This Frenchman, coming to a fitting room near you.

I heard the low rumble of the Frenchman’s voice seconds after I peeled off my shirt.

What the heck? I was in a woman’s fitting room. What was a man doing on the other side of the curtain?

The change room was the same size as an airplane washroom, putting me in very close proximity to this stranger, while also reaffirming that males still dominate the world of retail architecture.

I snapped my shirt back on and left, getting a friendly smile from the Frenchman on my way out.

In North America, I’ve seen a few women drag their guys into fitting rooms. What is wrong with these women? Can they not make a simple clothing purchase without their guy? Have they ever tested the less annoying practice of trying on the dress, then stepping out of the fitting room area for the requisite guy-appraisal?

Maybe their guys are mere accessories and they want to see if they color-coordinate properly? I don’t know, but I do know the practice is more popular here in Switzerland.

I’m still learning the local standards of fitting room etiquette, which so far has appeared in a sideshow-like manner, with the women being the show and the guys  cheering from the side.

Yesterday, a 60-ish woman in her underwear flitted in and out of her fitting room into the adjacent hallway, chatting with her husband. She had not yet tried on any new clothes. Puzzling.

The hallway actually ends before her fitting room and angles onto a window over a street, giving everyone in the store and on the sidewalk a fine view, so to speak, but no crowds massed.  As I said, she was over 60.

Some extol the relaxed attitude other cultures have toward women in various stages of undress, as though this is evidence that these cultures do not over-sexualize the female form.

Those people should have been in a clothing store one block over two weeks ago when a new shipment of swimwear came in. Wide-eyed men with tongues hanging out exchanged approving glances as women trekked into the fitting rooms with bikinis tucked under their arms. These particular change rooms happen to have doors, but the doors happen to have windows that are at a pretty good angle for any guy standing over five-feet six-inches tall.

Swiss fitting room - this convenient viewing deck faces onto a bank of mirrors, adding to the viewing pleasure (or horror) of people standing outside.

I settled in to watch the guys watching the girls. It was fascinating, like watching sharks circle. A few men were allowed into this inner sanctum with their girlfriends, grinning all the way.

Then, another slender attractive young woman walked into the fitting room area with her guy in tow, both unaware that another man had slipped into their jet-stream. Seconds later, there was a commotion and the second male scooted out of the area, red-faced, wide-eyed and very happy. The other guys hanging around restrained themselves from high-fiving the offending interloper.

In other more innocent revelations in the next shop over, a four-year-old girl made her way down a bank of fitting rooms, ripping aside curtains as she went, to announce, “Hello, I’m Lily!” exposing a half-dozen clients, all while her mother cooed over her daughter’s adorability.  No one seemed terribly upset.

I don’t get it.

Postscript: Since writing the above, I visited a few women’s clothing stores in France where I discovered the number of men in the fitting rooms was equal to the number of women. One young woman left the curtain pulled aside so her young man, seated across the hall, could offer his opinions and record her dressing and disrobing on his iPhone. Their matter-of-factness, along with the lack of attention this drew from the other shoppers and their male companions suggests this is business-as-usual.