Fo!

Chirimoya

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Dec 9, 2002
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Here's a sweeping generalisation for you all that happens to be accurate: Dominicans are disgusted by people who don't wash.

Take this incident at a small supermarket yesterday: three foreigners (nationality omitted to protect the guilty) who REEKED provoked a mass reaction from most other shoppers and all the staff.

Even though no one was hiding their horror with some pretty unsubtle gestures (fanning the air), exclamations of disgust (Fo!) and distressed facial expressions that can't have failed to cross the language barrier, as well as comments ("Get the air freshener, quick!!!/How about Baygon?) the pungent trio carried on oblivious, leaving rancid wafts of stale BO up and down the aisles in their wake.

It would have been funny if the smell wasn't so toxic.

It can't be denied: Dominicans always look and smell clean, even if they've been doing strenuous work on the hottest and most humid day.

If you do catch a whiff of eau de sobaco in a public place, the odds are a foreigner (alas, usually European) is in the vicinity. And when I go back to Europe, it hits me from all directions. Fo!
 

J D Sauser

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Nov 20, 2004
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Yes, Dominicans in general pride themselves in being CLEAN. One can never cease to be amazed to see how nicely and clean some people manage to come out of shacks with dirt roads! I love that.
I also have come to suspect that Dominicans smell differently than other elasticities.

They expect the same from others and they are right to.

Ay que fo!
Que grajo tiene este.
Er driablo que bajo a... ya tu sabe!
E'to gringo, como que le tienen miedo al agua parece!
:cheeky:

... J-D
 
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RacerX

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Well...maybe if they were funkier they could actually get more work done. And then step back WITH A REAL SENSE OF ACCOMPLISHMENT and say "I did, I do, I ve done and I will do, ergo I stink." Now if you spend all day genuflecting and postulating, you dont really build up a funk and you dont get much done either.

Long live the stink!
 

Lambada

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If you do catch a whiff of eau de sobaco in a public place, the odds are a foreigner (alas, usually European) is in the vicinity.

I also think the Dominican attitude rubs off, after a while. If I get a whiff of stale B.O. in Tropical supermarket my eyes are automatically scanning around for the nearest European ( just to get on the upwind side of them :cheeky:). Even most of the homeless beggars here don't smell as bad. I can sit & chat with beggars & not have the nostrils wrinkling.
 

centurion

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Dominicans aren't the only one's experianced it while stationed in Germany and get hit it with every now n then when at resort on vacation just worse , b.o and 90 degree weather......
 

Mariot

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i think it is hilarious that no matter what country i have been to, people accused foreigners (especially different looking ones) of being unclean and smelly.

but europeans have come a long way, my grandma used to tell me how, when she was a child, they used to bathe only once a week and share the bathing water with the whole family. parents first, and than the children. and they were a regular middle class family in the 1930's. now, people at least take a shower everyday.

on the other hand, dominicans might keep themselves and their houses as clean as it gets, but their sense of hygiene stops right in front of the doorsteps. cities like santo domingo smell like one huge pile of waste. look at the malecon. every european who sees the 'beach' there is disgusted, and in most dominican cities the streets are littered with trash.
it's not only that european cities have more money, and can therefore afford to keep the streets clean, but also that people would not throw out their trash like that. and if the government wouldn't clean up the streets, some sort of civil action group would for and either do it, or pressure politicians into spending money on the issue.
 
?

? bient?t

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If you do catch a whiff of eau de sobaco in a public place, the odds are a foreigner (alas, usually European) is in the vicinity. And when I go back to Europe, it hits me from all directions. Fo!

I could fly, but couldn't hide: 5 hours (three hours waiting and two flying) next to un couple de touristes.
 

Bob K

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Aug 16, 2004
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Sometimes I wonder if they consider a beach swim a bath...

I belive they do. I have seen many mothers using the sand to scrub thier kids and them selves on the beach.
I am always amazed how clean and fresh the kids alway look.

Bob K
 

Luperon

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fi fy fo fum I have never smelled any body odor on a Dominican Woman, no matter how hard I tried.


It appears to a yeast free country. Maybe thats why I can not find good bread.
 
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noni

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Mar 30, 2009
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Mariot said:
on the other hand, dominicans might keep themselves and their houses as clean as it gets, but their sense of hygiene stops right in front of the doorsteps. cities like santo domingo smell like one huge pile of waste. look at the malecon. every european who sees the 'beach' there is disgusted, and in most dominican cities the streets are littered with trash.
it's not only that european cities have more money, and can therefore afford to keep the streets clean, but also that people would not throw out their trash like that. and if the government wouldn't clean up the streets, some sort of civil action group would for and either do it, or pressure politicians into spending money on the issue.

Could not agree with you more!
 
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pyratt

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What's Russian for soap?

No particular reason for asking, just curious:devious:
they don't have a name for soap in Russian and neither do the French...that's why they act like their s-!^ don't stink......they can't smell it (laugh it's a joke)
 

Hillbilly

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Jan 1, 2002
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Actually, Chiri, in a case that bad I would have gone to the deoderant counter and pick one up and taken it to them and asked them to use it. I have done something similar a few times in my life in the DR, no kidding. So what if they are offended, they are offending the masses!!
I once had a footballer from Spain who needed the lesson, and other European friends as well...

