dirty talk

Like sex, hygiene is something that people don’t talk about often enough. Everybody has their own personal definition of hygiene. Maybe we don’t need to talk about everything, you say. But when you share a bathroom, you do, I say.

We have our personal definitions of hygiene that we strangely believe everyone is aware of, and shares with us. We silently but irrevocably judge people based on how they leave the toilet, the sink, the floor, the taps, the drain. It is a testament to their character, their parents, their community and/or religion, the place they come from.

Notions of invisible ‘purity’ which form the basis of Hinduism and Sikhism may be hard to believe since they are, ultimately, abstract concepts upon which some people are alienated, murdered, sexually violated, exploited by other people in positions of power. But it’s interesting to note that while something might be visibly unclean to me, it might not be to someone else.

I live in a 2BHK flat with four other women. One of my friends in the other bedroom constantly complained how her roommate, K left the drain clogged with her hair every morning. To me, this is unforgivably inconsiderate.

After three days, I jumped in the middle of what was, technically, their dispute, because each bedroom has its own bathroom. I confronted her as soon as she came out of her bath. I spoke to her unkindly, asking her what she thought of herself to leave the bathroom in such a terrible condition for her roommate. I said a lot more, too, assuming that she was doing this out of laziness or disgust. (Eww, who picks up hair from a drain?)

She was stunned. She simply assumed that the cleaning staff was doing the needful. I sharply corrected her, no, it’s your roommate who’s cleaning up after you.

That night, I happened to eat alone in the mess; my roommates had finished before me and had gone upstairs. I realised that my friend had never mentioned having spoken to K about her discomfort. She, as I, had simply assumed that K was at fault because she didn’t share this common code of hygiene with the rest of us. Neither of us had stopped to think that we had never verbalised this code to anyone.

I hadn’t pulled up K for leaving the bathroom dirty. I had attacked her for not reading our minds.

Why can we not talk to each other about hygiene? Just because four women happen to follow a particular aspect of this all-important code doesn’t mean it becomes obvious. The bathroom is one of the most crucial spaces in a house—unlike the kitchen, it’s a space that everyone uses frequently. It’s a private space that we are forced to share. We confront our uglinesses, we let go (forgive the terrible pun), we strip ourselves bare in that room. It is impossible that each of us does this identically. Even when I was living alone, it was the bathroom that made me feel most vulnerable when a guest happened to use it.

I think it’s time my roommates and I overcame our shame and disgust and spoke to each other frankly about hygiene. In matters of dirtiness, the bathroom is no match for the mind.