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How to Enjoy a Public Bath (Sento) or Hot Spring in Japan
One of the greatest things about traveling to Japan is the way baths are enjoyed. Aside from the awesomeness that is the bath in a person’s home, sometimes people enjoy a trip out to a public bath, or if they are lucky enough to live within a few hours of an onsen or hot spring, they may do that.
It’s also an wonderful thing to do with kids in Japan. If you are traveling in Japan with kids, I think a public bath or hot spring should be at the top of the list of things to do. Relaxing and floating in the water (kids also tend to get a bit more tolerance with how they play in the bath), even hanging out on a beach chair wrapped in a towel, kids will love the whole experience.
The first bit of trepidation people feel about the bath is being completely naked in front of a whole lot of strangers. Please let me alleviate your fears…
- You can carry around a small hand towel with which to cover the good parts. For guys, this can be enough for you to cover what you want to cover. Most women don’t really bother to cover themselves, but if you want to you can use the hand towel to cover a good bit of real estate.
- Once you are in the water, you are fine, and that’s where you’ll be spending most of your time.
- The baths are NOT coed so it’s not so different from walking around in a locker room.
- There are plenty of body types in Japan so no matter what shape you are in, there’s no reason to be shy.
People are generally tolerant of each other and make space so unless you are at an excessively crowded bath, you should have a little space to spread out. People tend to respect the fact that people are there to relax and rejuvenate so they tend not to bother you. On the other hand, it’s also a good place to strike up a subdued conversation with someone who seems willing to talk if you want to practice your Japanese.
Before I get to the bullet list below of things to do to make sure you are doing it right and with good manners, I’ll tell my own bad manner story.
I blame Japanese tv for the few mistakes I made during my first trip to a public bath in Japan. On tv, for obvious reasons, the people in the bath stay covered at all times. Even when they get into the water, they tend to keep a strategically placed towel in the water with them. Although I knew about washing first, and not “swimming” around in the bath, I didn’t know about the towel.
While my friends watched in horror I brought, not only the tiny hand towel that people carry with them to cover themselves while walking around, but a regular towel to cover myself in the bath like the people on tv. Not properly interpreting the shocked faces of my friends, I proceded to shape the towel in the water into various water animals and make the towel “swim” around in the water.
Then finally, one friend looked at me, and in restrained, polite Japanese said, “You are not supposed to put towels in the water.” I said, “Oh,” took the towels out of the water and began to relax.
My friend explained that there are little threads from the towel, dust, or other things could end up floating around in the water. (That’s not to say you won’t occasionally see naturally occurring hairs floating in the bath, so be forewarned.)
Anyway, here’s what you can do to fit the Japanese culture of the bath and have a good time…
Part 1: The reception area and locker room.
- Before you go in, you will probably pay and get a key for a locker in the locker room. The key will probably be on one of those bracelets common at gyms.
- If you don’t have towels with you, you may want to get one. Some places offer them for free, some places have a nominal fee, and some places even have towel set vending machines.
- In the locker room, you will change into a robe or your birthday suit depending on the set up. If it’s a robe, there will be a little basket you can put your robe into when you get into the bath area. If this is where you get naked, you’ll just want to grab your smaller towel to bring with you into the bath.
- Make sure your locker is locked and get ready to head in.
- A lot of places say “No Tattoos”, but what they are really doing is reserving the right to try and kick out any yakuza or (more recently) young people trying to make trouble. For the most part, there won’t be a problem if you have a little tattoo somewhere. In the better safe than troubled department, you can always try to tape it up or cover it somehow if you want to. If a place is a little too strict about this, you can always find one that isn’t.
Part 2: Showering before entering the public bath.
- There will be showers on the periphery, some sites say that you can just splash yourself before getting in, and I’ve seen some people do that, but manners say the proper thing to do is a nice shower with soap and water.
- Most showers will have two kinds of faucets… one that will pour water out into a bowl you can use to splash over yourself, the other will be a shower. The bowl is surprisingly pleasant to use so don’t let yourself fixate on the shower. It’s about relaxation and experience.
- There will also be liquid body soap and shampoo that might be shared with the person next to you. Some places will even provide a bar of soap to use for people who don’t like the body soap.
- There may be stand up showers, but there may not be. The most common type of shower in hot springs and public baths are the sit down ones. In this case there will be a plastic seat with a hole in the middle to sit on while washing. It is pretty easy to get clean sitting down.
- Be prepared for a scary bathroom. I’ve been in a few places with nice bathrooms, but with the amount of water being dripped and people going in and out, the floor will be wet so don’t hesitate to utilize the lesser of two evils – by this I mean the multipurpose sandals that are probably there.
- If possible, use the bathroom in the reception area before and after… I say “if possible” because once you relax in the bath you may want to make a trip.
- Do I need to mention that you should use the bathroom instead of the shower, or, God forbid, the bath?
- Be sure to get all the soap off you before heading to the bath.
Part 3 – In the bathing area
- Don’t waste any energy worrying about being naked in public – enjoy the bath!
- Don’t jump in… (obvious?)
- Don’t bring your towel in with you, you can leave it on the ledge near by.
- Explore all the baths they have to offer – different places will have different types of baths, different temperatures, different types of additives or minerals… I’ve even been in ones with small electric currents. If you are lucky enough to go to a place like Osaka Spa World, you will have a full day’s worth of different types of baths, swimming pools, and even water slides to enjoy.
- Don’t dunk your head under the water. (Some people in Japan will definitely do this, but it’s not really good manners.)
- Don’t swim, although a little floating and moving is OK… as with much of Japanese culture – the trick is simple – don’t make waves.
- When think you’ve had enough, lay out on one of the chairs or somewhere near the bath… you might find yourself wanting to soak again. Also, though I don’t know much about this, I’ve heard it’s good for the skin to open and close the pores with hot and water.
- Try the cold bath as well. Though more invigorating than relaxing, a lot of folks enjoy mixing in a little of the cold bath with the hot spring when it’s available.
- Some places also have saunas that complement the cold and hot baths well.
Part 4 – Back in the locker room
- Some onsen hot springs and public baths have nice lounging areas in the locker rooms. After a hot relaxing bath, it’s a great place to play with a cell phone or relax while waiting for everyone to finish up.
- There will often be hair dryers and some simple toiletries in the locker room area to tidy up before heading out.
- People will be in various stages of undress here as well with people “air drying”, and others in business suits ready to go back to work.
- There are a lot of beverages to enjoy to replace any loss of hydration, often beer, green tea, water, or sports drinks hit the spot. I recommend milk. (I once stayed at a hot spring resort in Hokkaido and loved coming out of the bath to a nice cold bottle of fresh Hokkaido milk).
- There may be a little restaurant in the public bath serving soba, udon, ramen, curry and rice, or other Japanese cafeteria staples. Although you may come out of the bath hungry and relaxed… you can probably get better food at a family restaurant or might I recommend Coco Ichibanya Curry for something fast, hot, inexpensive, and delicious?
I hope this encourages visitors to Japan to go and take the plunge. Other things to know are that if you go to some resorts you can have a hot spring bath right in your room which is great. Some places also schedule times for people to have a bath to themselves.
A lot of times a public bath can be useful if staying at a campground which doesn’t have showers as well. The local public bath is the default option in these cases.
Have fun then, with this inexpensive and very Japanese experience!