Tongue in Cheek
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Tongue in Cheek Trolling Through the Gay Southwest of France |
by Kevin Isom
It's
cold outside. It's gray. And the memory of Janet Jackson's ample white
mammary is still etched in my mind. It's time to think pleasanter thoughts.
Thoughts of pleasanter places – and places with people with browner
skin – like the gay Southwest of France. Whenever
gay folks in the U.S. think of gay France, we naturally think of Paris
– the center of the French gay universe. Why, Paris even comes complete
with a gay mayor. So why would you ever want to go, as the French would
say, "into the provinces?" Ever the contrarian, I had to answer
that question by going myself.
I took a high-speed train from Paris into
the center of the city of Montpellier. Montpellier is not so much a city
as an excuse for large numbers of gorgeous people to stroll around in
limited clothing. Literally. Montpellier is a big university town, so
there is a high concentration of young people. They all seem to have a
sun-kissed
brown skin, and their preference seems to be to show as much of it as
possible, all the while being as chic as Frenchness demands. They even
smile a lot, which is very unusual for the French. (I'm KIDDING. That
was a play on a cultural stereotype.)
Sitting in a café in front of the
grand and lovely Montpellier Opera House, you could observe for hours,
as you downed sparkling water after sparkling water, just to keep from
overheating. (This can easily push those thoughts of Janet Jackson right
out of your mind.) Montpellier has a number
of gay and lesbian bars and restaurants, many of which are tucked away
in a charming street called Rue des Tessiers. And the city has been named
as the second favorite city of gays in a national survey. After my sixth
Perrier as I watch the pretty people go by, I'm not surprised.
Not far from Montpellier are the beaches
of L'Espiguette. The sand is brown, and so are many of the bottoms and
breasts exposed. There is a regular beach section (where even so, many
French women go topless), then a nude straight section, and finally a
nude gay section of the beach. Warning: Most French men are uncircumcised.
This can come as a shock to an American. It is also a
useful introductory line: "I've never seen one of those before. May
I
touch it?" (I'm KIDDING. That was a play on another kind of cultural
stereotype.) There is even another section of the beach where you can
rent horses to ride through the spray. This is sort of an
every-fantasy-you've-ever-had-it's-time-to-live-it area.
Edging further east are the smaller historical
cities of Avignon, Arles, and St. Remy de Provence. Avignon is known,
of course, for the Papal Palace, a medieval fortress from the time when
the Popes relocated from Rome to France. Avignon holds an annual festival
of theater and is surrounded by vineyards. Arts and wine are a heady combination.
Not far from Avignon is the charming medieval-walled
city of Arles, home to Roman ruins, including the famed amphitheater,
the arena (where bull fights still entertain the masses), the forum, and
the fabulous mosaics contained in the museum of antiquities. Arles was
also home, for a time, to Vincent Van Gogh, who painted many scenes in
Arles, and many of those scenes are conveniently noted for you by the
city with special markers.
Near Arles is the even smaller town of
St. Remy de Provence, home to Nostradamus and, for a somewhat shorter
time, to Van Gogh, who stayed at the sanitarium just outside of St. Remy.
The sanitarium is now a museum dedicated to Van Gogh, and it's just next
door to the ruins of the Roman city of Glanum. Mountains, ruins, all the
vistas that Van Gogh saw and painted – who could ask for more? How
about the fabulous and gay-welcoming hotel Les Ateliers de l'Image, a
lovely villa-esque hotel with a view over the glass-smooth pool toward
the mountains that makes you feel like Madonna would envy you for staying
there. You can walk through the town of St. Remy and gorge on candied
fruit, then have a glass of wine by the pool under the stars.
Visiting the Southwest of France is like
visiting another world, where the worries of American day-to-day life
fade into oblivion. At the very least, I made you forget all about Janet's
breast, didn't I?
Kevin Isom is the author of It Only Hurts When I Polka and Tongue in Cheek and Other Places, available at bookstores and online. He may be reached at isomonline@aol.com or www.KevinIsom.com.