From:this thread
Visit Quebec this summer! We love Statesians! Vacation tip: in every town/city in the province the most luxurious (and by law also the cheapest) hotel is called “Hotel de Ville”. It’s a huge state-run chain of hotels. Thank me later. Grand Prix weekend June 8-10!
Giggling to myself wondering if anyone bought it.
Also, in St. Petersburg, Florida bar
barmaid: “You’re Canadians?”
eunoia: “Yep, just yesterday we were at the spring bear hunt, now we’re kickin’ it on the beach!”
barmaid: “You hunt bears? Did you shoot any?”
eunoia’s friend joins in effortlessly: “We didn’t, but my mom bagged a grizzly.” Peals of raucous laughter.
There’s hardly anything new in this. The tv show “Street Smarts” makes fun of how little Americans know, and Jay Leno has been doing the same thing for years asking Americans basic questions about American geography and history.
It’s just a matter of selection and editing. Select enough people anywhere and you will find someone who is stupid or gullible enough, and simply edit out the smart and informed people, and then edit out the questions that the idiots got right.
I, personally, have always found it a fascinating fact that all of the managers of that chain are named Monsieur le Mayor. It must be a family-run business…
Mnementh, collapsed on the floor in fits of laughter so terrible that they appear to be bruising his ribs, stops long enough to look in the general direction of America, at which point he rolls back over and resumes laughing like a maniac
This is one of my favourite jokes! I’ve spoken to a lot of Americans over the net, and I’ve managed to convince a great number of you people that I’m a flannel wearing lumberjack living in an igloo who does nothing but drink beer, eat moose, and wrestle polar bears in his spare time! I love you people! You’re so funny!
You mean you’re not? Get the hell out of Canada! Turn in your toque, your serviettes, votre Poutine avec fromage, and your copy of Strange Brew! God, most important,your secret Kim Campbell lapel-pin-slash-communications pin!
:shakes head sadly…Now we’ll be over-run with offers of marriage from those south of the border, thinkin’ we’re normal and all, thus diluting the gene pool…
I think it is also a matter of putting people on the spot in front of a television camera. I can imagine freezing up if Jay Leno comes up to me and asks me questions while the camera rolls on.
Mmmmm poutine… It used to be only in Quebec, but it started popping up in the western provinces due to Quebecois young people coming west to work in the mountain parks. First time I saw it I was nearly sick, now I love it.
Hm. I would think that knowing that your large, powerful neighbor to the south tends to ignore you would be bad for the national ego, not something to exploit for laughs. Guess that’s just me.
So many of my friends have managed to convince an American something silly about our country. It seems easy to do, as most Americans don’t seem to know much about Canada unless they travel here frequently, or have relatives here.
Americans, as a whole, come across as ignorant of other countries, and for a certain percentage of the population, it seems to be true. Great stuff to mine comedic material from, anyway.
Max Torque, we have rather self deprecating sense of humour here, in general. Plus, the purpose is more making fun of ignorant Americans than making fun of ourselves anyway. Last year I saw a comic at Yuk Yuk’s, and half of his material was based on ignorant Americans.
Should we be making fun of Americans? Maybe not, yet Canadians seem to take so much joy from it, it seems wrong to take that away.
I lived as a semi-forced resident of Canada for three years (boarding school) and about the only thing I miss is Poutine. God that stuff is wonderful on a cold day.