La crème de la crème

Ahh... french women.

I'm a little bit obsessed with them. We share the same sidewalks but seem to occupy two different planets. I feel foreign around them, like a cross-dresser in their midst.

And yet I find myself slowly migrating and starting to mimic their strange behavior. Just look at what I did to my face!

It occurred to me today that I could cream myself french - that culture may be a simple matter of conditioning.

This was following a conversation with some male victims on Gmail chat about the words that they use to for les françaises.

"Douceur" was the first response and an obvious effect of creaming.

The second description was "complicated," and can also be attributed to beauty products. To simplify the theory (Descartes, I believe it was) about local ladyplexity and the differentiation of creams: if the pharmacy in a given culture is selling two seperate creams for knee and thigh skin, than the women in said culture will be crazy.

The third adjective, "elusive," is also related to the regimen. A stong commitment to hair removal leaves little time to return phone calls. Is Delphine being coy... keeping you quivering with anticipation? Or did she just not have time to shave her legs?

The final word, "passionate," was used multiple times, and I gotta give the girls credit on this one. French women are without a doubt more sensual than their American counterparts.

Some say our prudishness is the by-product of Protestantism. But I think it's all about lubrication. Sensuality must increase with the number of hours spent self-lotioning. All that rubbing is bound to make a girl think about sex.

I pressed the same boys to give me some additional words for Americans. I heard "franche," "bold," "assertive," "confident," "strong," "busy," and "delurée."

At least half of those adjectives are directly related to alcohol. And french girls, after their 70€ breast cream, can rarely afford more than one drink. Americans may have an edge in the "strong" and "witty" department, but it would be wrong to say that French women aren't busy. The work of beautification is invisible to men, but the breasts, rest assured, are not lifting themselves.

"A few kilos, at least" is how Nabékor summed up our cultural differences. But this, too, I'm happy to report, has a cream-based solution.

Super Stud(ette)

Last night I rode the train into unchartered territory, recalling Paris to the Moon and a syrupy passage about Métro stops imagined but never seen.

Adam Gopnik's heart of darkness was the Goutte d'Or, an area rarely visited by left-bankers like himself. Mine, on the other hand was the (more than one drop) 16th.

The author cooed as he trundled past the Château Rouge stop - imagining a storybook cottage waiting for his family outside. I, on the other hand, clenched as we rolled through Passy and I realized that for the first time in my life there were no brown faces on the Métro.

I admit it: I am scared to death of the 16th.

Out of the Métro and in unsafe open waters, I hurried head down to my destination. I held my bag close and made no eye contact with the nannies. I was very nearly running.

What was I even doing in that neighborhood, you ask?

Getting the best haircut of my life, that's what. A towering Scotswoman, a friend of a friend, cuts it for cheap out of her apartment. There was sipping and snipping and bagging on men while we waited for my hair to turn blond-ish. She told me tales about working the fashion shows and offered her chambre de bonne if I need it. It was another planet, but incredibly fun.

I left with a sashay and headed to my first apartment visit of the night. I was hopped up on adrenaline, feeling capable and adventurous. If I could visit the 16th, maybe I could also find an apartment.

I was not, before last night, familiar with the concept of the studette. I hadn't thought there was anything smaller than a studio until I visited this diminutive bed-box in the Marais.

A mattress on a mezzanine, a shower I had to crawl into, and no light from either window - was this really to be my new reality? An Italian girl ten years my junior explained that she only slept there after dancing.

It was raining when I left and headed back to my beloved 19th. "My email will be full of offers," I told myself as my heavily sprayed hair began to stick to my cheeks. I began to hum a little as I made my way along the Bassin - a snippet from the Magnetic Fields song Nothing Matters When We're Dancing, with lyrics altered to suit a newly-imagined stud(ette) lifestyle.

"I only sleep there after dancing..."

Mercy, beau coup!

Last night I celebrated Thanksgiving at a wine bar - a departure from my original idea to host 25 people for wild food acrobatics.

Plans change and spheres collide. Four women found themselves instead at le Verre Volé, upending tradition with oysters and foie gras.

It is no longer possible, after Sex and the City, for four women to gather chastely around a table. Perhaps this has always been true. Perhaps I am just getting older. But when a recent business dinner in Dublin included an assignment of the "Samantha" role, I began to sense that the times, in fact, are a-changin'.

Last night's conversation unfurled with the usual revelations about work. The curator from Boston explained her visit (Paris Photo). The reporter from Miami discussed a recent assignment (Castro). The Paris-based writer described her (completely awesome) book deal. And I don't discuss work on this blog.

This reasssurance of professionalism, this "go girl!" performance - this is what smart women do during the first drink. The devolution begins with the second, however, and can wind its way through any number of discursive gutters.

Our particular Thanksgiving path included the following:

1) The reporter's counsel that "sturdiness" is the most important quality in a dining table.
2) The curator's fist-in-the-air manifesto about every-day oral sex.
3) The writer's description of trans-Atlantic difference in circumcision.
4) My illustration of said difference with a wine bottle and baguette end.

In a contemplative moment, I asked my friends what they were thankful for. There was silence, glances cast toward the ceiling, and an immediate return to the sex talk.

I'm not entirely sure, was this a dismissal or a response?

Le Coup de Chance

My first cut in Paris went something like this:

I arrived at a recommended salon armed with pictures and a modest vocabulary. I asked for a coupe de cheveux en dégradé and a brushing. What I got was the exact same cut that every other woman my age seemed to be wearing.

