Last week I
spent a few hours at our local sauna with my husband. Unlike many people of Northern European
origins, the idea of hanging out and sweating buckets in the company of nude
strangers – has low appeal to me. The double
pass to the sauna (valued at 80euros) was a Christmas gift from my spouse and
facing its expiry date. I hate waste,
and, the challenge of extending my comfort zone to a place of nervous laughing
is something I find difficult to resist.
Anticipating
that going to the sauna on the weekend may be equated to going to the markets
to choose meat that you plan to cook at home,
I arranged childcare for a Thursday night. Further, I was plucked like a hippy chicken
with bonus clean cut toenails. In usual
fashion, my husband had showered and shaved, that morning, before going to
work.
We handed in
the voucher at the reception desk, climbed the stairs, and discovered that
there was only one unisex change-room.
Disrobing, we were stumped by not knowing the protocol for body coverage
during the short journey down the stairs, through the restaurant into the sauna
area. My husband was all for wearing flipflops. I ignored his assertion that draping a towel
around myself would cause the other customers to feel uncomfortable, and
adorned myself in three items: two flip
flops and one towel. Soon I felt smug
that I was not the one feeling stupid, or having to return to the change-room
for a towel.
So fine, we
make it to the sauna and issue salutations to the other patrons while
maintaining eye contact. Ditching towels
and shoes, we shower and head into the sauna box. About six dripping naked people were sitting,
lying, and conversing in this small ridiculously hot space. Although my eyes were mostly closed, I do
know that I was surrounded by a mix of gender, age and tattoo coverage. An older, larger lady had taken over a whole
bench by prostrating herself. Two guys
were having a heated conversation about which neighbourhoods were easier to
demand higher fees as house painters (yes, it is true – non-Dutch people are
worth more money).
An old bald
gentleman joined the party, stopping to throw more wood onto the sauna, before
squeezing onto a lower bench. As he sat
down I noticed that he had a catheter (with plug, not bag) attached to his leg
by an elastic band. My eyes popped open
in disbelief and my stomach valves loosened.
To me, a catheter seems to be an accessory not really welcome in even a
Dutch sauna or spa. Like a
swimsuit. Or socks. Or a diaper.
But this is the Netherlands – a land of tolerance. My reaction once again proves that I will
never truly be ingrained within the culture of my adopted homeland.
Giving
ourselves few long minutes to camouflauge any discomfort we may have felt, we
left the sauna and headed to the showers to cool off and debrief, before
tackling the remaining areas on offer.
All up, we managed to stay involved in this relaxing and rejuvenating exercise for about one hour. I use italics because I never really made it
into the relaxation zone. I was nauseous
from the heat, in pain from the cold, and freaked out that I may end up with
tinea on my private regions from the steam room.
Our
neighbourhood sauna is like most saunas, I guess. Hot wooden room; wet and steamy tiled room;
ice-bath; warm bubbling spa; salt scrub area;
showers and large buckets of cold water; outside nude area; relaxation
lounge; and, small café with television.
Except for the roof top butt naked zone, we partook of everything on offer. The highlight for me was having a beer while
wrapped in a towel, facing a room full of nude folk. That is an image that doesn’t come up too
often in my average week.
Here is a
confession. I am from a large island in
the Southern Hemisphere. I grew up near
the beach. Just like all my female friends, I was mortified if my mother took
off her swimsuit and was naked in a women’s only changing room at the beach or local
pool. Like all Australian women of my
age (younger than you think), I was highly skilled in switching an entire set
of clothes while having a towel wrapped around myself. Nudity was for tourists and old nutters.
A
second confession is that I have been to
other saunas around the world. In New
York, I had a limited membership at the Russian baths on 10th street
in Manhattan. This weekend evening
sessions were extremely popular especially with singles and gays. At all times, patrons had to be clothed. Men wore the shorts and women dressed in the
green dressing gowns issued as you entered the reception area. Both sexes worn plastic flipflops. By comparison, during a stay at a Helsinki youth
hosteI, there was some obvious disgruntlement caused by me wearing a swim
suit. Really, it was a hot cupboard
filled with nude people - looking at me like I was the odd one.
So why is it
that people who grow up in the colder areas of Europe are so keen to be naked -
together? My uncle and aunt, both in their
80s, recently gave up membership to their much-loved naturalist club. For the uninitiated, this is a nudist, and
not gardening, club. Is it a unquenched
need for vitamin D? Is it a reaction to
growing up in a Calvinistic society? Is
it just seeking tactile freedom denied many months of the year due to the cold
climate? Or is it plain
exhibitionism?
The flipside
to these questions is why do Asians, Americans, Australians and possible
Africans all have issues with public nudity.
It is a coincidence that these are all A-cultures? (sorry, obvious
joke). Are we seriously prudish about
our bodies and other people’s bodies?
Have we separated the naked self from being part of our humanity?
Many
questions and ideas to ponder alone in the bathtub, or with a group of naked
people in a sauna. For me, the need to
expose myself remains non-existent. It
isn’t about being embarrassed about my own body. It is about an unspoken intimacy with strangers.
More, it is about seeing the same face
serving me at the bank, and feeling uncomfortable that I know a secret about
them and vice versa.
