In Japan, there are places with no equivalent in France: Sentô, the Japanese public baths, urban and popular places for cleaning, relaxation, and social bonding. My story with those special places began in 2018, when I first came to Japan as an exchange student. I was twenty years old, and didn’t even know such places existed.

One day, while walking home after my classes, I saw one of my classmates standing in the street, waiting by himself in front of a strange building, on which it was written Heian-yu. I asked him: « what are you doing here ? », and he told me « I’m waiting for our teacher to go to the bath ». I was surprised: teacher ? Bathing ?
What was he talking about ? He invited me to join him, and five minutes after, I was completely naked in a very cold bath with him, and the teacher I just had class with two hours ago. This was unthinkable for a French student to bath with his teacher ! In France, we come from a Christian heritage, which means we have a very different approach to being naked in front of each other. It’s embarrassing for us to see our relatives naked, and even more strangers. Of course, we don’t bath together, we don’t even bath that much — except for babies — instead, we shower alone. That’s why sentô was a great discovery for me, so to say, it was my way to enter the great bath of the Japanese society.

With this friend, we quickly started to go 3-4 times a week to the public bathes. He didn’t speak English, and I didn’t speak Japanese, but we communicated though sharing these special moments. I later discovered that there is a word in Japanese for that: « hadaka no tsukiai », or skinship. Usually, we would meet up around 7pm, ride his motorcycle, go try a different sentô every time, and then share a late night coffee or a ramen.
For the young student I was, these moments were full of freedom.

My friends Teru and Chiko, working a part time Job at Umeyu in 2018.

This friend was working a baito — a part-time job — at a newly reopened public bath in downtown Kyoto, called Umeyu. He introduced me to the young owner, Sanjiro Minato, who asked me: « hey, do you want to draw a bath towel for my sentô ? » Of course I wanted to. This is where everything began…