The Gaijin Monogatari (Foreigner Stories) -- (Author) ieyasu

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Author: ieyasu
Timestamp: Jan 19, 2019 at 2:42 AM
Content: Introduction

Thirty years ago today I started learning Japanese. Technically speaking it was thirty years ago yesterday but thanks to the international date line it still is yesterday over in the United States of America. As can be surmised by the submission date (if you’re in the right time zone), I started studying Japanese on the 18th of January in the final year of the eighties. (I’ll save the story of why I studied Japanese for another time but suffice it to say that that decision had a profound impact on my life.) A couple of months after starting to learn Japanese I flew and lived in Japan for nearly two years. At the time that I returned home I thought that I would never have the opportunity to return to Japan again. I was ever so wrong!

I resumed my studies at the local university right away and a few months later I met the woman of my dreams. She was a Japanese exchange student and absolutely stunning. I’m still not certain how she ever fell for someone like me but fortunately she did. It’s been more than a quarter of a century since we were married but she is still the love of my life! Over that time our household has grown and shrunk as only one of our four is still at home.

My first trip back to Japan was to ask my soon to be father-in-law permission to marry his daughter. That was an interesting experience but it will also have to wait. After marrying, I completed my degree in computer science and started working as a software engineer in the automation industry. That and my current job have provided countless opportunities to travel to Japan both for business and pleasure where I’ve traveled over most of Japan and have learned quite a bit about its history and culture. Enough so, that many of my peers call me “haafu” (the Japanese pronunciation of half which typically describes someone of half Japanese descent) because while I’m Caucasian I act Japanese.

I am currently on a business trip to northern Japan and have been to this factory many times over the past eighteen months. All of the early trips I stayed at western style hotels but this time I staying at a “ryoukan” (Japanese style hotel) that has an “onsen” (natural hot springs). Perhaps one day I’ll describe the differences between the styles of accommodations but for the purposes of this story it is sufficient to state that this particular ryoukan is a nice resort which has several onsen “ofuro” (bath – officially “furo” mean bath but prefixing it with o makes it honorific). Each onsen ofuro is dedicated for either male or female use at a given time.

Yesterday, I finished work early and returned to the ryoukan in late afternoon. I had been in two of the three ofuro rooms. Unlike the other two which were permanently dedicated to males the third one alternates between male and female and this was my first chance to use it. I returned to my room and changed into the resort provided yukata (cotton equivalent of a silk kimono). I then prepared my wash towel, bath towel and a small bag which contained a printed diaper and plastic pants to change into after the bath. At the “genkan” (entryway) of my room, I stepped into a pair of indoor sandals and after locking the door headed to the third ofuro.

The ryoukan has been around for over a hundred years and the original ofuro were in the basement next to the river. The one on the left is permanently dedicated to females but my destination was the alternating one on the right. I removed the sandals at the genkan and continued into the changing room where I placed the bag in a basket on the shelf (typical arrangement for an onsen). The changing room was empty so I didn’t have to worry about anyone staring (that too is another story which will have) but between the noise in the next room and the fact that several of the baskets were filled I knew that the actual ofuro was occupied. I proceeded to remove all of my clothes. I made certain that the clothes covered the bag so that the other guests would not see my preferred evening undergarments when the left.

I opened the sliding door and entered the room with the ofuro. It turns out that this room had two ofuro and one was occupied by three or four twenty something Japanese males. Either I scared them off or more likely they were done because they proceeded to leave as soon as I entered leaving the room to myself.

In Japan, you bathe or at least rinse before entering the ofuro. The character that Tom Selleck played in the movie “Mr. Baseball” found this out the hard way. Unlike the movie, this was not modern at all. In fact, this was very traditional. It had a rectangular wooden sink that was constantly, slowly filled with“oyu” (hot water) via a hollow “take” (bamboo) pipe. Guests should dip a “hinoki” (Japanese wooden bucket where a board or two sticks up and is carved into a handle) into the wooden sink to fill it with oyu and pour it over themselves ensuring that dirt, grime and oil does not get into the ofuro. I did that several times and then entered one of the tubs. These tubs were small for an onsen – only about the size of a five or six person hot tub. I relaxed in the first tub for a while and tested out the other one as well.

I liked the traditional aspect of the hinoki, wooden sink, and take pipes but rest of the room was not nearly as nice as the other two ofuro rooms within the hotel so I was just about to climb out of the ofuro, change and head off to one of the other facilities when I heard “Gomen kudasai” (please excuse me for bothering you) in a female voice…