柳原美咲

Misaki Yanagihara

As a child, I often visited the open-air baths at the hot spring resort my family frequented. People who had only just met would chat as if they were old friends. Finding this slightly strange, even I, a mere kindergarten pupil, was drawn in and greeted them cheerfully. It was a pleasantly tranquil time.

Ten years have passed since I began working as a photographer in Tokyo. Amidst the dizzying pace of daily life, escaping occasionally for solo trips became my respite. It was during this time that someone suggested I visit a hot spring resort. Hot springs had been familiar since childhood. I found no reason not to go. Hot spring towns, communal bathhouses, therapeutic hot spring resorts, abandoned springs, wild mountain baths... The more I visited, the more I discovered the depth of these places, leading me to travel with my camera to hot springs all over Japan.

In 2020, the pandemic reached the hot spring towns too. People vanished from the streets; laughter disappeared from the bathhouses.
People grew suspicious of those before them, refusing to mingle. Witnessing bathhouses closing and the world fragmenting was more heart-wrenching than I could have imagined. I visited a hot spring inn through an acquaintance's introduction. ‘Welcome! Thank you for coming all this way.’ Hearing those words, which I'd once taken for granted, nearly brought tears to my eyes. I soaked to my heart's content in a bath too large for one person. Returning to the lobby, I found the owners chatting.

‘Instead of alcohol, we should just spray this hot spring water!’
‘It makes your hands smooth too, so kill two birds with one stone’.
Seeing them speak so earnestly made me chuckle. That's right, hot spring resorts – bathhouses – have always offered this humour and these moments of peace, haven't they?