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You can find the current article at its original source at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/22/skinny-dipping-british-germans-swiming-nude
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| Version 0 | Version 1 |
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| No skinny-dipping please, I’m British | |
| (about 3 hours later) | |
| In the depths of a German winter, and to the astonishment and alarm of all my friends, I went outdoor swimming this year in the icy Weissensee lake in east Berlin. I was there for the film festival, but bunked off to go swimming with my wildswimmer friend, Jessica Lee, who is about to publish a book entitled 52 Lakes about her gloriously Byronic mission to swim in all the lakes in and around the city. | In the depths of a German winter, and to the astonishment and alarm of all my friends, I went outdoor swimming this year in the icy Weissensee lake in east Berlin. I was there for the film festival, but bunked off to go swimming with my wildswimmer friend, Jessica Lee, who is about to publish a book entitled 52 Lakes about her gloriously Byronic mission to swim in all the lakes in and around the city. |
| Shivering and quivering with endorphins afterwards, I nonetheless became thoughtful when Jessica cheerfully told me about the FKK enthusiasts you sometimes see about the place: Freikörperkultur types – nudists, in fact. It is a German tradition, although even at the height of my post-swimming euphoria I was not tempted to join in. | Shivering and quivering with endorphins afterwards, I nonetheless became thoughtful when Jessica cheerfully told me about the FKK enthusiasts you sometimes see about the place: Freikörperkultur types – nudists, in fact. It is a German tradition, although even at the height of my post-swimming euphoria I was not tempted to join in. |
| Related: Death, rivalry, tension – that’s my garden mid-afternoon | Tim Dowling | Related: Death, rivalry, tension – that’s my garden mid-afternoon | Tim Dowling |
| Now there is a dispute among FKK folk in Meissen, in Saxony, whose club finds itself next door to a refugee shelter on the edge of their lake. They are under pressure to cover up, although the construction of a discreet screen might solve the problem. We need the German equivalent of an Ealing comedy to do justice to that situation: and for all my enthusiasm for German swimming, I share the unbelievers’ unease about going The Full Monty. If ever I went FKK, I would need around me a special set of screens on wheels, like a Victorian bathing hut. | Now there is a dispute among FKK folk in Meissen, in Saxony, whose club finds itself next door to a refugee shelter on the edge of their lake. They are under pressure to cover up, although the construction of a discreet screen might solve the problem. We need the German equivalent of an Ealing comedy to do justice to that situation: and for all my enthusiasm for German swimming, I share the unbelievers’ unease about going The Full Monty. If ever I went FKK, I would need around me a special set of screens on wheels, like a Victorian bathing hut. |
| Let’s get it over with | Let’s get it over with |
| When the Scottish referendum result came in, the film director Edgar Wright wittily tweeted: “Scotland! Let’s have make-up sex!” Nice idea. The divorce has been averted, so let’s resume cordial conjugal relations. | When the Scottish referendum result came in, the film director Edgar Wright wittily tweeted: “Scotland! Let’s have make-up sex!” Nice idea. The divorce has been averted, so let’s resume cordial conjugal relations. |
| It became a pious English commonplace to praise the 2014 Scottish vote for re-energising political debate; but could anyone think that about our extraordinarily ugly EU campaign? Can we expect much makeup sex this weekend? Will the pundits and politicians be getting out their vinyl copy of Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get it On and preparing for metaphorical reconciliatory rogering with their opponents, in the interests of national unity? | It became a pious English commonplace to praise the 2014 Scottish vote for re-energising political debate; but could anyone think that about our extraordinarily ugly EU campaign? Can we expect much makeup sex this weekend? Will the pundits and politicians be getting out their vinyl copy of Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get it On and preparing for metaphorical reconciliatory rogering with their opponents, in the interests of national unity? |
| Will we see a mass figurative oiling-up prior to an orgy involving Boris Johnson, David Cameron, George Osborne, Kate Hoey, Michael Gove, Gisela Stuart, John Cleese and Nigel Farage? I’m afraid that, on the contrary, the political dorm atmosphere tomorrow is going to be very, very unerotic. And that’s just before the gloating and recrimination spreads across the weekend papers. | Will we see a mass figurative oiling-up prior to an orgy involving Boris Johnson, David Cameron, George Osborne, Kate Hoey, Michael Gove, Gisela Stuart, John Cleese and Nigel Farage? I’m afraid that, on the contrary, the political dorm atmosphere tomorrow is going to be very, very unerotic. And that’s just before the gloating and recrimination spreads across the weekend papers. |
| The political watchword of everyone is going to be the notorious unofficial motto of that nursery of ambitious careerists, the Cambridge Union Society: “In defeat, spite; in victory, revenge.” | The political watchword of everyone is going to be the notorious unofficial motto of that nursery of ambitious careerists, the Cambridge Union Society: “In defeat, spite; in victory, revenge.” |
| Happy bankers | Happy bankers |
| Goldman Sachs came under attack for corporate mind control this week when the US broadcaster CNBC found the bank had secret software monitoring employees’ emails, not just for fraud but unhappy emotional phrases. These are red flags for off-message thinking and bad attitude. Trigger phrases include, “not a happy camper”, “bad to worse” and also – this one is the real killer – “something will go wrong”. | Goldman Sachs came under attack for corporate mind control this week when the US broadcaster CNBC found the bank had secret software monitoring employees’ emails, not just for fraud but unhappy emotional phrases. These are red flags for off-message thinking and bad attitude. Trigger phrases include, “not a happy camper”, “bad to worse” and also – this one is the real killer – “something will go wrong”. |
| Just imagine if Philip Larkin had been employed at Goldman Sachs. He would be hauled in front of the boss all the time. (“For Chrissake, Larkin, stop going on about your parents! Look, I’m sure your dad was a great guy. Now get out there and sell some derivatives!”) | Just imagine if Philip Larkin had been employed at Goldman Sachs. He would be hauled in front of the boss all the time. (“For Chrissake, Larkin, stop going on about your parents! Look, I’m sure your dad was a great guy. Now get out there and sell some derivatives!”) |
| I keep up a nonstop barrage of Eeyore-level whingeing and whining in my own emails. But Goldman Sachs is just doing what everybody does in their social media lives: we police and censor our Twitter and Instagram feeds, weeding out negativity and misery, and presenting something relentlessly upbeat. It’s not healthy to do without the rainfall of misery. | I keep up a nonstop barrage of Eeyore-level whingeing and whining in my own emails. But Goldman Sachs is just doing what everybody does in their social media lives: we police and censor our Twitter and Instagram feeds, weeding out negativity and misery, and presenting something relentlessly upbeat. It’s not healthy to do without the rainfall of misery. |