Safranbolu Bonus: The Haman Bath Experience

One of the things we were excited about experiencing in Turkey was the Haman baths.

In Safranbolu they recently restored the 300-year-old Cinci Haman so we decided it was the opportune time to take a dip in a Turkish bath.

The Haman had separate sections for men and women so Shane and I entered our respective sides and that is where the adventure began.

My host led me to a change room and gave me a cloth to wrap myself in. Next she led me though a series of double doors, down a steamy corridor, and into a main room with several rooms shooting off its perimeter. The room we entered had many sinks atop of low marble benches. In the centre of the room was a large table. Looking up I could see the afternoon light streaming in the high windows in the ceiling dome.

She escorted me to a sink and handed me a small plastic basin, indicating I was to start dousing myself in the warm water that was slowly filling the basin.

Then she left. I was alone in the echoey chamber.

I started to timidly rinse myself. Attempting to be a tidy bather I tried to get all the water back in the basin. Now thoroughly rinsed and starting to sweat in the hot room I peeked my head out the entrance. One of the rooms was a sauna and there were a few other small rooms with sinks, just like the one I was in. All of them were empty.

I had read the Haman bath section of the Lonely Planet guidebook several times but I had been hoping someone else would be in the bathhouse so I could see exactly what I should be doing.

Unsure of what to do, I sat. And sat. Was I supposed to go into the other rooms? Was I supposed to go get my host to tell her I was sufficiently rinsed? And wait, was I supposed to keep my cloth thingy dry for after my bath? Hmmmmmmmm.

20 minutes later my host returned, no longer clothed but instead wrapped in a cloth and with her hair pulled back. At this point I could see her strong stout build and her arms, so very thick with muscles.

She gestured for me to lie on the table and then started to rinse me again. At this point I realized there had been no point to me trying to contain all the water in the basin. Water was being flung around the room until the marble floor was awash in a warm sea.

Next, she donned a rough mitt and began to scrub. She scrubbed with an even pressure over my whole body, being no less gentle on the tender area around my eyes than on the rough soles of my feet.

These were not cursory scrubs. She scrubbed me harder than I scrubbed my beautiful Le Creuset pot that I boiled dry once (okay, maybe twice). She scrubbed so hard I could see bits of the mitt crumbling off all over my skin. She scrubbed so hard it hurt.

I braced myself because I thought for sure my ribcage was about to collapse from the pressure. I could almost hear the slow hiss of air escaping my punctured lungs and the snap of my collarbone shattering like peanut brittle all over the table.

I was reminded of the time I once helped Shane refinish a 50-year-old hardwood floor. But this time, instead of yielding the sander, I was the hardwood floor. Once worn, scratched, and marred with age, she was shearing off my dull layers and the dirty crust of daily life to return my dermis to its former glory. She scrubbed away so many layers that I wondered if I would have any skin left at all and if I would end up looking like one of those preserved skinless humans in the Bodyworlds exhibit.

Next came the soap. Frothy mountains of suds became the sea foam floating on the warm marble-lined sea.

This woman was strong. Strong as an ox. Between the powerful scrubs and suds I felt like I might slide right off the platform and tried desperately to get a hold on the slippery soapy edges of the table. Perhaps there was someone else I could be paired with, someone with a similar body type to mine. I mean really, would you send Muhammad Ali into the ring against a boxer with the build of Woody Allen?

And then there was more pain. The pain of the mitt was one thing, but along with the sudsing process came a new battery of pain affliction. When she cleaned each hand she weaved her fingers into mine right at the base, squeezed them hard together and then pulled her way up to my fingertips. Bone against bone. I can only compare the experience to stripping an electrical wire with the inner blade on a pair of needle nose pliers. I tried to open my mouth to call out in pain, but no sound came out. Who knew handwashing could be a such a taxing experience? This was some serious clean.

When the whole affair was over we were both hot and exhausted. She retreated back to the main area to smoke a cigarette and I went back to my room to get dressed.

Shane and I both felt like we had never been so clean in our lives. We looked red and felt raw but inside we were renewed and with baby soft skin to boot. When the sun beat down on us I was sure people were blinded by the glare of our freshly burnished epidermises, shining like diamonds all the way back to the pension.