Having to say 'yes'

“This is your room. The water is hot from 8 to 11:30 pm,” she said. I was standing on a bamboo carpet, past a small paper-and-wooden door. I could see six almost cosy tatamis on the floor, a thin navy-brown wooden table for tea in the right corner and a couple of green kimonos in hangers. A heater rests silently on my far left. That’s what we were sharing, a heater. I ask for the bathroom, the lady takes me to the hallway and shows me a door. I go in. A public bathroom. Six showers one after the other, a reasonably-sized blue jacuzzi in the middle. The walls were covered with light-blue and pink mosaicos and simple duck images. The toilets were in cabins. At least.
Simple. I was not taking any showers for the next six days. But I am what I am, Brazilian. Used to taking two showers a day. Who was I fooling? By the time I returned from that day in Tokyo, I was willing to take a shower. Even if it was to be public. Naked. Very naked in front of a handful of Japanese women. I gathered all my shower gadgets, went to the public bathing room and got undressed. The lady from earlier that day was preparing to shower too. She felt the obvious need to teach me how to “Japanese shower.” She mimed that I should clean myself in the shower, go to the jacuzzi and then clean myself again. She got in the room, sat down and started to clean herself. She would not even notice that I was there. She concentrated, oblivious to her surroundings. She cleaned herself very slowly. I usually shower fast. She showered like the world had stopped for her to do so.
How could she stand that purple jacuzzi, I wondered? Boiling, that’s what it was. It felt like my skin was about to peel off. My body finally acclimated. How did I end up in this public shower? I hear the silence. The silence mixed with water dropping on the floor, water dropping back in the jacuzzi. And the women appear to be in a kind of “nirvana” state of mind. Their minds are calm and slow. A contrast to my mind. My mind is fast, analytical, impressed, out of its comfort zone. Because my mind is very naked.
But this can’t go on. So I try to imitate their ceremony. Or, I try to imitate what I think they are doing. I clear my mind, I think of the water, of the silence. And for a split of a second, I am a common Japanese. I feel free, relaxed, warm, calm. I’m living in peace. This peace reminds me that the 7-eleven meat buns upstairs await. I take the towel, take a final glimpse at my shower-mates and leave.