An onsen (温泉, literally "hot spring") is a natural hot-spring bath, and it is one of the great pleasures of Japanese life. The two kanji say it plainly: 温 means "warm," and 泉 means "spring." Japan sits on a chain of volcanoes, so it has thousands of hot springs. Around them, a whole culture of bathing, rest and quiet company has grown over the centuries.
Japanese law sets the rules for what counts as an onsen. The water must come out of the ground at 25°C or warmer, or it must contain certain minerals. That is what sets an onsen apart from a sentō, an ordinary public bath with heated tap water. The minerals give each spring its own character. Some springs run milky white with sulphur. Others run rusty red with iron, and others are clear and a little salty. Tradition says that different waters help the skin, the joints or the circulation. People have long visited hot springs to heal, and this kind of stay has its own name, tōji. Dōgo Onsen in the city of Matsuyama is among the oldest of all. It already appears in Japan's earliest chronicles and poems.
The etiquette
Getting the ritual right is part of the experience. Before you enter the bath, you wash and rinse well at small washing stations. That keeps the shared water clean. You step in already clean, just to soak. Everyone bathes naked. You keep a small towel for modesty, but it stays out of the water, often folded on your head. The bath is for quiet soaking, not for swimming. Most onsen have separate baths for men and women, though some country springs still let everyone bathe together. One practical warning for visitors: many baths still turn away guests with tattoos. In Japan, people have long linked tattoos with organised crime. Still, more and more springs now welcome tattoos, and many places offer private baths that you can book by the hour.
“Soaking is for stillness, not splashing.”
Where to go
The best-loved kind of bath is the rotenburo (露天風呂), an open-air bath. You sit in steaming water under the sky, above a river or a valley, or in falling snow. Hakone, close to Tokyo and Mount Fuji, is the classic escape. In Beppu on the island of Kyūshū, steam rises from the ground everywhere. Its scalding, brightly coloured ponds are a tourist route called the "seven hells" (jigoku). Kusatsu has some of the strongest sulphur water in Japan. The wooden streets of Ginzan Onsen, lit by lanterns, look like a film set from a century ago. Next to the springs stand ryokan (旅館), traditional inns. There you change into a cotton yukata, soak before and after dinner, sleep on a futon on tatami and eat a long seasonal meal of local food.
Words & idioms to take away
Idioms & proverbs to carry away
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裸の付き合い (hadaka no tsukiai): "naked friendship," the frank, open closeness between people who have bathed together with nothing to hide.
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湯 (yu): "hot water." A single hiragana ゆ on a blue noren curtain is the universal sign of a bathhouse.
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湯治 (tōji): a stay at a hot spring for the sake of healing.