Chatting with "Right Bloke Richard"

Herr/Fair Reader,

On the blog "mysexprofessor.com," written by the fetching Dr. Debby Herbenick, I had a rather spirited exchange in the comments section with a Gentleman known as "Dick," who I have renamed for the purposes of this online journal as "Right Bloke Richard." You can visit the entry in question here.

But Right Bloke Richard left me an interesting question that warranted immediate answering. Permit me to share:

Ed,
for a long time i’ve been skeptical of blogs, chat rooms, and the internet in general. now i see why people like it this so much. without the world wide web i’d never have been called a ‘right bloke’. i’m sold on this interweb stuff.

since you’re a lively chap, i’ll throw this one at you…

which western european city has the best looking ATTAINABLE women? i’ve traveled to a few of the larger cities, and even a few smaller ones, and for the most part been impressed by the women, but i find the bars to be much like the museums in your part of the world - everything is very pretty, but the look but don’t touch rule is in effect. so, where do you go to find europeans who are attractive AND willing to show you their ‘bits’?

Dick

In response:

Right Bloke Richard,

That is an excellent question, one that has hounded me for eons. Being an American tourist in a city filled with exquisite foreign lasses can be a both overwhelming and exhilarating experience. I agree with you in that, for the most part, attending a European bar is a "look but don't touch" situation. As to which Western European city has the most attainable women? I don't know if there really is one. It has more to do with how you approach these situations than it does in the casual nature of the local lass. Luckily for us, European women are, for the most part, friendly and approachable. Sure, there still remains some anti-American sentiment in the Old World. But as their Euro is easily outperforming our dollar, I would imagine European women look at American men with more pity and curiosity than they do with scorn and curiosity.

But on the matter of the approach: you could follow Neil Strauss' "The Game" and become a pick-up artist, dye half of your hair blond, don a pirate shirt and garish jewelry, change your name to "Hyperlink", and then go up to hot Spanish women in Barcelona bars and ask "did you know that 32% of all Spanish women find armpit sex desirable?" Although I wouldn't be caught dead doing this, to his credit, in the book Neil Strauss does go to Europe and "clean up" (this part can be found in Step 6 in the book, if you're curious).

For our purposes, let's say I'm traveling to Berlin for a weekend. In the event that I have friends who live there and are sociable, I would ask them to take me out, show me the nightlife, and if I am single, ask them to introduce me to some fine looking German girls (they do exist). But for 90% of the time, Gents like you and me visit cities where we don't know a single soul.

Example of a comely (Iranian-)German: Shermine Shahrivar

In this case, it's surprisingly easy and genteel: if you see an attractive lady at a bar, restaurant, or a sommerschlussverkauf, you just simply approach her and ask if she speaks English. If she does, you explain that you are visiting by way of NYC and wanted to get a good meal and follow it with a good night on the town. If that manages to draw up a good conversation, try to get her number. If she says "I have a boyfriend," you can add, "that's fine, I have a girlfriend back home. I just want to really see Berlin properly while I'm here." Besides, if she's taken, you can meet her attractive friends. It may or may not lead to a scthupp later that evening, but at least you will be hanging with some authentic Germans and having a good time in the end (that is, if she answers your call). It's an approach that I think would work in Berlin as it would in Talinn, Sofia, and Stockholm.

But as you told me a humorous tale about your European travels, allow me to share one of mine with you:

Back in my London days, my friend The Marquis de Crusty and I decided to do a proper visit of Prague. We saw the sights, ate great food, drank great beer, and then went to a "hip" little restaurant in a more residential part of the city (read - away from all the stag parties and brothels). There were two attractive Czech girls sitting at the table next to us. We struck up a conversation (similar to the one I suggested above) and asked them where was a good place to go to afterwards? They said they were going to a disco right near the Banoc casino, where one of the girl's worked as a blackjack dealer (no joke). We asked if we could tag along, to which they happily allowed. We grabbed a taxi and drove out to the club. Long story short, we danced and drank a good deal with them. The blackjack dealer was more interested in the Marquis than she was with me, which was fine as she had dreadful breath. The other friend retreated to a group of her friends and displayed no interest in a tan handsome man like yours truly (I believe she was a lesbian in the end). A gargantuan Czech male suddenly approached the blackjack dealer, gave her a cordial kiss on both cheeks, and they appeared to be talking to one another like old friends. She kissed him on the cheek and then returned to our group, where she suggested we leave as she had to work early in the morning. The other girl joined us and we were about to exit the disco when the gargantuan Czech approached the blackjack dealer once again. They conversed for a bit, and then the man began to violently shake the blackjack dealer. I asked the other girl, "Christ, should we do something about this?" to which she replied "don't worry. He just friend of discoteque." The shaking ended and she rejoined our group, to which we quickly exited the disco. We went to the subway and as we were going in separate directions, the Marquis decided to give the blackjack dealer a kiss, learning the hard way that her breath was indeed horrific.

So there you have it. We approached the ladies civilly, managed to get a good evening out of our genteel approach, and also managed to witness a young woman nearly get shaken to death by a Czech amateur strongman.

Stay "right" and a presto,

EtG