At the Nail Salon

Angelika Incidentally, I recently had the absolute Seinfeld experience (if you don't know what "Seinfeld" is, just look in my last newsletter). To understand the joke, I have to explain a bit more. First of all, you have to know that there are countless so-called nail shops in America, where you can have your hands and feet cared for. Of course, you can also have your fingernails and toenails painted with nail polish. In our neighborhood alone there are four to five of these nail shops. Whenever we pass by, Michael always bursts out laughing because the people who get their nails painted look like they're in a shop window, which means that everyone who passes by can look at the well-formed or less well-formed feet and hands of the customers.

It should also be noted that it is completely okay in America to clean or cut your nails in public. So you often see people in the subway calmly working on their nails. In any case, Michael has been annoying me for months to get my fingernails painted red in such a shop. He would also come by with the camera and take a picture of me in the window. You have to know further that most of these nail shops are run by Asian women. That's exactly what the mentioned Seinfeld episode is about. The Elaine character in the show always goes to get a manicure in a nail shop run by Koreans and has the feeling that they are gossiping about her in Korean, which she of course doesn't understand. To get clarity about this, she takes George's father as a spy to the manicure the next time, because he speaks and understands Korean as an old Korean War veteran. Of course it turns out that they are indeed gossiping about her.

Recently, my friend Sylvia and I were also in such a nail shop and we suddenly had this strange feeling that we were being heavily criticized. The ladies who were working on our feet and hands were throwing comments at each other and rolling their eyes in our direction. Despite this gossip, I finally came home with red-painted fingernails and purple toenails. Michael's horrified face was really worth it. But don't worry, otherwise I'm still the same.