The washcloth is the smaller, squarish one; and the hand towel is the bigger, rectangular one. At least around our house. (I think I got that right. My instinct is always to assume the hand towel is the smaller one, but it’s not.)
White. Washcloth every time. Single use. I really don’t worry about the soap being dirty.
What??? You mean you let all that water that touches one part of your body touch another part of your body? I can’t believe you haven’t died of leprosy by now!!
It probably has to do with families where the practice was handed down, originally in communities where running water wasn’t as readily available. (My mother made me use one, but I later realized it wasn’t necessary.) The only thing you can do with a washcloth that you can’t do with your hand is absorb water and . . . save soap.
You’re just going to use more soap to wash the washcloths. It takes less soap to wash your hands than it does to wash a washcloth. And since when has soap been expensive, anyway?
Prior to the 19th century soap was a luxury in many places. In pre-revolutionary France it was taxed as a luxury item. It wasn’t always cheap.
It is, however, cheap in the present world, at least in developed nations.
My point exactly.
Sent from my LG-H990 using Tapatalk
I haven’t used soap/body wash/washcloth/what have you for as long as I can remember. The suds from my shampoo/my hand are sufficient for me.
After reading this the first time 13 years ago I got so confused I stopped showering.
Well, Redd Foxx said it best, “you gotta wash your ass.” You can look it up on Youtube; I’m not providing a link…
I have no idea how other people bathe. How WOULD I know?
And how does any comedian know how different ethnic groups shower?
I’m a white guy and I use one of those poofy scrubber things made out of some kind of netting material. Good friction, if I bear down I can exfoliate like a bastard.
Easy enough: ask. You can find people who’ll talk about things a lot more intimate than this!
“Excuse me, Senor- when Mexicans shower, do you use washcloths? And do you wash your butt and weenie before your face?”
I dunno, I don’t see that conversation going well.
I may be able to find this one out, I’ll check back in about a week after I see some friends.
Anyhow
I’m white, I mostly just use the bar of soap for normal cleaning, and use a combination of fresh wash cloth (rough ones) and soap if I am really dirty, or once a week (exfoliating purposes), whichever comes first. I use the spray shower head to “pre-wash” if you will, then I wash my hair first (shampoo) then use the bar soap starting at my face and working down to my feet, I clean the private areas before the feet since, well dirty water is falling on your feet anyhow. Spray down the shower after I rinse off. Clean me, clean shower. I leave the used wash cloth (squeezed out) in the shower until the next shower (to let it dry out before putting it in wash/no mold).
I can’t see how someone can reuse a wash cloth, you can get a big cheapo pack of them at most department stores. If you reuse it, thats gross, its going to be a germ farm, but thats not even what bothers me, just thinking of all the bodily “crumbs” on it is nasty enough. For that matter, I’ll only [maybe] reuse a towel to dry my hands or something. As for toothpaste, I wet the brush beforehand. After I am done using it, I run it under scalding hot water and shake it out.
Stereotype half busted.
Yep, this is my new conversation piece at work - minus the butt and weenie part.
After 13 years, that washcloth is so grungy it’ll probably crawl out of the shower unless you wedge the door closed.
Yeah, but then where do you hang your hands to dry and sanitize afterwards? And, what do you use for opposing digits while they’re drying? 
Me, I’ve used a very very coarse dish washcloth I bought in the Korean supermarket in about 1995. Seriously. I bought a pack of 3. They’re rough enough to do dishes with. Nothing gets caught, so no matter what part of my corpus I am scrubbing, the cloth rinses quite cleanly before I move on to the next part of my corpus.
They’re pretty coarse and so one upside is that they remove all dead skin as I scrub. ALL over. Distinctly different than using a cotton washcloth found in the hotel, etc.
I think the 3-pack was about $ 7.99.
Now and then I think to soak them in hot water with bleach, but that’s perhaps… once a year? They smell new, retain no soap or body scum. They rinse out 100%. Kinda awesome actually.
See- this is why I’m afraid to venture into Brooklyn.
I use exfoliating gloves which may be of a material similar to these, and shower gel/body wash. This way I can get into all the nook and crannies “down there” and it rinses off. My face I was with bare hands and whatever facial scrub/wash I have on hand (no pun intended!).
But I was taught to use a washcloth and bar soap for all over, and never told to put it in the laundry every use. I think rinsing it thoroughly is sufficient.
A 2004 thread?
Oh well, here goes. White woman here. And I use a wash cloth, starting with my face.
First you wash as far down as possible. Then you wash as far up as possible. Then you wash possible.
I also use scrubby gloves which I rinse well and hang up to dry between bathing, because really…those things never touch possible.
Wash cloths get hung up to dry before being put in the hamper so they don’t mildew and sour.
As a lifetime greasy truck mechanic I always used a wash cloth, after the wash cloth I went back over everything with a clean bar of soap. Always rinsed wash cloth until soap free and hung to dry. Guilty of not changing wash cloth as often as I should. Once week when doing laundry.
For most people that probably is sufficient, but I lived in a household with a diabetic, who was more prone to infections that non-diabetics, and I myself have had some epic skin problems (famously documented in a couple threads around here). For people with those conditions a little extra caution is a good thing.
Buying a lot of washclothes, using only once, and sanitizing with bleach in the laundry did help both of us, but as I said, we’re at higher risk than average.