Florence + Joel
(1/12) 𝗔𝗯𝗼𝘂𝘁 𝗙𝗹𝗼𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 + 𝗝𝗼𝗲𝗹
Joel was born and raised in Oakland, CA, in the Oakland/San Francisco Bay Area. Florence (AKA: Flo) was born and raised in a historic region near Lausanne, Switzerland. At the age of 21, Flo moved to the United States. The year was 1992. Her original goal at the time was to, as a native French speaker, better learn the English language (she had only begun to learn the language), attend an American University and dive headfirst into American culture. Months prior to her departure from Switzerland, she would choose a small college to attend in the San Diego area where she would enroll as a freshman during the summer of 1992. Concurrently, Joel was a full-time student at the state university, located about 10 miles from Flo’s new school, and in his senior year, (during the same summer of 1992), he happened to be taking supplemental classes at the same school during the week of Flo’s enrollment. On an otherwise uneventful day, Joel and Flo would have a chance meetup on the quad; ironically, on Flo’s very first day in the United States. The rest is history!
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As of Jan 2022, Joel and Florence have been married for 29 years. Now empty nesters, they have raised three children, ages 27, 25 and 21; they have a dog, a cat and 3 chickens. They currently reside in a bedroom community that borders Oakland just to the southeast.
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Racially, Joel identifies as a black male, while Florence [reluctantly] racially identifies as a white female (more on this later.) They are both American Citizens (Flo being a naturalized citizen.) Culturally, Flo strongly identifies with both her Swiss background and with her American acculturation, and therefore considers herself somewhat of a hybrid culturally (albeit with strong Swiss roots.)
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