Bathhouse journal in Desert

One evening, Jose was in a good mood suddenly said he wanted to have a short hair cut in crew style; I rushed back to the kitchen after what I heard him say and picked up a big fish knife, at the same time I put a rag around his neck.

“Please do sit down properly.” I said to him.

“What are you doing?” Jose in shocked.

“Cutting your hair.” I pulled a big bushy bit off his hair out.

“What? Wasn’t cutting your own hair was not enough?” He jumped a step away from me.

“The barber in town is not as good as me, you save your money; Come! Come!” I ran after him to catch him.

Jose grabbed the car key and started running away, I quickly threw my fish knife down and chased after him.

Five minutes later, we both ended up sat down in the filthy and sweaty barbershop. The barber, Jose and I had an argument about how to cut Jose’s hair and we did not give in to each other. The barber wasn’t happy, he was fiercely staring at me.

“Echo, please can you go outside for awhile?” Jose impatiently told me off.

“Leave me some money and I will go.” I went through Jose’s pocket and took a big flat note then stepped out of the barbershop.

I went down a little road along the street from the barbershop to the town, the street was full of filthy garbage with swarms of fly around it, a big flock of skinny goats was also looking for things to eat. I had never been to this area before.

I passed a broken house which was without a single window, there was a big bundle of dry spiky plants on the door. I curiously stopped my walk and had a good look at it. This house surprised me had a plaque hanging outside on the door, it had written on it ‘Spring’.

I thought to myself wondering how come a sign saying ‘Spring’ would appear on such a house full of rubbish? I went down to the half closed wooden door and stretched my head inside to have a look.

Under the big strong sun, there was nothing I could see inside but I heard a startled person making a shocked squawking noise —-

“Aw…Aw…..!!!” Follow by shouting in Arabic at the same time.

I turned back and ran away a few steps, I felt full of questions, what were these people doing inside? Why they were so afraid of me?

A middle age man wearing a Sahara long robe came from inside to chase after me, he saw that I didn’t run away and rushed up wanting to catch me in time.

“What are you doing here? Why were you peeping people bathing?” He angrily questioned me in Spanish.

“Bathing?” I was very baffled.

“You have no shame of yourself woman, Go away! Shoo—shoo—”

That man made a hand signal in the air as if he were driving me away like livestock or poultry.

“ What are you shooing me for?  Wait a moment!” I shouted back.

“Hey, What are those people doing inside the house?” I asked him and made my way into the house at the same time.

“Bath, Bath—ing! Don’t go look inside again!” He was started making the Shoo sound to me again.

“You can have bath here?” I was more curiously than ever.

“Yes, that’s correct!” That man was getting more inpatient.

“How do you wash? How do you bath?” I got over excited, this was the first time I heard people in Sahara even bathed, wasn’t it was a case of breaking the record and having to find out in the end?

“You will know when you come.” He said.

“I could come and wash there?” I asked in a manner of full of exhalation and surprise.

“It’s from morning eight to twelve in the afternoon for women, it costs 40 dollar.”

“Thank you, Thank you! I will come tomorrow.”

I ran back to the barbershop and told Jose about this new place to go.

The next morning, I was holding a big towel as I carefully stepped firmly down on the thick goat waste and went visiting the ‘Spring’. There was an unpleasant smell on the way and that made my stomach feel a bit out of sorts.

When I pushed open the door to go inside, there was a Saharan woman sitting in the house, she looked shrewd and aggressive, properly the boss lady in the house.

“Want bathing? Pay here beforehand.”

I paid 40 dollar to her, then looked around. There was nothing in the room apart from rusty buckets that lay on the floor everywhere; the lighting was poor and a nude woman came out to pick up a bucket and went inside again.

“How can I wash?” I asked and acted like a country woman looking around.

“Come, come with me.”

The boss lady grabbed my hand and took me into a room, the room was smaller like only the size of three or four Japanese Tatami mats; a few wires were strung across the wall which were full of Saharan women’s underwear hanging on it and also some dresses with some long cloth that what used for wrap up their body. A very thick strong smell forced inside my nose and I had to hold my breath.

