Canucks Throw Cheese In Lake. Bosda Bemused.

[Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor]

Is this some twisted, occult Canadian ritual?
I’ve heard about those… :dubious:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4729971.stm
The ways of the wily North are strange & inscrutable.

In the South, we attach the cheese to fish hooks, before we throw it in the water.

[Big_Norse]

@Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor

The ways of the wily North are strange & inscrutable.

And so are their naming traditions: “Baie des Ha! Ha!”? - I’d love to hear the story behind that one!

[Ponder_Stibbons]

Maybe July 30 (when the story was posted) is the Québec version of April Fools Day? Surely “Baie des Ha! Ha!” is not a real name!

[kingpengvin]

Nope, the place is real

[ultrafilter]

They insisted that cheese production must be carried out in licensed, fully hygienic facilities, which rules out the bottom of a lake.

This sentence alone is worthy of a Pulitzer.

[Phlosphr]

Why the hell didn’t he put a buoy on it?

[photopat]

@Phlosphr

Why the hell didn’t he put a buoy on it?

That’s sexist. He could just as easily have used a guirl.

[The_Scrivener]

If worst comes to worst and the cheese proves inedible, he might be able to carve it up and pass it off as hockey pucks.

[Larry_Mudd]

Step one: Locate lake cheese.

Step two: Head due east and recover ice-cold Bass Ale from hold of H.M.S. Titanic.

Step three: Proper nosh.

[Cat_Whisperer]

This was my favourite line:

“He took it, hesitated, ate it and told us it was one of the best cheeses he’d ever eaten.”

Well, at least he hesitated before eating cheese he fished out of a lake.

Oh, as for the hygienic facilities - this is stuff that is made with bad milk and mold on purpose - but it must be clean bad milk and mold.

[Draelin]

“This cheese tastes funny.”

That was really only amusing to me, but I had to post it anyway.

La Baie des Ha! Ha! Get it? Tastes funny? Okay, never mind.

[Larry_Mudd]

Okay, this is bothering me now.

I know the article is quite clear on the cheese being at the bottom of a lake – but isn’t la Baie des Ha! Ha! a, you know, bay?

Or did those wacky Quebecers perversely place a lake right on the Atlantic coast and call it a “bay” for giggles?

What’s up with that?

[Larry_Mudd]

Nevermind. Inlet off the Saguenay. Not on the coast. :smack:

[Mehitabel]

I love those cute old stories when a place gets a funny name because of a shattering tragedy. Drowned ghost baby, wheeee!

Just as I head up to Canada tomorrow it goes all crazy. Thank God I’m going east, to NS. Hope the government doesn’t fall when I’m up there because that means riots in the streets, right?
But if I get offered Lake Country Cheese, I’ll know now to be wary.

[Cat_Whisperer]

Well, hesitate before eating it at least.

You know, if the Canadian government falls, I don’t see rioting in the streets. More like, “And in other news, the government fell today. More at 11:00.”

[Spatial_Rift_47]

[Homer] Mmm … submersed cheese … drool [/Homer]

[funeste]

It’s all true! There really is a place named Baie des Ha! Ha! where a guy somehow lost a ton of cheese at the bottom of a lake. It was actually on the news a few days ago. Oh, the shame of it all!

Incidentally, he did tie a rope to the cheese, but then he couldn’t find the rope either.

[The_Scrivener]

Maybe the Canucks should be on the lookout for a really big mouse…?
…and set out an improved trap while they’re at it!

[matt_mcl]

From the database of the Commission de Toponymie du Québec, from which I read myself to sleep every night, the entry for Baie des Ha! Ha!:

Il existe d’autres utilisations de cette appellation. Par exemple, à l’est du village de La Tabatière, sur la côte nord du golfe du Saint-Laurent, une autre baie des Ha! Ha!, nom déjà en usage au XVIIIe siècle…

Le substantif haha dans la langue courante évoque tout obstacle interrompant brusquement un chemin et, dans le domaine des fortifications, un fossé situé à l’entrée d’une fortification et qui empêche le passage. Par extension, on désigne ainsi une barrière dont l’aspect inattendu arrache cette exclamation aux voyageurs. Sur le plan étymologique, les lexicologues préconisent l’onomatopée marquant la surprise : Ha! Ha!, pour expliquer cette exclamation. …

There are other places that use this name. For example, east of the village of La Tabatière, on the Côte-Nord region on the north shore of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, [there is] another Baie des Ha! Ha!, a name already in use by the 18th Century…

The noun “haha” in common language suggests any kind of obstacle that suddenly blocks a path; in the language of fortifications, it is a ditch at the entrance to a fort that blocks passage. By extension, it means any barrier whose unexpected appearance causes travellers to utter this exclamation. On the etymological front, lexicographers favour the onomatopoeic expression of surprise, “Ha! Ha!”, to explain this.

And from the entry for yet a third, Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha! in the Bas-Saint-Laurent region:

L’exclamation Ha! Ha! n’en a pas moins soulevé des interrogations et des supputations non fondées allant du huron ahaha, chemin, que l’on retrouve en montagnais avec un sens rapproché, à l’amérindien hexcuewaska, quelque chose d’inattendu, en accord avec l’expression d’étonnement et de joie qu’auraient manifestée les pionniers en découvrant le lac Témiscouata qui forme à cet endroit un coude prononcé. Il ne faut cependant pas ajouter foi à ces interprétations fantaisistes. En réalité, le haha, en français, est un archaïsme qui identifie une voie sans issue, un cul-de-sac, une impasse, un obstacle inattendu. Or, à 8 km à l’est de la localité, on retrouve le lac Témiscouata qui effectue une courbe prononcée au nord-est, formant ainsi une petite baie. Ainsi, les anciens voyageurs devaient-ils effectuer un portage de 80 km, ce cul-de-sac, ce haha, interdisant la poursuite d’un périple en canot. Pour ce faire, ils étaient contraints d’emprunter le territoire sur lequel la municipalité de Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha! a été implantée.

The exclamation Ha! Ha! has nevertheless raised much unfounded speculation and suppositions, ranging from the Huron ahaha, “road,” found in Naskapi with a similar meaning, to an Amerindian word hexcuewaska, “something unexpected,” in harmony with the expression of astonishment and joy the pioneers supposedly showed when they discovered Lac Témiscouata, which forms a sharp bend at this location.

However, these fanciful interpretations should not be relied upon. In reality, a haha in French is a path with no exit, a cul-de-sac, or an unexpected obstacle. Accordingly, 8 km east of this location, Lac Témiscouata makes a pronounced bend to the north-east, forming a small bay. For this reason, travellers had to make a 80-km portage, as this cul-de-sac or haha blocked them from continuing by canoe. In portaging, they had to pass through the territory on which the municipality of Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha! would later be founded.

A slightly more boring explanation, perhaps – but it brings with it the astonishing realization that there are not one, not two, but THREE locations called Ha! Ha!, in completely separate regions of Quebec.

Come back next time for the story of the Chute du Caribou-Qui-Pisse.

[Larry_Mudd]

@matt_mcl

A slightly more boring explanation, perhaps…

Not by half! On the contrary, thanks very much.

Is it possible, though, after the last coupla decades, to read this:

@matt_mcl

For this reason, travellers had to make a 80-km portage, as this cul-de-sac or haha blocked them from continuing by canoe.

…without mentally hearing the linked bit?