Jimjilbang

The Korean bathhouse. Baths and hot tubs of ranging sizes and bubbles.  Saunas of varying temperatures and therapeutic benefits. A café, restaurant, computer room, jungle gym, treadmill exercise area, reading area, and nail salon at this particular venue. It costs about $8 to enter this particular jimjilbang for 24 hours, and it really can be turned into an all day affair. For some it appears to be a whole family activity.  You can even spend the night at a jimjilbang, which is a cheap accommodation if you don’t mind the lack of sleeping privacy. The electronic locker key that is on a waterproof wristlet serves as your credit card to all the extra perks. On the way out you have to settle your tab, or forgo your shoes.

My coworker and I spent our first hour or so in the bath area, dipping into one pool or another and letting any tension melt away.  This portion of the jimjilbang is gender segregated…because you bathe naked. Also in this section is a massage service that looked a little too rough for my taste as well as full body scrubs that cleans every last flake of dead skin off…and then some.  

Following the bath portion, we adorned in the lovely yellow prison uniform outfits that they provide and headed for the mixed gender area to use the saunas.  On the way, an reenergizing misutgaru grain drink that seem popular at the jimjilbang. The hot rooms ranged in temperature from ice cold to warm to very very hot. In addition, the saunas also had different themes such as charcoal and pink salt, probably having some type of medicinal benefits I am unaware of. I really enjoyed the moderately hot saunas in combination with the cold room to cool off once in a while.  I had fully anticipated loving the baths but was surprised by my love for the saunas. The whole experience from start to finish was relaxing and thrilling.