“Here, take off your clothes.” The boss lady sounded as if she was ordering me.

I went silent, took off my clothes, only leaving the bikini on which I put it on at home before I went out and I started hang out my clothes on the wire at the same time.

“Take that off!” That boss lady urged me again.

“I am done.” I gave her a hard look and rolled up my eyes white.

“How can you wash when you are wearing this strange thing!?” she asked me and used her hand very roughly to pull off my floral bra and my pants.

“How to wash is my own business.” I rolled up my eyes again and pushed her hand away.

“Okay, go outside and take a bucket now.”

I went outside and took two empty buckets with me obediently.

“There, start wash yourself there.” She pushed another door open, this house was just like accordion, go inside room after room like some sort of bread roll.

 ‘Spring’ finally appeared in front of my eyes; I felt very moving, it was the first time I had seen where water actually came up from the ground in the dessert yet inside a room.

It’s a deep well, many women splashed the water laughing and joking next to the well, the scene was certainly very lively and impressive. I stood in stunned silence with two empty buckets in my hands staring at them like a silly fool.

These women stopped and froze when they saw me wearing clothes and entering the room. We were staring at each other in smiles and they obviously didn’t speak much Spanish.

A woman came up to me and helped me fill my bucket with water; she very friendlily spoke to me: “Like this, like this.”

She threw a big bucket of water over my head, I quickly brushed my face but another bucket of water was straight away thrown right on me again. I ran at the corner and hurriedly said with: “Thank you! Thank you!” I dared not to try again.

“Cold?” A woman asked me.

I nodded my head hard very awkwardly.

“If cold, go inside.” They pulled another door open, I just didn’t know how many rooms there were in this accordion bread roll house.

I was sent to another room, very deep inside the building. I felt a wave of heat coming straight on my face; everywhere was filled up with mist and I couldn’t see a thing.

I waited a few seconds and just started to notice the wall around me. I stretched my arms out straight searching ahead, I had merely walked a few steps but it seemed I had stepped on someone’s leg, I bent down to look what happened and found out there were women sat down on the ground all side by side in this tiny room.

On the opposite wall of this room, there was a huge water tank with constantly boiling water bubbling away. That’s what happened in this room full of misty steam in the air it was just like a Turkish bath.

Just for a moment when someone pulled open the door, the air cooled down a fraction and I could see better right away.

These women all had two buckets beside them and the buckets were filled with cold water from the well. The temperature in the room was high, the ground was steaming up extremely hot like a steamer and my feet had to keep dancing on the hot floor. I really didn’t understand how these women could bear the heat and sit on the ground!

“Come to sit down here.” A nude woman made some room for me in the corner.

“I am better standing up here, thank you!” I looked at the wet floor full of mud and dirt, I really couldn’t make myself to sit on it even if I could bear the heat.

I saw every woman using a piece of stone to scrap their own body, every time they scraped, a line of dirt was left similar to black ink. They didn’t use soap and not even much water. They only rinsed their body with water after softening up all the dirt by scraping.

“Four years, I have not been bath for four years, I live in the desert called ‘Shay Ma’, very far from here, far away in the desert….” A woman giggling spoke to me, ‘Shay Ma’ meaning tent in Sahara; I stopped my breathing when she chatted to me.

She poured a bucket of water over her head, within the thick stuffy air, I saw the dark black dirty water slowly flooding over up to my clean bare feet. I felt my stomach starting to boil up, I bit my lip hard and stood there without moving.

“Why are you not wash? I lend you my piece of stone to scrap.” She kindly passed me her stone.

“I am not dirty, I have already washed at home.”

“Why come here if you are not dirty! Like myself, I only come here once every three or four years.” She still looked very dirty even though she had been washed.

The room was very small and without any window, on top of that, the big hot water tank make my heart beat like crazy and sweaty like rain. There were so many people here, the air filled up with bad body odour. I felt like I was about to throw up. I made myself lay next to the wet wall, only to discover the wall was covered with layer after layer of stuff that looked like snot. I had already had a big piece stick to my back; I ground my teeth whilst hurriedly and desperately drying my back with my towel.

