Shard

How many real life British friends do you have in Canada? Friends, neighbours, colleagues, family. Consider a household as one friend. Define friend as someone you might go to the pub with or have over for a drink.

ann m

One family who moved over at a similar time to us, one family who had moved over about a year befor us, and another lady through work who has lived here 30+ years but we clicked straight away.

We know of lots of Brits I guess, and meet up at a few social events here and there. Don't seek them out and don't avoid either. Take people as I find them.

Real life Canadian friends - now that's a whole other poll.

haggis88

colleagues?

several, there's a pile of Scottish guys at work, all from the same factory as me back home (came at various different times) and we go to the pub, hockey games etc etc quite regularly

some of the Canadians even join us from time to time, but we outnumber them in the factory

Buttons-Galore

We have only met one applicable couple in Montreal so far, an Irish guy and his English wife. Both very friendly but snowed under with three kids under the age of six! We haven't seen them since we met at a mutual friends' house at xmas, a Quebecois couple who wanted to introduce us for the "English connection". Most of our friends are local French and English speaking Quebecois, as well as some Canadians from Ottawa, Vancouver, etc and a few Americans thrown in for good measure. Basically, everybody but Brits?! To be honest we just haven't come across any apart from that one couple so far, but then I don't believe there is a big contingent in central Montreal...

Piff Poff

I put 2-5, but it's probably more. It has been more and it has been less, depending on whether people are coming or going and whether we have ceased to be useful to the newly arrived Hence my reticence to be useful to new arrivals to Red Deer these days.

Cyan

Often wondered what it would be like to live in a British ghetto here in Canada.

I've seen two types of Brits here. The ones who within 5 -7 years have seamlessly assimilated here (usually they have kids in the CDN schooling system and/or have a CDN partner). The other types are those still seem to be stuck in a time warp, still watching downloaded 90s' re-runs of Lenny Henry and Keeping Up Appearances on TVO/Vision, and constantly harking about how great ASDA and Tesco are, accompanied by a tearful nostalgia for roundabouts.

Oink

Don't forget the self-rightous and sanctimonious ones who're disdainful at anyone that offers critical insight of Canadian culture as if its a personal attack.

ArthurBrit

I don't know about other parts of Canada, but here in Winnipeg they are putting lots of 'roundabouts' in as a trial to get Canadians used to them.

The problem with the idea is they have stuck them in the residential areas where there used to be 4-way stop signs. meanwhile you drive on the perimeter and encounter traffic lights!

I am now fairly well assimilated but when someone in Winnipeg tells me how pointless roundabouts are it's hard to find the energy to keep explaining to them that they should be used more on main roads/high traffic areas just to keep the flow of traffic going not as a way to move through residential streets marginally faster.

There are things I like about driving in Canada but I will never get used to the mandatory stop sign, I guess the big difference is in the UK it's more pedestrian beware of cars than cars beware of pedestrian but still annoys me that I have to stop when I can use drivers judgement!

Hawk13

Roundabouts. Designed a few of these and ran the open house seminars to explain how they work (not rocket science but you know...).

You do get quite an interesting array of questions on how they work and reasons why they won't work.

Bottom line is that most are resistant to change especially the elderly.

Pedestrians. The mentality of most pedestrians in Canada is quite shocking. They have no problem marching out in a crosswalk not bothering to make eye contact with the driver fully expecting the driver to stop, which they should but...

rwin

Most of the ones I know whine about how much better the old country is.

Oink

I'd say they're engaging in more of a comparative analysis than whinging. You should be grateful for the input as thats the only way things will improve.

Shard

Don't worry, over time Darwinian selection will take care of these folk !

ArthurBrit

I feel that Canadians in general are fairly happy with what they got and don't strive to improve.

After a while to ultimately adapt you need to accept the above like it or not.

Shard

Improve is the operative word here. It depends what that means. The emphasis of an egalitarian culture, the enormous multiculturalism, the relatively high standard of living all do encourage a certain complacency.

ArthurBrit

I've had a few employers here and I have been made supervisor/manager in all but my current employment (started 6 months ago).

The reason why I manage to get the supervisory/management role is because the people around me (Canadians or not) do not go above the everyday tasks, it's not in peoples nature here to sit and question what they do on a day to day basis they just do it, which is a remarkable quality.

I was brought up in an environment to constantly increase 'productivity/efficiency' we had to do this to avoid layoffs and to out compete our competition. The trouble with the UK model is eventually work dries up and no privatised company wants to pay there workers for doing nothing and also it bred the exportation of sending 'professional' jobs overseas.

In Canada there isn't quite as much off shoring and there isn't nearly the amount of money going around like there was in the UK. they are like the turtle in the old turtle vs. hare race, slow and steady and ultimately on the way to success.

The reason why I left my previous roles ended up being that I could only improve the companies so far before ending up fighting a losing battle trying to enforce changes that would ultimately reduce work times and boost accountability and hopefully reduce errors.

I have yet to find a job here which will look hard at it's own processes and policies honestly and take any form of 'constructive criticism' which in the UK was a mandatory meeting after every project.

Is it that Canadians can't take criticism or is it because they know they are making enough money to live a comfortable life without the pressure of the international world?

I honestly don't know but I can't criticize their methods as it seems to work for them.