Justifiably Paranoid Pigs

Back home in Australia, we do enjoy the odd bit of pork. Bacon is a common addition to hamburgers and pizza. Pork chops are the bane of children a good meal choice, and hams are often featured as not only as part of a Christmas feast, but are often the filling of sandwiches.

However I don't think that the addition of bacon to a chicken wrap would do this to us:

Bacon Chicken Wrap commercial from McDonalds, posted by rsemailinbox.

North America, what is it with your love affair with pork products? The stuff is everywhere, and in so many forms! Ribs, burgers, pork sausages of all kinds, pulled pork, pork sandwiches, pork chops, pork loin, pork roasts, pork rinds, pork and beans, hams, Spams and bacon bacon bacon! So much bacon! Streaky, back, Peameal, smoked, pepper, maple flavoured, hot, cold and tepid. So much bacon, so little time.

Now, the list above isn't complete by any means, but most of these are recognisable to an outsider. Pork and bacon is savoury, and definitely accepted by the Australian, even if we don't quite have the plethora of pig related foods in our everyday cuisine.

However we then get into the realms where Australians go, "WTF, mate?"

Image is from Wikipedia 

That is a maple bacon donut. When a friend first introduced me to the concept of bacon being added to sweet things such as this, I was flabbergasted. Surely this was a very specialised taste?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bacon_mania 

It doesn't seem to be. More and more I'm seeing references to foods like this, where the very sweet is tempered with the salty meat.

I haven't dared try it yet, but I have to admit that once I got past my, "You're joking, right?" reaction, I have become quite curious. I've found food here is somewhat sweeter than I was accustomed to back home, even bread. I can imagine that the saltiness of the bacon would cut through that sweetness and make a nice counterpoint to it. After all, chocolate covered pretzels are rather good!

All this being said however, if I was a pig here in North America, I would be terrified. Here's hoping they don't seek revenge.

Winter, Difference, Fashions

Living here in a Canadian winter means that I've been a bit housebound, so my exposure to Canadian culture has been in short bursts or through the television. I have to say though that winter itself is a different thing here. Snow, ice, weird fogs... this place has it all. One of the funniest things I saw when driving around the town was the girls who refused to give up to the notion that it was snowing, and still were wearing their barely-covers-the-arse skirts and heels. With bare legs. In the snow! Me sitting in my SUV with the heater blasting, wrapped in my coat, jacket, long trousers and sheepskin lined boots, couldn't help but shiver as I saw these fashionably determined girlies.

I will get my revenge when the weather gets back into the positives, and when they're all gasping at how hot it is, I'll be wandering around grinning. Maybe I'll even wear a woollen jumper just to rub it in a bit. I'll then pass out from heat stroke, but I'll be giggling all the way down.

Double Tongued

One of the things I've had to accustom myself to since coming here is the fact that many things have to be printed in two languages. In fact, regular readers of this blog have already seen one small example of this, here. Australians are used to having the instructions for things printed in multiple languages (which is only fair given not everyone speaks English), however I'm quite certain my fellow countrymen aren't used to seeing this:

*sings* It's gotta be PFK, I like it like that!

At this point I should point out that I'm not in Quebec, but in Ontario, and this was the way my lunch was presented to me. However just in case you couldn't work out what the above picture was, here's the opposite side of the box:

Yes, I had KFC for lunch. Woo. Hoo.

It's been something of an education coming here, as even road signs in this English-speaking province are often repeated in French. I grew up in the Western Suburbs of Melbourne, so other languages and accents aren't alien to me, but there's a definite adjustment to the thinking needed on seeing a road sign and not being able to immediately decipher what it says, or seeing a well known trademark such as the one above and simultaneously recognising it and finding it very unfamiliar.

One day I hope to go to Nunavut, where they throw another language into this mix, Inuit!

This image was taken from the Wikimedia Commons.

A Serious Moment

This is intended to be a light hearted blog, but I need to step away from that for a moment to comment on current events.

It's been difficult watching what's been happening in Queensland while being so far away. While the floods haven't reached where I came from yet, I have friends in the affected zones. So far they're safe, and I can only hope they remain so. I feel helpless being so far away, but I also know that I could do little more if I was back in Victoria.

Queensland and northern NSW are the worst affected, but with floods also happening in Western Victoria and warnings being broadcast for all regions except Gippsland, my home state is on high alert as the rains roll in.

My thoughts are with my fellow Aussies in this time, but I want to leave you with an impression of our sense of the appropriate in very dire times.

This is the XXXX (pronounced "four ex") Brewery, taken on the 12th of January, 2011 by duplicate_helix (from a live broadcast on Channel 7 News). As you can see, it's very flooded. Yet Aussies soldier on, and we know what's important.

(via Twitter)

Australians are a big hearted people in their wry, understated way. Their spirit is strong, and they do not give up easily. They also are known for laughing at adversity, and I think the above encapsulates that well. Yay beer!

Though there are also people out there who are risking their lives to save the animals caught in the flood. The man in the dinghy saving the drenched wallabies moved me to tears. There are acts of bravery out there from ordinary people, and tales of those who face their own fears and losses to help others worse off. Those who give in to their baser instincts and take advantage of the situation should be ashamed.

I love you, Australia. It hurts to see what's happening there, and I hope that it will be over soon with no further damage to property and life. Be safe.