The aesthetic concept of beauty in the desert says a fatter woman is the best beauty, so no matter what, every woman wanted to make herself as fat as she could.

Normally when women went out, they would wear a long dress and used a big giant cloth to cover all over their whole body and wrapped their faces and heads like an airtight parcel; As for some modern ones, they would put  sunglasses on, so that no one would see their true faces at all.

I got use to seeing women here wrapped up like a mummy. Now, suddenly seeing them all nude with their huge giant bodies, it made me shocked and totally speechless. This bathhouse showed the true form of everyone here, in contrast, I rather looked like a shoot of tiny dog tail grass that grew on the ground among with these giant milk cows, I was well over shadowed indeed.

There was a woman who was covered with black dirt all over on her body that had not been rinsed the dirt away but she heard her baby crying outside, so she ran out naked and picked up her few months old baby, then she sat down on the ground started to breastfeed the baby.

The dirt from her chin, her neck, her face and her hair all dribbling down onto her breast, her baby just carried on sucking hard at the milk from mother which was mixed together with the dirt. I was frozen in shock to see such a terrible scene myself, my stomach started to churn again and I could not tolerate any more, I turned my back and storm out from the room. 

I ran to the last room, breathing hard into the fresh air and returned back to pick up my clothes from the wire.

“They said you wasn’t bathing, only stood up there; what is it you are looking at?” The boss lady asked me curiously.

“Look at you to see how you bath.” I answered her with laughingly.

“You spent 40 dollars just come for watching?” Her eyes opened wide almost popping out.

“It’s not expensive, it’s worth it.”

“This is the place only for washing outside the body, it need to be wash inside as well.” She spoke again.

“Wash inside?” I didn’t understand what she was talking about.

She made a sign of taking out from the stomach. I was shocked again.

“Where is this place for wash? Please tell me?” I was excited and buttoned my cloth all wrongly.

“It’s on the seaside, you go for a look, it located on ‘Boohato Bay’ where there have many tents around; In Spring time, people stay there and wash themselves for seven days.”

The same evening, as I was making dinner I talked to Jose: “She said the place to wash inside the body is ‘Boohato Bay’.”

“Have you heard it wrong?” Jose was shocked too.

“I didn’t hear it wrong, she even made a body sign of it; I want to go there and have a look.” I begged Jose.

We drove almost 400 miles from our little town of Laayoune to reach the Atlantic Ocean. We could just about make it back the same day.

We had heard that there was a bay at Boohato but there almost wasn’t any beach along the thousand mile rocky coastline of the Western Sahara.

We followed along a previous vehicle’s tracks to the sea but had to spend an hour driving slowly and carefully along the cliff tops before we sighted Boohato Bay.

“Look, it’s down there.” Jose said.

We stopped our car at the other side of a broken cliff, several meters down below there was some clear blue seawater constantly and calmly lapping into a half moon bay. The bay had countless white tents erected on the sandy beach, there were men, women and children all wandering around and they looked very relaxed and peaceful.

“It actually exists such a life like that in this chaotic world.” I said admirably, sighing to myself, this is a realm of paradise.

“Can’t find a way to go down, the people down there must have their own secret path somewhere.” Jose said after he had returned from spending a while searching the cliff. 

Then Jose pulled out a big thick coil of rope from the car and tied it on the bumper, then choked the wheels with piles of big rocks. Afterwards he securely tied the rope to the car bumper and he threw the rope down the cliff.

“Let me teach you that, don’t put all your weight hanging onto the rope, you need to step firmly on the rock near by with your feet, the rope is only a thing to stabilise yourself, are you scared or not?” Jose asked.

I stood at the cliff listening to his explanation, the wind blowing me and shaking.

“Are you scared?” Jose asked me again.

“Scared, very scared.” I honestly said.

“Okay, I go down first if you scared, you go after me.” Jose went down with his camera on his back.

I took off my shoes, descending down from the cliff in my bare feet, there were a couple of strange birds flying around me. I was afraid they would peck my eyes, that made me rush myself down to the ground. Because my attention was distracted I was made it to the ground without too much fear.

“Hey! This way.” Jose was behind a big rock.

