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Day 16: Romance in Real Life: The Pink Princess in Distress (in this dress)

By J. W. Ashley on January 31, 2013

Princess Peach—a well-known Princess-in-Pink—is not the biggest princess phenom is Taiwan. She takes second place to the Taiwanese Baby-Doll Princess. On day 16 of Romance in Real Life, BwB continues our week-long Distress in This Dress mini-series, and April plays a damsel in distress wearing plenty of pink and polka-dots. Will there be romance in real life for a princess in pink?

Success! Finally! April gets help with her suitcase and with her papers! And from men! Woo-hoo!

With the paper drop, two guys immediately stop to help (one of them is on his cell phone and puts it down to play knight). It’s almost as if they cannot help themselves. As they help April with her papers, they mumble to each other, no doubt wondering at why this American woman has quite so many magazine photos of Japanese idols.

With the suitcase, April goes up. She struggles. Two guys are not far behind her, and they start to go up too (on the opposite side). April stops, sort of pouts, and one guy immediately turns around, goes down, comes up the other side, and carries her bag.

In my memory, they were kind of looking at me the whole time, and when I pouted, the one guy handed his drink to the other before he came to help me. He just grabs it…no questions or pause.

Although April’s hero might have been a little bit surprised by the fact that the bag was rather light (since it only had a few of April’s clothes inside), this was a welcome success after so many days of failure. April and I thought that the Baby-Doll Princess outfit might get the best response. Although the Lady in Red is a popular and much-loved figure in America, the Princess in Pink carries the most cultural weight here. Average April, Working April, April in Red… all of these damsels didn’t read as “distress” to most male onlookers. She seemed too strong, too little in need of their aid. But, pull out the pink and it’s GAME OVER.

Lessons in love and life: Clothing has a huge affect on male response. When April dressed in her average, everyday clothes, she was essentially ignored. Nearly the same happened when she rolled up her sleeves and put on the clothes of a professional working girl: although she got a smidgen of attention in her little pencil skirt and her black pumps, she didn’t see any male help at all. The red dress, though, drew so much attention and so many double-takes and glances: it even drew one fellow over for a little help. But—in Taiwan, it took the Pretty-in-Pink Princess to bring out true and eager chivalry.

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