Instead of putting forward the reasonable argument that I am quite sure that I've had many winters before this one thank you very much - isn't that the cold season when we erect a tree in the sitting room and huddle around a log fire singing carols? - I feel a sinking feeling in my stomach.

You see: I'm a Brit. I can't hide it. Every fast food restaurant or Tim Horton's server is well aware of the fact that I'm not a local boy from the second I open my mouth. Not to mention my uncanny knack of picking out the English-version of words instead of the Canadian.
For instance, "What would you like on your burger?" "Gherkins, please." "What?" Fiance correction: "Pickles, he means pickles."
Although, in the case above, I must admit that pickles and gherkins may not be the same thing after all. But, I bet if you put me in a dark room full of gherkins and pickles (and why not some cucumbers and zucchinis too, for that matter), I wouldn't have a chance in hell of telling them apart.

Vegetables aside, when I recently asked my partner what she would like for Christmas, I expected her to ask me the same in return. But she already had 
a list of gifts drawn up for me: long johns, insulated sweaters, gloves and mittens (the double whammy), hat, fleece. I should consider getting sponsorship from a skiing-apparel store (that's a 'shop' to any British people reading this). I might as well have a sign on the back of my new coat which reads 'Snow Virgin.'

As a non-native, the suspense is building towards my "first" winter. How will it compare to my first steps? Yes, I imagine there will be similarities; clumsy footing and falling over. If I am to believe the hyped-up tales so far, I am expecting nothing short of snow as high as the roof tops, ice covering the lakes and seas and a chill that would make Frosty the Snowman turn the temperature up on his heater.Yet England is hardly a warm country. I don't recall ever strutting around in my shorts or sunning myself on tropical beaches in coastal towns like Cornwall (in the summer or winter sadly). My point being; how cold can it get?
I am informed, often with a deadly look in the speaker's eyes, "Very."
The shark-hunters in Jaws would say: 'We're going to need a bigger snow mobile.'
That's another clue as to how snow isn't such an 'experience' back home - over here you actually sell snow mobiles. A vehicle especially designed to travel through/across snow. We have those too; we call them cars.

Snow in the United Kingdom is, to be frank, rare, except right up North, and
causes only mild inconveniences. Like if your mate throws a snow ball, some of the flakes might get down the back of your neck giving you a nasty chill.
Okay, perhaps not all of the inconveniences are mild, nevertheless, they
don't compare to the stories I've heard from Canada. 

In England, the pipes may freeze and burst closing a few schools. The slush on the roads may slow down cars and buses. The drivers of salt trucks might have to -shock! horror! - get up early to throw their load on the icy streets.

In Canada, however, so I'm told, the snow was once so bad, they had to shut the schools for six months. And the van drivers in the province of Ontario have to get up so early to put salt and sand on the highways that they wake up in 1995. In most cases though, British snow is such an oddity it's fun. I imagine it is fun here too, although the UK only get it for around two days a year making the white stuff a total novelty. Snow is synonymous with childhood days of getting time off school and going tobogganing. Despite my age, I intend to make the most of Canada's wintry weather by exercising my sledding muscles.

There is a thrill in writing such bravado nonsense of course, knowing that some helpful soul will be reading this all back to me when I am tipping my hot coffee upside down and it freezes before impact on the ground. Just to hear my own words turning on me as I sit with my snow pants' butt 'Slush Puppy' cold in a melty puddle because my ill-fitting snow boots slipped away from me with my feet still inside them.

Either way, what ever happens, my first winter in Stratford, Ontario should be a memorable one.

Story: Toby Osborne
Design: DeDubya