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A lot of Americans don't know this, but the winner of the Canadian election will be required live in a small cottage located in the backyard of the palace where the viceroy to the King of England lives. The cottage just recently got a new wifi router, which was very exciting for all Canadians.

The Canadian election is actually 338 local elections. After the votes are counted, the winners will gather in a big room to vote on a ceremonial leader, and then drag him kicking and screaming to sit in a big chair, which is tradition because the King of England used to chop off people's heads.

While American political scandals are typically called a "-gate" after Watergate, in Canada we also have political scandals, but we call them a "fuddle-duddle" for reasons I can't really go into right now.

Only a few years ago it was literally illegal to tweet about Canadian election results on election night, because we didn't want British Columbia to know what was happening. People seriously discussed whether the federal government might send somebody to jail for tweeting.

While Canada has 10 provinces and 3 territories, arguably the most important political delineation is "Upper Canada" and "Lower Canada" which is best understood as a sort of national historical dom/sub thing.

Canada has five politically significant islands: - Montreal - Vancouver - Prince Edward - Newfoundland - Cape Breton Each of these islands is confusing in various ways.

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The City of Vancouver is not on Vancouver Island. Prince Edward Island is a province but probably shouldn't be. Cape Breton is not a province but thinks it is. Newfoundland is only half a province. Montreal was the biggest city in Canada until some shit happened in the 1970s.

South Vancouver and East Vancouver are part of Vancouver, but North Vancouver and West Vancouver are not. the West Side and West End are parts of Vancouver. North Vancouver is two different municipalities, the City and the District, though no one who doesn’t live there cares.

Ok I gotta get some work done, but I will post more Canadian civics lessons throughout the day if I can think of any other important aspects of our rich national fabric that are worth posting about.

A bunch of people have corrected me, that the Canadian election is not 338 smaller elections. It's actually 343 smaller elections. Why did the number change? Because Canada got richer in the past four years, and we can afford five extra so we decided to splurge.

Politically and economically, Ontario is by far the most important part of Canada. But because people have a lot of feelings, Canadian politicians are traditionally expected to pretend that every other part of Canada is more important.

(I only mention it because last time I was up there, its status was apparently a mid-level issue for one voting bloc in the Saint John—St. Croix electoral district. And of absolutely no consequence anywhere else.)