A couple of weeks ago, I went to my first jimjilbang. I met my friend, Keara, and we had lunch first. She had been there many times, so it was nice to have somebody there who knew the ropes. We walk in and pay our 7,000 won. The lady gives us a towel and our shorts and t-shirt. First, we put our shoes in a locker. Then we give the shoe key to a different lady, and she gives us another key for our clothes locker. This is the part where I felt a little weird. Here in a big open locker room, you strip down. After getting over my initial "oh my god im walking around naked in front of all these Korean women and Keara" moment, we make our way into the public baths area. You are required to shower first before doing anything, so we head over to the only shower head not being used.
Before I go any further, let me paint a little picture.
Its a big square room with tile floors. Along one of the walls are the shower heads. There's also bath stations throughout the room where women sit on plastic stools and wash themselves. Another wall is filled with massage tables covered with naked ladies being scrubbed down by the workers. The back wall is home to a wet steam room and a dry steam room. The remaining wall has a cold water bath, a freakin' cold water bath, and a tepid water bath. In the middle of the room are the heated baths. Oh and there's also an area with heated stone floors to lay down on. Naked.
And it wouldn't be Korea without sinks for brushing your teeth.
So after I shower, I go into the dry steam room first. Its pretty crowded, so I'm forced to stand for a minute or two until somebody gets up. I then take their place, setting my towel on the bench before sitting down. I'm not going to pretend my eyes weren't wandering around. After all, its not everyday you get to see what Korean ladies' bodies really look like. I was surprised at all the flab. Of course there were a few of the typical Asian beauties, but the majority had pretty average bodies.
After a few minutes, my lungs felt properly saturated in steamy humid goodness. I got up and went over to the heated stone floor. You lay down on your back, naked of course, and just relax. I did cover myself with my towel, since it wasn't going to be used for anything else. A Korean lady was lying next to me, and Keara walked over for a minute. As she was walking away, the Korean lady threw her head up to watch her walk away. I guess Koreans are as curious as I was.
Picture this sans clothes and Star Wars towel-do
After my back was hurting from lying in one position, I decided I wasn't ready for the lying on my side with my ass hanging out yet. So, Keara and I tried out the warm baths in the middle. She then wanted to try out the cold baths, and for some reason, I went with her. I could only get in up to my stomach, and I quickly got out to jump back into the warm bath.
During all this, I observed. Old ladies are walking around careful not to step on their boobs, and little kids are running around without a care in the world. But the sweetest thing I saw were the moms washing their kids. It almost felt like we were in ancient Rome. And it may sound gross, but it was so clean. Everywhere you look, you see women exfoliating in the shower, lathering on the soap, and brushing their teeth.
Its interesting to think about from a cultural standpoint. Here you've got a typical conservative Asian country, where tank tops and flip flops are frowned upon. Yet, you walk into a jimjilbang and women are completely comfortable in their own skin with no inhibitions about being naked in front of their friends and strangers.
America, however, seems to be the opposite. Women can get away with wearing practically anything (nothing, rather), but get us into a locker room and eveybody's reaching for the towel from behind the shower curtain.
But there's more to a jimjilbang than public nudity. We walk out of the baths, and put on our matching pink shorts and shirt. After walking down a long hallway, we reach the co-ed part. There's little cubbies filled with Koreans napping, reading, eating, and talking. There's all kinds of different heated rooms to sit in. For instance, a salt room, charcoal room, lavendar room, etc.
They also have massage chairs (1,000 won for 10 minutes), which we took full advantage of.
Again, old people walk around, little kids run around and play. It's like an indoor central park. There's even a snack bar and restaurant!
I can say with full certainty that won't be my last trip to the jimjilbang. I feel clean and relaxed just writing about it.
