All in a day’s walk

As mentioned before, the male Marseillaise population is a relatively sketchy lot: they see nothing strange in asking out any old girl they pass on the street. The attempts towards me of this tried-and-not-so-true dating technique had largely abated over the past couple of months, so I was rather hopeful that I’d simply figured out the proper way of broadcasting, “No, I don’t want to go out with you… REALLY, I’m not going to have juste une petite café avec toi, so don’t even bother wasting your time!” in French body language. In the past week, however, the offers have started rolling in again, so I guess the great French romantics were simply in hibernation for the winter months.

And today, while walking home from work on a beautiful and sunny evening, this guy passed by me a couple of times on the street. As we were waiting at a traffic light, he sidles up next to me and says in this very definitive voice, like he’s finally made a major decision:  “Vous êtes belle…”

I look at him a bit awkwardly and say “merci” and continue walking down the street. Of course (as they do), he walks along next to me. I studiously look at the sky, or the storefronts we’re passing, or my shoes; I think rather clearly broadcasting that this interaction is not going to go any further.

After a couple of minutes, he says it again: “Vous êtes belle.” Boy, am I flattered to hear that! I can hardly contain my excitement. Or my eyerolls.

Another few minutes pass, still walking down the street. Then he says, “Comment vous vous appelez?” This guy is clearly a stellar conversationalist. “Isabel,” I reply.

He thinks for a while. I can nearly see the wheels turning in his head; he’s clearly detected my accent even in the two words I’ve said and is trying to plan an intelligent next move. He offers, “Vous êtes espagnole?”

“Non,” I say, with a bit of a smirk, as I borrowed the name Isabel from a friend of mine here who’s actually Columbian.
“Française?”
“Non.”
“Algérie?” (Really? Do I look Algerian to you?)
“Non.”

Now I’ve stumped him. My suitor, it seems, is not such a cosmopolitan guy. But however minute his horizons might be, a quitter he is not, so he tries again from the pool of countries he’s apparently heard of.

“Espagnole?”

Still no, pal. “Il y a des autres pays du monde, vous savez,” I tell him. (Ya know, there are other countries in the world.)

“Ah oui?” he asks, seeming genuinely surprised.

[facepalm]

The rest of our conversation, as we continued to walk down the street towards my ultimate destination of the supermarket, couldn’t even be called one-sided. He’d say one, completely unintelligible word, repeat it five times until I could understand what he was trying to say (“Travail?”) (“Maison?”) (“Marseille?”) (“Numéro?”) and then think for several more minutes while I contentedly walked along, thinking this silent conversation was among the most awkward events I’ve ever participated in in my life. When we finally reached the supermarket, I assured him several times I neither wanted to get a coffee, nor go to a disco club, nor give him my number, so he bid me adieu. (Hah. If only this breed were that classy. It was actually “Ciao”.)

I just wonder… how successful can these guys really ever be? There are thousands of these types in the city, all asking random women out. Does anyone ever say yes? What part of the culture here teaches boys that they might actually be successful in love (or even in sex) by literally choosing, at random, someone to invite out for coffee? It’s simply unfathomable the thought processes going on in these guys’ heads, and how they think this is at all a rational policy. Right?