Do Zalanthan women shave their legs?

[SewerRat_inTheOpen]

Wilma and Betty doesn't have hair sprouting all over, be it legs or armpit. So there.

[Bedhead]

Maybe I missed it, but I'm surprised that nobody has mentioned other methods of hair removal.  I remember reading that the ancient Egyptians used some sort of waxing process to remove hair.  Something like that probably wouldn't be hard to come by on Zalanthas.  :?:

[Incognito]

There's a song by this great musician called Adrian Belew, titled "The Ideal Woman", where he's recorded various men - given a single-line response to what their ideal woman would be like......


One of the responses is:
Pretty with hairy legs!

[Angela Christine]

I bet half-giant chicks don't shave their legs.  That would take all day!


Angela Christine

[Vesperas]

Zalanthans would have different compounds and chemicals available to them that don't exist in our world.  It IS quite possible that they are able to make a wax from some secretion of some animal or plant; its also quite possible someone in has discovered that that gortok whose been chasing everyone up and down the North side has eye-fluid with miraculous Nair-like abilities.

There's also that theory about people on Zalanthas evolving to have little body hair.  I've not been around very long, and so am no authority, but Zalanthas most likely as SOME point was quite green.  There hasn't been enough time since that Armageddon-like catastrophy for any of the races to further evolve (naturally, anyway), if you take into consideration that many places in the game hint at old rumors about older days.

[Kennath]

For all who don't have dessert experience: Hair is a no-no in the dessert. For a sandstorm you want hair, but  you SHOULD NOT be doing anything outside in a sandstorm if you don't have to. If you are then you WOULD hunker down, dig a hole, let sand partly cover you (for protection) and keep your nose pointed away from the wind. Hair is very annoying, and those of us who have hunted easter-oregon desserts (wich are pretty mild, but barren) know that sand gets on your legs and stuff


For those of you without forest experience: Hair good! Keeps general dirt from crusting on and when you want to get off what is on, simply shave.


^you make the decisions^

[Maybe42or54]

I have quite a bit of hair on my legs. I live in the desert, and on a hot day, with the wind blowing through that hair it actually gets rather cool, from evaporation and what not. When I'd shave my legs for baseball and Football, I'd shave my legs and get some really bad irritation to my legs that annoyed me pretty damn much, and it distracted me and I got a couple goals on me for the first few games. After A while I got used to it and It'd feel like a sweated a lot more than when I actually had leg hair, so... I don't think they shave their legs. I don't.

[richter]

Many ancient cultures, including the Romans, did not shave but rather plucked the hair with tweezers.  I'd find this more consistent with the cultural and technological level than shaving (the form such tweezers would take might be different, but still possible).

Painful?  Yeah, probably.  But so is a lot in life.  The things some people do in the name of vanity.

[Fhangrin]

At the risk of reviving an old thread which I have a disgustingly annoying habit of, with the scarceness of water, you'd think that SOME people would do what the fremen in the Dune books did- Sand baths.

It's a desert planet, and it's really, REALLY hot. You'd think the scorching sand would be able to kill the hair follicles.  (Just a thought)

(Edited for leaving something out)

[FiveDisgruntledMonkeysWit]

Wouldn't 'sand baths' do horrible damage to your skin if it was hot enough to 'scorch' off hair follicles? And what about the genitals?
Ouch. No thanks.

[Fhangrin]

Early on, yea, but the whole thing, if it scorches, rubs ff the dead skin, then the old damage would at SOME point be either barely visible, or completely gone. At some point you'd have skin that could actually resist the damaging effects of the sand


Right!?!?!?

[Cenghiz]

Shaving is not the only option to remove hair. In old Anatolia, women used to boil sugar to become a viscous matter and they used it to pluck the hair from their legs. I believe there may be substitutes.

Also, as a man who had had girlfriends with a lot of finals and no time to shave their legs, I know hairy legs also feel smooth to the touch. At least for some women. So it's not a _must_ to shave your legs to ensure your sexual partner caresses them and feels smoothness.

[Rindan]

My girlfriend is of Asian ancestry and shaves about once every three months or so. She grows a tiny patch of hair on her knees that after all that time becomes just barely visible.  She can shave off three months of leg hair in about 4 strokes with a razor.  Hell, she could do it with tweezers in about 2 minutes if she really felt like it.  If a woman is dying for an explanation as to how they can have silky smooth skin leg hair free skin and can't think of an in game way to shave, I would just call it genetic.  It isn't a terribly hard stretch of the imagination as it already exists in this world.

[Winterless]

I think that as races and species evolve to better survive in the world around them and to further themselves from their ancestorial species. I would imagine that the races, living in a harsh, sweltering, desert world would have evolved to have as little body hair as possible. This doesn't mean that they can't have hair on the top of their head or on their face as this is used among many species for differentiation between the sexes, but body hair was present at one time for warmth and as these races would no longer need body hair for warmth it would have eventually become a null gene. Humans today are not hairy like apes anymore, are they? Why would you expect advanced races on another planet to be. And yes, I do believe Zalanthans would be advance races, because they have learned how to open up their conciousness and speak to others with their minds.

