THE JAPANESE WAY

It’s when you live as the locals do in their country that you return home a little freer and lighter, says Saumya Ancheri

- Saumya Ancheri

Our bodies are veiled by steam rising from the deliciously scalding pool of a cave onsen (hot spring) in the volcanic caldera of Mount Aso. My guide Junko and I share the mellow quiet of “hadaka no tsukiai” (naked communion) with other bathers in this women’s onsen.

Perhaps it’s the deeply absorbing sensory experience of warmly baking in the earth’s fiery grasp. Perhaps it’s the rituals that envelop this traditional strip and dip—only a face towel is permitted in the onsen to partially shield yourself until you get into the waters, when the cloth is folded and placed on your head. We may be strangers, but in that pool, it just feels like we have stripped down to the essential experience of being human.

It’s been so quiet and meditative since I landed in Kyushu island, the southwesternmost of Japan’s four main islands, that I just want to sit back and take it all in. Every day, we drive through rusty red and deep green forests of cypress, cedar and pine. When we return to our ryokan, I can’t go to bed just yet. I slip into the open-air hotel onsen until I am the only person steeping in the mineral-rich waters under a full moon.