Day 161 - Fun facts: Canada vs the UK

With Phil off to Winchester and me working (actually on my novel, finally...woo hoo!), today's blog is a return to some fun facts comparing Canada and the UK.

National dish:

In the tikka tikka tikka tikka
tikka room...

• UK: Chicken Tikka Masala -- a spicy curry dish allegedly not available in India, and created when British restaurant eaters complained they wanted more "gravy" with their Indian food, and so the chef made a sauce using a can of tomato soup.
• Canada: Poutine -- well, according to a Globe and Mail survey we apparently wanted it to be maple syrup, but we don't eat that out of the bottle...or do we?

Number of foreign-born residents as of 2016:

• UK: about 13.5% 
• Canada: about 21.9%

Food item you have to smuggle into the U.S.:

Haggis: I can only guess this is
what happens to sheep's lungs when
they refuse to give up smoking.

• UK: Haggis -- Apparently, sheep lungs just don't cut it as a sausage holder in the U.S. say the people for whom beef jerky is a delicacy.
• Canada: Kinder Eggs -- Actually, this changed in January this year, but before then Kinder Egg fans had been held at the border for hours and threatened with fines between $300 and $2,500 for this candy...because as Canadians their intention was really to choke small American children to death by forcing them to swallow the toys inside. Who needs gun laws?

Longest place name:

• UK: Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch in Wales, which translates from Welsh to “St. Mary’s Church in the hollow of the white hazel near a rapid whirlpool and the Church of St. Tysilio near the cave.” How can you miss it?!
• Canada: Pekwachnamaykoskwaskwaypinwanik Lake is a lake of Manitoba. The name is Cree for "where the wild trout are caught by fishing with hooks." Its right next to the one with the similar name that translates to "where the wild trout are caught by fishing without hooks" which you'd think would be longer. Ah, the strangeness of language, eh?

Tallest habitable building:

The Shard -- or the Salt Cellar as
some Londoners refer to it.

• UK: The Shard in London (actually, also the tallest in the Europe Union) at 1,020 feet (310 metres)
• Canada: The One in Toronto at 1,005 feet (306.3 metres).
• Always begs the question: Why?

Largest body of fresh water by volume:

• Loch Ness: It has a surface area of 56 sq km (22 sq mi) and is 230 m (126 fathoms; 755 ft) at its deepest point. The Loch Ness monster has been spotted in it over 1,000 times. 
• Superior wins here for Canada, but we do share it with the U.S. It has a monster too: Mishipeshu, which is an underwater panther covered in scales. If you pick a lake that resides solely in Canada, it would be Great Bear Lake, which, despite it's name, does not have a big monster bear living it ... although they have been spotted taking the occasional dip.