The little differences

After work, I wasn't really up to doing anything anymore - I had to work the early shift starting at 9 AM after having worked until 9:30 PM yesterday, so I was quite exhausted.
As I  still wanted to write about something today, I decided to write a little article on the little differences between life in Canada and in Germany instead of going out.

Let's start with the appearance of the cities here in Canada - and the US for that matter. Most streets are organised in some kind of grid and they are all very long - it is not unusual to have street numbers going up to 2000 and higher. If you need to go somewhere, all you need to now is the crossing, for example 'Douglas at Fort Street' in order to find the place you are looking for. Since all the streets are quite long and have memorable names, most people can also tell you how to get to your sought crossing.

If you are a pedestrian, the traffic lights are not red and green for you - they are red and white.

Taking the bus is also a little different. First of all, you need exact change in order to buy bus tickets. While riding the bus, there are usually no stops announced but you could ask the driver to let you off at a certain place. Apart from that, you can just try to orientate yourself on the different streets you cross - most busses stay on one street for a long time, so you only need to know what the streets parallel to you desired crossing are called. When you want to get off the bus, there are not always stop buttons. However, you can find a yellow line that runs along the sides of the bus. If you pull the line, the bus will stop at the next bus stop. When leaving the bus, you say 'Thank you' to the driver.

You can find public toilets in many places, expecially close to parks and other places of interest. In contrast to Germany, all public toilets are for free and there is no one expecting to get change for it. The toilet seats are also often shaped differentl. Instead of the round or oval 'O' shape, the seat is often more like a 'u' with the opening at the front.

When you go shopping, you have to consider that the taxes are usually not included in the prices. Consequently, you always have to pay a price higher than the price on the price tags at the check-out. Furthermore, there are no 1 or 2 cent pieces in Canada. Consequently, all prices are rounded up or down when paying with cash.
When buying groceries at the supermarket, you don't have to pack them into your bag yourself - the cashier will do it for you.

If you go into a fast food restaurant like for example Mc Donalds and order food, you don't get it right away at the cashier. Instead, you get a number and then have to wait for a few minutes. Your meal will be prepared and when your number gets called, you can collect it. Even if you just want one little cheeseburger, you usually have to wait for a while.

Beds are also made a little differently. There are not always bed linen for the comforter. Instead, there is always a so called flat sheet, which is just one big sheet that you put in between yourself and the comforter.

There are many more little differences but those are the ones that caught my eye the most so far.