Some of the women lifted seawater from a bucket into a big can on the beach. The big can had a section of leather tube connected through which the water could flow. A woman was half lying on sand, another woman carried the water can by hand and the same time inserting the leather tube into her body using it the same as an enema, the water went through the tube and went inside her intestines. 

I pushed Jose and pointed out to him the long shot lens and asked he put it on the camera. He was in shock and forgot to take photos. 

When all the water had emptied through the end of the can, the woman next to her poured another bucket of sea water in it and kept the irrigation going for the woman who was lying down on the sand. After three buckets of irrigation, the woman was groaning because she could not endure it, then when another bucket of water was poured into the can she seemed suffer a great deal of pain and started screaming out. We watched all that from behind a big rock and were frightened to death.

The leather tube was finally pulled out and the tube was straight away inserted into another woman’s intestines; meanwhile, the woman who had already gone through the irrigation began pouring water again but this time into her mouth.

According from the boss lady at the ‘Spring’, it had to be done three times a day and for a total of seven days.

It was virtually a real spring clean. I was amazed how much water a body could actually put up with.

Not long after that, the woman who was now fully injected of water stumbled up, slowly walking over in our direction.

She squatted on the sand and starting excreting, she passed out an uncountable amount of dirt. She backed herself a few steps off each time she passed solids, at the same time she used her hands to grab some sand and buried the dirt in front of her away; just like that, she excreted her waste and buried it, she did it more than ten times without stopping.

I could not help myself but made a big ‘Ha Ha’ laughing  when the woman was crouched down and started singing unexpectedly; it was incredibly funny and made me laugh. Jose jumped over and covered my mouth but it was too late.

That naked woman turned her back and saw us behind the rock, with an open mouth, her face distorted with fright she first ran dozens of steps away before screaming loud ahead.

We stood up straight away after she screamed and looked again, there were many people coming out from their tents, the woman pointed at us, all the people aggressively came running over.......to kill us?

“Run! Quickly run Jose!” I wanted to laugh but felt nervous at the same time. I made a shout loudly and pushed my legs to run for my life, after I had run for a moment, I turned my head shouting to Jose: “Hold your camera tight!”  

We ran quickly to the rope that was already hanging down, Jose pushed me hard and I didn’t know where I got the strength but in only a short while I reached the top of the cliff, Jose also soon to climbed up there too.

Then to our horror although there wasn’t any visible path down the cliff, the people chasing us without even using any rope suddenly appeared. They must have used an unknown mystery secret path.

We quickly moved away the rocks holding the wheels, there was not enough time to untie the rope, we threw ourselves inside the car and shot the car out like a cannon.

When more than a week had passed, I still felt the heartbreak of having to leave my beautiful sandals on the cliff top but had not dared to drive back there to pick them up. Suddenly I heard Jose back from work and chatting to a Saharan friend under the window.

“There is a rumour about an Asian woman peeping at people bathing everywhere, people said your——-” That Sahara friend attempted to ask Jose.

“I never heard that before and my wife has never been to ‘Boohato bay’ too.” Jose replied to him.

I heard that and rushed outside, Oh dear! This idiot was giving himself away.

“Yes, there is! I know there have some Asian women who like to peep at people bathing.” I was saying it with a radiant smile. Jose looked full of surprising dread.

“Wasn’t there a plane full with Japanese tourists arrived here last week? Japanese like to study how people bath, especially Japanese women who would go asking everywhere how people take a bath——”

Jose opened his mouth wide with his finger pointing at me. I quickly made a slap on his hand. The Sahara friend listened to what I said, suddenly he stumbled to what I meant and said: “It’s the Japanese. I thought, I thought….” He looked at me with a blush appearing on his face. 

“You thought it was me, right? Apart from cooking and washing clothes, I am not that much interested in other things, I am afraid you have made a mistake.”

“Sorry, I have mistaken you, I am sorry.” His face was red again. When this Sahara fellow had gone far away from us, I lay myself on the window sill, closed my eyes and smiled, in my unguarded moment Jose tapped me on the head.

“Don’t be in a daze Madam butterfly, it’s time for making dinner!”