Sydney Dearth is a senior here at SHS who traveled out of the country this summer. Dearth went to London, Paris and Barcelona through the Ef Tour, an organisation where you can go to other countries with a group from your school, in this case, with Southport Middle School. Dearth traveled with Mr. Bailey, the French teacher at the middle school, and other students whose family members that also went on the trip.

Dearth wasn’t planning on going until her friend  had said that she wanted someone to go with. Dearth wasn’t learning a language along with the other students, so going was just for her own enjoyment and learning about other cultures. Conveniently these were places that she had wanted to visit already, she asked her mom if she could go, and her mom granted her permission.

Dearth was in Europe for ten days, learning about a worldly country first hand. In some cases, Dearth experienced some culture shock.

“It was kinda scary,” Dearth said.

The people in other countries don’t have the same interaction with people that strangers do here, Dearth says. You could walk by someone, and they wouldn’t make the effort to make eye contact with you, they would just walk past you, not really do anything more. Neither person would smile or say hello, they would just keep going where you’re going and not see them again.

The only other differences from America according to Dearth, are the language barriers. People speak different languages in Spain and Paris so she didn’t have the ability to talk to them even if she wanted to. If Dearth could go back for any reason she says she definitely would.