Boots=French

I'm studying in Toulouse, France for a trimester abroad, but normally I'm a student in the US. Here's a little something-something to entertain.

Without question, the women on our trip to Toulouse want to purchase French clothing, an act inevitably accomplished through a foreign frame of reference; we want to dabble in Frenchness without sacrificing all of our identity, adding bits to our closets that stretch our tastes but do not subvert our own standards. While shopping in a foreign country is obviously an experiment, we all wanted boots. The ubiquitous black over-the-knee ones seem to beckon. Unfortunately, we’ll be back on campus just in time to ruin those boots in the mud. A sacrifice we’re willing to make in the name of style.

In Toulouse, the easiest fashion accessory to obtain is boots (other than cigarettes). They line the floor of every window display along the narrow cobbled streets. Every Toulousian woman has a pair. And any woman who doesn’t (those who don’t either wear heels or are foreign) buys them during the after-Christmas sales; their Black Friday happened on January 7 and is still going on. Signs reading “Soldes” in all sorts of bright, tacky colors clutter brick facades. While finding boots on sale isn’t difficult, purchasing the perfect pair is.

After stepping into countless stores after class one day, we were dizzy from the influx of French flair. Sitting together in a shoe store while grooving to Barry White, our group of six American shoppers (backpacks and all) awkwardly asked for our European sizes and squeezed into boots of various colors and detailing. Kendall, having narrowed her selection down to two pairs, sat confounded by her nuanced choice between a pair with buckles and a pointy toe and a pair that was much tighter and of a slightly lighter hue. “C’est très difficile!” she cried, looking at the sales girl who then, like many French people we’ve encountered, remarked that she would get her manager who spoke English to help us. She returned with a man sporting shiny shoes and slicked back greasy hair. “Ze ones with ze buckles—zey are for older ladies. You don’t want zose,” he said, making some kind of joke about Olive Oyl and her little legs and big boots. “You definitely want ze tighter ones,” he continued, gesturing with his hands to convey something that meant “tighter.”

To our little shopping group from a college in the boonies, both pairs were adorable. But by French standards, since everyone, including my host mother, wears boots, the buckled ones were somehow “old.” Kendall ended up buying the tight ones after struggling with balancing fashion in France and usability in America, and she is très chic despite a few blisters here and there. While six of us are still searching for the perfect pair, I can proudly say four of us have bought boots. And, my, do we look Framerican.