Canadian Identity

I'm planning a trip to India this summer and so I've been trawling websites, blogs, and forums and talking to people who have visited, trying to get the skinny on what's crackin over that way and a sense of what to expect. In the Canadian news over the past couple weeks everyone has quite rightly been talking about President Obama's visit to our land, and, strangely, his purchase of a beaver tail - a doughnut like thing for eating apparently. Bear with me - I'm going somewhere with this.

From talking to people and researching India I've been learning about a lot of particular and peculiar and fascinating customs, traditions, gestures, symbols, etc, etc. I really can't wait to bumble around the subcontinent and experience it all first hand. It made me stop and think - what is peculiar and particular about Canadians? What makes us, us? Beer, hockey, mountains/lakes/fishing/hunting type stuff, cold, being courteous, the French/English deal, mounties, um...beaver tails? These are things that tend to come up. But I don't play hockey, never did, I've never hunted or fished in my life, it's hot as hell in these and other parts during the summer, and I had never heard of a beaver tail until the press was talking about it in relation to Obama. I do love beer, the politeness I can see, et je parle un petit peu de brise Francais.

I don't identify with this overall picture of what a Canadian is. Do any of us? Or is this just an issue in any country - particularly those that are as massive and regionally and culturally distinct as ours?