There hasn’t been anything really to report. I haven’t fallen in love with a sumo wrestler, I haven’t been transformed into a harajuku girl, I haven’t eaten a raw eel and I haven’t hopped on the wrong bus filled with Japanese tourists. I’ve caught trains, checked out the vast and odd array of women’s footwear, been hit on by a black man who was probably trying to sell me something and I’ve laughed at a man wearing a breathing mask while puffing on a cigarette. Nothing too far from centre and nothing that’s going to change the way you see me. Until tonight.
The hotel in Takayama has it’s own private onsen. I had to ask someone what that was and was not shocked to find out that it involved me getting naked with a bunch of other women. I’ve seen the Karate Kid, I’ve seen the Last Samurai. They sit in big bamboo tubs nude, have a chat and get out.
I’ve never been all that comfortable naked out of the house. I am a pure advocate for pants off Tuesday, I have been known to leave the toilet door open when I wee, but I’ve very rarely gotten nude outside of my own or my family house. Togs? All over them. Remove that very thin, very constricting layer of lycra – far from all over it.
Bob, my fifty-six year old portly tour guide, gave me the run down in the bus. Put on the pyjamas, go downstairs, nude up, scrub – a lot, rinse, get in, repeat as desired. That’s the shortened version but easy enough. I checked in, went upstairs, dumped my luggage and went on the hunt for the pyjamas. A pair of rather small elasticised backed pants and a cross over top. It was clear that the sumo fit was not part of the room decor and since I wasn’t about to go downstairs and mime to the desk clerk ‘bigger pyjamas’ I squeezed into the unflattering matching suit. While no matching suit has ever been flattering, this took on a whole new level. The pants came ever so slightly above the Mitsubishi spare tyre around my waste and cleaved a very eye catching camel toe on my front bum. The top tied underneath, almost meeting like the jeans I had when I was twenty and then tied across the top. I took a selfie and posted my misfortune. If anything my family would appreciate the laugh.
In the elevator, downstairs, and into the public bath house. There was a wall of baskets for you to put your stuff in. My glasses, my towel, my pyjamas and then there was nothing. The basket wasn’t even close to half full and yet I had nothing else to put in it. Staring at the ten signs in Japanese on the door it was impossible to tell what to do next. I couldn’t work out if I was glad that there was no one else in there to ask or miffed that my first outing in purposeful, public nudity was going unwitnessed.
Ignoring the signs, I heard Bob’s voice. Wash, rinse, dip. Three instructions – can’t be difficult… When I slid open the door, the steam and heat hit me in the face. If I was wearing glasses they would have looked like I’d just checked the roast chicken in the oven. I sat, carefully, on the tiny plastic chair in front of the mirror. In a giant slate room, I was sitting naked with my fat rolls out on a very tiny plastic step. I had to hold on to the tap to lower myself that close to the ground and had visions of sprawling out like a cartoon character with the plastic legs of the chair flat on the ground underneath me.
I squirted the body wash into my hand and hit the shower tap handle. I scrubbed my body and rinsed with the hand held shower and watched myself in the conveniently placed mirror. I’d always imagined watching myself shower would be more erotic, like one of my stories. It’s not. Your skin jiggles, your fat rolls and you by no way look like you’re in a Dove soap commercial. There is water in your eyes and like all people do, you look like someone’s dumped a bucket of water on your head because they have.
Scrubbed till my skin was already pink, I stood up and moved to the pool. It’s a bath really but it looks like a giant spa bath only without the bubbles. I sat down and laid my body out in the water. With no one in there, there wasn’t any need to sit unassuming on a step like I would in a public spa, I let it all go. I laid back, floated in the hot water until eventually I got bored. I sat up and looked at my distorted body in the water. It was awesome. The water distorted the outlines of my fat rolls and the minerals in the water made everything float. I mean everything. My boobs floated perkily just under the surface, breaking out of the water slightly in perfect circles, my belly lifted and rounded so that the full length of my thighs was actually part of my legs and I looked almost elongated and god forbid, a little bit sexy. While all of this went through my mind, it drifted as it normally does, to what happened in this room before me. Yes, it was a women’s onsen, but traditionally they were mixed. Everyone got in there and all of sudden it was clear why the Japanese are such a randy bunch. With that kind of relaxation and stimulation a daily occurrence it’s no wonder their pop culture is so accepting of busty manga women, nude school girls and bum- cheek grazing skirts. Why hide it when you’re in the onsen and everyone’s breasts sit high and everyone’s bum cheeks round out with perfect skin under the water?
After broiling myself for what felt like an hour, was probably only fifteen minutes, I had to get out. My skin had turned pink and my face glowed – and not in the good way. It’s hot in there! Getting out and walking carefully back to the dressing room, still nude, I struggled back into my too small pyjamas. I’d already been naked, there was no point playing modest with a towel and I stood in the middle of the room filled with empty baskets to finish getting dressed.
My first onsen experience was alone, and I may have done it wrong, who knows, there was no one there to tell me otherwise, but it has been done. I am glad that the first time I did it, I could do it alone. I was allowed to fuck it up all by myself without the polite giggles of elderly Japanese women pointing and laughing at the disproportionate way my body now hangs. Now when it happens next time, I’ll at least be able to walk in, trust the tiny plastic step and wash my underarms without needing to make uncomfortable eye contact with those around me. Because sitting in some hot water in the nud with a bunch of strangers, who wouldn’t want that?
life in big frilly knickers 