Despite vociferous criticism of the press recently that is is longer doing its researched investigative job, occasionally a story comes out that shows that some informative journalism still takes place. The Vancouver Sun, for instance, published in its August 6 edition, startling information about US State Department grasp of foreign affairs, when, after a 3 and a half year wait, it received information it had requested under the freedom of information act, about the protocol guide prepared for President Bush and his staff before Bush’s first visit to Canada in Ottawa and Halifax from Nov. 30-Dec 1, 2004. Documents included by the U.S. Office of the Chief of Protocol prepared the president for the culture shock he would experience when travelling far from home.
Under social customs and courtesies, designed to prevent USERS from accidently offending the natives, were the following:
“On being introduced the customary greetings are firm handshake, customary “Hello” or Bonjour” in Quebec.”
“During conversations remove sunglasses.”
“While indoors remove hats.”
“Canadians, for the most part, place importance on education, skill, modesty and politeness”.
Under advice on deciphering a foreign tongue
‘”eh” is pronounced “ay”, is used mostly in rural areas and roughly translates as: “You know?” or “Isn’t it?”‘
While concluding “that most Canadian gestures are the same as those in the US it notes some exceptions:
“To call someone to you, use the entire hand rather than the index figure.”
“In Quebec, the thumbs down sign is considered offensive.”
In a follow-up analysis of the visit, the document also deals with serious political matters such as expected anti-US demonstrations, noting that protesters ranged from anarchists to raging grannies:
but “The Belly Dancers Against Bush were nowhere to be seen… they do tend to be active in the summer, for obvious reasons.”
No we assure you that these are not the fantasies of Rick Moranis, Joe Flaherty, John Candy, Martin Short, Andrea Martin and my brother and me in one of our finest hours. If you don’t believe me, put in your request for freedom of information documents, and in three and one half years, you will see why my brother and I can no longer do satire like we could in the good old days when we blew up things real good. Now it’s done by bureaucrats who should be stand-up comedians. By the way, your president by then will probably be a chap who recently announced that he would like to talk to the president of Canada. If he ever had made the trip 100 kilometers north of his home base (which he hasn’t), he would find out there was no such thing. Oh no, not another one! I wonder if he knows which country is by far the US’s largest trading partner and which country is by far the leading source of its fuel. There must be some documents on the topic in the secret vaults that he could take a look at before it’s too late.