...and here we go. Off to another country and all we have are our
wits and our common sense(s?)... and too bad that NONE of that
translates into FRENCH!
Leaving Vermont, we continued to pass through some
of God's most beautiful country. We saw hills, backed by larger
hills, backed by mountains, backed by larger mountains. The
absolute 3-dimensional aspect of the horizons kept me oooh-ing and
ahhhh-ing for a hundred miles. Note the sign in the 2nd
picture. This is the half-way point between the equator and the
north pole. Think about it... We started from Dallas, and that's
no where near the equator. Yet, as we passed this sign, I was
given a brief glimps into the magnitude of this universal marble on
which we live.
Shortly thereafter, we came to the border crossing
where we
showed our drivers licenses and birth certificates. Then we had
to declare stuff.
We declared we were on our honeymoon and in search of a karaoke
club. The border guard was probably wondering about crazy
Americans at that point. All hope regarding our possible
normality
was removed when the guard looked past
me to Wade and asked, "What do you do for a living?" Wade
answered
that he sold music for dance and ballet classes. Then the guard
asked me
the
same question. I told him I ran a trucking company. By this
time,
I'm sure he was wondering why a gay man and a lesbian were just married.
Oh yeah... we also had to declare the one bottle of wine we brought.
Then we entered Quebec (pronounced keh-BECK
for you Texans, Tennesseeans, and Arkansans). Ya know, I should have remembered, having
lived in Europe for three years, that crossing a border meant that
customs and languages and costumes and religions change in the blink of
an eye. Yet, there we were, making the transition between the two
"Monts" (Vermont and Montreal) and, suddenly, cultural
vertigo hit us. The world was sideways and, if nothing else, I
discovered I was allowed to drive 100/hr. But just exactly how
fast is 100 kilometers per
hour?!
(I'm good with numbers, but it was fortuitous that the speedometer had
both MPH and Km/H.) Beyond the quick-conversion problem was the
issue of not speaking French -- and everything
past that border crossing was in French. We noticed a
tremendous change in landscapes, too. Vermont is
mountainous, and Quebec is as flat as west Texas. But that's
o.k. At least we weren't having to pop our ears every 2 miles.
(See Montreal, P2)
~~Bet & Wade~~
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