Category: JapaneseCulture

Ofuro or furo (traditional Japanese bath) is a really deep seated tradition in Japan that has carried on until today. The Japanese routine entails showering at night right before going to bed. After a shower, Japanese people get into a bathtub full of really hot water (approximately 45 ºC / 110 ºF) for a few minutes. They say it’s a very healthy habit to take a bath in such hot water right before bed.

First you have to scrub while sitting on a plastic stool. You don’t use a sponge for scrubbing, but some sort of special “rag”. In order to rinse, you pour water in some sort of vat and then pour it on yourself using some kind of bowl.

Bowls

After scrubbing yourself clean, you can get into the bathtub (ofuro) to relax.

It reminds me a lot of Ranma

If you travel to Japan and want to enjoy this experience, look for public baths (sento). They are a very common sight in Japan and some of them are very well equipped with ofuro, jacuzzi, sauna, gym, a video room, a cybercafé… all in the same premises. Apparently there are also mixed-sex sento, but those are more complicated to find.

Pachinko are the quintessential Japanese slot machines. They are machines with small marble-like balls that you have to throw and depending on where they land, you receive money or not. On most playing modes, the only thing you can control is the speed at which you throw the balls, so it’s quite a “stupid” game.

Japan is full of pachinko arcades where Japanese people have tons of fun gambling. Those arcades are usually crowded, the noise of the falling balls is deafening, and they blast the music up to encourage people to keep playing. If you ever want to experience pachinko, the way to do it is buying balls at the entrance and then proceeding to sit down at the machine you like best. If you’re lucky, you might leave richer than you came in. Legend has it that professionals devote themselves to study the probability of winning with each machine at a certain arcade; but then it is said that the parameters of every machine are changed from time to time so people can’t cheat…

Pachinko machines

Building full of pachinko machines

Bruce Lee said: “Be water my friend”, last weekend Garr Reynolds in his talk at TEDxTokyo said: “Be bamboo my friend”. In that sentence, Garr sums up several lessons Japanese people has taught him using bamboo as a metaphor: what looks weak is strong, you do not have to be big to be strong, bend yourself but don’t break yourself, you have to be deeply rooted yet flexible, slow down your busy mind, you have to be always ready, find wisdom in emptiness, commit yourself to growth and renewal (even a 20 meter bamboo cane can grow one meter more), express your usefulness through simplicity, unleash your power to spring back, if you fall 7 times stand up 8 times. Making it short: be flexible, tough, adaptable and able to recover with even more strength, like bamboo.

Every morning, on my way to work I pass by a place with bamboo canes, from now on every time I pass by there I will remember Garr’s words:

Here you have the complete fabulous talk by Garr:

“Be bamboo my friend”