Travelling 15km to take a bath?

Many countries are so fortunate, and particularly so in Singapore. Many houses here have 2 to 3 bathrooms with hot water available at the turn of the tap, 24 hours a day. Do Singaporeans take this for granted at times? Most people who have been to China see the progress China as made over the years. But head into the country side... and you will still see parts of China that is still relatively undeveloped... where electricity and water are hard to come by!

Back home where I come from in the countryside of Liaoning province, we do not have hot water... at least off the tap! When we want hot water, we have to boil it. However, it becomes a problem in winter when you want to shower with hot water. That's because it is freezing cold here and our bathroom is a short walk away. So even if you boiled the water, you have to transport it to the bathroom to take your shower. And if you take too long, the water is going to cool down very, very quickly and you'll end up with cold water again. Not to mention that transporting the water is going to be a very heavy job!

So what do we country folks do?

During the winter, we "dry clean" ourselves with a towel and hot water at home. Even this is a chilling experience as our homes are not heated. And every week or so, we take a bus, go on a 15 to 20 minutes ride to the nearest bath house where we can have a bath. It cost 6RMB to take a bath and you normally do this with friends or family members. Also they have separate sections for male and females. Quite often, since we travelled all this distance (about 10 to 15km away), you'd usually want to savor the moment and stay a little longer to enjoy the space and nice warm water.  After all, you haven't had a bath for one whole week... you might as well have a super long bath and make sure every nook and cranny is sparkling clean!

See how fortunate you are now?