On Sunday night I went to my first Korean bath house, or a Jimjilbang. It was quite the experience. After our long day of hiking I was ready to go to bed at 8 o'clock until my Director texted me asking if I still wanted to go to the Jimjilbang. As you could imagine, I was very nervous about this (if you don't know why now...you will when you read further). I decided to bite the bullet and do it. How awkward could it be? So my director picked me up at 8:30. One of the first things she said to me was, "wow, you are very giddy right now," and I explained that I get giggly when I'm nervous hahaha
First of all, I was obviously very new to this Korean tradition. I didn't know what to do or where to go. It was a hard balance of trying to follow my director and other people and see what they were doing, yet not starting and watching their every move. I pretty much mimicked my director for the 2 1/2 hours. What ever she did, I did. Where ever she went, I went. It proved to be a very good method because I did not make a fool of myself.
So, when we walk into the jimjilbang we take off our shoes and place them in a little shoe locker, pay, get a "uniform" and head to the actual locker room. The locker rooms are separated by gender. This is where the naked-ness began. There were tons of women anywhere between age 5 through 70 walking around. My director and I found our lockers and we did what all the other women did. Got naked. There I am, walking around with my boss and about 50 other women, naked! Ahhhh! So before we could do anything we had to take showers in the shower room. The room is long and on adjacent walls there are multiple showers in a row. I didn't bring my shower supplies so I had to share with my director. We picked showers that were side by side and soaped up. She then asked me if I wanted to use her scrubby face cloth and I politely declined. Then she started washing my back! I could have died! When in Rome...so after she washed mine, I washed hers. It gives me, personally, a new meaning to the phrase, "You wash my back, I'll wash yours"!
After our showers we walked to a different room with about 4-6 large hot tubs. In these hot tubs you sit and relax (still naked) with your friends and also other people you don't know. This room also has a swimming pool with cooler water and a little play poo for the little kiddies. We spend about 10 min the hot tub. From there we went to a sauna room and sat and chatted for a few minutes. She was explaining to me the different services for an extra fee that the jimjilbang provides such as massages and exfoliation stations. From the sauna we watched a woman get exfoliated (sounds dirty doesn't it? hmm.... it almost makes sense because we are all naked....what a conundrum) Anyway, at the exfoliation tables a woman takes a rough hand mitten type thing and rubs your whole body, yes, everything...front and back with her scrubbing mitten.
After our sauna session, we took another quick shower and got dressed in our uniforms that were given to us when we paid. It is a pink tee-shirt and long shorts combination (the men get blue ones). My director told me that I should put on my bra so the men won't look. I got dressed in the very tiny shorts that were just a bit too small and a very baggy shirt. We headed upstairs to the sauna floor which is co-ed. It is a big open room with 2 big water fountains, massage chairs, TV's and a bunch of mats and pillows on the floor. Also, it's decorated with a bunch of gemstone murals. It is very beautiful and peaceful. There is a separate room for eating and purchasing food too. We bought a bowl of persimmon juice (the local fruit. It's tastes similar to an apple but it looks like a tomato) and a few baked eggs (yes, baked). We sat in the common room for a bit while she explained the different sauna rooms. There were about 6 or 7 different rooms, each with a different theme and temperature for health. The first room we went into was the salt room. I can't remember what the temperature was but it was HOT! The room was decorated with various stones and flowing pictures, all very serene. There were straw mats that lined the floor. Underneath the mats were big crystals of salt. It was really cool! The salt in the room is supposed to help make your bones grow stronger. We spent a bit of time in there and we sweat like dogs! Oh my word! I could just feel the sweat dripping off of every bit of my body! It sounds gross, but it actually felt good. After what seemed like 20 hours, we went back to the common room, drank our persimmon juice (I need to find out the actual name of the drink) and headed to the next sauna room. This one was not as hot, but still boiling. I don't know what the theme of the room was but it was very beautiful. This room was filled with about 10 different gems forming pictures of mountains and a big yin yang on the ceiling. We just layed in this room, relaxed, and stretched our muscles. She taught me a trick to always face the wall when you are laying down, otherwise people can see up your shorts hahahah Once we were done in that room we went back out to the common room and went into our third and final sauna room. This one was bigger than the others and it was a whopping 72 degrees celsius (thats 162 fahrenheit for all of you friends back home) We only spent 5 min in that one, thank goodness! I could have literally died in there! We finished up our baked eggs and juice and went back downstairs to take one last shower. After our shower my director wanted to put some lotion on her face. She insisted that I shared with her and put someone my face. I use the term "some" loosely because I must have but 6 different lotions on my face! I'm not a women of beauty either so I felt like I was pampering myself. After that, she dropped me off back at my apartment.
Boy was that an experience. As weird as it sounds, I actually enjoyed it. It's not weird being naked around 50 other women if they're all naked too. The jimjilbang is a traditional Korean pastime and I want to embrace the culture around us.
When I got home I felt rather sick. I felt very nauseous. I think it was a combination of dehydration and getting used to sitting in a sauna for more than 5 min at a time. For the first half of the night I slept on our couch, just in case. In the end I felt better after a little bit of rest, and I spend my second half of the night in our bed.
Other side notes about the jimjilbang.....
- I bet you're wondering what me and my director talked about during this time. The memory stands out the most when we were both lying our sides, facing each other and asked me why I liked Dave and if I want to marry him. We talked about a range of topics such as health, friends, family, pets, etc. It is a bit hard to communicate with her because her English isn't the greatest, but it also not the worst. We had some good conversations and I learned a lot.
- Jimjilbangs are also a place where you can sleep for the night. It is $8 to get in and they have separate areas designated for sleeping.
- Because children are allowed in the jimjilbangs, sometimes we may see our students and their parents there! My director says when she sees them, it is the one time she gets shy. Could you imagine if I ever saw a student while I was on the first floor? I don't even want to think about it! hahahah
There are many differences between Korea and home but we love it!
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