Not Always in Slippers

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In my opinion, providing slippers for guests is not necessary. If people know the home is shoes-off, they can bring their own slippers and if they have not visited before it is hardly a great endurance to be in socks or bare feet.

Some people insist that providing slippers is a must by pointing out the example of Japan:

In Japan, you are not expected to go bare foot; the host will always give you slippers.

This is actually an half-truth. It is true that hosts will normally provide slippers in Japanese homes. However, these are intended to be worn in the hallway and kitchen. Bedrooms and living rooms normally have tatami (grass mat) flooring. It is expected that one removes slippers and step on the tatami in either stocking or bare feet.

Carpet has become more common in Japan and often it is expected that one removes slippers even before stepping into carpeted rooms.

Not seen that for a while

I was in Watford today and saw a couple of assistants dressing a shop window in their stocking feet. I have forgotten what shop it was. Removing shoes to dress shop windows does not seem as common as it used to be.

Its 2011 and Everyone is Still Alive

Good grief Charlie Brown! What in the hell have you been up to? Hmmmm, besides the usual? Not much, I guess...

It's definitely been an 'intriguing' start to the next year. Not a whole lot has changed really. The weather is always changing; I'm growing older; I'm learning new things; my outlook on life and people, places, and things is changing; so I guess a whole lot has changed. I think a smart person once wrote "Change is the nature of existence". This seems to be the theme to my meager and unrelentingly ambiguous life. Instead of fighting the tide I've embraced this fact and tried to go with lifes ever evolving ebb and flow. I would desire not to get too stuck in the muck and mire of dwelling in the past or rehearsing the future. Another smart person said, "Rolling in the muck is not the best way of getting clean." So with a fresh face, and strong desire to move forward I've made a comittment to return to school and finish my masters degree. With that I've also taken up a new outdoor interest: snowboarding. It's something I've wanted to try for a few years now. When I lived in Colorado as a kid (age 9-15) my parents would take my brother and I up to Winter Park for skiing. My father, being quite proficient at the sport was gone in a spray of snow flakes, leaving my brother and I to fend for ourselves. After a few times out we eventually got the hang of it and I can remember blasting down the steep snow covered hillsides manipulating the two skinny and long planks strapped to my feet with great ease and having an absolute blast. Not to mention the beauty of the mountains and the warm embrace of the lodge afterwards. So after a great deal of hand wringing and hopping from one foot to the next I finally made the financial plunge and invested in a few things I would need to get the adventure off the ground.

So far I've been out three times; twice to Crystal Mt., and once to Mt. Baker. I have to say that all three times were more than I had hoped for. With the occasional 'slam', I've actually managed to start carving as of my last trip, and I finally have garnered some visible control. My main goal has been to get good enough to start doing back country (i.e. Rianier), but really, it's just been invigorating to get into something new.

Mt. Baker parking lot.

Crystal Mt. My first time out was a heart wrenching one. My 'friends', all quite good and well seasoned skiers and snowboarders thought it a downright traditional faux-pa not to throw me down a double black diamond my first day out. This is said black diamond, The Powder Bowl. I took a lot of seats going down, but made it unscathed, and ended up going down another three times.

Mt. Rainier, as seen from the summit of Crystal Mt.

Now don't get scared. I've not given up climbing in the snowy white face of some new outdoor adrenaline fix. If anything it's given me a new perspective on climbing; hell on life in general. Yesterday I had a great breakthrough and managed to carve down my first black diamond with no falls and no drifting. I got to the bottom and had this supreme rush of clarity and unadulterated joy. It was like clipping the chains of my first outdoor lead all over again without the slightest notion of what this might do for my climbing ego or scorecard. I couldn't stop myself from hugging my friends and looking as if I had taken a large hit of laughing gas for the rest of the day. It was an overwhelming sense of accomplishment. And while this is the same reason I climb, it was amazing to find it in another activity. The struggle of learning how to move over snow/rock effortlessly; taking huge whippers or slamming after catching an edge is such an enlightening process that locks you into the 'moment'. It allows you to let go of so much that keeps you from enjoying these present moments in life that are happening all the time.

"A much more interesting, kind, adventurous, and joyful approach to life is to begin to develop our curiosity, not caring whether the object of our inquisitiveness is bitter or sweet. To lead a life that goes beyond pettiness and prejudice and always wanting to make sure that everything turns out on our own terms, to lead a more passionate, full, and delightful life than that, we must realize that we can endure a lot of pain and pleasure for the sake of finding out who we are and what this world is, how we tick and how this world ticks, how the whole thing just is."

Good friends Stephanie and Kyle at Mt. Baker. Such a great day.

Peace in the mist.

Best for friends for life! Right? The view was amazing, the weather was sunny, and the runs were open and not crowded. Can't wait to go back.

Bye! Thanks for reading...

Housewarming Parties

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If you are moving into a new house or apartment and you want to make a clean start and have a no-shoes rule, you have an ideal opportunity to kick it off with an housewarming party.

The best thing to do is to indicate clearly on invitations that you will be requiring shoes-off. That way people will have no surpises. They can bring slippers, wear clean socks with no holes or a floaty skirt that looks great with barefeet (Trinny and Susanah actually recommended that hostesses of dinner parties should wear a long skirt with barefeet or slippers).



