Why are the french so french?
From the John Muir Trail:
On Day Zero of my 24 day John Muir Trail thru-hike, I met 3 french guys. We met at the shuttle stop at 6:15am. I was solo and was going to start my trip, they had just spent 21 days and had just finished their trip. They were very french. They were 19 years old and worldly. One even pointed out that he did the entire 230 miles of hiking in his ‘slippers’… which were a pair of cut up Keds with the backs cut off. (“The blisters hurt, so I cut the shoe. Eh.”)
We stopped off at a MacDonald’s while waiting for our next ride. The boys were baffled. HOW in the world could fast food be so CHEAP???? “A burger here… is the same price as an apple!” one exclaimed. “No wonder you people eat so many hamburgers.”
We talked for quite some time. This was their first time in the U.S. Their observations:
“You must need to be rich to go to university. In France it’s free. If I want to go, I can go. If I cannot afford housing, they will give me subsidized housing. Here, you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars and you are already poor when you get out.”
“The doctors are not so rich in France. But the rich and the poor, it’s not so big (wide, I think is what he meant) as it is here. Here you are really rich or really poor.”
“I buy an apple. It’s 60 cents. I buy a burger, it’s 99 cents. Why buy the apple when your apples don’t taste so good here?”
“Your fruits and vegetables here… there are a lot. But they don’t taste good. They don’t taste at all.”
“We cannot go anywhere. What do your 19 year olds do at night?”
“If you break a leg, you just go to the doctor in France. Here, I don’t think I could afford going. Why is it so expensive to get doctor care?”
Answers were not given, just nods and mutual silences of deep thought. Then my ride came, and I boarded, never to see them again…
I’ve spent some time in France — kid’s right. Our fruit and veggies are tasteless. Thank god for farmer’s markets, you can get a peach that tastes like one.
but the French smell. For all their beautiful language, arts, cuisine and culture they haven’t gotten out of Louie’s court yet — bon jour, this is called a shower.
Did they say these things all snotty-like? Movies have thought me that that’s how the French say everything.
Learn the ways of capitalism, frenchies!
[...] OUTDOORS WHILE ASIAN- THE FRENCH GUYS: [...]
Europeans also do not wear white socks. Ever. It is kind of a vulgar American thing. I am wearing white socks, but don’t like to acknowledge it. Think I will go out right now and buy some black ones. Then I will be civilized.