Being mistaken for another culture is tiresome, especially when it's one that feels like it's threatening to subsume your own.

Absolutely, but they are often assholes about it, and I don't base this opinion on more than one incident or observation. A polite "I'm canadian, actually" is fine, but I more often saw outbursts and sharp words.

I'm really curious what they serve in McD's in India, where cows are sacred.

The Maharaja Mac! (Which I thought was mutton-based, but that article claims it's chicken.)

On Big Bang Theory, Koothrappali said the Maharaja Mac was chicken!

I'll admit that we ducked into a McDonald's in Paris after a very frightening attack by a French bag lady outside Guard du Nord. And being cheated out of change at the pay toilets at Notre Dame, and being pushed and rudely treated by two French teenagers atop the Eiffel Tower, AND being there on a Tuesday, when the Louvre was closed and DH having to wear his prescription sunglasses on a cold, cloudy day because his glasses had gotten smashed in a club in Camden the night before.

We don't have fond memories of Paris.

It was almost like the scene in Gotcha where the kid escapes East Berlin and walks into a McDonalds in West Berlin and orders "American" everything.

I get the NZ defensiveness too, for the same reason.

Yeah, that's fair. And occasionally pretty amusing.

Incidentally, there's a TV show here, a humorous news wrap-up kind of deal, that has a segment where they challenge ad firms to come up with ads for some odd products. One week they did an ad promoting the invasion of New Zealand. (The slogan ran something like "100% Pure. 100% No Army. 100% There for the Taking.")

The Gruen Transfer!

bt, I love that show. The recent one about the mining ads was really interesting. That show? Would never fly in America. We like our fear-based advertising just fine, thanks. No need to see, much less discuss, what is behind it.

I can deal with people being irritated or angry about cultures subsuming their own. What I'm not keen on is the smug sense of superiority that the guy in China had. There's a difference, right?

The Americans that were on our tour of Italy years ago were so awful and rude, that my family and I couldn't be insulted when one of the English citizens on our tour said we weren't like other Americans.

Happy Birthday, Teppy!!! I hope it was a wonderful day!

My friend I traveled with and I worked hard to not reinforce ugly American stereotypes. Once, when we hit an annoying situation at U.S. Customs on the way back, we looked at each other and said, "Hey, we can be rude now. Thank god."

they are often assholes about it

I've known more Americans who pretend to be Canadian when travelling than I've known Canadians who were assholish about not being American. And that's after a pretty long time living both places. That's where I come at it from. Before I'd even get into counting "ugly tourist" stats. Which, as a Jamaican, just make me want to weep. And then I'd have to get to "ugly host nation" ... and, well, I found writing off Canadians to be little less hostile than Canadians reacting overtly defensively about mistaken identity.