Bathrooms & Basins

Me in front of my new front door. Elation doesn't cover it.

So yesterday was hilarious. I was planning on doing absolutely nothing after the excitement and exhaustion of the day before (when I bought a house for the first time in my life), but then I started to panic. Renovations! Painting! Floors!

My completely awesome House-Hunting Team: Sandro (left) and Ako (right).

Top of my list was having a bathtub. When Sandro and I were checking property after property, one of the things we were checking for was whether there was enough space to install a bathtub. Not a big one. A Japanese student style one. And when we checked the bathroom of the house I ended up buying, I thought (if thinking is the correct term for this level of stupidity): if I swap the toilet with the basin, I can fit a bath in there.

Well it sounded like a good idea...

Yeah… No. 

So today I took the Angel of our Building, Mr Kago, who lives next door to me, over to meet the Angel of my Courtyard (also my next door neighbour), Mr Mamuka. Love them both. Such bloody legends. 

My wonderful new next-door neighbour, Mamuka, who actually built my house,
and his homemade Georgian sauces which he gave me when I first met him. 

Lots of shouting ensued because 1) the toilet can’t be moved because it backs directly onto Mamuka’s bathroom on the other side of the wall and 2) once I’d explained to Mr Kago several times that while, yes, any normal person would be happy to stand up and shower and the bathroom worked perfectly for that purpose, I am not normal in that regard. I MUST have a bathtub. 

Mamuka and Kago in my kitchen.  

So dear Mr Kago went into overdrive. And if that meant moving a non-loadbearing wall 40 cm out and getting rid of a kitchen cupboard and moving a whole lot of other cupboards over, then he was going to make it happen. 

I took Mr Kago out to dinner after we left. I will miss him.

If that sounds complex, you don’t understand the half of it. Kago was measuring, I was measuring. We were drawing basins and baths and toilets in the air. Chaos. 

So at this point I’m starting to think, fuck, maybe I CAN’T have a bath. Very, very mutinous thoughts began to arise. 

And then I remember that I’ve actually seen portable, inflatable Japanese baths online. 

Admittedly, I have a bit of history here. Back in 2010, I was missing having a bath so much that John Craig sent me (at my request) a blow-up toddlers pool from Qatar. This photo from 2010 attests to the utter failure of this idea… 

Me in my blow-up kiddies' pool in Qatar. Yeah, just that bit too big.

And then in Malaysia, because there wasn’t enough hot water to fill the bath, I bought 3 automatic boilers (used for tea or coffee) to fill the bath. You can see them in this photo of my Malaysian bedroom – just behind the bed. The handles are sticking up. 

My bedroom in Malaysia.  You can see the handles of the 3 massive tea kettles set to boil between my bed and the bathroom.   

However, apparently, since those ad hoc solutions of the past, ice baths have become popular. 

 Now, I can’t imagine why ANYONE would want to have an ice cold bath. It seems akin to Russians jumping into a heap of snow after getting out of a sauna. Masochistic bullshit, in other words. 

But as it happens, I don’t care. The upshot of this new fad is that portable bath technology has improved enormously - thank god because the inflatable ones tended to leak, overflow and collapse causing a tsunami of water in the bathroom (and mine, as you have probably worked out, is tiny). 

There are now FOLDABLE tubs that are meant to fit in the shower stall and are much easier to disassemble, and store. Woo hooooooo! 

Better yet, although they may be intended as ice-baths, looking through the reviews I realized I had found my people after reading comments like this:     

          

        “This tub has made me so happy! You can actually sink into hot water. It comes with a little pillow too, like one you would blow up, except you actually fill it with warm water and set it on the back of your neck to provide weight and warmth and something to lean your head on.”       

        “I set it up… and filled it up with warm/hot water and put my Epsom salt in. I filled it about 3/4 full with water, and when I got in it filled all the way up with water and felt so amazing.”

This is the tub I think I’m going to buy. I just have to work out a way to get it from the US. And in the meantime that monstrosity of a monster basin really has to go.

There are cheaper ones but this has lower sides and a padded bottom (the bloody bath - not me!). I love it.

Onwards!

May your baths be hot, full, and scented. 

And may your neighbours be as awesome as mine. 

Sim