Talk:Sentō

the sento is now closed. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 126.236.99.172 (talk) 05:26, 23 March 2016 (UTC)Reply

I think voyourism section mentioning about gay and children is bit stupid. It say more about how non Japanese feel self concious when they enter sento first time. Moved information regarding kids allowed to enter both sie to other place. FWBOarticle 21:10, 13 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Boys staring at adult female customers of the other sex is a problem many females have encountered in Japan. While I am unclear about the exact definition of voyerism, this staring definitely makes other people very uncomfortable. I have added the section again. -- Chris 73 | Talk 07:06, 15 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The reference to bandai is too esoteric, this word should be given a definition or replaced with a layman's term. Malnova 05:53, 30 December 2005 (UTC)Reply

I like Bandai best, but I am open to alternatives. How would you call it? -- Chris 73 | Talk

I added distinction between "sento" and "Japanese bath house." The sento is only one type of public bath house (公衆浴場 kōshū yokujō) that meets certain criterias, and are subject to price restrictions by law. --69.214.226.246 01:30, 2 Jun 2005 (UTC)

With a thorough hammering of grammar and general structure, there is all the material here for a future featured article. Anyone want to go over it with me? Soo 11:44, 1 September 2005 (UTC)Reply

This article should be merged with Sento, and also needs a major cleanup. Exploding Boy 05:48, 3 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

...um.... this is the article Sento. Should this be merged with another article? Which one? -- Chris 73 | Talk 06:49, 3 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

Sorry, I came to it via a link in another article, which opened the page up to the Tension between social groups in sento bathhouses section. So, no merge, but yes cleanup. Exploding Boy 20:03, 3 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

While there are Sentō that are bathhouses, there is also an American customer service company called SENTO. How would we best accommodate both articles? A disambiguation page? A tag like "Sento (company)"? Bo-Lingua 15:36, 25 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

Sento (company) would be best. --日本穣 Nihonjoe 18:27, 25 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

Would we just want to put a tag on this page saying "For the American Company see: x"? or would it be better to have a disambiguation page? Is Wikipedia not sensitive for diacritics? Bo-Lingua

SENTO would also work, with For the American Company see: x. On a side note, if you are an member of this company, you should restrain from creating an article, since this would be self promotion. The company should be notable enough to warrant an encyclopedia article. -- Chris 73 | Talk 19:21, 25 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

Wikipedia:Manual of Style (trademarks) discourages ALL CAPS for article titles, even if the company uses them. --日本穣 Nihonjoe 19:32, 25 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

Duly noted, Chris, and good point. Thanks for the clarification of the on the Wiki Style Guide. Bo-Lingua 19:56, 25 April 2006 (UTC)Reply

I changed a portion that said "many sentō and onsen have a no tattoo rule to keep yakuza out of their baths, often under the pretense of hygienic reasons". However, from my experiences at these places, the sentos do not hide the fact that they want to refuse services to yakuzas in particular, and they make no phoney claims about hygienic reasons either. On the streets of these neighbourhoods there are often signs that say something along the lines of "Yakuzas get out!", etc.—Tokek 14:49, 31 July 2006 (UTC)Reply

I feel this commentator has the sento mixed up with supersento and ryokan. Sento which are members of the bathhouse association in each prefecture have no discriminatory rules as far as I have seen. Supersento which are private businesses and ryokan which are not members of the bathhouse association still reserve the right to refuse service to customers with tattoos and have signs about it. --219.106.152.19 (talk) 03:53, 18 April 2014 (UTC)Reply

what are the actual tempretures of the baths? i have heard that japanese like very hot baths, for instance ≈60 degrees C. which is very hot, it's scalding. is this correct?

I have read that in america water heaters for private baths (spas, jacuzzis) are not allowed over 104°F (40°C, not very hot) by law.

i think the article should mention actual temperatures. -unsigned

Typically they are in the range of 12 - 45 °C. The baths in the mid to upper 40's are considered "very hot", while the baths in the teens °C are usually taken to cool down, after a sauna, for example. Rumors of ≈60°C were greatly exaggerated. —MangoCurry 10:41, 28 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

There is one onsen (not sento), where the water used to come out at 60, and they stirred it like mad for a few minutes to bring the temp down, so they could spend 1:30 min in there. But I think the water flows changed and it s no longer so hot. Nowadays supposedly they do it only for tourists. Otheriwse the temp in sentos can be adjusted by the customers, and even the attendants often do not know the actual temp. -- Chris 73 | Talk 07:58, 29 October 2006 (UTC)Reply

I removed the following sentence "However, except for a single case in a small town in Hokkaido, racial discrimination at public baths virtually does not exist." on the grounds that this is not verifiable either way.

I also alter this sentence " such racist situations are very rare" to "rarely reported".

There is not intention to imply that racism is rampant at sentos, the statements were just one person's opinions. —unsigned

There is lack of facts or reason to speculate that racism is anything but rare to nonexistant at a sentō. To give an impression otherwise would be misleading the reader. The "such racist situations are very rare" snippet may have been another person's addition to the article, if so, that'd mean it wasn't "just one person's opinion." IMHO, an encyclopedia shouldn't exceed reasonable speculation.

