“The usual bucket-rake-shovel beach toys or a bodyboard?”
Mark hesitated for a second. “Bodyboard.”
For 40 reais ($9.50), it was a good deal, even though I suspected that like riding the trottinette, it would be a steep learning curve. No worries, teaching him is right down my alley. I’ll never be a soccer or hockey mom, but I spent my teenage summers bodyboarding, windsurfing, and surfing along the Atlantic Coast.
Ahem… You never forget how to ride a bike—or catch a wave, right? RIGHT??
“Do this,” “don’t do that,” and “seriously?” are probably the sentences I say the most at home. I’m not the fun parent and sometimes, I worry that I don’t spend enough quality time with Mark, that he always sees me working, being busy, or tired.
On top of that, I always feel vaguely foreign in Canada. I don’t really stand out—after all, I’ve been Canadian for almost half of my life now—but I wonder how Mark sees me because clearly, I didn’t grow up here. I can’t relate to his Canadian childhood. I always forget “pizza day” at school because guess what, we didn’t have “pizza day” in France. I don’t know local recess games—for months, I thought “Fortnite” was the Canadian version of tag or hide and seek. I’ve never made a snowman, worn a snowsuit or sang “O Canada,” I’ve never taken a school bus, celebrated Halloween or spent hours in a car every day. I don’t particularly like to watch movies, I can’t use the tablet and no, Mark we didn’t have Wi-Fi when I was a kid.
But I can swim and catch a wave. I’ll show you all the tricks, mon chéri.
Honestly, how many kids can say «my mom teaches me how to surf»? lol. How cool is that?
But I don’t let him watch It and other scary movies. Totally cancels my coolness factor.
La photo avec le drapeau et les cailloux est marrante. “Attention Cailloux¹”. Ben oui, on voit.
¹: je soupçonne que ce qui est écrit signifie “Danger local”, ça ressemble à l’italien.
“Mazout, ne pas se jeter dedans”.
“Lugar peligroso”. Mais en fait, j’ai jamais vu un drapeau vert avec “endroit pas dangereux” sur les plages, leur système d’alerte doit être un chouia différent.
« Mazout. Ne pas se re-jeter dedans. »
Oui, on ne voit que des drapeaux rouges. En France, ça correspondrait au drapeau orange, « vous pouvez y aller mais faites gaffe. »
J’ai vu une ou deux fois des drapeaux verts, mais effectivement, le système est différent. Ça fait un bout de temps que je n’ai pas vu ces drapeaux en France, d’ailleurs, maintenant que j’y pense…
I identify so much with the feeling of not being a fun parent with my kids (I never aspired to be cool anyway 😆 ). I seem to be so full of patience and fun as a teacher with other kids, but not so much with my own. *sigh* Also, I love your pictures. I always find price conversions to be misleading: great prices for foreigners are not necessarily as great for locals (with local salaries).
When he was younger, Mark used to call me (without a hint of irony) “mommy no fun” :-/
Thank you for the reminder that what feels cheap to me isn’t always cheap by local standards. I mean it. In some countries (e.g. Guatemala, Peru) it’s more obvious but there’s such a crazy gap between rich and poor in Brazil! Sometimes I feel poor (for instance in Rio’s wealthy neighbourhoods) and sometimes I feel much richer than the average Brazilian.
Oh no, don’t worry, hockey’s overrated. Surf’s way more cool! Mark is lucky to build these memories with you! 🙂
I hope he will remember these moments…