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Istanbul, Turkey | Of private acts in public places
How anticipation and excitement quickly turn into mortification and embarrassment in a Turkish public bath
She pointed to a tiny cell with a wooden door, and handed me a red and white check towel and a key with a number tag.
I walked into the cell. It smelt of wet towels, and contained a narrow cot, plastic curtains and a palm-sized wall mirror. I slipped out of my denims, T-shirt and underwear, and placed them in a neat pile on the cot. With some trepidation, I put on my two-piece swimsuit. I wrapped the towel around myself like one wraps a dhoti, and tied my hair up in a bun. I took a deep breath, and steadied my nerves for my first entry into a public bath.
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The Turkish bath or the hamam has been an integral part of Turkish life since the 13th century. While the hamams owed their initial popularity to Islam’s strict emphasis on hygiene and purification, under the Ottomans they went from being just places of bathing to venues for socializing. Men and women alike flocked to hamams regularly, much like a modern-day café or bar, to meet friends and bump into acquaintances.
Today, the hamams have lost much of their social significance, but Istanbul residents do often drop by a hamam with a friend, and for a short while it feels like the old times once again.
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When I was on holiday with my husband in Istanbul, I had decided to sample this unique slice of Turkish life, even though a part of me squirmed at the thought of a stranger giving me a bath. After all, the last time I’d delegated the job, I was 4. The historic Sultanahmet neighbourhood, where our hotel was located, had a number of Turkish baths that catered to tourists. But with their hushed reception areas, elegant boutiques and vitamin bars, not to mention the apple-tea-sipping, glossy-magazine-flipping guests in silk robes, they seemed more like posh spas than public bathhouses.
However, I was determined on the real thing. I wondered sometimes if I could handle the accompanying grittiness but I decided to go for it—for I’d rather have an authentic experience than a sanitized one. My hotel’s concierge had recommended a routine of “first bath, then eat, then sleep”—and I couldn’t wait to begin.
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Gedikpasa Hamami is reasonably priced at 55 Turkish lira (around ₹ 1,700) for a bath, scrub and soap massage. For a more luxurious, almost decadent, experience one can opt for the Ayasofya Hürrem Sultan Hamam, steeply priced at 190 Turkish lira.
At the hamami I was led to the ladies’ section on the first floor and from there into the “hot” area—a huge marble bathroom with a raised hexagonal slab of marble about 2ft tall at its centre. Six women in various stages of their bath lay on their towels, atop the marble platform. Three of them were covered in soap lather, two were getting scrubbed, while one seemed to have just gotten started. Six attendants, ladies of various shapes and ages, with strong arms and dimpled thighs, loomed over them in their underwear. I flinched reflexively. This seemed too private an act to be conducted in so public a place. For a fleeting moment, I thought longingly of my hotel room’s shower.
Six other women leant against the chamber’s wall and sat beside the taps there, pouring water on themselves. Some bathers had on a pair of underpants, but most were completely naked, with only their towels thrown carelessly across their bodies. In the case of the women on the marble slab in the centre of the room, there was not even that—they were buck naked. I pulled my own towel, or pestemal as I learnt it was called, tighter around me. I didn’t care if I stood out in my swimsuit, the swimsuit would stay.
My attendant led me directly to the sauna. It was a wooden cabin lined with wooden benches on three sides. Two pairs of women sat, sweating and chatting freely. I stayed in the sauna for about 12 minutes—but that was all the heat and stuffiness I could take. I walked out quickly, red-faced and thirsty.
I was finally beginning to relax when it occurred to me that my attendant had used the same rough glove to scrub the woman before me, and probably all the women before her. Like an efficient conveyor belt, the customers pouring in were led from the warm areas of the bath to the cool area. The attendants didn’t seem to be taking a bathroom break, much less stopping to clean or replace their bathing equipment.
She began lathering me with an olive soap and napkin. Expertly she massaged my arms, kneaded my back, and pressed my calves, and even while the thought of how many times the napkin had been reused continued to linger in my head, I felt myself get drowsy and give in to the soporific rhythm of the massage. I felt that the easiest course of action was to yield to the inevitable.
Soon she had lathered and washed my hair, doused me with warm water and wrapped me in my pestemal—my bath was almost over. Now I was free to take a dip in the pool or another sauna, or simply lean against one of the walls and douse myself with more cool water and relax. The pool was tiny and looked murky, so I decided to give it a pass. An attendant led me to the “cool area” where women who had finished their baths were lounging on deckchair-like chairs, napping or sipping tea. As I lay on a chair listening to the buzz around me, I felt that what I really wanted right now was a good old shower followed by a big meal. In other words, “bath…eat and sleep!”
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First Published:11 Jan 2014, 12:50 AM IST
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