Having an housewarming party is such an excellent way to send the message that your new house will be a shoe-free zone. Even those of your friends who do not come will see on the invitation that you want shoes-off.

Requiring shoes-off at a housewarming party sends the message that you are really serious about the rule and that it is not just an exception for a wet winter evening. After all, some people with shoeless homes actually make an exception and allow shoes-on in parties. However, having shoes-off at an housewarming makes it clear that you want the house to stay as it was when you bought it.

Guest post from Sandro

Sandro is a regular visitor to this blog. He lives in Georgia (that is the ancient Christian kingdom in the mountains of the Caucasus incorporated into the Russian empire and after it the Soviet Union; not the Georgia in the USA. Today Georgia is an independent republic with important political and economic ties to the west).


What I really find strange that our museums do not require shoes removed. Yet when I was in Baku as a tourist with my wife, we also visited a number of museums, and our removing shoes was accepted in some of them though made certain fun of in one case. I am talking about apartment museums, i.e. ex-apartments of famous persons in Azerbaijan's history, now the dedicated museums.

Only in of them, a famous local jazz musician's, shoes-off was required. In others, our intention to take our shoes off seemingly shocked the staff, and we were strongly told to leave my shoes on (not surprisingly, the floors were dirty and scratched in those museums) or, if a museum had been renovated, offered extremely uncomfortable (even dangerous), falling down and slippery bags or slippers to put ON shoes. It would have been particularly troubling for my wife, who was wearing high heels (BTW bags cannot protect polished parquet from heels).

In cases with bags/slippers, we were "allowed" to remove our shoes with more or less tolerance or understanding. In one case, we preferred to put the bags on our stockinged feet, which was still not so uncomfortable for us and not so "shocking" for them. We found it was seemingly easier to "control" the bags without shoes rather than through shoes, and not to slide or fall down. This was especially vital for my wife, who was wearing high heels. I think the staff didn't notice we had left our shoes in the lobby.

In the museum of rugs, those on the display are located partly on the floor. The museum provides no slippers or bags, and visitors must stay in their shoes (the floor is parquet rather scratched). However, to see the labels with information, one has to step on the rugs displayed. We repeatedly removed our shoes every time stepping on a rug. We had to put them on to move from rug to rug, from room to room. We would have preferred to keep them off, but didn't want to move dirt from the parquet onto the rugs with our stockinged feet. Nobody from the staff commented our actions. I wonder whether they would have told anything hadn't we taken our shoes off. I hope they would.

Baku is a wonderful city with nice people, who follow the shoes-off policy at homes almost with no exception, but they don't accept the same policy for offices and, which is even harder to understand, for museums.

Children

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I am always a little surprised when I see children wearing shoes at home, whether on television or in person. It surprises me because when I was a child, my parents expected me to remove my shoes at the door. When I visited my friends' homes, their parents often expected me to take my shoes off. So it always seems a little strange when I see children keeping their shoes on at home.

The practise of removing shoes was expected until I reached the age of about 12. My parents became less stringent about it as I got older. Occasionally this house rule would be revived in later years. It was restored when I was 21 when my parents and I moved to a house with cream carpets, though they were not consistent in keeping to it.

There are some homes, in the UK, where the hosts will expect the children of guests to remove their shoes, but would not expect it of adult guests. Some guests will insist that their children remove their shoes without removing their own. I can understand why some people may be more concerned about children's shoes; children do tend to be less careful about what they step in and are more likely to run around in long and wet grass. However, adults should never forget that their own shoes pick up an awful lot of less noticeable dirt. There is also the fact that children learn to follow rules better when adults act consistently. There is a certain amount of 'do as I say, not do as I do' in the requirement of shoes-off for children only.

Some childcare experts are of the opinion that children should wear shoes to the minimum necessary and therefore recommend shoes-off indoors for health reasons. Not to mention protecting them from the various harmful materials that shoes can pick up. It is becoming increasingly the case that daycare nurseries and childminders adopt the no-shoes rule.

Smelly Feet

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The issue of 'smelly feet' is often raised as an argument against the Shoes-Off rule.

In Western society there seems to be a lot of paranoia about the phenomena of 'smelly feet'. I think this is simply a result of people not removing their shoes very often. Your feet will actually smell a lot less if you remove your shoes regularly. Perhaps in Britain we have not yet reached the civilised heights of Finland, where it is acceptable to remove shoes in business meetings and on trains (not that people do not do so in Britain, but it is not seen as conventional behaviour).

Nevertheless, I think most people worry too much about this issue. People imagine their feet smell far more than they actually do. I have met very few people who let off much of an aroma after removing their shoes, and most of them were people who did not wash and change their socks regularly.

If people know in advance that they need to remove their shoes, they can make sure they wear clean socks, or even better, bring slippers with them. If they are especially worried about it, they can use some of those fancy foot deoderents.

Feet will smell a lot less if people wear sandals. Sneakers tend to smell more than leather shoes, though I will admit I often wear sneakers when not in flip flops or crocs.

Some people will say 'I would rather put up with a dirty floor than people's smelly feet.' Well, I guess people decide on their own priorities. However, stinking feet will leave with the guests. A dirty floor will not. Nor will the dust they brought in on their shoes, and that is very bad for your health.