National standard for Japanese baths (8 photos)

This is a long-standing problem in the country, one they can't seem to agree on. Every city and prefecture has mixed-gender baths where a mother can bring her son. However, the rules for entering these baths... are sometimes alarmingly different.





Public baths are normal



I don't like going to bathhouses with children because they sometimes pee in them.

The tradition of going to bathhouses and hot springs with children and parents is normal; in many countries, for example, only mothers take children of either gender. In Japan, many centuries ago, it was common for people of all ages to bathe together. This practice is called konyoku. Until the early 20th century, most homes didn't have private bathrooms. Therefore, visiting public baths, known in Japanese as sento, was common. Everyone simply bathed together.





A 16th-century drawing of women bathing with a child

But after World War II, the practice of bathing together became taboo. Public baths with separate sections, separated by gender, were built. The question arose: what to do with small children?! Up to what age can they go with a parent of the opposite sex? At the same time, due to the ban, many people simply began washing at home and gave up going to bathhouses, fortunately for home bathrooms and showers.



A mother with two boys in front of a public bathhouse

This was a very difficult time for public baths. But the whole nation still loves hot springs, although they have also been segregated by gender, with their own rules for children. It's easier for families; they often rent separate baths on site. However, age restrictions for shared bathing vary across Japan.



Japanese jokes about this never run out.

Recently, the Japanese Ministry of Health compiled statistics on where and how they allow access, and it turned out that in some places, boys are allowed into women's baths not even by age, but by height! That's where the dwarfs triumph. The lowest age limit for a mother to take her son with her is 7 years old. But in Tochigi, Iwate, Yamagata, and Gifu prefectures, the highest age limit is 12 years and up. 12 years old! Of course, the poor teenagers themselves are ashamed to do this, but some mothers force them. Now that's some serious childhood trauma!



Public bathhouses don't have individual shower stalls.

Some prefectures have incredibly vague rules. For example, in the city of Ureshino, they ask that mothers of boys who LOOK like elementary school students not enter. What kind of measurement is this – just by eye? And in the city of Kitakyushu, Fukuoka Prefecture, they introduced a height limit two years ago. And you know how tall you can't be with your mother? 120 centimeters! And this is considering that Japanese people themselves are rarely two meters tall, meaning a boy of that height is no longer small. The administration came up with this idea after residents complained about a large (but small for his age) boy in the bathhouse. But once it's fixed, it's fixed!



Bathrooms offer family bath rentals, which is more expensive, but no one will measure your boy.

And in the city of Utsunomiya, Tochigi Prefecture, it's even worse. The rule there states: "Children under 130 centimeters tall are allowed to take mixed baths in spas." The Ministry of Health conducted a survey of 1,500 boys and girls aged 7 to 12 years old from all regions of Japan. The results showed that the most common age at which children begin to feel "embarrassed" about visiting a bathhouse of the opposite sex without a bathing suit is 6 years old (27%). And only 4% of respondents said 10 years old. At 12, this question already seems ridiculous.



But there's also a good thing about public baths: they teach you not to be ashamed of your own body or that of others; it's just a body, after all.

They'll probably eventually introduce a National Gold Standard for boys' access to women's baths, to prevent the administration from being foolish.