5 Cities With More Sex Than Abu Dhabi
In Sex and the City 2, we reunite with Carrie, Miranda, Charlotte and Samantha exactly where we left them — outside Bergdorf Goodman. Very little has changed — their styles are still slit-your-own-throat desirable and their apartments have the same deep echoes. Some things are new though, like crows feet and menopause vitamins.
Samantha presents the girls with the opportunity to go to Abu Dhabi, and since they’re all eager to take a break from their lives, they agree to go. But as someone who’s watched all 94 episodes at least 100 times each, I know the real Carrie, Charlotte, Samantha and Miranda would shoot down a trip to Abu Dhabi faster than it would take for them to each pop a Xanax. The characters are too high-maintenance to accept a single bead of sweat on their foreheads, let alone elect to ride a camel through the desert in 100-degree heat. Carrie couldn’t even stand a TV and air conditioner-free weekend at Aiden’s house in Suffern, New York! Stop pulling my leg with this Middle Eastern getaway, writer/producer/director Michael Patrick King! And did I forget to mention the small, minute detail that sex isn’t nearly the public spectacle in Abu Dhabi that it is in America? Kissing in public is against the law! Why would four women who love sex so much want to go to a place like that?
They wouldn’t, that’s how. Here are five cities we think the girls should have visited instead of Abu Dhabi.
Since the girls seem to be irrationally unhappy with certain parts of their lives (I won’t say which because I don’t want to spoil anything), what they need more than a self-indulgent vacation of mimosas is a humbling one to remind them of the luxuries they’re lucky enough to have. In this regard, Abu Dhabi could be considered a good place for them to visit, since encountering women with little to no rights and heavy censorship would give them an electric reality check. But Abu Dhabi isn’t the grandest place for them to reach this kind of personal epiphany – it’s actually Beijing. Every inch of the vivacious city holds transcendent and “out of body” significance, and the culture is so multi-faceted (from the festivals, the temples, the landmarks like the Great Wall of China and the Temple of Confucius, to the banquets), they would get to have the kind of fun that’s more in their wheelhouse (as opposed to riding camels) while their values parachuted back to sea level.
I know exactly what you’re thinking: How much “sex” will be in these trips? The truth is: very little. Carrie, Charlotte and Miranda are married, so they’re just looking and not touching. The only one who’d possibly have sex on the trip would be Samantha. So seeing as they are all past the age of sleeping with a different man every night, the stay in Beijing (and the next three locations) would be, in large part, an observational one. They’d look at their surroundings and let Beijing’s strong emphasis on family and tradition inspire them to re-evaluate the way they are with their own families (a theme which comes up quite a bit in the movie). In the end, they’d return from Beijing with new and improved ethics, an appreciation of America’s acceptance of sex, and ready to take advantage of it with their partners.
Therapists recommend deep breathing and “emotion flashcards” to help couples emerge from boredom in their relationships. But both of those techniques are lame and never work. They should advocate trips to Buenos Aires, because it’s their seductive sides that need kicks in the ass – not their emotions. The “Paris of South America” treats sensuality, exoticism, and carnal pleasures with more respect than any other place in the world – which means if Carrie, Charlotte, Samantha and Miranda were looking for physical excitement without judgment, they should have ventured here instead of restrained Abu Dhabi. They’d only need to make 15 “south of the border” jokes (between the four of them, of course) and participate in an Argentinean tango that would put even make a porno director uncomfortable before they’d opt to cut their trip short, race back to New York and into their marital beds … that they’d then all proceed to break with true Argentinian ¡Olé!
Again, now that the women are way past their days of copulating in taxicabs (even Samantha), one of the problems they’re struggling with is the feeling their lives aren’t fun anymore. If that’s the case, then Amsterdam is the place where they can down the stuff faster than a seventh grader’s first tequila shot. With the infamous red light district full of sex shops, adult theaters, and both legal and illegal forms of prostitution, Amsterdam’s sexual atmosphere would make the girls feel free, regardless of the flashy rings on their fingers and the “his” and “hers” sinks in their bathrooms at home. Granted, Amsterdam would not be the best place for them to analyze their relationships and the way they feel about them, but you’ll recall how much Carrie enjoyed smoking a doobie and munching on a banana split after Berger broke up with her on a post-it. And Amsterdam happens to allow doobie smoking! (Not sure about if there are banana splits there, though.) In other words, if it’s a vacation from maturity and following building co-op policies the four women want, they’re much more likely to have the opportunity to smoke away their troubles in Amsterdam instead of Abu Dhabi.
Even though the women hail from New York, they are quite Parisian. They don’t adhere to fashion trends and are more comfortable taking risks (both with fashion and with other aspects of their lives). They know their own styles and what works for their body types better than their zip codes and they’re never afraid to be the most over-dressed women in the room. In fact, the women take pleasure in dictating style and showing off their own interpretations of big labels – even if it means taking a bucket of red paint from a PeTA member. In these ways, the women could be considered French expatriates. So if they wanted to quickly yank themselves out of their ruts in a place that’s both familiar and somewhat new to them, they should have gone to Paris, where they’d see themselves in the young women in the streets and in the cafés, yearning for the kind of love they were lucky enough to already find. They’d recall the miles they’ve run on behalf of finding true love, and realize that even though the younger girls may live with the excitement and struggle they miss, they’re the ones living with love.
Taking a trip never solves your problems (unless you’ve got a cat that just won’t die). That strapless tan you get might brighten your mood but the second you set foot back in the your apartment, your original troubles come flooding back when you look in the mirror and realize you fell asleep on the beach with your sunglasses on.
The trailers for Sex and the City 2 make it look like Carrie, Charlotte, Samantha and Miranda take a glamorous and well-deserved trip, and we’re invited along with them if we pay something like $13. But if you consider the circumstances leading up to the trip, it’s four women complaining how they’re dissatisfied they are with the lives they wanted for themselves. I was appalled with how they’d think (AT THEIR AGE) taking a trip across the world would help them fix their issues instead of being mature adults and working with their partners and/or bosses to figure out what’s wrong. Of course they’re all entitled to some fun and excitement in their lives every now and then, so from Michael Patrick King’s standpoint, the women’s trip to exotic Abu Dhabi to escape their boredom makes for an adventure people are going to want in on. But the reasoning for the trip is wrong. I can’t believe after six seasons of the women facing their problems (impotency, trouble conceiving, extramarital affairs, money problems, unplanned pregnancies, and true tales of heartache) head on, they’d think a temporary leave from their relationships and responsibilities would be the answer. And that’s why the women should have stayed in New York – so they could do some digging and fix what needs fixing. The distance may have made their hearts grow fonder, but they’re old enough to know distance also makes problems fiercer, and that’s when bad things can happen (hint hint).
