Planes, trains and automobiles: is it ok to do yourself up anywhere you like?

I missed lunch one day last week when the discovery of an about-to-expire receipt forced me to make an emergency last-minute returns trip into town. To paraphrase the Hulk: you wouldn't like me when I'm hungry, so I ducked into a cafe to grab some noms before I started turning green.

I had barely taken two bites of my Mexican chicken salsa wrap and my tastes-like-summer San Pellegrino Limonata, which always makes me feel so faaancy, when I realised that there was something dampening their deliciousness.

 

Giving someone the stink eye while they're doing their slap
on the train is considered very impolite in Japan (image via GO City Girl_

Then I clocked the 19 or 20-year-old girl two tables away, engrossed in painting her nails a two-tone green and orange French while her mother and aunt looked on.

We've talked before about the outraged letters in the Metro about girls putting on their makeup on public transport - and we even have guides to putting on your makeup on the bus.

Advertised

Now, I can beaut-commute (discreetly put on slap in a quiet corner en route to work) with the best of them, but in my book any aspect of beauty that creates a smell is strictly not for public consumption.

Figuratively and literally, where things like spraying deodorant or perfume in company is concerned.

I was astounded that it didn't occur to three grown women that inflicting the stench of two open bottles of nail varnish on other people, especially while they were trying to eat a meal, might be kind of a crappy thing to do. Still, as I wolfed down the rest of my lunch to get out of there as quick as I could, I reflected on all the places I've engaged in a spot of beautifying that other people might consider inappropriate.

I've sorted my nails on trains, planes and automobiles (while a passenger, and using polish strips on both the former, I hasten to add), applied full faces of slap on buses, done eyeliner on trams, once GHD curled my hair at my desk in work (after hours) and spent an afternoon last summer practising my nail art in in a local park that myself, Himself and the dog had to ourselves.

I might not go down well in Japan, but at least I've never harmed anyone else's sandwich in any of my beauty endeavours.

What do you think about doing your makeup in public?  Is it something you do or do you HATE other people doing it?

Advertised

Do tell!

 

Related Articles

More from Beauty