THE DEATH OF ANOTHER CHERISHED FRENCH TRADITION

Felicity Flambé was sitting in her Paris apartment, flipping through a fashion magazine, when she discovered an article which discussed the growing obesity problem in America.

This interested Felicity because the only book she had read in the past ten years was French Women Don't Get Fat by a fellow Frenchwoman.

"It definitely shows the superiority of France," sniffed Felicity as she shifted her five-foot-two, 135-pound frame on the divan.

Unfortunately, the book was wrong. France is fattening up rapidly.

Obesity has imprisoned more than 11 percent of the population of France and 40 percent are now rated fat. These figures don't look too bad when compared with an American obesity rate of 31 percent and a British score of 23 percent. But, it appears that the French obesity percentage was computed in a different way. Instead of using the British and American approach to body mass indexes, the French method was simply to ask people whether they were obese or fat or normal. Naturally, no proud, svelte-thinking French citizen is going to admit she is fat or obese. In all probability, half the people in the survey told little white lies, with the great preponderance reporting themselves lighter, not heavier.

Felicity cannot admit that the French have gotten as fat as Americans. It would just be another humiliation at the hands of the rich barbarians across the ocean. Felicity feels that the Yankees have destroyed too many wonderful French traditions.

It all started with World War I, when the nation that produced Napoleon could not charge all those German machine gun nests and push the Boche out of French territory. With France exhausted from war, the brash doughnut-eating doughboys rejected French military leadership and charged into the Germans, defeating them in six months’ time.

The 1920s found Americans infesting the French music world with that vulgar thing called Jazz, which rapidly captivated France's youth.

In the 1930s, a roaring lion called MGM invaded France with opulently produced movies which overwhelmed the fledgling French film industry.

In World War II, Napoleon did a back-flip in his grave as the French army collapsed before the German blitzkrieg in a matter of days. The traditions of Napoleon's grand conquests were fully destroyed by surrender in World War II, leading to jokes like, "What do you call 100,000 men with their arms in the air? The French Army."

After World War II, history books taught Felicity that France fell into economic and political chaos, with a new leader chosen every few months. The country came perilously close to falling to communism, only to be rescued by General Marshall's famous plan and the re-emergence of General de Gaulle. Again, it was a case of the hated Americans coming to the rescue of a helpless France.

Felicity remembers the Cold War, when the Soviets aimed 5,000 tanks at Western Europe and scared everyone half to death. Again, it was the Americans with their military and atomic might who held the Soviets in check and preserved French independence.

What makes Felicity particularly angry is how the Americans took advantage of post- war France. "The Americans kept the Russians out so they could invade us with their dreadful rock and roll," she shouts over the din of the club below.

"The Americans have ruined our culture," she complains. "They control the movies, the music, the internet, the arts, everything that should be French. That terrible paint dripper called Pollack moved modern art from Paris to New York. Yankees even corrupt our language with all those harsh-sounding words like 'internet,' 'google', 'yahoo' and 'gigabyte.'

“They confuse us with their culture. Before the Americans, no woman wanted a mouse in the house; now the American Dell puts them in a box with their computers. And I always thought a 'spread sheet’ was something one put on a bed. Now my son laughs at me and says it's a computer program.

"I am so upset about the Americans tonight that I am too tired to cook. Maybe I will go to McDonald's, or perhaps buy some chicken at KFC. Or a frozen pizza...."

The French may have been able to resist following the Yankees into Iraq, but they appear to be no match for McDonald's, as they follow the Americans into obesity.