Remember the closing ceremonies of the Winter Olympics in Torino? Remember watching and learning about Vancouver during our city’s presentation during the ceremonies? What did that presentation show the world about Vancouver and Canada? That we’re enlightened enough to vote for a mayor in a wheelchair? That there are igloos and moose on Robson?

Let’s face it our little song and danced sort of re-enforced some of the old myths of Canada. The Mounties always get their man! Watch out for polar bears! Snow! Don’t feed the moose! We don’t have any vampires! SNOW! We let our women sing! SNOW! There’s nothing here but nature! We make houses out of snow and ice! SNOW!

Seems the entire thing did not go down with the Federal Goverment quite as well either. Greg Klassen the Canadian Tourism Commission’s vice-president of marketing believes that the Vancouver bid group focused too much on the old Canadian myths [cbc].

Klassen said the 2010 Olympics will focus the world’s attention on Canada. He said it’s time to get beyond the cold, clean, and safe image this country has promoted for the past 50 years.

“We’ve got some vibrant cities, we’ve got some amazing cultural experiences that you can have in Canada, that go well beyond the sort of moose, mountains, and Mounties idea,” he said.

That’s right Vancouver, it’s time to wheel East Hastings out onto the world stage. Yes we have drug use too and severe poverty. We don’t live in wooden forts, some of us live in cardboard boxes.

Okay, so maybe that’s a bit too urban and edgy. The happy middle? Somewhere between Dudley Do-Right and IV drug addicts.