It is believed that in the famous Turkish bath, a person becomes spiritually pure and sinless
Galatasaray is a women's hamam located in Istanbul. In the huge dome there are small windows through which sharp sunlight penetrates into the room. Next to me, onto the navel, a raised marble platform, sits a local employee, Sabiha, and tells me about the history of this hamam.
She tells how her late mother worked in this hamam during the so-called 'golden times'. About fifty years ago, she washed strong and large women living in Turkey. Those were times when mostly local women came to the bath... Now her hamam is visited mainly by female tourists from other countries. Sabiha is already fifty-two years old and for most of her life she has been engaged in 'rubbing' clients, in other words, she is a professional bath attendant. She was even born in this same bath – her mother went into labor right at work, after which she was taken to a separate clean room and gave birth.
Today, the number of visitors to the local bath is getting smaller and smaller, which cannot but amaze the bath attendant. According to her, not washing in the national Turkish bath, the hamam, is equivalent to not washing at all. At that moment, Sabiha turns her head towards her regular client, who over the years of visiting the bath has become her true friend, and asks her to confirm her words. Gülsen – that is the visitor's name – gladly joins the conversation and tells about her husband, who bought a jacuzzi so that she wouldn't need to go to the hamam. However, this 'miracle of technology' is not entirely to her liking. According to the woman, if she does not wash in the hamam, she feels as if she hasn't washed at all – she is so accustomed to the hamam.
Both women recall the old days when hamams for men and women were still located in the same building. Then one could only tell by the color of the towels hanging in the locker room whether a man or a woman was bathing. And even earlier, women wore special silver slippers intended for bathing. Gülsen and Sabiha also have these slippers – they specially ordered them from Syria. However, on the women's swollen feet, they are unlikely ever to fit again...
It is important to note that the exterior appearance of baths in Turkey was never given much importance, but the interior decor is a different matter! Among the majestic columns of the Turkish bath, its grand past seems almost real. One gets the impression that time has stopped here and is inexorably moving backwards, bringing us closer to the era of the Ottoman Empire.
Interestingly, even visiting the hamam is a rather complicated matter. Thus, from the locker room, which is decorated with magnificent stained glass and called by the residents of Turkey 'jamekyan', you must move to the middle hall. In it there is a pool with a fountain in the middle, usually behind a special glass partition. After that, the women go directly to the steam room – 'hararet'. This place is the warmest; in it, women receive massages and wash.
Sabiha tells me that in the Turkish bath, under no circumstances should one remove the bathing sheet. To my reasonable question about how to wash then, she replies that only the woman who knows how to do it is worthy of washing in the hamam. According to the women of Turkey, many members of the stronger sex would give anything just to peek at a naked woman. That is why one should wrap oneself in the sheet.
I sit on the edge of the marble pool and begin to soap myself. According to Sabiha and her regular client, after visiting the Turkish bath, one's own home bathtub seems very uncomfortable and cramped. They invite me to come to their hamam more often... And in some ways they are right – because only in the Turkish bath is a true return to oneself possible...