France is Dirty and It's Great

Since today is Wednesday, we only have class in the morning and then we have the afternoon off! So I did absolutely nothing this afternoon and rested literally all afternoon in my room, which I haven't gotten a chance to do yet - there's been very little down time.

Today in class we talked about World War II, in preparation for our trip to the beaches of Normandy tomorrow! It was interesting to learn about how the French are taught about WWII in comparison to us. For example, as Americans, we are taught that America swooped in halfway through the war and saved the day, essentially winning the war. I didn't realize/know that the Soviet Union was actually the country that won the war. Also, we barely talk about the Japanese-American concentration camps in America, if they're mentioned at all. In France, they mostly talk about the war in Europe, not so much the war in the Pacific Theater, and a lot about concentration camps, which makes sense since the war and concentration camps actually happened in their country.

Our two countries also have very different ways of showing our nationalism. For example, we demonstrated the pledge of allegiance to the French students who found our chant very strange. I never thought about it before, but one of the French students compared learning the pledge at such a young age (around the age of 5? Whenever kindergarten is) to being similar to brainwashing.

Yesterday, Ben and I were riding back from the internship and chatting with the guy who was driving us back. I told him that we were from Akron and the US to which he said "oh, the American Dream". I just replied, "yeah, kind of I guess? But not really". It was so weird to me that the French (possibly the rest of the world) has this conception of the "American Dream" that American's don't really have. I asked him if he's ever visited the US and he said he hadn't because it's too expensive. I don't know what the American Dream is or why other countries don't have the "French Dream" or the "South Korean Dream", I feel like I'm living in a dream right now, but is that because I'm France or because American supplied me with the opportunities and resources to be in France right now?

Finally, not everything in France is sterile and I love it. For example, at the market on Sunday, the woman who was selling bread touched the bread she was talking about and then handled money. No gloves. No hand sanitizer. Not everyone showers ever day. Not everyone smells good 100% of the time. It's so interesting to be in a culture for this time. Everything here is clean, don't get me wrong, but it's not as sterile as everything in America. I am all about it.

Fun side note- right now the cars for the 24 Hours Race are practicing and I can hear them on the track with my dorm room window open (even a little bit with my window closed).