Things that make my kids seem weird to North American kids

It occurred to me yesterday as we were eating breakfast that although my children have a Canadian mom and speak English, there are some things that North American kids would definitely find different about them:

- The Bambina's accent (when she speaks English - I think it's a mixture between Brooklyn and East London)

- The Bambina insists on wearing a dress or skirt every single day.  She hates jeans and all pants in general.   Even in winter in Europe, she will typically wear leotards and a dress rather than long pants.

- The Bambino typically wears a shirt with a collar and cotton shorts or pants.  His best American friend is always in a T-shirt and sweat-shorts.

- Neither of my kids has ever been to McDonalds (although there are plenty in Europe, there are none in Madagascar), nor have they heard of Burger King, Taco Bell, or KFC.

- The Bambino asks for "mano" with his pasta (mano = parmagiano, Italian for parmesan cheese).

- At age 6, the Bambina knows how to write in cursive but doesn't really know how to print!

- Neither of my kids drinks cow's milk - ever!

This is not to say that my kids are purely European.  In fact, when European kids (and adults) hear my kids speaking to me in English, they assume that my kids are American.  When my kids ask for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches or drown their French fries in ketchup, this is more of the North American coming through.

And then the Bambina turns to her father and speaks a perfect, accentless, Parisien French, and people get really confused.  :-)

Why we love visiting Paris

The Bambino and I just returned from Paris less than two weeks ago.  As usual, we enjoyed every minute of it.  Here are some reasons why.

Carroussels abound.  The Bambino liked riding on this one right beside metro Jean Jaurès in the 18th arrondissement.   He went on it at least six times a day!

And the one in front of the hotel de ville was also a real treat, for the ride and for the gorgeous surroundings.

You can find a clean, safe, and fun public playground in pretty much every neighbourhood in Paris.   There are no parks or playgrounds where we live.  We rely solely on our own and other people's houses for this kind of recreation in Madagascar.

Flower shops, boutiques, ice cream stores,... civilization!

...and of course bakeries.  The Bambino asked for a croissant every single morning of our trip.

Hey, anybody home?

Herein lies the essence of what makes neighbourhood life in a developing country different from your house in suburban North America or Europe.

Walls and Gates.  Metal, stone or brick.  Two metres high with sharp glass or barbed wire on top and thorny bushes on both sides at the bottom (except of course at the gate, so people and cars have a place to enter, if the guard posted out front lets them in).  

Barriers that keep intruders out - but that also keep out little neighbours who are just looking for a playmate on a lonely summer afternoon.

Skiing at Les Gets

We are back home in Madagascar, having spent the Christmas holidays in France, first in Paris and then some skiing in the French Alps, at Les Gets.  The British website Ski Famille describes Les Gets very aptly:

When, twenty years ago, we started looking for a resort which would be ideally suited to the needs of families, Les Gets shone out.

The picturesque village of Les Gets is about as far from a purpose built resort as you can get. Real people live in Les Gets all year round, the land is still farmed and you can wander round the weekly market every Thursday to purchase everything from the latest fashions for mountain folk (think 1950's Eastern Block chic) to alarmingly smelly cheeses. More sophisticated retail opportunities also abound!

They're absolutely right.  We loved it there.  It's not just a ski resort.  It's a real mountain village, complete with town hall, market stalls, skating rink, and good restaurants (can you say cheese fondue, raclette, and tartiflette?).  And did you know that Father Christmas lives at Les Gets?

Ski vacations are expensive enough as it is, so we tried not to pay a fortune for lodging.  We stayed in a two-star hotel (the Hotel Christiania), which has a nanny service for kids too small to ski.  The hotel has a very cozy and convivial atmosphere.  Just a warning: the rooms at this place are small.  BUT you don't have too spend to much time there.  Guests tend to spend a lot of time hanging out in the hotel's cozy lounge, around the roaring fire.  The price per night is per person and includes breakfast and dinner.  The food was scrumptious - at least as good as the food served in any four-star hotel.  If you do end up going to Hotel Christiana, you can tell the owners, John and Nicola King (a Scottish couple) that you read about their hotel here!  

The Bambina started out in the beginners ski class at the Ecole de Ski Française.  The classes consisted of ten children each and were offered in French and English.  Normally, I would have been inclined to put the Bambina in the English classes but since none of the English teachers were native English teachers and the Bambina speaks French just as well, we decided to put her in the French classes.  She graduated to the level of "flocon" (snowflake).  There was a "ski garden" for children as young as three years old but the Bambino is only 20 months old so he'll have to wait a couple of years.


We definitely want to go back to Les Gets soon!

When are the Europeans going to get with the program on baby shoes?

Just when the Bambino was starting to walk, we noticed that his right foot seemed stuck at two o'clock, while the left one was at twelve.  We found this to be a little disconcerting, and the Frenchman even starting talking about putting the Bambino in foot braces, eventual surgery, etc.

"But you need to get him in some real shoes!," our French friends all told us when we showed them the Bambino's pose.  This advice seemed so obvious to them that they were surprised that the Bambino, at thirteen months, was still in Robeez style slippers.  I had to explain that we Anglo-Saxons tend to view barefoot as best.

The "babies need shoes to learn to walk" theory holds tight in many European circles, despite that fact that orthopedists worldwide (including European ones) recommend barefoot or close to it.  In France, I'm convinced that holding true to the "they must wear shoes" view is a way of propping up the children's shoe industry.   And we're not just talking about any shoe.   Your typical French, Spanish or Italian shoes salesperson will recommend a shoe with a thick, stiff sole and a high ankle for your toddler, so as to "support" the foot, as if mother nature hadn't equipped small children adequately for learning to walk.

Even standard baby websites in the French language give this dated advice.  For example, Infobébés has a whole page on shoes, in which it advises to choose a shoe that is "high enough to support the ankle", that is laced rather than in velcro, and that is "not too stiff" (well, at least they got that part right).

Netenviesdebebes suggests soft-soled shoes for infants who haven't learned to walk yet but fails to consider the possibility of no shoes at all.  It goes on to say that once baby has learned how to walk,

on préférera alors des chaussures qui maintiennent le pied et la cheville : bottes, boots, bottines par exemple.

 Translation: we prefer shoes that maintain the foot and the ankle: boots or booties, for example.

Well, it took Europe about twenty years to get on the no-smoking-in-restaurants bandwagon, so I expect about the same amount of lag time for progressive thinking on baby shoes.

The ray of light: we took the Bambino to visit the chief pediatric orthopedist at Necker hospital in Paris, to have his crooked gait checked out.  The doctor said that we should just wait another year and the Bambino's foot will likely adjust to the right position all by itself.  He didn't have an opinion on any kind of particular shoe for the Bambino but he did say that barefoot was definitely best.