If you’re planning a day-after- Election Day move, here are some suggestions for blending in.
First, learn the metric system. The freezing point is 0 degrees Celsius. A yardstick is about 100 centimeters. Then there’s everything else you can weigh or measure: height, width, depth, weight, distance, kilometers per hour, liters of gas etc.
Beer and liquor
In most of Canada, you can drink at age 19, but in Quebec (pronounced kay-BECK), the drinking age is 18.
You can buy a “mickey” of liquor, which is 13 ounces (375 ml) or a two-four of beer (case of 24). The two main Canadian beers are Molson Canadian and Labatt’s Blue. Do not order “Lablatz” unless you want to be outed as an American.
And speaking of Quebec … the official language in La Belle Province is French. In Quebec, unlike other parts of Canada, you do want to identify yourself as American because the Quebecois (kay-beck- WA) will be more forgiving of your Americanized French accent.
Be sure to order “poutine,” (poo-TEEN) which is fries covered with gravy and cheese curd. Travel deep into Quebec for the best poutine. Don’t settle for McDonalds’ version, which uses Cheez Whiz.
Your food and drink will come with a “serviette” (napkin), the only word known to have traveled from French to English via packaging. Oh yeah, all packaged goods are labeled in French and English.

Coffee
Although you will see a Starbucks here and there, most Canadians drink brewed coffee from Tim Horton’s. If you want cream and sugar, order a “regular.”
If you want twice the amount of cream and sugar, order a “double-double.” Note that Canadian sizes are smaller than U.S. sizes, so a small from a Tim Horton’s in Buffalo will be a medium in Toronto.

Milk and Soda
What Americans might call “regular” milk, in Canada is “homo” milk. It says so right on the package. Also, in many parts of Canada, milk comes in quart (oops, one-liter) bags, which you serve from a special pitcher. Learn to say “pop” instead of “soda.”
After all that drinking, you may need to use the facilities. Ask about the “washroom” or “restroom.” “Bathroom” sounds vulgar to Canadians.

Food specialties
Canada is a culinary heaven. Think maple syrup, ketchup-flavored chips, Canadian bacon, butter tarts (pecan pie with maple syrup and raisins, and no pecans), beaver tails (fried dough), Montreal smoked meat, donairs (actually Turkish gyros), Nanaimo bars (indescribable).

Apparel
Go ahead and wear the “Canadian tuxedo” – a jean jacket over jeans. Wear a jean vest as a sleeveless top with nothing under it. Wear “shit-kickers” – cowboy boots or other types of non-winter boots. Bring your beanie with you and in Canada you’ll be timelessly fashionable in your “toque” (pronounced TOUK).

Money
Three units of currency have disappeared from the Canadian monetary system: pennies, $1 bills and $2 bills.
“Loonies,” a gold-toned coin so named because they feature a loon (it’s a bird) on one side and Queen Elizabeth on the other, are the new $1. “Twonies,” so named because they are worth $2, are two-toned coins, gold-tone in the middle and silver-tone on the outside.
Pennies have been eliminated, so all transactions are rounded off.
Canadian bills are made of polymer, not paper. Besides bright colors, the bills feature translucent windows and metallic images of parliament buildings. They do not fold like paper money does.

Other weird things
In hockey, “deke” is a move in which a player gets by an opponent by faking. In Canadian lingo, to “deke” means to dash in or to go somewhere suddenly.
Mounties patrol remote areas. In most parts of Canada, electricity is known as “hydro” because of hydro-electric power.
The government system is parliamentary, so there’s no electoral college. The current prime minister, Justin Trudeau, is a self-proclaimed feminist who named the most diverse cabinet in Canadian history.
Oh, by the way, his father, Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, dated Barbara Streisand in the early 1970s.
OK, there you have it. Canada from Eh to Zed (Zee).