Bags o' Milk!

Can you take a photo of bagged milk for us non-believers? :D - duplicate_helix


I had no idea such a thing existed before this comment appeared back on a post I'd made about my May trip to Canada. Owing to the circumstances of that visit I wasn't able to take a picture then, but as I'm now living here and have more than enough time to devote to this, here is my illustrated guide to the Bag Of Milk!

Figure 1 - the Milk Bag
The Bag in its natural environment, surrounded by its protective crate shell within the dangerous confines of the grocery store. That shell is how we outsiders can determine that this is truly milk related, as it is still recognisable as a milk crate. That is, if the words printed on the bag didn't tip you off.

The bag itself is reminiscent of a bread bag, only wider. The plastic it's comprised of feels the same. If it didn't slosh alarmingly and shift its centre of gravity when picked up, it might be mistaken for a loaf of bread in a very dark room.

Figure 2 - the opened Milk Bag
In captivity, the bag of milk is opened at the top, a bread tie keeping the contents from being spilled out. However, closer examination of the specimen reveals an interesting fact:

Figure 3 - sachets within the Milk Bag

Figure 4 - an individual sachet
It is not just one bag of milk, but several! So, how do we deal with these individual sachets of cow secretions?

Figure 5 - the jug
At about this point, anyone not used to the vaguaries involved here would simply split open a sachet and pour the contents into this open jug, wondering how the heck the milk doesn't go off in the fridge. Surely it would absorb every smell and flavour in that closed space, making it completely unpotable?

No! The Bag o' Milk is more clever than that! In quite an ingenious twist, one simply places the actual bag in the jug, like so:

Figure 6 - the filled jug
Then simply snip off the two top corners off the sachet, and the milk is ready to be used! One simply pours it from the bag! The airflow provided by the snipped off corners allows the milk to be easily poured without slopping. It's really quite amazing in its simple, strange way.

So there you go, non-believers. Canada really has bags o'milk, and they are indeed different when compared to the bottles, Tetra-Bricks and cartons we Aussies are used to.

Waste Management

 This post contains references to toilets and the bodily functions associated therewith. Proceed at the risk of your own sensibilities. I'm looking at you, people who can't even say "toilet".

Dear North America,

Your toilets are problematic. In fact, they're so problematic that it took my Canadian husband years before he could actually say the word toilet. And now that he's back in your realm he's regressed into the euphemistic mumbling it took me years of earthy snickerings to get him away from.

I really feel sorry for those learning English here. Can you imagine the confusion confronting a person looking for a place to relieve one's self and being told where the washroom is? 

"But I do not wish to wash! I wish to do the urination!"

"You'd better wash afterwards, you disgusting person!"

"But where do I go?"

"The washroom!"

"But I do not wish to wash!"

However, back to my contention. Your toilets are problematic. Back in Australia the water levels in one's toilet bowl is very low. In fact in a well working toilet, the level is only just higher than the entrance to the S bend. When one flushes, water gushes from the cistern to flush away one's refuse neatly and with a minimum of water usage. In fact, in Australia we now have dual flush systems that will allow one to choose how much water the amount of refuse might need. For liquid, press the half flush. For more solid matter, choose the full flush. Simple, and water efficient (unless there are skiddies left behind, but that's what toilet brushes are for!).

However for you guys here in North America, it's... different. The water level in the toilet bowls are stunning to this girl from a water restricted country. I first noticed it when I was in the States years ago, and to begin with I thought the toilet was blocked up, the water was so high. In fact, the first time I encountered this phenomenon, water was almost up to the rim. Horses could be lead to these bowls (but not be made to drink), I swear! Wildlife documentaries could be made around these potential watering holes.

Here is where the problem begins to be defined. You see, every - erm, release - prompts a splash against one's buttocks if one is sitting at the wrong angle; this is quite distracting and nigh on nauseating to this girl from the great Southern land. This isn't to mention the wiping. Seriously, how do you not get your fingers wet upon wiping when the water is up so high (and remain seated)? It's gross, and the worst offenders of these so very high levels seem to be public washrooms. I know I want to wash after being in them. This probably explains why they call them washrooms. Ick.

Then there's the flushing process iteself. Wow, there's so much water involved! That finger-soaking pool gets sucked away in a maelstrom of waste, only to be replaced by a gushing new one that sparkles right there under the rim of the bowl.

North America, I'm certain your bowel cancer organisations adore you, as there's no problem seeing what you leave behind. In Australia there was a campaign to look at what you leave to monitor changes or what have you, but I always found it difficult in the small amount of water anything was left in. No such problem here! It swirls in a kaleidoscope of wonder for at least a few seconds before being swept away into a magical land far far away. The fact that the water rises up before it's sucked away is a definite concern. I keep thinking that what happens in Leisure Suit Larry when he flushes the public toilet will happen to me when I see that.

NA, in some ways your toiletting is superior to Australia's, I will grant you that. I haven't had to wield a toilet brush for *cough* emergencies since I got here. Yet your toilets are also scary and confounding, and use far too much water than is really needed to get the job done. I'm really glad that Canada has so much water.

Now, if only I can get you guys to call it a toilet, and not a washroom.

Love, Me.

PS: Have a look at how much water a "proper" toilet should use!

This video isn't mine, but one I found on YouTube, created by markymark75.