Weekend in the country...

sounds sooo English. I went to London to take care of some paperwork and then spent Saturday and Sunday in the country (the Cotswolds) at a party for my friend Robin's birthday. Robin is the ultimate international jet setter (me multiplied by ten): we have met up in Rio, London, Budapest and Paris already and I am contemplating paying him a visit in Shanghai, which is where he currently resides. He has businesses everywhere and knows loads of people in all of these countries and his friends, including the guests at this weekend's party, are usually quite cool and interesting and generally "my kind of people", or at least the kind that I get on with without any effort. They were mostly English, but of the sort who, despite having the poshest BBC English accent, still feel the need to claim that they are actually Italian, Greek, French, whatever - because they have a parent or a grandparent from those countries. Upper-middle class, private school educated, well travelled and (mostly) jewish they do lots of different things from international event organizing to investment banking. Many of them "have their own companies", they know to appreciate the good things in life, and they all have an air of elegant ease about them, which comes from financial and academic and success, but are not arrogant and don't show off.

Against this background, I was not really surprised that I very much got into and enjoyed a "murder mystery game" that we played on Saturday night - despite the fact that I am not usually a person who likes organized fun. The game consists in acting out a detective story: with dressing up, character development, the whole nine yards. Of course, the gorgeous dinner cooked by one of the girls contributed to the amusement level as well as the fact that I had a lot of success with my costume and acting during the game: I had to play a man, an alcoholic actor from the 1920s, who is perennially broke and is in danger of being suspected of the murder. Anyway, it was all fun and games and food and champagne, which, after a previous night of playing around at various bars with a new male acquaintance had the effect that, by the time I got back to Paris last night I felt truly exhausted.

Coming back to work didn't help: still trying to (mildly) assert myself in this sexist, nerdy environment - with limited success. Of course, as always, I am torn between my (if not bruised but slightly chipped) "professional ego" (and reluctant feminism) and my fundamental lack of interest in the subject matter or workplace competition...

(PS: the English' ability to be parochial and insular still amazes me every time: the only two things they kept obsessing over on the news was the stupid hunting ban and Charles & Camilla's marriage. I mean, Jesus, get a life. Although from a different perspective this is sort of positive: if there is nothing more important to obsess over then the state of the affairs must be pretty damn good.)