Who makes bathtub water dirty?

Dear editor,

Sonia Reid Strawn wrote in her letter to the editor of The Korea Times on Oct. 19 that “Korea surely can do better toward the day when the presence of a foreigner at a sauna is no longer seen as making ‘water in a bathtub dirty.’”

I’m not condoning the Busan bathhouse owner’s denial of an Uzbek-Korean’s entrance to her sauna house because the willing bather had a different skin color. But please hear this:

Pohang City in North Gyeongsang Province has a nice beach where the U.S. and Korean forces conduct landing exercise every year. A large number of U.S. soldiers are mobilized and they stay in a cantonment mostly made of tents, no showers.

Years ago, I was in a bathtub of Pohang among other Korean male bathers enjoying the warmth of spa effects when two naked handsome young soldiers, with crew cuts, long legs, joyfully stepped into the fogged bathroom, holding a towel and soap each.

From top to toe one was white and the other was black. I’ve never seen such a beautifully contrasting sight of naked men. They knew how to adjust shower valves, took shower using their own soap, not touching the soaps complimentarily provided by the bathhouse.

Subtly using the corners of eyes, the native bathers in the tub were curiously anticipating for the two different skinned foreigners to join them. The soldiers carefully walked over to the rim of the large tub, suspiciously scanned the surface of smoking water. “Come on in, it’s not that hot,” I uttered unsolicited advice.

“Thank you, sir. But afraid we can’t,” answered the first one. “We’re told not to dip in the water, but only shower.” He was discreet enough not to say the water seems really dirty as was told. The local bathers murmured, “So they don’t want to bath with us and they didn’t even touch our soap,” and they all grinned.

Why don’t you visit to a bathhouse in Pohang when a joint military exercise is underway, you’d know who makes the water in a Pohang bathtub dirty.

Nam Sang-so

Seoul

sangsonam@gmail.com