not that there’s anything wrong with that
i go to a gym in shanghai. it’s a nice gym: big and clean and very modern. it’s got three levels — all connected by escalators — with walls of mirrors and lines of neon lights and tall windows that look down upon huai hai zhong lu. it’s got tv sets and techno music and more exercise equipment than i’ve seen in one place … anywhere. hell, it’s even got spinning classes. what i’m trying to say is that my gym in china — a country still relatively new to the whole gym thing — is amazingly … um … normal.
well, kind of. like most “westernized” things here in shanghai, there are always some things — typically very minor quirks — that make the experience very chinese. and this is a good thing. i’m not complaining. i enjoy these little idiosyncrasies. they keep life interesting. that’s why i’m here. but, try as i might, i never totally understand why things are the way they are.
in the locker room at the gym, there are obviously lots of lockers. and beside some of these lockers, there are big plush chairs, the kind you might find in someone’s living room. and yesterday, a man was sitting in one of these chairs as if he were in his own living room. he had one leg crossed so his foot was close to his face. he was picking at his toes with his fingers.
oh, and he was completely butt-freakin’ naked.
america, contrary to my students’ impressions, is actually a rather conservative country … especially when it comes to locker rooms. if we are walking from our locker to the shower, we wrap a towel around our waists. if we are sitting on a chair picking crud from our toes, we go home first (and then we hide in the bathroom with the door locked).
i bet most americans would assume, as i did, that the chinese would be the ultra-conservative ones, especially when it comes to showing some skin. but, in locker rooms at least, that is not the case. no, that is definitely not the case. sometimes the level of comfortableness makes me uncomfortable. walk around a corner without paying attention and you’re bound to get an eyeful — if you’re not careful, you may end up with a handful, too.
i subscribe to the jerry seinfeld “good naked/bad naked” mentality: woman brushing her hair = good naked, woman opening a jar of pickles = bad naked. there are few forms of same-sex nakedness that would be classified “good” under the seinfeld rubric. none of these examples — all seen at my gym in the past week — would qualify, i’m sure: talking on mobile phone while naked, cleaning out ears with cotton swab while naked, washing hands at sink while naked (and then bending over to wash face), urinating at urinal while naked, standing in the middle of the room and carrying on a conversation while naked, wandering aimlessly while naked, taking a nap on a chair while naked … and then, of course, you’ve got the toe-picking guy. (reports from the women’s locker room have naked people standing in front of the mirror using electronic hair dryers … to dry their hair down there.)
now, i’m not a prude. i think being comfortable with one’s body is a good thing. a couple of years ago, i spent a day at a nudist camp in the mountains of north georgia for a newspaper story. i spent most of my time there nude, and i came away from the experience thinking that there is much that is healthy about the nudist lifestyle … and that there is much that is unattractive about the average human body. and, really, aren’t most bodies you see at the gym there for a reason? because they need improvement?
i know what you’re thinking: “dan, maybe you go to a ‘gay’ gym and are just too dumb to realize it.” i’m fairly certain that i don’t. i doubt those exist in china … yet. and, anyway, if they did, i’m sure the bodies in the locker rooms at those places would look a lot better than the ones at mine. but, now that i think about it, the attire worn by many at my gym is very, well, um … let’s just say some folks would fit in pretty well as extras in a queer as folk gym scene: tight tank tops and spandex shorts that end right below the ass cheeks and leave very little to the imagination … “little” being the operative word. (ok, i’m sorry. that was a low blow. literally.)
while all the skin and spandex take a little while to get used to, it’s all rather refreshing in a way, really. it’s nice to know that in some situations the chinese don’t have a lot of the hang-ups, stigmas and stereotypes that we americans do. we can learn a lot from each other.
but, seriously, if you need to pick crap from your toes, do it at home. or at least throw some underwear on first.
one other thing …
can anyone explain to me why very few chinese people put shoes in their lockers? the tops of the lockers at my gym are lined with pairs of shoes. i, on the other hand, always put my shoes in the locker … because shoes would be one of the main things i wouldn’t want stolen. but i am definitely in the minority with this mindset. can anyone explain this footwear phenomenon to me?
further reading: nude water volleyball: doing the bible belt in the buff
01.30.2004, 9:21 PM · Observations
7 Comments
The feet are, in the eyes of most Asians, the most base part of the body, and shoes are intimately tied to the feet (of course) and also are seen as being dirty. Thus they always take their shoes off before going inside their apartments, and either leave them on a shoe rack by the door or outside in the hall. They would be very uncomfrtable having “dirty” shoes come anywhere near their clean clothes in the locker. So they either use seaparate foot lockers or leave the shoes on top on the lockers. About the skin thing, it is alarming at first. They have absolutely no inhibitions like us uptight Americans (Germans and probably most other Europeans are less uptight in this regard as well; we are cursed by our puritan heritage that fears and despises the naked human body).
thanks richard. that makes sense. so i guess no clean-living, self-respecting chinese person would ever steal someone else’s “dirty” shoes?
the panthers lost in the last 8 secs, what an upset
Have you seen the film “Shower”? Public Bathroom was a part of mass culture in China.
Dan! Update! Update, Dan!
ok. i’ll do it … now.
I am a member of a health club, and very few of the other women ever cover up in the locker room! You see it all, walking around completely nude, blow drying their hair while nude, doing their makeup standing in front of the mirrors nude. I’m sure every lady out there who has spent time in women’s locker rooms could relate stories of the nude women that have started conversations with them. I actually do envy their freedom about their nude bodies, and it’s at least nice to see that they are comfortable with their nudity as opposed to being ashamed!