Posts on: Foreigners

And you shall know me by my receipts

Apr 7, 2009 4:06 pm•By: •1 Comment

The past few months I have been slightly more disorganized than usual, i.e. what other people call “normal.” Instead of filing my credit card receipts by month in a mini accordion-style file folder, I’ve been letting them accumulate in messy piles on my desk and allowing them to slowly take over most of the space in my purse. My wallet had grown obese (not with cash, sadly), and I had crammed so many receipts into it that I had to wrestle them back out.

But eventually, my mild OCD wins out and I have to straighten it all out. This weekend I sat down and sorted out about 8 months worth of receipts — a mind-numbing if deeply satisfying task.

It turned into a kind of trip down memory lane, as most of the past year of my life flashed before my eyes. I could practically reconstruct my days with this paper trail; where I had gone for happy hours and what I’d had to drink, when I had splurged on clothes or makeup and what silly over-priced stuff I had bought. Receipts from a vacation, a dental emergency, a big hair makeover. Dinners eaten out and taken out, quick trips to the grocery store for a last-minute ingredient, and endless receipts for wine.

I am the designated wine-buyer in our relationship, as I pass the wine store on my walk home from work. We would buy wine in bulk if we had the space or inclination, but until we do I pick up a bottle or two almost every day.
In Europe, people who drink wine with dinner every evening are considered “normal human beings.” In America, people who drink wine with dinner every evening are considered either “Europeans” or “alcoholics,” depending on the drinker’s country of origin. This means that my boyfriend is a European and I am an alcoholic.

The American way is to drink water or milk or soda with your dinner every evening. Then, on Friday and/or Saturday night, go to a party or a bar and consume an entire week’s worth of alcohol. This is not unlike the American tendency to not have sex all week, and then sleep with either a random stranger or the S/O on a weekend evening after consuming an entire week’s worth of alcohol. I can only conclude that Americans do not actually enjoy either sex or alcohol, since they seem to be trying to get them both out of the way with one swift weekly binge.

If Americans truly enjoyed both alcohol and sex, they would spend most of their time drinking and fucking. And then they’d just be Europeans.

Posted in City Life, Food
about ,
1 Comment

Old Faithful

Nov 1, 2007 7:20 am•By: •What say you?

I’d never seen a bidet in real life before. Bidets, to me, were like chocolates on pillows and room service bringing up champagne for two – part of a lush hotel experience that I had only encountered in movies. So when the Russian lover and I arrived at our B&B to find a bidet in the bathroom, I was thrilled. Not just because I had now joined the ranks of people who stayed in rooms with bidets, but because I could satisfy my curiosity about this foreign bit of plumbing.

I approach most thing in life with caution; slowly and deliberately. A water fountain for genitalia was no exception. A braver soul might have simply plunked her bottom down and turned the faucet, but I put the lid down on the toilet next to the bidet and sat down to look things over. It wasn’t hard to figure out, so I reached over to turn the knob a bit. A gurgle of water emerged from the tap at the bottom of the basin, barely leaving the surface. Underwhelmed by this initial display, I did what any logical-minded woman would do. I tried the opposite extreme.

I turned the knob as far as it would go, and immediately a geyser of water six feet high shot out of the bowl, splashing the bathroom ceiling and spraying me with water. I squealed and shut the thing off, sputtering and wiping water from my face. The Russian lover ran in to see what the hell was going on. I stopped laughing long enough to explain to him, at which point he just shook his head and walked out, muttering something about “Americans” and “women” and “crazy.”

But I was pleased with the results of my experiment; at least I had learned the parameters of the water shower aimed at my vagina before I aimed it at my vagina.

Posted in Culture, Men and Women
about , , ,
What say you?

Viva La Insistence!

Jun 21, 2006 7:41 pm•By: •What say you?

Part I.

On Monday night the Russian lover and I wandered around Center City, trying to decide where to eat for dinner. On the street we bumped into our usual waiter from a little French cafe where we have brunch almost every Sunday. The cafe is stereotypically French, and so is the waiter.

He was out with a friend of his – also French. They were very trashed and very happy to see us. They insisted we accompany them on their search for an after-binge meal. We knew there was little chance that drunk, insistent Frenchmen would accept our deferral, so we followed them to Monk’s, a Belgian beer and mussels joint.
They insisted on a bottle of wine, and when they saw the waitress pour a glass merely a quarter full, they waved her away and told her they would do it themselves. As soon as she was gone, they filled each glass as full as it would go until the bottle was empty.

We drank and they regaled us with stories. The waiter’s father owns a beach house on Ibiza, because his father is rich. He quickly clarifies that it is his father who is rich, and not he (“I’m a waiter!” he laments, although he is really a student who waits tables). The downside of this wonderful house is that it is next door to the house owned by Liam Gallagher. Gallagher, they assert, is completely insane and physically violent. Once he walked up to their table in a restaurant and punched their friend in the face, apparently unprovoked. It’s too bad about Oasis, they continue – they were brilliant, they did too much drugs, they sputtered out early. And now…instead of being the next Paul McCartney, Liam Gallagher is nothing but a terrible, awful, frightening neighbor of theirs on Ibiza.
They try to light cigarettes, but the waitress tells us that we can’t smoke at the tables. We can only smoke in the bar (the bar which is 15 feet away from our table). At this they shrug and put out their lights. They tell us that at least Philadelphia is a little better than New York when it comes to smoking, but it is still hard coming from France where everyone smokes everywhere. There they smoke in the trains, they tell us. And students smoke in class, where the professor smokes while he lectures. They allow that someone ought to draw the line on the actual bongs in class, though.

They continue to put back wine and tell us about their lives and thoughts as French guys in Philadelphia. They want to know where they can find a decent club, and we tell them “New York.” They’re disappointed, so they amend their question and ask where they can go to avoid “JER-zeee BEE-tchis.” Jersey Beaches? “No-no-no. BEE-tchis with zee LEE-tle shirts, zee ugly shoes, zee bad makeup…all looking like zee same.” Ohhh, Jersey Bitches. Hmmm. We rattle off a few places with tolerable crowds. They tell us about the places they spin house music, and we say we’ll stop by. They invite us to their Bastille Day party– an event for Philadelphia’s young French underground, who’ve banded together in an effort to create a social scene. We promise to come, and satisfied they stagger out into the night.

Part II.

On Tuesday night, the Russian lover and I had a spat. I stormed out of the pub, and went for a fuming walk around the block. I was pissed as hell and stomping down the street in four inch heels and a little black dress, with an expression that dared men to comment on my passing form. Most of them were bright enough to discern that when a woman is clearly upset at one man, chances are high that she’s prepared to take it out on all of them. So I fumed unmolested, until an unperturbed fellow with a pleasant smile stopped me.

He must know who I am! Where I am going! What is my name! Where I will be and can he see me there! Can he call me?! I can barely process what is happening as he walks with me. His name is Sebastian! and he is from Paris! and I am lovely!

He can’t come with me now — he must return the video rentals.

But soon, soon, at 10:30pm tonight, he will call me! Then we will meet! Yes? We meet? He doesn’t relent until I nod and reassure and smile. Then he releases me to go on my way. Strangely weary from the encounter, I decide I have forgiven the Russian.

The operative words for Frenchmen are insistence and persistence. You will never out-insist a Frenchman on anything, and you will never out-persist in fleeing a Frenchman who is persisting in pursuing you.
La Insistence…THIS the French win.

Posted in City Life, Observations
about , , , ,
What say you?