Things We Are Dreaming Of

When we left on our trip, we assumed that we’d miss things like family members, friends and loved ones. We were wrong. Here is a list of the things we really miss.

Fresh Milk

I don’t mean like “straight from the cow” fresh. I just mean a jug of milk that needs to be kept cold. The milk here comes in cardboard “bricks” and is plasticky, sterilized, and in defiance of nature, DOESN’T NEED REFRIDGERATION. All I want is a gallon of 1% that can’t be stacked like a lego block.

Fast Internet

They say you don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone. Now we know all too well how blazingly fast US Internet is. A 30-second YouTube video takes 10 minutes to load. Half hour tv shows? A day. Movies? About a week. I’m actually worried that when I finally do experience normal Internet again, it will explode my brain.

Bagels

These just do not exist here. No one’s even heard of them. Strangely, the stores do stock Philadelphia cream cheese.

Video Games

Neither Tate nor I are big video game fans. But there’s a certain kind of vegging out that only video games provide. I brought the Wii halfway across the world, but we fried the power cord when we tried to plug it in. Now I’d trade my left leg for an Xbox.

Good Beer

When’s the last time you said “Hey, let’s get some of that great French beer!” ? That’s right. Never. The French may do wine and cheese and processed duck fat, but they don’t do beer. We’ve survived on “Number One” and the occasional trip to “Trois Brasseurs” the only brew-pub in the country, but I’d kill for a Sam Adams.

NetFlix

From our perspective here, NetFlix sounds amazingly futuristic. The idea that for $20 a month, some magical person will send you as many movies as you want, and they’ll actually get there is too good to comprehend.

American Bureaucracy

“Golly, why would anyone miss American bureaucracy?” I’ll tell you why. Because French bureacuracy makes you want to carve your eyes out with a grapefruit spoon. No administrative task can be accomplished with less than three trips and about six hundred sheets of paper. Paying rent, filling a prescription, depositing a check: all of these require multiple visits to far-flung offices, staffed by people who can’t comprehend that maybe this system is new to you. All in French. I’m starting to fantasize about the DMV.

Pizza

Everything in Noumea is expensive. But a medium pizza costs $35. I am not kidding. We ordered one once out of desperation, expecting that for that price, it must be the most amazing pizza in the world. It was cold, greasy, and had an egg in the center. One of my English students works in a pizza shop, and I asked her why it was so expensive. She mumbled something about the cost of cheese and looked away.