Long night in waxworks

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 34021, 10 December 1975, Page 6

Long night in waxworks

People do some funny things sometimes. Take Helen Neville, for instance. She has just spent a night — a long 11-hour night — shut up with the dummies in Sydney’s King’s Cross waxworks. She came out in the morn-

ing, said “Phew, thank goodness that’s over,” and polished off a stiff Scotch and water.

It had, she said, been “scary.” She had thought of spiders. Albert Einstein was creepy but Henry VIII was the worst. “I wouldn’t do it again,” she said. “Not even for another $200.” The waxworks’ manageress, Heather Currey, offered the $2OO as a dare during a television programme and there were so many takers that a name had to be drawn from a hat.

And it was, frankly, the money that Helen was after. She is forward hand in an all-women’s crew which has entered this year's Sydney to Hobart yacht race and the money has gone into the kitty for that. Funny tilings A night in the waxworks may not be in quite the same class as some of the other funny things that people do — like days of pole-sitting, chess playing, cycling, walking, jogging, the incredible feats of phone box and mini-car cramming, piano smashing, pie eating, oyster stuffing, spaghetti slurping, bed making, beer swilling, and what have you that go to make a record for that Guinness book. A Sydney couple, for instance, have just danced their way to a non-stop record. But all these things have a result of some kind — money, fame . . . Women, according to Dr Joan Piaggio, of Bundaberg, are doing some very funny things to themselves — and all in the fickle cause of fashion. The are developing a “pantie girdle syndrome”— swollen, aching legs and varicouse vein problems — from wearing pantie girdles

with tight, elastic legs or tight leg bands. Their bosoms are becoming pendulous because they go braless.

Hazards

Women, says Dr Piaggio, are risking dermatitis and skin irritations from jewellery containing nickel, deodorants, and antipersirants—some of which may also cause skin cysts—coarse and no-iron fabrics, resin treated dripdrys, detergents with fluorescent whiteners and drycleaned clothes that have not been aired thoroughly. Some of their rouges and lipsticks with fluorescent dyes in them may behave oddly and badly when exposed to sun, says Dr Piaggio, and .some hair dyes, it is suspected, may have a cancer risk in some of their ingredients. Teen-agers with acne may be making it worse by frequent washing, using some medicated preparations and keeping their hair long. And women are asking for trouble, says Dr Piaggio, by wearing sandals with heels over three inches high and no backs. They are risking weakened ligaments, sprains or worse if they fall, curvature of the spine, backache, leg cramps, and muscle non-co-ordination from shortening of the Achilles tendon. Silicone If shoes and stockings are too narrow they can cause bunions. If shoes are badly ventilated there is a risk of dermatitis, tinea and corns. Some sun oils do not do their job very well and some short-cut cosmetic operations such as injections of silicone, paraffin, or beeswax have, says Dr Piaggio, caused death. Dr Piaggio, in fact, would

like to see textile and footwear design and technology and fashion integrated. There must, she says “be a link between the biological sciences and social humanities to create a situation where fashion is not a health hazard.”