{"id":4944,"date":"2016-02-23T17:27:23","date_gmt":"2016-02-23T15:27:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/?p=4944"},"modified":"2016-02-23T17:27:23","modified_gmt":"2016-02-23T15:27:23","slug":"shared-sentiments-despite-cultural-differences","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/2016\/02\/23\/shared-sentiments-despite-cultural-differences\/","title":{"rendered":"Shared Sentiments Despite Cultural Differences"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>-Morgan Ippolito<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\">My love story with Valentine\u2019s Day began when I was rather young. Each year at school, we made Valentine\u2019s Day boxes, which means we found shoe boxes and reused them, decorated with red paper and bows, to receive Valentine\u2019s Day cards. Each student made cards for everyone and passed them out on Valentine\u2019s Day. Of course, the cards were accompanied with little candies. After that, I fell in love with Valentine\u2019s Day. I celebrate it every February and make sure that my family and friends know how much I love them when I give them a Valentine\u2019s Day card.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_4835\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/files\/2016\/02\/FullSizeRender.jpeg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-4835\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-4835\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-4835\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/files\/2016\/02\/FullSizeRender-300x202.jpeg\" alt=\"Valentine's Day Cards. Photo de Morgan Ippolito.\" width=\"300\" height=\"202\"><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-4835\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Valentine&#8217;s Day Cards. Photo de Morgan Ippolito.<\/p><\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\">This year, my Valentine\u2019s Day experience was much different. In fact, the French don&#8217;t really celebrate it all. Maybe there are a few couples that do, but in general no one truly recognizes the holiday. In conversation with my French friends, I learned that Valentine\u2019s Day is considered too commercialized. Moreover, the day does not accurately express feelings one may feel for another, according to the French. Why should one say \u201cI love you\u201d on a designated day? Love is a constant state and cannot be expressed through only one day. I find this point of view rather philosophical and sophisticated, and I agree with it. However, my agreement does not stop me from feeling sadness: even if Valentine\u2019s Day is too commercialized, I still adore it. Yes, love is constant, but why can\u2019t we have a day where everyone knows that they are loved?<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify\">I was having a true moment of cultural shock when Valentine\u2019s Day actually came around: I missed my family and friends so much. Nonetheless, I decided to reframe my situation by making Valentine\u2019s Day cards for my friends and my host. I was worried : would my friends like the cards? Am I being too American? I strongly hoped that my actions would be well received. In giving the Valentine\u2019s Day cards, I discovered that everyone, whether they are French or American, likes to receive a little treat and a note that means someone is thinking of them. I had created an opportunity to share my culture with others. I still miss American holidays, but I now feel more comfortable and happy: I have realized that everyone appreciates a moment where we all share a common sentiment.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>-Morgan Ippolito My love story with Valentine\u2019s Day began when I was rather young. Each year at school, we made Valentine\u2019s Day boxes, which means we found shoe boxes and reused them, decorated with red paper and bows, to receive Valentine\u2019s Day cards. Each student made cards for everyone and passed them out on Valentine\u2019s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4847,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[30101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2-la-une-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4847"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4944\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/toulouse\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}