The Day of the Stolen Hat - Andernos-les-Bains

So last Sunday, our landlord Véronique needed to make some repairs on her mother's old house in this tiny little village called Andernos-les-Bains, or Andernos for short. Pretty little houses + the sea = Andernos.

The town was only a one-hour drive from Bordeaux, which was nice because I'm not really one for long car rides. We went into this boulangerie/patisserie to grab a baguette to make a sandwich for lunch. Let me tell you this... everything's way better in France, especially the food. Just look at this.

Look at all these delicious pastries! (that we never get to eat)

After lunch, we left Madame to work on her house and set off to walk around the tiny village. My first impression of it was that it seemed like a French version of the Hamptons, except less pretentious. The people seemed much friendlier, although slightly ticked when Adena and I take selfies in the middle of the street and hold up traffic. I'm kidding. We don't actually cause obstructions on the road... I don't think.

Mom, Dad. Let's buy a vay-kay home here.

So I can take selfies on the beach. #alldayeveryday

Before you continue reading, open up a new tab and keep this song playing on the background for some mood music.

It was nice to just walk on the pier and sit on the beach, not really worrying about anything. Our conversation actually got pretty deep. So far, even though we'd only been in France for about a week at this point, we've already fallen in love with the culture here. French people seem to take the time to just sit back, relax, and appreciate everything that surrounds them. In contrast, Americans are always working, living such a fast-paced life, that no one really pauses to say "thank you" for what they have. And even more, our very university, Berkeley – everyone knows I love it, but the atmosphere on campus is just one of high-stress. Everyone feels like they need to overachieve, to impress the person sitting next to them in lecture. Sometimes when I talk to someone at Cal, I feel like I'm getting their verbal résumé, which is cool and all. I mean, I'm glad you interned at Ernst & Young last summer. That's great. But what do you like to do for fun? And no, networking doesn't count.

The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky is one of my favorite books of all-time, not just because it is so easy to read (you don't need an elaborate vocabulary to get through it) but also because it's just so real. There's this one famous line from the novel: "... and this moment, I swear, we were infinite." And that's exactly how I felt last Sunday while sitting on the beach in Andernos. It didn't even matter that there were people walking past us. Honestly, if they all wanted to stop and sit, breathe in the fresh air, listen to the crashing waves of the Atlantic Ocean, and bask in the glorious French sun, I would've let them sit with us. But alas, it was just Adena and me and the sound of Chris Martin's dulcet tones crooning out, "... and I could write it down, or spread it all around, get lost and then get found, and you'll get found, not swallowed in the sea." It was perfect. We were happy, and that's all that really mattered.

I mean, look at this face. ECSTATIC.

Is this church the real life? Or is it just fantasy?

Even this tiny, little port is perfection.

Walking around Andernos for hours three straight hours got pretty exhausting, so we thought it was appropriate to have a little afternoon snack.

"It's winter," you may tell me. So what? #stillyummy

On the way back home, we some more pretty houses, so naturally, we had to take pictures of them, or in my case with them. 

I must have really liked this house.

Someone once asked me why I take so many photos. "Because the pictures never change, even if the people in them do."

And it's true. I'm not going to be the same person I am now in a year or two or seven. But at least I have these photographs to remind me that there was a time when I was indeed happy.

Selfie game strong.