Angela Merkel intervenes over court ban on circumcision of young boys (in Germany)

[Scootaloo]

10. Do you live in Burkina Faso?

Your profile says you live in Chicago, so I guess not. Okay, here's what you do. I want you to get up, and go to your bathroom. Somewhere in there should be a basin-shaped thing, usually attached to the wall. if you look carefully, there should be a pipe-looking thing jutting over the basin, with two knobby things, one on either side.

Okay, you see it? Now, put your hand on one of those knobs, and turn it. If it won't go, turn it the other way. Okay, see that clear stuff that's rushing out of the spigot? That's called water. it's a pretty neat substance, but i'll spare you the chemistry lesson. One of those knobs - usually the one on the left - is magic. When you turn that one, you will get hot water. You can even adjust both knobs to get varying degrees of warm water.

Okay, practice turning the water on and off until you get the hang of it. Okay now, look for a bar of stuff that looks kind of waxy; it'll usually be rectangular or oval in shape, and is usually located near either the basin, or in the shower stall (I'll explain that one in a bit) Have you found it? it should be slippery if your hands are wet. This is called soap, it was invented ages ago. Now, what you do with it is, with wet hands - use warm or hot water for best results! - rub the soap between your palms. it should make a bunch of little bubbles, called suds. What soap does, it bonds with oils and loosens dirt from your skin. With that loosened oils and dirt come all sorts of grime, like dead skin cells, bacteria, ink, whatever you've got on you.

Okay, are you nice and lathered up? Okay, set the soap down - careful, it's slippery! - and rinse your hands under the stream of water. All that stuff the soap has loosened up? It's being rinsed from your hands and is going down the drain in your sink. If your hands are especially groady (and since I have to explain this to you, I'll bet they are) you may need to repeat this process another time or two.

Now, I promised I would explain that shower thing, right? If you've mastered the sink, this is actually really easy; in the shower, you do with your whole body, what you just did with your hands. it does require you to get naked, because it's hard to get your skin clean if it's covered, right? don't worry, no one will laugh.

In the shower, you should pay special attention to places on your body that can get, well, shall we say... dank. Your armpits and crotch for instance, where perspiration gathers and there's little air circulation. The crack of your rear end is a similar place that needs to be washed. Also, well, if you're a larger person, you may have a few other places that need attention as well. Also worthy of attention are the areas between your toes and behind your ears - you'd be surprised at the amount of grime that can collect behind your ears, especially if you wear hats or use over-the-ear headphones.

Now, some of these places require a bit of equipment. This is called a washcloth, it's not expensive- usually it's a nine-by-nine square of terrycloth. The way this functions is that you either soap your body and scrub with hte cloth, or you soap the cloth and use it to scrub. Whichever technique works best for you.

When you've scrubbed, rinse off (just like your hands!) and step out of the shower. There should probably be another, larger piece of terrycloth nearby you can use to rub yourself dry (WARNING! even though you are clean now, this cloth - it's called a towel - WILL get dirty and smelly. You should wash it regularly!)

This is a technology known as "washing." it's brought to you by the modern marvels of plumbing and clean water! And this may surprise you, but it's even effective for cleaning parts of your body that Victorian mores assure you should never ever be touched, such as the penis or vulva!