July 2, 2008
Osento to Wash Its Final Vagina
Our enablers over at Curbed have word that Osento -- the city's only hot tub and "sauna refuge" for (biological) females -- will close its doors for good. What goes on inside the sugar walls of Osento, located on Valencia Street? We can only imagine; clucking about boys, stickers, My Little Pony dolls, and who they want to marry, we assume. Another blow for San Francisco business and women's dirty parts. Alas.
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Osento seems to welcome non-biological females as well:
1. If you were born female and are transitioning and have not had genital reassignment surgery you are welcome at Osento. However, if you consider yourself male, please respect this as a female only space and do not come in.
2. If you are a female who was born male and have had genital reassignment surgery you are welcome at Osento.
Good on them.
thansk, generic. i remember gay shame (sf) throwing some sort of hissy fit about this. thanks for providing me with the facts.
Technically, you weren't wrong the first time.
I think they are the only hot tub & sauna for (biological) females. They just don't exclude le trans.
What goes on inside the sugar walls of Osento?
Not leg-shaving!
"We can only imagine; clucking about boys, stickers, My Little Pony dolls, and who they want to marry, we assume."
Are you kidding!! (Wait, please tell me you're kidding and this sexist bs isn't for real.)You know that women don't always care about men, right? And you know that even straight women don't always think about men, right?
Osento is a loss for all the women in the city. It is a unique and special place - accessible, unpretenious, and safe. It's the kind of thing that made the city special and now we've classed ourselves out of it.
Straight men also don't care/think about women all the time. like when they are too drunk to get it up... and... yeah.
My Little Pony is all about the patriarchy, people. Look it up.
Stickers, fo sho.
sfmidwife, from one feminist to another, Brock is kidding.
And according to the website, the woman who owns the place is retiring - this business does not seem to be a victim of gentrification. If I had access to capital, I'd love to try and keep it running, or maybe now that the competition is vanishing, start up one of my own.
sfmidwife, there's a joke in here somewhere about humorless feminists but I can't quite get the wording down.....
Wow. This sucks. There isn't going to be anywhere to go soak and gossip...some of my best times with friends have been inside the dry sauna, talking about boys (yes, it happens) This is really sad.
Can't someone get it together and open a coed sauna? With a big Japanese soaking tub? Preferably on or around Valencia? How about in that weird country and western store at 26th/Valencia that no one seems to be using?
perique - perhaps the one you are looking for is the old q:"how many feminists does it take to change a light bulb?" a:"That's not funny!"
@suki I've never been -- I'm not a fan of bathing with others, not that there's anything wrong with that -- but what about Kabuki Springs?