LES ULIS, FRANCE

Here's a compelling argument for why you should always mail your letters at your local post office: You never know whom you might discover. Or who might discover you.

Seven years ago Noemie Lenoir was buying stamps for her mother at a post office near her home when she was spotted by a representative of Ford Models. That chance encounter led to a contract, and this 23-year-old has since put her stamp on the modeling world.

Lenoir has been featured in campaigns for L'Oréal, Gap, Tommy Hilfiger and Victoria's Secret, and is making her third appearance in the Swimsuit Issue.

In 2001 she made her first foray into acting by playing one of Cleopatra's courtesans in Astérix & Obélix: Mission Cléopâtre. Her second movie, Gomez et Tavares, opens in France in May.

She plans to pursue more acting roles, but when she needs to get away from the pressures of her career, she visits her mother, who lives on Réunion island, a slice of paradise off the coast of Madagascar.

-- RICHARD DEITSCH