10 small differences between Manchester and Scarborough, Toronto 

By Emily Smith, University of Toronto (Scarborough Campus), Canada

1. Wildlife – something refreshing about my academic exchange was getting to experience student life at a university based in a more rural campus, contrasting the very urban environment of Manchester. It meant I was exposed to more greenery and therefore more local wildlife – most notably contrasting from the standard UK fauna were black squirrels, skunks, and even red cardinals! As for plantlife – well. It was an absolute pleasure to bear witness to the famous Canadian maple trees in autumn.
2. Reliance on vehicular transport – whilst Canada is obviously much bigger than England, what I wasn’t expecting was for it to feel that way. In contrast to the convenience of Manchester, in which even at the edges of the city you need not walk longer than 15 minutes to find a shop, everything in Canada is much farther apart. The roads are bigger too as everyone has a car – so rather than high streets, shops tend to be in retail parks that are mostly accessible by driving, or are located by the roadside (with small spaces for parking your car).
3. Don’t worry though! If you have a Metro public transport card, you don’t need to pay twice when changing buses – which makes navigation significantly less stressful as there isn’t a fiscal penalty for accidentally getting on the wrong bus!
4. Speaking of roads – yellow lights! Plus rather than red/green man they have white man for walking and red hand for stop
5. Large housing estates with interesting architecture – and seasonal decorative lawn culture! My accommodation was a flat complete with shared kitchen and bathroom with other tenants – located in the basement of my landlord’s two-storey house! And it was located in an estate of equally sized houses, though all with unique designs, complete with balconies and pillars, and even turrets sometimes! And seeing the way these houses decorated their lawns for Christmas, and especially Halloween was one of the highlights of my entire exchange. I remember not paying attention to and getting jumpscared by a 7 foot tall skeleton, and another house that gradually added more lights and decorations throughout October until Halloween itself, in which they left the house for the night and had decorations of “ooze” coming out from under their garage door with figures in the windows and lettering that “we have taken over the house.” It was genuinely fantastic.
6. Because only large supermarkets and so much local produce, significantly more choice and significantly less packaging for fresh fruit and vegetables 
7. Thanksgiving! Celebrated in October, I was fortunate that the university organised an event for international students to engage in the festivities too. There was a meal, autumn wreath making, sharing thanks – as well as a stall acknowledging other harvest festivals from around the world such as the Midautumn festival.
8. Pumpkin pie (and pumpkins in general) – around harvest season in October a lot of pumpkins start showing up in supermarkets and outside houses – as well as pumpkin pie, which I learned is very very tasty so if you get the chance to try some I would definitely recommend it!
9. Halloween is taken more seriously in Canada, with people even showing up on campus in costume
10. School buses! Honestly one of the highlights of my exchange was getting to ride in one of the iconic yellow Magic School Bus school buses on various trips with the International Office.