| Our bathhouses are not so bad. You can wash yourself. Only we have trouble in our bathhouses with the tickets. Last Saturday I went to a bathhouse, and they gave me two tickets. One for my linen, the other for my hat and coat.
But where is a naked man going to put ticket? To say it straight-no place. No pockets. Look around-all stomach and legs. The only trouble's with the tickets. Can't tie them to your beard.
Well, I tied a ticket to each leg so as not to lose them both at once. I went into the bath.
The tickets are flapping about on my legs now. Annoying to walk like that. But you've got to walk. Because you've got to have a bucket. Without a bucket, how can you wash? That's the only trouble.
I look for a bucket. I see one citizen washing himself with three buckets. He is standing in one, washing his head in another, and holding the third with his left hand so no one would take it away.
I pulled at the third bucket; among other things, I wanted to take it for myself. But the citizen won't let go.
"What are you up to," says he, "stealing other people's bucket?" As I pull, he says, "I'll give you a bucket between the eyes, then you won't be so damn happy."
I say: "This isn't the tsarist regime, "I say, "to go around hitting people with buckets. Egotism," I say, "sheer egotism. Other people," I say, "have to wash themselves too. You're not in a theater," I say.
But he turned his back and starts washing himself again.
"I can't just stand around," think I, "waiting his pleasure. He's likely to go on washing himself," think I, "for another three days."
I moved along. next > |
The Bathhouse