Stop Being So Prude And Get Your Kit Off

I have had four new neighbours within the last couple of months. They are all lovely people - friendly, clean, quiet and considerate. One of them is a Japanese lady. She is very friendly but I've realised that she is a bit forgetful. Like she forgets that she's got eggs boiling on the stove and the water's run dry and the eggs are starting to smell... like a bad fart. She also forgot her laundry in the washing machine the other day. For as long as I have lived here, if someone leaves their laundry in their washing machine and you need to use it you just take their stuff out and dump it in the dryer (without turning it on in case there are delicates in there and it'll shrink... see, I'm considerate like that). Well, my neighbour had left her laundry in the machine for a while and I needed to use it so I took her stuff out and put it in the dryer. About half an hour later she approached me in the kitchen and asked if I was the one to do the laundry after her. She wanted to know because she had her UNDERWEAR (oh deep horror!!!) in there. I said yes, it was me and I took your stuff out. I also told her that I've told the others that they can do the same because often the person who does the laundry forgets about it, falls asleep or goes out. And if that happens it's not fair that the others won't be able to use the washing machine until they remember. She gave me an angry look and said I just wanted to make sure it was you and NOT A MAN, thank you, thank you! (Wow, Japanese people are polite even when there pissed off with you!).

In all the years I have been living here it has never crossed my mind that my male neighbours would take any interest in my underwear. I have also never thought that me taking someone elses laundry out of the machine and putting it in the dryer would cause upset. It's not as if I was taking her laundry out piece by piece, putting her knickers on my head, taking a photo of it and posting it on Facebook. I seriously couldn't give a shit what her underwear looks like. I just wanted to use the machine.

But this led me to think about when I go for a swim (yeah, joined the gym a couple of weeks ago) and the women using the communal showers actually shower with their bathing suits on.

Being a Swede, where nudity is something natural, this is incredibly strange to me. When I'm in the communal showers I notice that these women are still wearing their swimmers but had they been naked I wouldn't have batted an eyelid. Why is it that some women, depending on their upbringing, culture or religion, cannot get undressed in front of other women. We all look the same. And when I'm in the shower I don't look at what your bodies look like. I'm busy trying to squeeze out of my wet, too tight bathing suit and just wash myself. I have no interest in looking at other women. So please, just get your kit off and feel that it's ok to wash yourselves properly. Because you can't really reach all your bits when wearing a Speedo!