Day 4/Rochester

We said goodbye to our host families and packed in the bus for the (tentatively) last day of our trip to England. On the way to Rochester for a Dickens-themed tour, V spoke to me a bit about the unsettling conversation last night and explained that most of these views were only shared by older generations. She has black friends and family members as do many others as intermarriage is becoming more common in France. Our tour guide in Rochester was, incidentally, black and came dressed up as Pickwick from the Pickwick Papers. He gave a wonderful tour in perfect French, explaining how Dickens wove details about Rochester into Edwin Drood, The Pickwick Papers, and Great Expectations. H and I were enthralled by the town’s history, but the students were more interested in arguing, texting, and trying to break up established couples. G bargained for a special deal at a local Italian restaurant whose owner had moved the entire staff from his village in Sicily. The Guildhall Musuem had some amazing reconstructions of life on the hulls, the detention ships used in the 19th century as a solution to overcrowded prisons. Upon leaving the museum, we received word that our ferry for the night had been canceled due to strikes on the English side. While the kids panicked, H tried to explain that this incident showed that we were truly “on an island” until V told him it wasn’t helping. The lycée called all of the families and our travel company found temporary host families for the night. D, the assistant chauffer, bought the profs cider at a local restaurant where we relaxed away from the nervous students. I went with H and D to stay at C’s house in a the nice adjoining town of Gillingham. Whereas Brighton is a rich retirement area, the Rochester urban area more closely resembles rust-belt America between Cleveland and Pittsburgh. It was actually quite refreshing to talk to someone who still worked and we discussed food transport, the weather, and local history over shepherd’s pie and mashed potatoes.