How we perceive ourselves, as Americans: Big. Much too large for European homes. We were always knocking shoulders, hips and knees on the doorways of the gîte. Stubbing toes. Dwarfing teaspoons. Eating the most out of everyone.

Annie -- another of Diny's neighbors, an elderly German woman married to a Russian -- feels similarly about us. She told us stories of WWII and the Occupation. To her (being a child) the war and air raids on Munich were amusing. She was young, an only child. Her family built a bunker. She remembers being sent by her school into the windows of bombed buildings in order to pull valuable items out. Her and her classmates were instructed to help clean and set-up a veterinary hospital that had been bombed -- only to have it bombed again once they were finished picking up broken test tubes and needles. When they liberated the work camps, all the real criminals were also released. It was a dangerous time and all they had was stolen. She recalls the Marshall Plan and the planes dropping candy and shoes. Later, her family owned a villa and the American officers staying in the area demanded to stay with them. The first thing she noticed about them was their gigantic size. They opened the door to find giants before them -- all of them wanting, above anything else, a long, hot bath.


Corinne also told us her impressions of Americans. She says, most everything she knows of America and its citizens comes from movies. Of course she knows better, but she has the impression that we are all movie stars. Tall, confident and good-looking movie stars. Who speak the "nose language." She traveled to the States when she was younger, taking a grand tour of the country with her family. But the most memorable part for her was staying at a holiday ranch in the Southwest -- riding horses in the morning to eat breakfast prepared over an open fire and watching real cowboys.

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