Do you know what the pink flamingo means in the motorhome?
Margareta Jonilson learned something new that can make many motorhome owners rethink their interior details.
And you have the pink flamingo with you on the trip too. Exciting! says the colleague and smiles meaningfully.
I do not understand anything.
"Google flamingo and mobile home and you'll see," continues the colleague and disappears out the door whistling happily.
Then of course I will. Pronto. And learn that there is a signaling system in campsites around Europe that I am not privy to.
Well, we've learned that we shouldn't decorate our mobile home with red hearts, as tempting as this might be during the Christmas weeks. Then we could get an unwanted visit from sex buyers, at least if we stop at a side of the road that is passed by a lot of commercial traffic.
But we had no idea until we started researching the signal system that a pair of red ribbons tied in a strategic place by the motorhome means an invitation to mutual sex exchange. There we will have to review what color we have on our strings and tension straps(!) in the future. You don't want to expose anyone to unnecessary embarrassment. Least of all ourselves.
What the colleague had discovered when he sneakily glanced over my shoulder was a photo of pink flamingos posted on a website which, among other things, deals with a group motorhome trip to the Camargue in southern France.
There, in the Camargue, nature is famous for harboring the long-legged pink birds, wild white horses and black bulls, as the pictures would illustrate.
One flamingo is said to mean "I am single and open to sex with a couple" and two means "we are a couple who want to switch partners with another couple". Well done, now we've learned something new again.
A little more googling reveals that the flamingo signal has been around for a long time. Our most common former evening newspapers usually run a small blurb about this at least once every summer.
The traditional garden flamingo turns out to have roots in the American fifties and got its boost(!) in Europe a few years ago, when it replaced the pineapple as the most popular decoration detail. (Do we want to know what the pineapple signals? No, I thought so.)
This sudden explosion of flamingos has of course caused confusion in wide circles. Abroad we should have regained our reputation as extremely loose people; every single tourist who comes to Sweden can see with his own eyes what we have in our gardens. Everywhere!
We campers help by decorating our eyeballs with little inflatable flamingo things that we place on the plastic mat under the awning, no bad idea.
Or on the contrary, fully consciously to be clear.
But we have an obvious problem here, I feel.
For whom dare to ask?
Name: Margareta Jonilson
Lives: In French Sète and plate ice
Favorite bird: Gull...eh?
Favorite color of laces: Nänä, don't try!