Justin Bieber. If you read a newspaper in the west it has news from around the world if you read one in the east it is mostly news from the east coast of the U.S. and Canada. Canadian words: Acadian that be where Cajuns came from Beavertails made famous by President Obama on his first journey out of the U.S. as president.. Canadian Whiskey (prohibition did not seem to hurt it) Chinook, Fiddleheads, Hound pounders something like a cheesehead Imax movies Loonies and Twonies, Really are you in pursuit of Trivia (a game from Canada). I noticed things where more different east to west than north to south

Ryan: If you think "there is too much power vested in one person", our President, you have a Lot to learn. Presidents are figureheads, many argue the real power is the cartels and their influence. A lot of things still haven't changed with Rep. Or Dem. presidents. I'm not cutting down your system, just correcting a common political myth.