happylife

Public baths in Beppu

I'm now in Beppu, one of the happiest cities in Japan. The reason for its happiness is clear; it has a great gift from the Earth, hot springs. We can see quite a few hot springs in and around the city and we can enjoy public baths deployed as many as Starbucks in Vancouver for the lower price than a cup of coffee. I arrived at this city the day before yesterday and I have enjoyed bathing more than ten times in two days. It's a little bit tough but extremely relaxing. I heard that they had wanted to send one of their daughters to this city as bribes because they can often visit to enjoy its hot springs. This picture is one of the most traditional public baths. It might look dirty, but it is actually clean. The reddish color on the surface of the wall and the bathtub is stain created from the iron content of hot springs. A lot of people including me had a happy time bathing in and around the bathtub. Anyway, before taking this picture, I asked permission for the people in the bathroom and they comfortably allowed me.

Snow in Tokyo

We had snow today. It was rather a heavy snowfall in Tokyo and all the streets were covered with the damp, white snow about three centimeters in thickness. I like to find that the view from the window has totally changed into the white world during a night, but I missed the wonderful experience this morning because I had known about the snow in my bed before looking out of the window; the small icon on my cellphone display had let me know about weather before I actually got up. Convenience sometimes interferes with a mood. It kept snowing almost all day long, but it has changed into a cold rain by night and the white world has almost vanished. It will be very cold Monday morning because of the melting snow. I am happy as I don't have to get up early to go to work.