Cathedrals of the Flesh (25 page)

After a glorious bath and gluttonous dinner, I felt so contented being out of a city, so relaxed from all the pampering -
having learned firsthand about the typical Japanese vacation of total sensory gratification — I couldn't help but wonder about
Kristy's very different evening back on the mainland. She didn't seem overly enthusiastic about my visiting her at Sweet Spot,
but she was so kind, staying on the quay, worrying about me getting ripped off. So I speculated that between her concern and
her hesitation to see me go, she might not be altogether upset if I showed up to watch her dance.

I went back to my room and took off my yukata, dressed in a knee-length black skirt and purple shirt, and left looking rather
smart. I caught the Scooby-Doo water bus back to the mainland, through the bay of rocks like ossified pterodactyls, and found
my way to Sweet Spot. The small, dark club was completely empty at 9:00, save for the bartender, manager, and the ten bored
dancers. A disco ball hung over the black vinyl booths, and pink lights bathed the long stage. Kristy teetered over in four-inch
white heels, flushed and excited to see me. She had traded her tank top and sweats for a lacy turquoise bustier and a micromini
black-and-white-checkered skirt. Her eyes were shadowed in blue, and her lips were lined in red but not filled in. She welcomed
me like a hostess at a fancy dinner party.

'You are a bombshell,' I said.

'A bombshell?' she questioned, looking alarmed at the mention of bombs.

'A knockout. You look gorgeous, like Marlene Dietrich,' I said, momentarily forgetting that Dietrich was German, not Ronlanian.

'Oh, thank you very much,' she said, looking pleased. 'Come, I want to introduce you to my friend.' It turned out Kristy had
a Romanian friend, Ava, who was also living and dancing in Kii-Katsuura. The three of us sat down. I was shocked when the
manager, a pathetic twenty-two-year-old sociopath, wanted to charge me the normal 6,000-yen entrance fee. Kristy, the fast
talker, ironed that over: it was decided that I just had to pay for what I drank and not the exorbitant entrance and hourly
fee.

For the first hour they had no customers, so we drank Sapporo and discussed the bleakness of their lives in this tiny fishing
and onsen outpost. Kristy and Ava complained that everyone wanted the Filipino girls because they look like Japanese girls
and were therefore less intimidating. Ava, the softer, more melancholy of the two, confided, 'Every time I go out there, I
am nervous and shy. I will never get used to it. This is not a good life.' Later we talked about their life in Romania - about
Kristy's five-year-old daughter, Ava's boyfriend, and her career as an aerobics teacher in Bucharest.

Suddenly I heard a little electronic ditty. All the girls jumped, and thirty seconds later a group of customers walked through
the door. Girl time was over. The manager asked the new arrivals, 'Philippine, Russian, or Romanian?' A smorgasbord of imported
international beauties - though none of the girls, with the exception of Kristy and Ava, were beautiful at all.

Two more entourages of testosterone arrived, and the chosen girls delivered drinks and joked around in Japanese. The most
amazing thing to me about this whole bizarre scene was the fluency these women had in Japanese after just a couple of months.
Then, suddenly, it was showtime. The lights dimmed and the disco ball began spinning in the blue haze of the smoke-filled
club. I sat back, ready for anything. First, one of the Filipino girls emerged from behind the curtain and performed a karaoke
version of'The Greatest Love of AIL' She walked around the room in a black ball gown, staring into different customers' eyes,
even mine, during her solo. I felt as if I were watching
Star Search
and hoping the judges would vote for her. Things heated up slightly when the four Russian girls came out - two in shiny red
vinyl bondage suits and the other two in black gimp suits.

After the Russian S&M romp, the Philippine Quintet sauntered out in pink baby doll outfits and did a cutesy — I'd go so far
as to say innocent — dance to an instrumental version of 'Mambo #5,' another song best forgotten. I sat in the back, watching
the bartender holding the spotlight in her hands, and thought, This is pretty tame.

