Drinking in the Bath

Cans - Curaçao - Cocktails

Some bad things have happened in baths.

Of course Agamemnon, returning quasi-victorious from his travails in far-off Troy, was brutally axed by his wife on taking his first bath at home. In the Kabuki play Kiwametsuki Banzui Chōbe, the titular hero is murdered in the bath house for daring to stand up to his feudal overlord. See also Whitney Houston.

But some of the best things that ever happened to me happened with almost-scalding water lapping around my clavicle and Adam’s apple.

About six months into my time in Japan I went on a trip with my the  love interest K. to the spring town at Beppu. We stayed in a lovely little lodge which had private open air baths bubbling up from the neighbourhood volcano and which you could book simply by hanging a wooden block over the handle of the sliding bathhouse door. In the little basket they gave you to carry your towels and so on, I hid a couple of cans of premium beer and K. and I went in to enjoy the heat of the water, the cold of the drinks and the twinkling, far-flung beauty of all the stars with different names. This was the first time I successfully navigated a conversation – a saccharine and lovelorn one – entirely in Japanese.

Last year, I took my parents on our first trip to the Caribbean. We stayed, rum-drenched and sunburnt, in a lovely resort on the windward side of Saint Lucia, where the adults-only part of the hotel was significantly less peaceful than the part with the kids for all of the American spring-breakers, with their tattoos, their baseball caps, and their inability to converse other than by shouting. But still: drinking silly blue drinks - and they really must be blue - and piñas colada with the Caribbean Sea conspiring to cause a spillage is a life affirming thing to do. Add to that that on Saint Lucia they have their own volcanic mudbaths and all of the same spin the Japanese have about the benefits of sulphur on the skin, and you find yourself a world away from dry reality in a Derek Walcott impressionist painting.

And so, drinking in the bath has become an important part of  (what it has become de rigueur to call) “self-care” for me. In the picture below, you will see my standard drinking-in-the–bath set up: a modest little table, suitable for picnics and the like, with a towel for face sweat and sodden hands. On it, you will find a suitably cold drink – in my case, the properly-made martini I proselytised all those months ago. Take off the shower head for fear of drips. Then some reading material: newspapers tend to get soggy, either from negligently dipped corners or the damp caused by condensation, but that may not be the end of the world given the quality of press you have available (only the TLS and crosswords merit the ink here I think). Otherwise, solid novels: but not so solid that the pages cannot be turned with one hand (the other ought to be pinching the stem of the glass). Have the window open. Observe the clouds passing if you can, or the stern lolling of the trees. Some may recommend incense or scented candles. Smoking does for others. For olfactory stimulation, I can think of nothing greater than the love of your life preparing food in the kitchen one window along from where the now tepid water laps around your throat.

I love drinking in the bath.