I'm in the midst of writing something rather daunting for a huge outlet, so I figure the best way to get my creative juices flowing is to whip up a blog entry about one of my favorite Taiwan misadventures. I had the opportunity to do so many wonderful, great, amazing things there, but one of the most fun was visiting Wuli, where they have authentic hot springs. Seriously - there was this area where you could take a bucket and dig yourself a hole, sit in it, and the hot springs would bubble up around you. As I didn't have a bathing suit and wasn't in the mood to get arrested in a foreign country, I opted for the hotel across the street that had separate men's and women's baths.
This is where the misadventure happened.
I forget the name of the hotel, but whether you're a guest or not you can pay a flat rate to go sit in the waters, which are purported to be therapeutic, all natural, the whole nine yards. I stuck my shoes in a cubby hole (reminding me of what it was like to be in kindergarten), then headed for the change room, where I stripped down and stuffed my hair under a completely unstylish shower cap. Using a little hand-held shower nozzle, I rinsed off before hopping into the first tub.
An aside: one of the things I noticed in Taiwan was how friendly everyone was, especially when they realized you spoke English. I spent half a visit at a temple being followed by two teenage girls who would repeatedly say "hello" just to get me to say it back. Yeah, I felt a little like a parrot, but it was novel at the same time, watching the way they beamed when they realized that in some small way, we spoke the same language.
The bath house was no different. When my colleagues and I entered the main soaking area chattering on about our shower caps, a woman leapt - stark naked - from the nearest tub and wandered over to tell us the proper way to do the baths: soak in the lowest temperature tub first, then the next, then the highest, but only stay in that one for two minutes. The tub with the water therapies was optional, but she highly recommended the steam room. We thanked her, but just to make sure we were well taken care of she checked in with each of us to make sure we were comfortable and enjoying ourselves. I don't know what impressed me more: how attentive she was, her firm grasp of English, or the fact that she was so at ease playing Bath House Tour Guide wearing nothing but a shower cap that looked like a condom on her head.
Anyway. The bathing was lovely and much needed, as all of us had been running ragged nearly the whole trip. After an hour of slipping in and out of tubs and consciousness I decided I was likely going to turn into a raisin if I continued, so I rinsed off and went back to the change room, where the change room attendant grinned widely at me and said, "Hello!" Yep - the only word she knew. I toweled off and dressed, took the shower cap condom off my head, and stepped to the vanity, where I was met with various bottles with zero English on the labels.
I had a brief flashback to when I was at a spa in Hawaii and watched a Japanese woman spray underarm deodorant in her hair. I wish I could tell you that I stopped her and showed her that the Herbal Essences bottle was what she was looking for, not the baby powder Suave... but something paralyzed me and I couldn't. I have no idea why, but I stood there and watched as she primped and sprayed anti-persperant in her up-do, the words, "No, that goes in your armpits!" stuck in my throat. She put the cap back on and looked at me, frozen in my position, then gave her hair one last fluff and walked out. It was then that I finally asked myself, "Why the fuck didn't you say anything?!?"
Wishing to escape the same fate, I picked up the bottle that most looked like deodorant and turned to the grinning girl, then mimed spraying my pits. She shook her head and mimed spraying her hair. Ah, okay - hairspray. I needed that too, so I fiddled with my hair a bit and sprayed accordingly.
Shortly thereafter, my scalp started to burn. I have a number of entertaining sensitivities that make me fun to travel with - digestive being one of them - so I figured that maybe there was something in the hairspray that was setting off my skin. I wrote it off and continued to primp... for a moment. When it became uncomfortable enough that I was worried, I decided to see if I could somehow make any sense of the ingredients on the back of the hairspray can. Characters, characters, characters... wait, an English word!
Butane.
Butane? Butane!!??!! The stuff that belongs in Zippo lighters? The stuff where inhalation can lead to asphyxia and cardiac arrhythmia? And it's in my hair!? Apparently it was common for hairspray to include butane as a propellant pre-1980, before legislation deemed them harmful to the environment. Apparently, hairspray companies in Taiwan didn't get that memo.
I had visions of an unattractive bald spot where my bangs used to be - this, of course, following the vision of my hair going up in flames after passing a street meat cart in the night market. I rinsed my hair out as best I could and prayed for the best, but it was definitely tense until the evening, when I washed my hair and realized clumps weren't rinsing down the drain with my conditioner.
That's what I get for not helping that Japanese woman.
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