Finally, Kristy and Ava strutted out in denim shorts and tight denim jackets. After a couple of exotic pirouettes, they pressed
up against the back wall and ripped off the jackets and shorts. They were naked except for pink g-strings. A huge applause
rose from the audience. They gripped the silver pole in the middle of the stage while enacting male fantasies of lesbian sex.
Kristy groped Ava's breasts while Ava did her best to appear turned-on. I thought back to our earlier conversation when I'd
stupidly asked where they had learned to dance and Ava had rolled her eyes and said, 'It comes from within.' After their dance,
they shimmied around the room collecting 1,000-yen notes in their g-strings. Any protectiveness I had felt disappeared when
I saw how much loot they were collecting. This must have been be why the Russian girls hated them.

The audience was pretty worked up after Kristy and Ava's lesbian tryst. For a finale, all the girls, the whole United Nations
of exotic dancers, convened onstage for a good-bye dance and bows. Then they headed off to individual tables for more personalized
entertainment. It was late, and the last water bus was about to leave for Urashima. Kristy ran over to say good-bye. I handed
back the picture of her daughter dressed as a cat and reminded her that we'd meet at 1:00 in front of my hotel for a trip
to the hot springs. 'You will be my guests.'

'Yes, yes, we look forward to it,' she said, rushing back to her guests.

They didn't come on the 1:00 boat, nor did they come on the 1:30 boat. I was sad that they had stood me up and also surprised
that in what sounded like a routine life, with not even a movie theater for distraction, they didn't want to see the Urashima.
Feeling rejected by my new friends, I hopped on an escalator to explore new parts of the onsen island. One escalator turned
into six escalators, until I realized I was ascending the side of a mountain, at least a thousand feet straight up through
a corridor of mirrors and chintzy casino decor. At the top, instead of the aesthetically anticipated roulette tables and slot
machines, a glass door led outside to a Shinto temple precinct. The long, narrow precipice gazed down upon the placid bay
of Kii-Katsuura on one side and the crashing waves of the Pacific on the other. Orange torii gates announced several open-air
dark-wooded shrines and, on the left, on the Kii-Katsuura side, a greenhouse.

A greenhouse? Could this be the famed jungle bath? Not speaking or reading Japanese, I tended to miss a lot. Whatever it was,
it seemed out of place amid the temple architecture. I slid open the glass screen door and walked into the steamed-up greenhouse.
To my right was a door leading outside to two small pools, rectangular boxes of cypress overlooking the bay. They were delightfully
situated, but nothing I hadn't seen before. I was becoming an onsen snob.

Inside, though, I hardly knew where to look through the mass of foliage. The high-beamed structure was a labyrinth of ferns
and flowers, palms and hydrangeas. The leaves were changing outside, but in here it was a beautiful day in Tahiti. Then I
noticed that this wasn't just a greenhouse, but that slate-carved soaking pools were hidden in every leafy nook of this overgrown
jungle. Small groups of women went from pool to pool, each hidden in an alcove of foliage and blossoms, extolling and comparing
the virtues of each. This must have been why the temple precinct was deserted. Everyone was bathing.

Just as I was removing my yukata, I heard my name being paged. 'Miss Alexia. Miss Alexia. Please come reception.' A phone
call? Unlikely. Was the karaoke master demanding an encore of my rendition of'It's Still Rock and Roll to Me'? Very unlikely.
Or had Kristy and Ava shown up? I raced down the escalators to reception. And there they were, with thinly veiled scowls,
dressed for a day at the beach. Kristy wore a neon green swimsuit with white drawstring pants. Ava was more tasteful in a
tank top and khaki shorts. They had been waiting for over an hour.

'Oh, I'm so sorry. When you weren't here by one-thirty I figured you weren't coming.'

'We get to bed late, so we sleep until one.'

Everything would be fine as soon as they were relaxing in the baths. 'I can't wait to show you this place. I just peeked into
the jungle bath. It looks divine, so let's save it for last. First let's go to the
genfuro,
a bath inside a grotto.'

'Okay,' they said blankly. They looked hungover.

'Late night?'

'Yes, one group stayed until three and we had to drink so much beer with them. We are gaining weight,' Ava said sadly.

'Well, you looked great onstage. Your routine was miles better than the other girls,' I said like a supportive stage mom.
'And the onsen water purges your body of all the toxins from alcohol and cigarettes. Some people think it even helps you lose
weight.'

This was the first thing I said that aroused their interest. On the way to the
genfuro,
a small jewelry store selling gold bracelets caught their eye and they wanted to browse.

