Memorable+Moment


 * French Experience of a Life Time**

During the summer of 2006, I experienced a vacation that will live forever in my memory. My mother, her boyfriend Chris, his kids, Jessica and Kevin, and myself all went on a vacation to France. I crossed the U.S. and traveled to a whole different continent for the first time in my life. Our plan was to travel all over France and, of course, visit all the tourist areas. Our other dream, however, not usually experienced by foreigners, was to experience the ordinary life of people in France. I had the opportunity to evaluate and experience some of the differences between American and European cultures. We decided to swap houses with a family in France, staying at their house while they did the same at our house in Hawaii. Our great benefactors, Dennie and Dalphine, were true residents of France who lived in a quaint little village on the outskirts of Nice. I was thrilled to not have to reside in some anglicized tourist hotel where everyone was just like us and knew nothing of the French lifestyle. Little did I know that when I actually did get a taste of regular European life, boy was I in for a surprise!!! After an exhausting twenty four-hour flight, we finally landed at the airport and picked up the car we'd be using during our stay in Nice. It ended up being a little grey Audi, small by American standards though moderately large by European standards. Squeezing five people into the Audi, which took quite a long time to arrange, we headed off to our temporary home. Upon entering the apartment, I was very surprised. It was fairly spacious, with a bedroom, kitchen, living room, a study, and two mini patios. Later that night, we strolled around the neighborhood. It was so much different than the houses and suburbs of American housing. There were cobblestone streets and elegant French styled houses with flowers overflowing from every windowsill. I especially loved the houses with rose bushes, growing and twining themselves up the house windowsills and railings. Looking as if they were trying to reach the heavens. Later that night, after strolling around the neighborhood, we experienced our first small European lifestyle problem. While taking a shower, the hot water suddenly ran out, with four more people still to go. We ended up using cold water, which at the time, wasn't very amusing at all. At least now we knew to conserve the hot water and use the least amount possible. But that wasn't all; the shower stall didn't have any curtain or shower hanger. Another difference between American and European lifestyles. We ended up flooding the floor by the end of our showers, so we mostly bathed so that we wouldn't have to mop up a drenched floor. Eating was a very interesting experience. For some meals we went to the village café and ordered coffee and bakery goods, such as croissants, baguettes, mini pizzas, quiche, and French bread. Other times we went to the village restaurant and bought extravagant foods that we couldn't read because they were all in French. We mainly pointed, and made animal sounds to see what kind of meat we were going to order; hoping for the best that we weren't going to end up eating frog legs or something as strange as that. Getting food from the restaurant was good and great fun, but it got costly. So we ended up buying most of our food from the village marketplace, which involved quite a lot of hand motioning for not many vendors could speak English. We also bought our food from an ordinary store very much like Safeway, except for the fact that it closed at 6:00 P.M. every night. When it came to cooking our food we didn't have an oven and mostly ended up eating breads, cheeses, cold meats, and fruit for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Even though we ate these foods, our main source of substance came from a deathly addicting condiment called "Nutella," a chocolate hazelnut spread that we devoured by the spoonfuls. From the outskirts of Nice, we traveled to the tiny principality of Monaco, then the little sea- side town of St. Tropez, and even the film festival in Cannes. We only stayed for about a day or so per place. Monaco was magnificent with its world famous Monte Carlo. In St. Tropez we saw many million dollar yachts and I also got to experience swimming in the freezing Mediterranean Sea for the first time. In Cannes we scouted celebrities at the annual film festival. Although we didn't see any, we did walk through the town and enjoyed pretending to be rich while touring the designer boutiques. We went to these places with anticipation, although none could top the anticipation for touring the Louvre and Eiffel Tower in Paris. During our stay in Paris we did see these places and became one with the other tourists and foreigners. Here we did not get a taste of normal European life, but experienced the curiosity and interest of tourists like ourselves. We climbed all the stairs to get to the top of the Eiffel Tower and toured many of the art and historical parts of the Louvre. After we finished touring in Paris, we realized that our days were numbered in France. We ended up taking the Metro (subway) to the airport, getting on our 24-hour flight, and going home. Overall, our vacation was very educational and made us realize how different American and European cultures really are. By experiencing the European life style first hand, we were able to identify the significant differences between the two cultures. This is definitely a vacation that will forever live in my memory.

MM Reflection