Also, with the type of clothing that is on Zalanthas, boots and tight, hot clothing of that nature would eventually rub off the hair anyway. I've known many friends who have been stationed in Iraq and due to having to wear combat boots out in the heat, came back with no hair where their boots wrapped around their legs and ankles, and it's taken some of them at least a year to get that hair back.

[fourTwenty]

Actually, body hair is to keep you cool. Head hair is for insulation, that's why it grows thicker and in more abundance. The thin body hairs are actually to catch the sweat that comes from your body. As the wind blows it hits the sweat that's stuck to your body and works as a surprisingly efficient cooling system.

[Bast]

Women (and men) in ancient Egypt used to move all their body hair with pumice stone. Including the hair on their heads as it was seen as 'unclean'. I'm also aware of some Persian taboo's regarding body hair in certain areas. I don't see why they wouldn't.   Hair is also hot. Keeping shaved would keep you cooler wouldn't it?

[Angela Christine]

Women (and men) in ancient Egypt used to move all their body hair with pumice stone.

I've tried friction hair removal on both my legs and face.  It works pretty well, and doesn't sting as much as you might expect.  But the idea of removing all your body hair with friction disturbs me.  In places where the skin is loose you'd need to pull the skin taut with one hand, and grind away the hair with the other hand, which seems like it would be really inconvenient when it comes to the genital area.  Some Egyptian dude stretching out his ball sack and buffing it with a pumice stone?  That just seems . . . pretty damn hardcore.

Hair is also hot. Keeping shaved would keep you cooler wouldn't it?

Not necessarily.  See the post above yours about how hair can help cool you.


Even the thick hair on your head doesn't act as a heater, it acts as an insulator.  A normal blanket doesn't generate heat, it just helps you retain your body heat, heat that the surrounding cold air would otherwise leech away.  But what if the air in the room was hotter than body temperature?  Isn't heat going to be leeching into your body?  In that case insulators might actually keep you cooler by keeping the heat out.

I live in a country where the ambient temperature is nearly always lower than my body temperature.  I'm not sure what insulators would do in an environment where the ambient temperature is usually higher than body temperature.  The space shuttle is wrapped in insulation, not just to keep the heat in when they are in the absolute cold of space, but also to keep the heat out when they are burning through re-entry.





In any event, if we assume that shaving would help you keep cool, and that people shave to keep cool, it seems to me that shaving your head would be as common as shaving your legs.  So if s/he isn't bald, s/he probably doesn't shave his/her legs either.

[Bast]

Women (and men) in ancient Egypt used to move all their body hair with pumice stone.

I've tried friction hair removal on both my legs and face.  It works pretty well, and doesn't sting as much as you might expect.  But the idea of removing all your body hair with friction disturbs me.  In places where the skin is loose you'd need to pull the skin taut with one hand, and grind away the hair with the other hand, which seems like it would be really inconvenient when it comes to the genital area.  Some egyptian dude stretching out his ball sack and buffing it with a pumice stone?  That just seems . . . pretty damn hardcore.

The pumice method was mainly used by priest in ritual hair removal. There was also heavy use of of a honey wax recipe. This site has some over shaving facts

http://www.hair-removal-shaver.com/hair-removal.html

[Cale_Knight]

Glad to see you and your girlfriend are still together, Rindan!

[bilic]

I live in a country where the ambient temperature is nearly always lower than my body temperature. I'm not sure what insulators would do in an environment where the ambient temperature is usually higher than body temperature. The space shuttle is wrapped in insulation, not just to keep the heat in when they are in the absolute cold of space, but also to keep the heat out when they are burning through re-entry.

In any event, if we assume that shaving would help you keep cool, and that people shave to keep cool, it seems to me that shaving your head would be as common as shaving your legs. So if s/he isn't bald, s/he probably doesn't shave his/her legs either.

I am from Texas. Having thick hair makes you hotter because of body heat. Being bald means the sun is beating down on your now unprotected scalp. Having enough hair to keep the sun off, but to little to insulate your head is best. Leg hair generaly doesn't grow thick enough to keep the sun off in any meaningful way.

[Twisted Minstrel]

:shock:
Jagged obsidian blades.... No water to spare for something like that (unless yer a noble ¬_¬).... No shaving cream or anything like that.... Just fucking... Ow, no. I've often wondered why so many Zalanthain men are clean-shaven if those are the only methods.

[psionic fungus]

Well... Just to be absolutely clear... Obsidian blades are not by necessity jagged... And have been used from ancient to modern times as surgical instruments because they knap to a monoatomic edge.  Doesn't really sound that scary to shave with.... Granted I use a Mach 3 with multiple blades, I use nothing more than my razor and water to shave.

Also, Zalanthans could use sand/stone abrasion to remove hair.  Mmm.

[Belenos]

Well... Just to be absolutely clear... Obsidian blades are not by necessity jagged... And have been used from ancient to modern times as surgical instruments because they knap to a monoatomic edge.

Had to research this, and sure enough he is right. http://www.finescience.com/commerce/ccc1065-obsidian-scalpels.htm

[Cale_Knight]

In fact, obsidian blades are so sharp that they'd be more than adequate when combined with simple bar soap (which is readily available in game).

[Maybe42or54]

It can be so fine you wont feel it cut you until you see blood and start panicking. Or atleast that was how it was for me, when I got to use an old Native American blade.