No nudes please, we're Chinese

SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Chinese eager to bare all in public will have to wait to disrobe after local outrage shelved the opening of the country's first nudist colony.


Originally scheduled to open to the public at a woodland park in China's eastern Zhejiang province on Thursday, that plan was put on hold after it sparked a furore among prudish locals, Wang Xiaoting, a spokeswoman for the park, said on Monday.


The move would have broken new ground in a country where sex is seldom discussed in public.


"It's caused a lot of debate," said Wang by telephone from the park near the town of Lin'an on Monday. "Many of the local people say it's disgusting and don't want it."


The park hit on the idea after a group of eight bold female university students stripped and went for a dip in the park's river, but were discovered by security guards, Wang said.


Park officials saw the opportunity after their blushes faded.


"I don't know why they did it here," she said, laughing. "I suppose it could be a good business opportunity for us though."


The planned nudist area lies along a river in a valley 80 km (50 miles) from the eastern city of Hangzhou.


"We do still want to do it, once related regulations are sorted out. I would say there are as many people who support the scheme as oppose it," she said.


State media said there was no law banning nude swimming or sunbathing in China, though no-one has so far been known to have tried to set up the kinds of nudist beaches common in Europe.


The bathing area, if it did get off the ground, would be a great leap forward for a country still shaking off its puritan Communist heritage.


Chinese beach resorts are typically dull, grey affairs, with bathers decked out in fashions not seen in the West in decades.