Paging the only customer

With only 33 million people living in the world's second largest country, Canada provides certain inconveniences and conveniences that are quite a change from Manhattan, which, according to the ever-reliable Wikipedia, is the most populated county in the United States, with nearly 70,000 residents occupying each square mile. Here are some examples:

Banking: Apparently, I'm supposed to be grateful that I opened a free checkinq account here more than a decade ago since that doesn't exist any more. Banks here charge for everything - I heard one guy got charged every time he checked his account online. Quite a difference from the States, where banks chase you with free iPods, sports tickets or $200 bonuses to give you a FREE checking account.

Credit cards: Similarly, while I'm used to getting tons of offers for free credit cards in the States, here they all seem to have annual fees. So my credit card recently arrived (along with its impressive $800 spending limit - hooray!) and before I charged anything, I already got a $30 annual fee bill.

Bank machines: Yesterday, I walked probably close to a mile on Yonge Street, Canada's largest street, before finally finding my bank's ATM machine. Again, quite a change from having Chase Manhattan in every Duane Reade. Apparently, the concept of convenience has not caught on yet.

Prescriptions: Now here is an example of how lack of people (which apparently leads to fewer of the above choices) brings about some good stuff. To pick up a prescription, they give you one of those pagers like you get at some chain restaurants while waiting to get a table. They are also very polite (unlike at any CVS in Manhattan) and don't require an hour to give you a medication I can reach behind their head (unlike at any CVS in Manhattan).

They take the pager stuff seriously: I think I was the only person in the store, at the drop-off, and at the pick-up, yet they still gave me the pager. I was roaming about the store when it buzzed seconds after I dropped off my prescription. Impressed with this efficiency and scared of arriving at the counter too late after it buzzed, I ran down the aisle and traded my pager for the prescription.