Sexercises: 10 Wonderfully Weird (and Upsetting) Discoveries at a Library Book Sale
Categories: Studies in Crap
6. At first, this next one looked like a fairly standard piece of '40s jungle pulp -- albeit one with a killer tag line.
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But then I opened it to this:
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7. There's no better way to learn the mind of a people than through its language, which is why your Crap Archivist dutifully roots through heaps of phrasebooks and how-to-speaka-the-English guides. The library sale offered two revelatory texts. First:
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Billed as "geared to the specific interests and humor of gay men," this 1995 travel guide is steeped in the most over-the-top of stereotypes. An earnest introduction explains that the phrases that follow include "telltale words" that should help men suss out just who and who isn't "acquainted with Dorothy."
To that end they translate the following phrases into French, Italian, German, Russian, Portuguese, and Spanish.
"I said, I'm just browsing!"
"You've had worse things in your mouth!"
"Would you just bring us the goddamned food?"
"All I carry in my purse is a tube of lipstick and a revolver!"
"Is your country plagued by religious fundamentalists?"It's a little much, but by the end of this next page -- after the authors demonstrate how to handle a serious travel issue Fodor's probably won't get to -- it's clear that such a book is necessary even today:
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NEXT: The French on porn and Disney! Then, Disney on customers! And How to Pick Up Girls!
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