Melt

Sake in a hot spring, let's the mind wander. In the depths of the Tokyo Winter, a hidden Spring emerges

Northern Japan isn't necessarily arctic but the snow never stops. In the first week it's romantic, after 10 days it transforms reality into a desperate search for warmth. If you're visiting, it's charming because the Sake and Spring Waters insulate the cold. If you're making a living, a land of greying people trying their utmost to make it to the next day, makes you wonder where all the wealth went.

It's like being in a padded cell snowscape. In a matter of days, you start seeking someone actually alive.

I saw Jun standing in the Onsen pool on the porch, the one fronting the snowscape. The water wasn't piping hot, but the steam drifted upwards like a Taoist fantasy, cranes and dragons of white drifting into the grey sky. He was wet. I'm not closeted and not shy. But a foreigner has to be reserved in a place like this. I threw furtive glances and blamed myself for behaving like some sort of bumpkin. I think he knew I was watching.

The cult of the Sumo created this ideal of Japanese hurly burly Masculinity. Of course these days there's every single product category of men available in Nichome and the Izakiyas. But that Winter, I had this itch. Jun-San had a younger brother, Ichiro. And he had a penchant of working two days in the Onsen and spending the rest of it in Tokyo. He didn't like Gaijin, even if they looked almost identical to Nihonjin: it's not the same. He looked at me with gruff contempt.

Ichiro on the other hand, liked to work out at dawn, in the few hours when the clouds break and the Sun is out. I never knew bodies could steam, and it was the first time I saw a fundoshi, the Japanese loincloth. In hindsight, I think he knew I was peeking through the windows.

I was hooked. The white fabric was stained; sweat, grime, the salt of his cock, who knows? I think if rushed out at that moment, he'd pummeled me to shit with that barrel.

I had to do something.

It is impossible to navigate Tokyo without cheap data roaming and Google maps, if you're not a native speaker, it reduces you to handwringing, miming like a deranged performance artist and incinerating Yen.

In 2011 1000 yen - almost 12 USD. The entire opposite of what it's like now. Navigating the hidden male lust wonderland of Ueno, Shitamachi and Shinjuku became this hideously expensive exercise of Kanji translation and a lot of guess work. At 5 dollars a subway ride on the Yamanote Sen, your money burns pretty fast.

I was desperate, a form of desperation that sort of takes over when you're 31, trapped in a country that spoke none of your languages but had all these virile yellow bears and bulges. The sort of anxiety that claws at the edges of your eyes when you're transplanted raw into alien soil. No longer a tourist, I took out 20000 yen and headed to Kanto. There is a very slight but perceivable difference between Japanese, Korean and Chinese men. It's something that you learn to detect when you've hung around enough of them in the skin.

24 Kaikan is the place you want to be for this. In the end, my first hookup was extraordinarily postmodern: a Beijing man, and nearly blocked at the door because of his tattoo. He actually thought I was local for five minutes. The details are getting hazy, but what stood out was that schlong, Ueno Kaikan is famous (infamous) for a male love mural of bears, frolicking in a Cherry Blossom garden party, in the hot pool area. And dipping my toes for the first time was an experience.

I can't tell if all the bears were alarmed by his tats or what was going on between his legs. But in that nonchalant Northeastern Chinese manner, he sprawled across the side. I guess by now you can read the room (pool); Japanese are especially sensitive towards other yellow people, with Koreans and ethnic Chinese topping the list. As he started snoring in the bubbling waters, people got up to leave. But honestly speaking I didn't think the rest of them had anything to be insecure about. There was plenty of meat dangling about.

We exchanged looks. And really for guys, it's always a tactile/visual cue, he was getting frisky and I needed a ride. Kaikan is a huge complex, multiple mazes, pools, gyms and half a hotel. So, people fuck in public, and in typical Japanese fastidiousness, there are different “dorms” for various physiques.

We sadly ended up in the 猪 (Piggy) Dorm. But I was horny and his cock was dripping, we had to spend the lust somehow. So fuck it. He cambered onto this giant wooden bunk bed, which had a sort of old timey 旅游官feel. The futon was utilitarian, lube was everywhere. He muscled my cheeks open and I felt that wet spear, wedged deep against skin.

“我就是喜欢操猪” （I just love rutting pigs)

I really didn't have the heart to tell him I wasn't local or that I could understand everything he was saying. But it was interesting how he seemed to get really turned on when I sank my lips onto his teats. He angled a thumb into my Chrysanthemum, and jerked it upwards. I felt his stick slide in.

I felt his rawness and panicked. I started squirming for him to back off. But his huge palms clamped against my legs. The Jack hammering commenced and the back of my neck pulsed against the soiled white sheets. I tasted salt on his dragon biceps muzzled my face.

I was sweating in earnest. The Dorm wasn't cold but we burned like a human furnace. I think he really liked my hole because I could feel his juices leaking through my insides. I'll never go raw again but the winter ice melted with that pistoning. I cramped badly, electric whips of pain, he slowed down and pressed a nerve on my calf.

We were so busy with the futon fornication, I didn't notice this Tokyo bear glaring from the corner of the mattress . He resembled a grouchy Kanto Zangief about to lunge forward.

I can't describe the sound of a fist landing against muscle, especially when you're connected to that body from another end of his spine. The Chinaman abruptly popped out of me as Tokyo Zangief spat out a stream of incomprehensiblely rude Nihongo. I just wiped myself off and rubbed my sore inner thigh.

They got into a classic choke hold and I found myself in a bizarre homoerotic Sino- Japanese rematch. The whole dorm stopped to watch, which in a regular heteronormative setting would have meant either stopping the scuffle or picking up fighting tips. Bet I bet in this case, people were wondering if they lucked out on a live show that was better than anything online.

They didn't just cross swords. It was more like watching two Alphas beat the shit out of each other with what looked like pretty well trained martial arts moves. When Tokyo Zangief did a Karate side swipe that the Chinaman Lover dodged with an elbow block, the futon disintegrated into a sodden mess.

In Californian English someone quipped

“Who’s gonna be top?”

This hairy white guy leaning on a bedpost winked my way.

“At the rate they're going, no one's going to stay hard enough to matter. “

I like live-porn like any other guy but honestly all this sizzle left me restless. I went down to the restaurant and grabbed a coffee. Back into the bathhouse, I avoided the pool and went straight for a shower. Somehow, it was both freezing and hellishly hot, drifts of winter slipped in and nipped bare skin, while the roaring pour of heated steam sluiced water over my ears. I was still stiff as a pole but somehow, I just wanted to be held in the liquid warmth.

I felt a weathered sinewy palm, cupping my balls. He slid down my sheath and tickled the vein, in a single stroke. I could hear my pulse against my ears. The elderly gentleman brushed his moustache against my neck and mouthed away the tension, lips pursed against slippery skin. I was oozing again.

In the flowing roar of steamed water, I didn't see his face, just a silhouette. But his grip was expert and my balls were being juiced while all the juices were leaking out. In my 30s, I orgasmed frequently, but nothing like this. The itch between my legs merged seamlessly with a rising pulse, a root unclenched deep within and the strain of the past months streamed out from my eyes. He sluiced my shaft, rotating grip. I sobbed, started gasping in the water, but the testicular torture was relentless. I bawled. Like molten lightning, thick chunks of sticky white gushed forth.

The anonymous Ojisan chuckled lightly and wiped the goo from his hands, I still couldn't see him from my cum stained eyes. I think the jizz fountain surprised him. A gentle pat on the back and he left.