You know, if you're going to use dictionary-style "entries" for Canadianisms as the concept for your product you should at least get your info right. No, our Canadian toque is not pronounced like toke. It rhymes with "spook".
For more on toques, see this post:
http://katherinebarber.blogspot.ca/2012/01/toque.html
I saw these coasters, made by an Ontario company from upcycled beer bottles, on sale at the Royal Ontario Museum gift shop. You can also get matching beer glasses if you really want to spread the "toke" mistake around.
Once I got over my "Why did we go to all the trouble of writing the Canadian Oxford Dictionary for these people?" shock at this, I started to wonder, "Why the heck do we call those things coasters, anyway?"
A "coaster" was originally a person or a ship who sailed from port to port along a coast, or around the coast of an island. In the late 1800s, some wit saw a similarity between this and the silver tray on which the after-dinner bottle of port (the other kind of port) circulated around a table, stopping at every welcoming "harbour" along the way. Coasters gradually became smaller and more stationary, until they designated the type of object above.
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is it true? about the coasters?
ReplyDeleteunlikely perhaps, but definitely true.
ReplyDelete