Summer vacation has different meanings and expectations across cultures around the world.
Even within individual cultures, summer vacation has unique interpretations. For many U.S. citizens, this means that rather than school, they’ll dedicate their time to working or playing.
I always thought summer was a time of recuperating yourself and relaxing. On the contrary, movies such as “Wet Hot American Summer” and “American Pie 2” create the illusion that the season in the U.S. is like nothing else out there.
In an attempt to understand other cultures’ perspectives of this season of the year in the U.S., I reached out to a friend.
Grant Gibbins, was born and raised in Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia. He now lives and works in Sydney as a video editor and producer at a major news station.
U.S. summer road trip
Grant came out to the U.S. for his summer holiday to do a short cross-country trip to some major cities with a few friends. He mentioned he had high expectations for his trip, assuming drinking and partying would surround him.
Grant had these expectations as a result of media portrayals he had seen in movies and heard in songs.
He and his friends were somewhat disappointed in what they found.
“The States are quite similar to Australia, nothing was extraordinarily different or even close to what the movies made it out to be,” said Gibbins.
They went to bars and clubs in each city, but that was the extent of the excitement.
Perhaps summer in the U.S. is boosted to draw in tourists. Maybe it reflects how we wish that part of the year would be?
