Ofuro

I've decided that I'm going to suffer horrendous culture-shock upon returning to the U.S. Because we won't have:
1. Heated toilet seats
2. The ofuro

Heated toilet seats are pretty self explanatory. Surprising at first, but you warm up to the idea quickly. (Pun intended, sadly).

The ofuro is the Japanese bath. In a Japanese style bathroom, the shower is separate from and adjacent to the tub. (See random google image below)
This is because of the ofuro tradition. At the end of the day, the house's ofuro (bath) is filled up with very hot water. Each person in the house gets a turn--they take their shower outside of the ofuro, then get some time to soak in the ofuro. (These are nice, deep tubs too, not the ones at home which you outgrow somewhere around the age of 10.) There's a cover to keep the water from cooling off too much over the course of the evening.

Anyway, I got my first chance to try the ofuro on Wednesday. It was great, totally relaxing. So, Mom and Dad, weren't you saying you wanted to remodel the bathroom? I'm sure you did...

That's it for now, but here's some pictures of fancy ofuro that I found on google.