Spring Break in America is an important event. Actually, it happens for the spring holidays but that depend on counties or states. And this « party » takes place the week before or after Easter, schools schedule spring break for the week of the third Monday in April to coincide with Patriot’s Day.
Patriot’s Day is the anniversary of the American Revolutionary War.
Spring Break regroups thousands or even millions of young people, mostly students, they will go to Florida, California, Texas, Cancun or nearby islands. As tradition requires that students travel at least once during their four years of study to a warm location with their friends and classmates to have fun for a week.
This period is also used for families who want to go on holidays or meet family members. But it’s true that in France when we speak about Spring Break, this alludes to « party ». Parties during Spring Break usually take place on beaches, or nightclubs. Young people meet up in pubs, but it’s « excess week », in order to relax after their school year.
According to the destinations, the trip can be very expensive, because it’s necessary to provide plane, housing, food, nightclubs and alcohol consumption.
But this year, Spring break has taken another flavour, partly due to the coronavirus.
Six weeks ago, Spring break was maintained because it was thought that the virus was far away and wouldn’t affect Florida.
Plenty of young people are have planned their Spring Break trip in Florida, Jamaica, Mexico, thinking that virus will not affect them because they. are young, and that the virus affects only old people.
With the number of people on the beaches during Spring Break trip, the virus could spread at a high rate. Tom Hanks was also infected and this began to panic the Florida population as well as young people wanting to go there. State and local authorities have decided to act by forbidding gatherings of many people. They have also asked the nightclubs to close and are considering introducing a curfew if the rules are not respected.
Unfortunately, in the United States as elsewhere in the world, some people think they are untouchable and act in they own interest putting in danger their health and health of other people.
For some American students, it was unthinkable not to leave during Spring Break, they would not follow the rules, such as washing their hands, not being too close to others, they didn’t realize how serious the situation was good.
But as American middle and high schools began to extend Spring holidays and plan for online courses, some began to worry. The situation was becoming critical, but personal well-being was very important. It was also complicated to cancel Spring Break because isn’t a single event in one place, it extends to several places and several states.
States cannot prevent anyone from coming on holidays, however, the population must understand that social distancing must be practicsed. But, despite the state of emergency declared by the governor , no one seems to be worried.
Yet, the message is very clear, it’s time to understand that everyone can be affected by this virus and there is no such thing as a « special » profile.
To conclude, this tradition has begun to take hold in Europe in recent years, even though it seems that Europeans have less fun than Americans…
Link : https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/13/us/virus-spring-break-florida.html
Picture by: Jeffrey Greenberg/Universal Images Group via Getty Images
Jeane Nicolas/ Timaëlle Martin/ Chloé Le Gargasson
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