For those of you who love onsens (hot springs), you can buy packets of onsen salts to tip into your own bathtub. It feels sooo good, especially after a workout or an exhausting day at work.

The Japanese believe that onsens can cure many everyday ills, like acne, boils, flatulence, eczema, rheumetism, sports injuries, exhaustion, constipation, and the list goes on. I’ve had Japanese gal pals telling me some onsens make your skin and hair super smooth. Awesome, isn’t it?

Onsens in different regions do vary in the minerals they contain, and according to Wikipedia, there are several types — sulphur, sodium chloride, hydrogen carbonate, and iron, are a few examples.

It feels like a glorious and decadent thing to do at home, so I only treat myself to a DIY onsen bath if I’m feeling sick or my back feels stiff. I also associate it with traveling in Japan and it’s a highlight of any trip to go to an onsen. A gleeful memory: I let myself have an onsen bath daily on my Hokkaido snowboarding trip and my muscles definitely needed some pampering. Kimochi ga ii (means it feels good in Japanese)…

After sniffing around my dictionary and the Internet, my onsen salts contain hydrogen carbonate and they smell lovely. There are several scents and colors — I can’t put my finger on the fragrances but they are subtle in a clean, slightly floral way.

A bubble bath leaves your skin squeaky clean, but you’re not supposed to soap yourself after an onsen bath, because you will wash away the goodness of the minerals.

Are these onsen salts expensive? Nope, not at all — I forked out about 400JPY (USD4) for a box of 10 packets. Sweet.

P.S.: For trivia’s sake, there’s actually an onsen called Obama Onsen in Nagasaki. It’s not named after America’s president but there’s a small fishing town called Obama in Japan, which by the way, went nuts when Obama was running for president. Check out the video here where you can see the Obama burger, manju (rice flour bun), Hawaiian dance, and a letter of appreciation from the man himself.

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