**SEX*** and now that I've caught your attention...

Sex sells in France...

 
Today, I'm going to be talking sex. Some of the more conservative amongst you are probably already freaking out. 'What is she thinking, writing about sex'. Well, don't get too worried, or excited, I am wondering more about the reaction to the subject itself, what do you think when you hear it casually breached in day-to-day conversation? So, I am not going to be rude. But is the subject of sex considered  taboo in all countries? By all countries, I am going to draw, as per usual, on what I've experienced here in France. The reason that this question comes to mind is due to a couple of things that have happened recently...

The first, a rather amusing story which I have already recounted to many of my nearest and dearest, started on a quiet Friday afternoon in school. As I sat, helping out in break-time with the kids, a couple of the teachers decided to let me in on their Friday night plans. One said: 'Hey Claudia, fancy coming to our little 'soirée' tonight?', 'Uhh...' I said, pretty excited that I was finally being invited to something with my collegues after many months of professional distance, 'Yeh, that sounds great'.  'Cool, well its a *something whispered* party'. The *something whispered*, I assumed, was a reference to alcohol, so I just gave a little laugh and nodded, as is my now natural response when I'm not quite sure about something.

So, a couple of hours later, in the car on the way to my colleague's house, I asked again what kind of party it was. 'Une soirée sex toy' was the response. 'Oh right'. No smile, no knowing look, no reference to the awkwardness of the fact that I was being taken to a sex toy exhibition party, no 'have you ever been to one of them before?'...we just carried on driving. And so, my little eyes were soon exposed to a multitude of sex toys in different shapes and sizes, bottles and bottles of flavoured oils, powders, handcuffs, lingerie... To be honest, despite a fair bit of of cringing inside, it was ok. The other colleagues were so comfortable with it all that I relaxed. One highlight for me came during a lull in conversation, while the presentation of each item was in full swing, where I found myself holding a sex toy in each hand, with noone speaking to or looking at me. I wish, I so wish, that any one who knows me had seen the expression on my face at that moment. True Bridget Jones stuff that.

Would this have been the same in the UK? To be honest, the party itself, probably. It was behind closed doors and so the people there would generally be there by choice (not accident as in my case!). I think the only thing that would be different would be that noone would invite their younger, foreign (especially british) collegue to join them! A learning curve it certainly was.

Another experience I had was a very casual conversation about group sex at lunch time. Granted it wasn't, thank God, a 'let's share stories' moment, but the openness with which the conversation topic was breached still amused me. Again, from the look on my face when I realsied what everyone was talking about, bit of a  sore thumb moment...

Certainly, those of you have seen the contraceptive advert with a personified little penis [warning: for the more conservative types, this is a bit explicit] will know that the French don't shy away from a subject matter like this just because it's 'taboo'. Ok, this link is a little rude but me even saying that is an example of shying away from the subject. In fact, its not rude, its an effective way of publicising contraception. We wouldn't be seeing it on TV in the UK though...! And now compare it, for a moment, to this British contraceptives advert, featuring none othe than our beloved Dominic Cooper, star of Mamma Mia [but a little earlier in his career, I would guess!]. Now this advert, I would say was pretty effective, nothing too lewd, and it gets the point across.  Now notice that it was banned. Come on UK! Finally, look at how Belgium tackles this subject...I am not surprised this one was banned, even though it's pretty funny.

I know this is a very generalised conclusion that I am coming to, there is no way that what I am saying about us in the UK is true for everyone and I am certainly no anthropologist. Of course, being younger than my colleagues, the [hopefully-ever-dimishing] language barrier and not being surrounded by my friends, may have affected my reaction to these things. However, it does seem that the French are not afraid to breach the subject of sex, even with a young British stranger, their professional colleagues, or with the public as seen in many ad campains here. And so, I can only be left wondering if it's our idiomatic 'stiff upper lip' that makes us so very....stiff....on this subject. Apologies for that.


Have a little watch of some of some other banned adverts here by the way...I expecially like the Peter Kay/ John Smith one...

Highly contested French anti-smoking campaign...does sex always sell?

Regret

I have just read an article from the guardian which describes research that a palliative nurse has done regarding the top most common regrets that people have before they die.

It got me thinking, this article, do most people regret things? The thought of knowing that I was in the last 12 weeks of my life scares the hell out of me, I can't possibly imagine what parts of my life, good or bad, would be dug up and bought to the surface when faced with this knowledge. I don't think anyone can predict the feelings that you would experience. The nurse who compiled these 'top 5 regrets', has obviously seen this first hand, and so, after getting over the somewhat insensitive title of her book, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying [why she had to put the second 'the' in this title, the dying, ugh, I've no idea], let's see what she put up there in her list.

1. I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

2. I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

3. I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

5. I wish that I had let myself be happier.

As noted by the author, I think that a number of these regrets actually reflect a different generation to ours. For example, it is interesting that it was pretty much only men who say they wished they hadn't worked so hard. I suppose she is right that the people she works with mostly come from a time where men were traditionally the breadwinners. I wonder if this will be different for our generation; will us women share this regret equally when it comes to the end? Morbid, sorry.

Staying in touch with our friends: easy peasy these days. I doubt it will be such a common regret in the future..although you still have to make a bit of effort, a bit of clicking and typing you know, so maybe given a few years it will not seem so easy after all. I actually think a common regret for our generation will probably be 'I wish facebook had never existed', after reading that 1/3 of divorces...yes that's one third...cite facebook, or the inappropriate use of, as one of the reasons for the spilt.

The regret that I find the saddest, and the one that I can imagine the is most easy to identify with is the wish to have had the courage to express true feelings. I bet there have been times in most of our lives when we have suppressed saying things that we would have liked to, but does the fact that it is a reported common regret mean that we are all a little too afraid of being honest? Two thoughts: 1) This is a British book so is it our natural British reservation that means we don't always say what we think, would this regret be the same in a different country? and 2) I watched an episode of Grey's Anatomy the other day, [bear with me, I am genuinely about to reference Grey's Anatomy, but it did make me think] and a man who had been given a very slim chance of survival, decided that he would send videos of messages to everyone from whom he had kept his feelings secret. He entrusted the sending of these videos to Meridith Grey, who being the meddling so and so that she is, didn't send them. Of course, the man survived the surgery, to be presented with his bag of videos. He decided to send them anyway. The point of this segue is to wonder whether, given this option, would we send the videos? If yes, then why not just say it all now...just a thought.

The final listed regret, I wish that I had let myself be happier, is interesting. Being only 22, I can barely even begin to know what I will be thinking in 60 odd years time, but I'm going to try bloomin hard to make this not one of them. In have found that happiness is a very temperamental emotion, it comes and goes as it pleases. Like cats really. Happiness is like cats. And in my experience with cats, you can try as hard as you want but you cannot control them, they will not come when called but they always come back. I am gonna try damned hard to keep my cat alive right up to my last day!

After making this wonderful analogy, I have just typed it into google, only to find that someone has stolen my idea and made one of those motivational posters of it. I'm going to see it as a good thing and let myself be happy about it.