We talked about bilingualism. The girl was pretty and nice and clearly enjoyed the opportunity to talk to a foreigner. She spoke English perfectly but had a slight accent. Her mother was French. Campbelton apparently is a true border town, carrying characteristics of both provinces and many residents are bilingual to different extents.
Up until fifth grade she studied in a French immersion class. She quit the program when they were required to learn math in French. They learned French with simple flash cards and for about an hour a day… That did not sound like true “immersion” to me, I must say. Other pupils were doing English immersion. I kept getting contradicting info about bilingualism in Quebec, or perhaps it is different in New Brunswick.
The two guys spoke English very well, and their French seemed secondary.
There was an Indian reservation on the other side of the bridge. The girl gave a complicated name I cannot repeat. Every Indian child born on the reservation gets 15,000$ from the Canadian government according to some historical treaty. Therefore, according to the girl, they were rich (I doubt that…). They have their own laws and their own prices.
Beer is much cheaper over there, and the minimal age for alcohol is lower than in town, but cops turn the other eye if teens come from the reservation with beer in their hands. Same for grass in small quantities. Campbelton is very small, everybody knows everybody, including the cops, and nobody wants to incriminate teens for slight offences. Cops wake up only if somebody walks around with a large amount of weed, seemingly for sale.
It was fun talking to them, swim and get warm in the Jacuzzi. When I got back to my room, I used the golden opportunity to dye my hair, something I wanted to do before getting back to Maine. I carried the hair color all the way from Israel, and it was time to use it. Making supreme efforts not to mess up the bathroom, I got my hair blue and black and enjoyed a great bath after the ordeal, sending my last gasping breaths to that part of Canada, in which I spent such a wonderful, and challenging, time.