Overheard in...: A Sauna

The "Overheard In..." category for the blog recalls snippets of conversation I happened to stumble across that for some reason stand out as indicative of cultural differences, or cultural issues I'm trying to understand. (And all subtly prove that reality is stranger than fiction.)

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Overheard in... a Sauna

The Setting:

The sauna, in my gym, in Swiss Cottage, London. Also known as the Swiss Cottage Leisure Centre, it's run by Camden Town Council and is actually quite nice and new... and subsidized, thankfully.

Scene One:
The dry sauna. Small, compact wooden planks.

The Characters (4):
(1) Me, wrapped in big blue towel. (2) A very skinny African woman in her late twenties, wearing a bikini--every muscle shows in her physique, particularly in her legs; (3) a slightly pudgy Korean woman in her thirties, also wearing a bathing suit, very round face; (4)and a boisterous fifty-something ostensibly working-class English woman with leathery skin on her face, as if wrinkled from smoking, but smooth skin on the rest of her body. She is wearing only a bikini bottom. Died brown hair, lots of makeup, heavy black eyeliner; breasts sag down to a bit above her waist.
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Korean Woman:
Don't make it too hot in here, bad for the skin. Dries out oil.

English woman: (boisterously, thick London accent)
Oh, this is good, this is good. I like the heat. Gorgeous.

(African woman silent, staring straight ahead as if no one else is in the sauna.)

Korean woman:
Weather here horrible. London weather awful.

English woman: (Thick makeup bleeding down her face from sweat)
Well, could be worse, love. Where you from?

Korean woman:
Korea. Where I from not like this, no. This awful, sad, weather.

Me:
Yes, I was really looking forward to the dry heat in the sauna, given how wet the air always is in London.

English woman:
Does it get cold there? You from North Korea or South?

Korean woman:
(GASPING) No!!!! I from South. SOUTH!!!! Of course, south.

(African woman still staring straight ahead silently.)

Korean woman:
I very religious. Christian. Pray every day. Pray for the North. Situation there awful. Just awful.

English woman: (to me)
The sauna's downright healthy isn't it, love?

Me:
Is it? Certainly feels good.

English woman:
Well yes, they used to prescribe whole courses of medicine that were just about sweating things out. Your skin is an organ, you know, an organ of purification.

Korean woman: (Shaking her head)
No get this cold in Korea. Cold, but maybe not this.

(African woman still staring straight ahead silently. English woman leaves to take a cold shower and announces she will see us all in the wet sauna)


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Scene Two: Steam Sauna

Characters (5):
(1) Me; (2) the Korean woman; (3) the English woman; (4) a young Russian woman who looks like a professional and has smartly cut blonde hair, wearing a swimsuit; (5) a Chinese middle-aged woman, naked, laying down lengthwise on a towel.
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I enter, the rest are already sitting there

English woman:
So you decided to join us here, eh? It's cold. When is the heat coming on?

Russian woman: (thick accent)
It's warming up, don't worry.

English woman: (to me)
I do this a few times a week. Dry sauna, a cold shower, wet sauna, a cold shower, then dry one one more time. It's lovely. (Then to the Chinese woman)
Do you think you're taking up enough space?

Chinese woman: (thick accent)
I sit... yes. Nice. (then some words no one understands.)

English woman: ( bemused smile on her face.)
Yes, you're taking up a lot of space, dear. (then to me again). Not that I understand her, mind you.... (pause.) It's tropical in here, doesn't it feel like a tropical rainforest?

(I'm wondering why I'm the only one she's directing these comments to-- perhaps because my accent isn't quite as foreign as the others?)

Korean woman:
I move here only three month ago.

Me:
Myself as well.

Korean woman:
I not like London. Not weather.

English woman:
Well, but wherever you go it's bad. In the east coast of the States they have hurricanes,no? Least we don't have those. We've got it mild.

(I hear this a lot-- English describing their weather as mild. Seems to me a somewhat strange description of a place where it rains nearly every day, and sunshine is a precious commodity-- but I suppose it's true that it's not Siberia. And then again, few places have weather like California.)

Korean woman:
Yes, but hurricane come and go. This every day.

(after a few minutes pass)

Me:
I think I'm done...

English woman:
No, no, try a bit longer. Go take a cold shower and come back in...

Me: (smiling)
Yeah, I actually really think I'm done. Enjoy, though...

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Scene Three

I am showered and in the main foyer to the leisure centre, talking on my mobile phone. The English woman passes me, fully dressed, on her way out. She sees me as she is about to pass through the door, stops, smiles a huge smile, and shouts over to me...

English woman:
Be sure to drink a lot of water, love. Lots and lots.

(I nod as I briefly interrupt my phone conversation. I think this may well be the first time while living in England that a complete stranger who is actually English has been so outwardly friendly to me.)

English woman: (waving broadly and smiling)
Bye-bye!