David Rakoff on how he tried to pass as a local once he moved from Toronto to New York. He claims that there must be a chip in his head — or something like it — that automatically tells him when someone or something famous is Canadian.

A mysterious tunnel in Toronto leads to wild public speculation. Nick Kohler tells Ira the story behind the tunnel, which he wrote about for MacLean’s.

A story about quitting by Sandra Tsing Loh.

Scaachi Koul is trying to learn a language native to her parents, and heads back to Calgary to ask why they never taught it to her in the first place.  (21 minutes)

Nancy Updike tells the story of the phone call from the prologue.

A mysterious tunnel is found in a forest in Toronto. Public speculation is all over the place and totally wrong.

We revisit a refugee who’s been resettled in America, and on our show in the past—Abdi Nor—to see what he thinks.

Host Ira Glass talks to Aaryn Zhou. When she was nine, her father threw her into the deep end of pool to teach her to swim.

Ira interviews Ryan Knighton, a blind guy who had a very peculiar experience with a hotel room telephone.

Short fiction from Bess Kalb about a groundhog named Susan, who has her own opinions about the holiday named after her species. (7 minutes)You can find more work from Bess at The Grudge Report on Substack.

Writer Malcolm Gladwell, reads from a story that he first wrote for the New Yorker magazine about his cousins, who immigrated to the U.S. from Jamaica 12 years ago.

A doctor tries to investigate something that horrifies her, but people tell her it’s not worth thinking about. It’s the way it’s done.

An '88 Grand Marquis that Senator Conrad Burns inherited from his mother; a New York taxicab whose driver, Jeff Perkins, tape-records his passengers to help pass the time; a 1980s-era BMW 5 series in which film producer Rob Levine had his first job as driver and assistant to movie producer Edgar Sherrick.

Host Ira Glass reads an ad from American Handgunner. People who love guns and people who hate them have a hard time seeing eye to eye, but this ad bridges the gap. As this week's show does.

More than England, or Japan or Israel.... When we think of South Africa, it's a more interesting mirror of the United States than nearly any country, because we glimpse a distant echo of the most frightening parts of American society — and the most inspiring.

What's French for French Fries? David Sedaris has been following the diplomatic fiascoes of the last few months from Paris, where he lives. Relations between France and the U.S. have been so horrible these days we asked him how it seemed from over there.

Ira talks to our Senior Producer Brian Reed about a fight that’s been brewing in the remote town of Homer, Alaska over a resolution that states that Homer welcomes immigrants. Which is odd.

This week we document what happened when the President’s executive order went into effect, and talk about the way it was implemented. A major policy change thrown into the world like a fastball with no warning.

Ira's quest continues. He calls his Uncle Lenny, who gets his news from Fox and the Wall Street Journal, and lives with an entirely different set of facts, and Alex Nowrasteh, an immigration expert at the CATO Institute, who explains that the central issue in Donald Trump’s candidacy is based on something that isn’t true.

Comedian Sam Mullins tells a story onstage about being in middle school, and throwing a party for his longtime childhood friend, who is also a girl. Sam sees the beach party as the perfect opportunity to impress a bunch of teenage girls in bathing suits.

Ira talks with Shalom Auslander, who was raised as an Orthodox Jew and who made a pivotal break with his faith at a Rangers game. Shalom Auslander is the author of a book of short stories, called Beware of God.

John Hodgman provides an occasionally true account of seven days spent at the Mall of America. After crossing mall officials, he goes rogue, drinking from the flume ride and exploring what he describes as a secret tunnel lined with human skulls.

Ira talks about those ephemeral, thrilling radio moments that you happen to catch in passing on stations far away that you never find again. Flipping through the channels.

Julie throws up.