'What do you do with all the money you've made?' I asked. 'Send it home or put it in the bank?'

'I either lock it in my room or keep it with me,' said Kristy. That didn't sound like the most secure arrangement, considering
there was an icy detente between the Russian and Romanian girls after frequent fights over shower privileges.

When we entered the grotto I couldn't stop myself from shouting, 'Isn't this insane! The Forget-to-Go-Home-Bath; a shogun
was so entranced with this cave bath that he forgot to return to battle.' I flailed around like a delirious tour guide, and
they looked through the glass wall into the natural cave grotto with mild interest. I began to take off my yukata.

Kristy asked, 'You go in the pool
naked?

'Yes, of course. The men are on the other side. First you take a shower along that wall, then you soak in the baths. And the
water, it's very good for your skin and your joints, and it will make you lose weight,' I added, again holding out the carrot.

'Pew. It stinks in here,' Kristy said, and scrunched up her nose.

'It's the sulfur. You get used to it after a while.'

While I was busy washing, Kristy and Ava tentatively stripped to their bathing suits and joined me in the cave. They washed
with their swimsuits still on. In a minute, they would see that all the other women were naked and that it was perfectly normal
to soak without a suit.

I set the example and got into the big pool.

'Will I smell like rotten eggs if I get in?' asked Kristy.

'Of course not,' I answered. 'Well, not for long.'

Ava, the more intrepid one, the one who actually ate Japanese food whereas Kristy subsisted on frozen chicken nuggets and
fries, joined me in the pool, albeit with her orange neon swimsuit still on. Kristy pouted by the steps of the pool.

At this point, I realized that Kristy and Ava had no intention of taking off their swimsuits. It would be a triumph if I managed
to get Kristy in the water at all. They had no problem strutting around in g-strings, rubbing their crotches against silver
poles, or squeezing each other's breasts onstage, but soaking in a pool of naked women was more than they could handle.

Kristy went back to the dressing room, weighed herself, and informed us that she had risen to sixty kilograms. 'Really, Kristy,
the minerals in the water break down the fat.' Whatever it took, I was determined that she try the bath. Ava reassured her
that the water wasn't toxic, and finally Kristy descended into the pool, giving us a wan smile. We applauded.

They didn't want to stay in the water for long. I didn't lecture them on skinship or try to convince them to ascend with me
to the botanic jungle bath. Maybe in retrospect Kristy and Ava will remember the experience fondly, maybe even as they wait
their turn to dance they'll think back to our bath today and wish they'd taken off their swimsuits.

After seeing them off, I stepped straight onto the jungle bath-bound escalator. I reentered the greenhouse and removed my
yukata and geta, my
ryokan
outfit that I now wore as comfortably as sweats. The only sound of water, the gush and bubble of a modest waterfall, came
from the back of the greenhouse where the water poured down from stone-hewn shower spigots. I walked past the other bathers
to examine this strangely monolithic structure. Huge square blocks of stone stuck out of the wall at six feet, and a steady
stream of warm water flowed out of the stones and into the long rectangular tub below.

After a thorough scrub, I began to bounce from pool to pool. In the long rectangular pool I lay down, positioning myself under
the spigots so that water bounced on my feet, back, and head at the same time. Free reflexology. I don't know how long I stayed
like this. Idly, I cupped some water in my palms. The water had tiny particles of black, organic minerals. I remembered what
Ayako had said back in Tokyo about how you could see organic matter in the best onsen water.

I felt better than I had at any point along the trip. Everything was coming together — the perfect setting, a clear state
of mind, a readiness to drink in my surroundings. My mind was quiet: no interior criticism, no nagging guilt, nothing but
the pure physical sensations of this place. Every sense had been elevated to an almost surreal heightened awareness. I could
smell the chlorophyll in the leaves, the iron reddening the water, I could even smell the rocks, as if they were freshly quarried.
The sound of the bouncing water and the low reverberation of voices echoing off the rafters sounded pleasantly tinny.

I was alone, and so happily alone. I promised myself that my days of guilt seeking were over. I would trade in guilt seeking
for thrill seeking; I would stockpile rosebuds instead of apologies. Life would be different.