This is cultural, I am afraid, and generally speaking they do react...

HB (When I talk about the introduction of perfumes in the Middle Ages, my kids know what country really took advantage of them!!!)
 

Chirimoya

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Dec 9, 2002
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I could fly, but couldn't hide: 5 hours (three hours waiting and two flying) next to un couple de touristes.
We had that on a two-and-a-half hour flight last year, the offending pair (who happened to be of the same nationality as our DR supermarket trio) were the row in front of us and we were being choked by the fumes. We called the stewardess and asked to be moved. The interval of time between her asking "why" and saying "OMG!" is the definition of a split second. Unfortunately the plane was full - so she came back armed with air freshener spray, surgical masks (it was at the height of the swine flu hoax) and wet towelettes. We happened to have that very same bottle of air freshener spray in the car - as we drove off we remembered about it and thought about going back to the supermarket to make a humanitarian gesture.

Mariot said:
i think it is hilarious that no matter what country i have been to, people accused foreigners (especially different looking ones) of being unclean and smelly.
In some places it is a case of hygiene - in others it is just different body odour due to dietary habits - if you don't eat dairy/garlic/spicy food you notice it on other people. I stopped eating garlic for a couple of weeks once and suddenly everyone smelt of it. I've also heard that the Chinese think that foreigners smell of milk.

but europeans have come a long way, my grandma used to tell me how, when she was a child, they used to bathe only once a week and share the bathing water with the whole family. parents first, and than the children. and they were a regular middle class family in the 1930's. now, people at least take a shower everyday.
Depends where in Europe - and it must have a lot to do with climate. As far as I know daily baths were always the norm where I come from in Europe, the southern part, but yes - some English friends describe growing up in the 1950s and even the 1960s with the routine of a weekly bath with just "top'n'tail" washing in between. Foreign visitors to the UK used to be scandalised by rules in boarding houses that only allowed guests "one bath a week". In the 19th century and earlier some people wouldn't bathe for weeks during the cold winter months. I suppose if everyone honks you don't notice it.
 

Chirimoya

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Dec 9, 2002
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Actually, Chiri, in a case that bad I would have gone to the deoderant counter and pick one up and taken it to them and asked them to use it. I have done something similar a few times in my life in the DR, no kidding. So what if they are offended, they are offending the masses!!
I once had a footballer from Spain who needed the lesson, and other European friends as well...

This is cultural, I am afraid, and generally speaking they do react...

HB (When I talk about the introduction of perfumes in the Middle Ages, my kids know what country really took advantage of them!!!)

Deodorant wouldn't have made much of a difference, believe you me. It had been a while since their bodies and clothes had been washed. People were reacting so strongly that maybe someone did say something in the end. They were still shopping when we were making our somewhat accelerated exit.
 

bachata

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Aug 18, 2007
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i think it is hilarious that no matter what country i have been to, people accused foreigners (especially different looking ones) of being unclean and smelly.

but europeans have come a long way, my grandma used to tell me how, when she was a child, they used to bathe only once a week and share the bathing water with the whole family. parents first, and than the children. and they were a regular middle class family in the 1930's. now, people at least take a shower everyday.

on the other hand, dominicans might keep themselves and their houses as clean as it gets, but their sense of hygiene stops right in front of the doorsteps. cities like santo domingo smell like one huge pile of waste. look at the malecon. every european who sees the 'beach' there is disgusted, and in most dominican cities the streets are littered with trash.
it's not only that european cities have more money, and can therefore afford to keep the streets clean, but also that people would not throw out their trash like that. and if the government wouldn't clean up the streets, some sort of civil action group would for and either do it, or pressure politicians into spending money on the issue.

We are talking about people no about the Dominican cities.

It is true that some European stink..... Years a go I was in casa Nelson Pto. Pta. trying to sell something to Dona Angelita the owner, three white Europeans passed by my side and the bad smell was about to induce my vomit.

Fo, que maldito bajo.

JJ
 

Mariot

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We are talking about people no about the Dominican cities.

It is true that some European stink..... Years a go I was in casa Nelson Pto. Pta. trying to sell something to Dona Angelita the owner, three white Europeans passed by my side and the bad smell was about to induce my vomit.

Fo, que maldito bajo.

JJ

well in essence, cities are just a whole lot of people. if there were no people, there would be no trash. my whole argument is that this has a much to do with a sense of hygiene as keeping yourself clean. europeans get the creeps because of the smell of the trash and the thought of the rats, cockroaches and whatnot it attrackts, just as dominicans are disgusted by body odor. when they come home, they will also tell people as horrified of what they experienced as people are doing in this threat.

and yes it is true, there are europeans in the dr who smell bad. most of them will smell perfectly fine in europe, it is just that they are not used to showering at least three times a day. this is because in europe it is first off not necessary because of the different climate, and second it is considered a waste of natural resources. than there are those who grew up in different times, and it was simply too expensive to bathe everyday. some people are just not as quick in picking up on local customs as others, so i guess telling them in a polite way would be the solution here.

there is of course also the legacy of the middle ages and renaissance, where europeans really had low standards of hygiene (not washing themselves, defecating in the streets, and throwing trash out of the window), but once we found out what caused the plague, most countries got rid of that.