I really like going to the gym in sandals. Birkenstocks to be specific. They are very comfortable and have a very stiff sole. They are, in fact, great for biking too. I once biked a few hundred kilometers in those sandals because my biking shoes proved too tight. Back to the point. Sandals make for pretty good gym wear. Sure, they are completely ill-suited to running and might fall off in various exercise positions, but my routine includes very little that the sandal isn't suitable for. Unfortunately, my gym hates sandals. I've been kicked out (very politely) on two separate occasions for wearing sandals in the gym. Getting kicked out can wreak havoc on a workout, so I usually bring the shoes along. I'm aware of the rules, as much as I disagree with them, and I don't want my workout interrupted by nosy gym staff. However, sometimes I forget. This was the situation today when I found myself surreptitiously getting a workout in while waring sandals. There was no issue, no one discovered my transgression. Well, no one that cared. However, this experience reminded me how inane the rules are. Perhaps they make sense from the gyms perspective. Perhaps someone, long ago, dropped a weight on a sandal-clad foot and got seriously injured. It's certainly possible, but that doesn't make it any more palattable. That would just meant the gym is trying to cover their ass at the expense of the gym-goer. Yes, it is an expense. Or rather, a cost. Sandals are the ideal footwear for Taiwan. It's almost always appropriate sandal weather. Furthermore, sandals are quicker to put on than normal shoes, much quicker. By disallowing sandals they are costing us all several minutes of time... You may scoff, but that adds up over the course of a year of regularly going to the gym. But beyond the time cost, its simply inconvenient. In a society that lives in sandals most of the time it's very easy to find yourself at the gym in the wrong footwear.