Germans in the Raw

Among the surprising legacies of the oppressions of communist East Germany is modern-day Germany’s commonplace “clothing-optional” lifestyle (FKK, or “Freikoerperkultur” — free body culture). A September Global Post dispatch counted “hundreds” of FKK beaches across the country and referenced a turned-up snapshot (not yet authenticated) of a young Angela Merkel frolicking nude in the 1960s or 1970s. Foreigners occasionally undergo culture shock at German hotels’ saunas and swimming pools, at which swimsuits are discouraged as “unhygienic.”