Before I added the snippet you mention, I did search Google for other instances, but I couldn't find any. My searches did not suggest racism was a widely reported issue save for one instance. If someone has better reseach skills, that's fine with me. However as a general rule X shall be innocent of Y until proven otherwise. —Tokek 11:03, 1 November 2006 (UTC)Reply

I'm under the impression that traditionally, i.e. before the opening of Japan to the West, most sento were mixed-sex, meaning men and women bathed together. If my impression is correct, it would seem there's been a significant cultural change in the sento during the past hundred years. Shouldn't such a major alteration get a fairly prominent mention in the article? T.129.93.16.77 01:42, 28 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

My understanding is that mixed bathing was forbidden during various times in historiy with various levels of enforcement, and the current separation originates from commodore Perry. - Chris 73 | Talk 06:14, 28 March 2007 (UTC)Reply

I noticed that you seem to have edited the onsen article to agree with your supposition. I did note that the earlier edit claimed it was a rural tradition - that edit was unsourced as well, however - being "under the impression" is not a valid source for a claim in a wikipedia article. I have added citation needed, but am going to look around and see if there is a source that would resolve this.72.205.55.200 21:30, 2 September 2007 (UTC)Reply

This is all very well, but it doesn't address my inquiry. T.129.93.17.106 (talk) 16:13, 25 February 2009 (UTC)Reply

The entire section was practically "PUBLIC BATHES: The Walkthrough". While it might be educational, it's highly inappropriate for wikipedia. Maybe wikiversity or even a wikibook on japanese culture/visiting japan (actually, that seems like a good idea) would be better, and then post a link to another wiki. Or explain the etiquette without using "you", or post a link to a site that explains 'the rules' (there has to be tons out there), but just not on wikipedia -- Phoeba Wright^OBJECTION! 12:26, 21 May 2007 (UTC)Reply

I disagree. I removed a couple of sentences that give advice, but otherwise i think the basic procedure is a description that is useful for the article. -- Chris 73 | Talk 03:52, 22 May 2007 (UTC)Reply

I don't know what the etiquette section was line before the changes above, but the article is now virtually content-free in information about how someone actually uses a public bath. The article says that foreigners have occasionally polluted the baths by getting in unwashed (so presumably one washes first), and another part of the article says that some customers bring their own buckets (so presumably a bucket is involved somehow), but other than that the article tells the reader nothing. Could this the intention of the changes? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 208.46.159.158 (talk) 04:16, 29 April 2008 (UTC)Reply

Public baths used to be very popular in Russia as well, and aforementioned proper etiquette is an accepted norm of behaviour for most of the Post-Soviet nationals/residents. This is very characteristic for Japanese, for very closed culture, to generalize other nations and discriminate against. A person having read "drunken Russian sailors debauch in baths" would think that all Russian sailors are drunk savages. Why not re-place it with "Some foreign nationals did not adhere to local etiquette, and that is why baths are now open only to Japanese"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.235.65.208 (talk) 18:04, 22 December 2012 (UTC)Reply

It was requested that this article be renamed but there was no consensus for it to be moved. --Stemonitis 11:46, 20 August 2007 (UTC)Reply

As the introductions to both the Sento and Onsen articles report, the two are different and should be distinguished. The place that debito went to was an onsen, not a sento. It's dishonest to report all bathhouses (onsen and sento) as practising discrimination, and it's particulary egregious for debito to be advertising his lawsuit against Yunohana Onsen on the sento page, when said reported discrimination didn't occur at a sento.

His publicity still appears on the onsen page, along with all the requisite links to his own page, so I don't see any need for it to be duplicated here. Recall that there are no other published examples of discrimination at a sento. Simon-in-sagamihara (talk) 08:08, 15 November 2009 (UTC)Reply

I have changed previous text stated, "They are not exclusive: A sentō can be called an onsen if it derives its bath water from naturally heated hot springs. A legal definition exists that can classify a public bathing facility as sentō."

In Kanto that is for more or less true, but in Kansai the nomenclature "onsen" merely means bathhouse and has no connection to if there is a hot spring fed baths. While there are numourous sento (members of the prefecture bathhouse association) that do have true natural hot spring water filling at least one of their tubs, there are even more bathing facilities in the region that only use tap or well water for their baths. The Japanese page for the absolutly wonderful, but normal water, Gengahara Onsen in Osaka contains the following caveat:

なお、｢○○温泉｣は上方に於ける伝統的な風呂屋の屋号であり、天然温泉を意味するものではない。

"In the Kyoto area the word onsen is a traditional name for a bathouse, it does not mean that there is a natural hot spring." --219.106.152.19 (talk) 04:13, 18 April 2014 (UTC)Reply

  This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 23 August 2023 and 13 December 2023. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): LN080205 (article contribs).

— Assignment last updated by LN080205 (talk) 06:47, 13 December 2023 (UTC)Reply