Out Of Africa..Into The Snug

My friend Tom's parents once had a farm in  Africa. They returned in 1939 to run a hotel/public house in Pewsey, Wilts, as they didn't want to miss the War. It was a curious decision, reflected in the decor. Half cabbage rose chintz, half Zulu Chieftain ceremonial tent.It could be a little unnerving;getting up in the middle of the night to visit the bathroom and walking into a vast tiger skin complete with snarling head which was serving as a  fluffy rug in the guest  room.  When I stayed there during Pewsey Carnival, the hotel was full. So I slept on a sofa in a room otherwise given over to the Carnival Queen's dresses, the dresses of her retinue, some tribal drums, and a selection of terrifyingly used-looking spears and assegais.Only after experiencing said Carnival did I appreciate that this was an entirely appropriate juxtaposition. Like most English celebrations, it featured wildly heavy drinking, and wilder transvestism. Hordes of grizzled farmers grasped their annual opportunity to stuff their sunburnt muscular arms into a tea dress, and plaster themselves with their wives Mayfair Pink lippy,going badly over the edges. And then straight in to the River Pew, or whatever it was called. I was told that the death toll averaged about half-a-dozen each year.  I wanted to go every summer and be the official counter of cross-dressed corpses fished out of the drink, but sadly my friend's father slipped and fell on the newly-installed Safety Floor.This put a dampener on the proceedings..How Anglo-Saxon men dearly love a frock-up,though...Any charity fund-raiser, stag do, rag day, or similiar event, is as the drop of a hat to the flower of English manhood.  The absolute top rung on the ladder to enjoyment is a day where you can put on a droopy dress, a vicar's wife-style hat, drink yourself daft and have a fight. If mud, water, or vats of baked beans are also involved, the English Male is in Arcadia. The French find this extremely odd,and they have NOTICED, you know. The Southern Mediterranean gentleman is primarily, in my experience and observation, motivated by the prospect of sex. They do not get as drunk as we do. This is because they need to be alert and quiveringly ready,should some prey appear on a distant horizon. They tend not to stumble around town centres singing songs about goblins, enormous penises, or the vileness of women's genitalia. I don't think they enjoy public vomiting. No, they cleanse and decorate, then parade themselves, in duos or groups of three at the most, stopping to imbibe an aperitif or a weeny glass of prosecco. Their aim is to get a girl to go with them to a "nightclub". I only did this once, and by mistake. You descend to an earpoppingly loud Gehenna, with human fluids pouring off the walls, and are given ONE drink. Often rather small men will then gyrate at you, in a marked manner. Should you demur, and play the "I don't dance, don't ask me" card, you will immediately have been deemed to be requesting a very fast drive in a very dangerous car to "Somewhere Quiet". Depending on location, this will invariably be a pine forest, a deserted beach, or a hilltop somewhere with no lights for miles. Should matters advance this far, you are in the soup and no mistake. Considerable research amongst my female chums concluded that crying only excited them, pleading the existence of a husband or boyfriend was regarded as inadmissable evidence, and for God's sake don't say you are pregnant as it only gives the green light to the more practical chap (see "Cut Cake;Slices Of). No, you have to talk about your Mother, their Mother, religion, or how you are going to be sick on their trousers. Top Tip.The same applies to being in a car with a maniac driving too fast. No-one is sufficently reckless to want sick in their car.
But I was talking about men in ladies clothing, rather than wolves in Maseratis. It is a curious thing, but a very girly boy looks much more masculine in drag. Little details, like big wrists, Adam's Apples, and a firm jawline,hitherto un-noticed, are highlighted.  I am something of an expert on this, as I have mentioned. Living with drag queens, and having a University BF who looked more like a girl than I did, gave me a sanguine approach to crossdressing, and a sadly depleted wardrobe. A girl can look delectably Dietrichian in a man's outfit, but it has to be a beautifully cut evening suit. A girl in a baggy Rugby sweatshirt and grubby shorts just doesn't do it. And as for dungarees, I think the "dung" part of the word gives a clue as to what you will look like.
I remember meeting Eddie Izzard in Edinburgh, before he was a transvest-out. He was wearing a tan leather bomber jacket (awful things), a t-shirt and some nasty cream-coloured trousers. A thoroughly delightful and charming chap, but  he did not look at all at ease.
The next time we met, a couple of years later, he was wearing a frock coat, a bra, full makeup, and suicide heels.He looked wonderful ; confident,  compellingly sexy, and still very definitely het.
 He said that he liked women with "Va-Va-Voom", and had certainly adopted that style. And as he also pointed out, quite literally.."Who DOESN'T like breasts?"
The Pewsey Carnival Ladyboys were much more in the Pantomime Dame mode, and you would have to have been in prison for a very long time to have mistaken them for even the butchest of women.  I know a couple of Drag Kings, too. When they dress up as men, they dress as glamorous men; Cary Grant rather than Wayne Slob.
I am a sucker for glamour, and anyone who raises the quotient, aesthetically, has my vote. And possibly my shoes, too.