Anton Voster, founder of a nudist resort due to open in Somerset West this summer, says Cape Town is “screaming” for it. Ever since he was reported to have said this, I have been diligently looking for these screamers. Believe me, they are hard to find. Maybe they are all silent screamers, keen not to set the dogs barking or have the police called. Maybe beneath all the clothing they wear this cold winter, their screams are muffled.

But at last I found one over the weekend. He was at the far, unfrequented end of Grotto Beach, Hermanus, howling at the waves. I wasn’t going to be pedantic, and start making distinctions between a howl and a scream. You’ve got to be grateful for what you get.

“Excuse me, sir,” I said. “I assume you are screaming, or howling as the case may be, for a nudist resort.”

His howling stopped. “Indeed, I am,” he said. “How did you guess?”

“Well, for one thing, you’re the only person I’ve found screaming and/or howling, and for another you haven’t any clothes on,” I replied. “Aren’t you cold? Actually, I can see you’re very cold.”

“It’s for a good cause,” he said. “What is a person in Cape Town supposed to do when he wants to go starkers?”

“I find the best thing is to get undressed,” I said. “Obviously in the privacy of my own home. I have no wish to expose myself to an unwilling public. You can get arrested for that sort of thing.”

“Exactly. Our desire is to expose ourselves to like-minded people willing to expose themselves, without any danger of arrest. There is no fun in going naked by yourself.”

“What about just keeping your underpants on?”

“It’s not the same. A person wants to hang free.”

“So what will you do while hanging free?”

“We will walk around, talk to other nudists, compare, er, notes, braai, play volleyball, tennis, ping-pong, have drinks in the bar, listen to music, watch TV – in fact do all the things that normal people do when they are constricted by clothing.”

“I don’t feel constricted by clothing.”

“That’s because you’ve never done things with your clothing off.”

“That’s not entirely true,” I confessed. “I’ve even skinny-dipped on occasion. But why turn it into a social event?”

“Well, as another nudist resort owner, Mr Mark Taylor, says, nudism puts us all on a level playing field. We are unable to judge people by what they wear.”

“So instead you judge people by how they look stark naked,” I pointed out. “A lot of people wouldn’t like to be judged like that at all. They are honest enough to know it would not be a pretty sight.”

“But the rest of us are screaming for it,” he said. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll carry on.”

I left him howling. At least the Somerset West nudists will be doing their own thing in a private garden out of public view, unlike the Sandy Bay nudists who so shocked society in the old days that police had to go undercover to catch them, their undercover consisting of no cover at all.

There were so many raids on Sandy Bay that the Public Indecency Unit acquired an all-over tan, and the then Cape Times cartoonist, David Marais, published a book titled All the Nudes That’s Fit to Print.

The only time nudists screamed was when a fellow nudist turned into a policeman and chased them across the beach. The Somerset West crowd will miss the excitement of the hunt.

johnvscott@mweb.co.za