Four Hundred Days Til Re-entry

Even lower under the radar - Japanese hot springs

I reached a new low this weekend, with a double whammy of immense proportions.



The first would normally have dominated a post like this. During the course of a weekend I embarked upon a course of action which ultimately lead to my paycheque being micturated up the house heat-retainer in under 48 hours. Bit of a head-fuck, that was. It was kind of like one of those Barklay Card adverts without the "priceless" thing at the end.



We had a party on Saturday night that took about ten hours of cooking, which started on Friday night. Beef bourguinon is one of my favourite foods but does unfortunately take about eight hours to cook if you do it right. Anyway, all told it was about 15,000 yen in preparations and food, I think. Well worth it, though. Thanks to everyone who came and squeezed into our tiny flat.



Saturday morning saw me in Nagoya for a Senior ALT meeting. The company paid for this of course. Unfortunately, the return route took me past the Mac Shop where I acidentally bought a new MacBook. Including the three year warranty this soared up to 180,000 yen, though I got a discount for being a teacher.



Sunday saw me buying snow tyres for the gas-guzzler. Even though I got them second hand, and at a good price too, these limped-along to 36,000 yen including fitting, balancing and sacrifice of chicken.



So, in my new-found spirit of poverty, I decided to go to the sento. What's a sento, UTR? I'm glad you asked. Here it is:



One of the best and most highly redeeming aspects of Japan are the hot springs. These are called "Onsen" in Japanese and are supposed to be naturally occuring. I say supposed to be because Japanese business people being what they are, these are often faked and dressed-up like an Onsen with a big kerosene boiler hidden in the trees at the back. An onsen can start at a steaming outdoor mudhole and range through small, garden-sized indoor pool all the way up to huge spa complexes. The best ones have indoor and outdoor sections, saunas, steam rooms, cold plunge-pools, bubble baths, Jacuzzis, special chair baths that blast your shoulders with water, and so-on.

Here are a few examples:

You remember I said that there were a few fake ones about? These basically fall into two categories: The one type are the cowboy outfits who would be closed down in the UK but aren't here because of the lack of trading standards.

The other are called Sento and are a godsend on a cold day after a day / weekend of pounding over the jumps, along the rails and down the hills on my snowplank. These are generally really clean and have more of the things I want: Whirlpools, steam rooms and plunge pools.

In both you go in naked but with a small towel. The towel should not be dunked in the water, however. They are 98% separated into mens and womens sections.

Now we are up to speed, back to last weekend. Sunday afternoon and I am about 230,000 yen down and a macbook, set of tyres and party experiences up. Before going to get some snowboard bits I decide to call into the sento. Clothes off, shower, rinse down with the special water before getting in (more manners) and one foot in the pool.

"nick-sensei! nick-sensei! Look everyone! It's nick sensei!"

Now, I do not mind being naked in front of other men. I do not actively seek it out but neither do i let it stand in the way of sousing my aching bag of bones on a Sunday. The line in the sand is drawn at people from school. Especially the kids. What a fucking nightmare.

I very quickly became aware that the school baseball club were in the building. despite my fears the kids were actually pretty civilised. Once we had had broken through the initial time/place/what do I do now? stage, the kids followed me round asking me questions. One of the kids took me to one side for a little confidence:

Kid: Nick sensei
Me: What?
Kid: Do you mind if I tell you something?
Me, with the fear of God inside me, quaking: Er, OK.
Kid: You know that doctor's surgery skit we did?
Me: Yeeeessss?
Kid: It was really hard.
Me: Oh thank fuck for that! Yes, I know. It was a taster for next year so you know what to expect.

So I got through it all OK in the end. I might have to start going further afield for my hot water adventures after this.

Labels: hot, Japan, Japanese, onsen, spring

posted by Between daisies @ 11:19