So the next time I changed both salon and approach. I chose a hipster-looking coiffeur and told him in broken French to “create whatever you dream.” My stylist’s dream, it turned out, was to give me a modified Job Bob with slightly longer layers. He earned points, though, for managing to smoke and snip at the same time. I went back to Les Intondables twice based on the merits of its jukebox and proximity to Sushi Yakatori Bagel.

Months later, with frange dangling in my eyes, I ran a search on “English-speaking salons” in Paris. I visited an English website. I called and booked an appointment speaking English. Upon meeting my stylish, I burst forth all in English with my stream of requests and small prayers. I watched Aurélie’s face begin to blanche. She spoke beautiful French and not a word of my mother tongue. It was, however, the best cut I’d received in Paris, so I returned three times before she disappeared into the suburbs.

Last week, returning home from a battle over my working papers, I paused at the doorstep of a trendy salon. I had recently seen enough vacation pictures of myself to know that a cut was in order tout de suite. So without an appointment or a second thought I found myself walking into the “Toxic” branch of Toni & Guy. The music was thumping, the stylists were beautiful. The beverage girl seemed to be flirting.

I knew I’d found someplace special when the shampoo chair began to vibrate. I felt so relaxed after tea and massage that I scarcely noticed my transformation. Gone now is the pony tail, the wispy lock across my forehead. In their place are seven hundred jaggy bits which, when taken together, make me look “butch.” Or so le mec tells me. Seven hundred bits which, when they grow out, are going to look completely CRAZY, ensuring that I will be back at Toni & Guy before the last autumn leaf falls.

The problem now is that my hair is much cooler than I am. Like Diderot’s new dressing gown, it just calls attention to my many other deficiencies of style. I can no longer wear those shoes with my new haircut. And that skirt? Forget about it.

Between the hair and my reduced wardrobe of six well-worn items, I feel I’m two giant steps closer toward being parisienne. All I need now is some lingerie.

Riding High

Tonight, dear reader, I will be living your fantasy.

I hurry now to finish this post, knowing that you are the only thing standing between me and a private club that I recently joined.

The doorman will flash me a smile as I slip him my card. I’ll descend into the basement and past the kids who are already going at it. I’ll follow a corridor into the heart of the club and find myself surrounded by dozens of half-naked women. They will be readying themselves for the effort to come - adding jewelry and adjusting their complicated lingerie.

Welcome to the Club Med gym.

Cloob Med is the city’s largest chain of fitness centers, and the site of tonight’s continuing anthropology fieldwork. I observe as the natives try to adapt to this curious new technology.

Behold: the female approaches the Stair Master. She walks twice around, sniffing, and gingerly mounts it from behind. The hair is perfect, her makeup fresh. She climbs for fifteen minutes on level 2 without breaking a sweat. She remains the picture of perfect aloofness, even while a jewel-encrusted string (I am not making this up) carves a new trench in her backside.

What (really--I’m asking) is up with French women and their lingerie?

A recent study confirmed that they spend, on average, 20% of their clothing budget on lingerie – an estimated 2.6 billion euros per year.

I’m not knocking the general idea, mind you, but at the gym?

For my own part, I’ll be riding tonight in my sensible whites. For there’s nothing worse while working on cardio (and mentally rehearsing your next karaoke triumph) than the cold hard feel of rhinestone in your ass.

Or so I suspect…

Tout nu or not to nude?

That is the question.

Whether t'is nobler in the mind to suffer the stings and stares of jellyfish and fellow swimmers while clothed, or to bare arms and legs against a sea of turquoise...

Hamlet, remember, was European. One can deduce, then, that he had no problem exposing his (royal) family jewels while on vacation.

For an ameriçaine, however, going natural is anything but. And thus I found myself recently wrestling with the question along the crystal blue waters of Naked Cove. A secluded spot on the southern tip of Istria, we found this place following a vigorous bike ride past the tourist hordes through pine stands and berry-laden brush.

Our group, composed of 2 Americans and 2 Europeans, had discussed this on the previous day. "You will see me naked in Croatia," said the Austrian, his tone carrying a finality that promised no escape. True to his word, Bernhard was the first among us to doff his drawers, splashing into the sea in the way that God intended. This reasssured the naked Slavs who had been eyeing us warily from their spot several hundred meters to the right. Upon seeing genitalia they returned to smoking and playing with their dog.

I, meanwhile, was warily eyeing my toes. And everything north of them, egad. Was I really qualified for this?

"Americans believe that nakedness is sexual," Bernhard told me. Yes and no. Americans believe in the perfectability of the body. And every freckle and roll is a reminder that we have not worked hard enough, will not be going to heaven, and deserve neither sex nor sunshine. Whether this reminder is personal or shared depends on the alcohol available.

Fueled only by lemonade, I was taking a particularly long time with my bikini.

It was the only child in me, the competitive one who tries to out-cliff jump the boys, who won out in the end. There was no way I was going to be left behind on the safe and sexless shore. So I dropped them. And then ran like hell into the protective waters of the Adriatic.

Hours later, after seeing my scraped and sunburned companions pulling themselves gracelessly over sharp rocks, I too settled into a state of corporal indifference. I put on my flippers and mask, and set out for some naked snorkeling.

Which, it turns out, is better than heaven.