There's a Real Chance Part of Your Body Has Never Been Washed

What's going on

Someone posted a thought that is difficult to un-think. Washing yourself is a fixed routine — same order, same hand motions, every day for decades — which means there is a decent chance that some part of your body has never been washed. Not neglected lately. Never, not once.

A little about the setting. A Japanese bathroom is built so that you wash outside the tub and then soak in it afterwards, which keeps the tub water clean for the next person. The scrubbing happens sitting on a low stool with a hand shower, and the standard tool is a long, stiff nylon washcloth you hold at both ends and saw back and forth across your own back. That tool exists precisely because of the problem under discussion, and as the replies make clear, it has not solved it.

The responses split neatly in two. First come the diagnostics: behind the ears, the elbows, the small of the back, the entire dominant-hand side. Then, somewhere past the midpoint, the thread stops being about hygiene and turns into childhood memories of hunting for places no human had ever touched.

Comments

The way you wash your body — the order, the hand motions — is so completely routine that there’s a real chance a spot exists on you that has never once been washed. My back is looking pretty suspicious.

体の洗い方って順番とか手の動かし方とか完全にルーティン化してるからワンチャン一度も洗われた事ない箇所が存在する可能性あるんだよな背中とか大分怪しい

View on X

True, you can’t see your own back…

確かに背中は見えないからな…

I own one of those long-handled body brushes that people overseas use, and even that one’s suspect.

海外の人が使うような　ボディブラシって持ってるけど　あれとて怪しい。

Forget your hands not reaching your back — there’s a theory your attention doesn’t reach it either.

背中は手が届かない以前に、意識が届いてない説ある

This always makes me anxious. What if everyone is just being nice and I actually reek, what if there’s a genuinely filthy patch on me

これいつも不安になる実はみんながやさしいだけでめっちゃ臭ってたら、めっちゃ汚いところあったらどうしよう

I use a cotton towel to cut down on the places the lather never touches. Hands alone are never going to cover it.

綿のタオルを使って洗うことでなるべく石鹸の泡が接触しない場所を減らしてる。手だけじゃ絶対無理。

Rotate between a towel, a sponge and a long-handled brush and you end up washing completely different places!

タオル・スポンジ・柄付きブラシをとっかえながら使うと全然違うところが洗えるぜ！

Just soaking in the tub for about ten minutes dissolves off roughly 50–80% of the general grit and sweat on your back, plus the sebum clogging your pores. Skip the shower and get in the tub once in a while.

湯船に10分ほどゆっくり浸かるだけで、背中の大まかなチリや汗、毛穴に詰まった皮脂の約50〜80%は自然と溶け出して落ちていきます。たまにはシャワーではなく湯船にはいりましょう

There may still be some mystery gap that forms when you sit down, where the hot water never reaches.

まだ座った時にできる謎の空間が実はあってお湯で洗い流せないかもしれない。

I wash by unconsciously going after whatever spot feels gross from not having been scrubbed yet, so there’s no order to it at all. Even so, the not-scrubbed-yet sensor might just be dead in some places I’ve never washed.

俺はいつも無意識に「ナイロンタオルで擦ってなくて気持ち悪い場所」を擦ってく形で体を洗うから、順番という順番がない。まあそれでも、擦ってないセンサーが機能してなくて洗ったことのない箇所はあるかもしれん。

Years ago a girls’ comics magazine ran a column on how to wash yourself that said to clean carefully behind your ears, and up to that moment the back of my ears had been such a blind spot that it caused a revolution. (Magazines aimed at girls print grooming and lifestyle columns alongside the comics.)

昔、少女漫画の身体の洗い方を説明してるコラムに「耳の裏まで丁寧に洗おう」って書かれてあって、その時まで耳の裏という存在が盲点すぎて革命起きた

Lots of people aren’t washing behind their ears.

耳の裏洗ってない人多い

A few years ago I noticed that behind my ears and under my ankle bones were both looking questionable.

数年前、耳の後ろとくるぶしの下が怪しいことに気づいた

Elbows, surprisingly.

意外と肘

The small of the back is probably getting a half-hearted job.

腰のあたり洗いが甘そう

The dominant-hand side is probably the one that mostly goes unwashed. I’m forever calling out to myself, right flank too please~

利き手側は基本洗えてないこと多いかも脇腹とかよく「右の脇腹もお願いします〜」て声かけてるし

The back of your dominant hand.

利き手の甲

Feet (soles, toes), groin (including the crack), armpits, nape, behind the ears, scalp — get those properly and your odor situation is handled. Everywhere else, washing it properly whenever you happen to remember is enough.

足(足裏、指)、陰部(おしりの割れ目含む)、脇、項、耳裏、頭皮さえしっかり洗えてれば臭い対策は出来てるからその他の部位は気付いた時にしっかり洗えていれば何とかなるよ

Picturing everybody standing there naked scrubbing their butts made me laugh so hard I can’t stop and now I’m happy.

みんな裸でケツ擦ってんの想像したら笑い止まんなくなって幸せ

This is like walking home from elementary school and thinking I might be stepping on a patch of ground nobody in Japan has ever stepped on.

小学校の下校中に、未だかつて日本で誰も踏んでない場所を踏んでるかもしれないと思ったのと似てる

In elementary school I worked hard at touching places in that historic building that nobody had ever touched. The ceiling of the music room, that sort of thing.

小学生の頃この歴史ある学校でまだ誰も触ったことないであろう場所を触るべく音楽室の天井とか頑張って触ったりしてた

Filed as usual under attempting a world first, nobody-has-ever-done-this division.

世界初への挑戦（今まで誰もやっとことないシリーズ）定期

I’d like to make a pilgrimage to one of these sacred sites someday. (The word here is the one fans use for real places that appear in anime, which they travel to visit.)

聖地と呼ばれる場所をいつか訪れたいです

A man looks back on neither his past nor his back. Do not concern yourself with it for the rest of your life.

男は過去と背中は振り返らない一生気にするでない

My take

It's not as if there's a proper procedure for it, and nobody ever sits you down and teaches it.

#Relatable #Culture #Society

Source & translation note

Comments loosely translated for tone. Reactions collected from Togetter and X threads.

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