Jjimjilbang Thrills.

What is a Jjimjilbang? A once in a lifetime, not to be missed opportunity! Although most of my group did, in fact miss it. Favorite Daughter, Single (and Brave) Niece, and I were the only ones to participate in this.

For those of you who watch Kdramas you know jjimjilbangs as the sauna visited by the soldiers in Crash Landing on You. It's a staple of Korean life...and sooooo foreign to Americans. Jjimjilbangs are basically public bathhouses where you go to bathe, have your back scrubbed, visit sauna rooms, enjoy snacks, and simply relax. The only downside to Americans is that on entering a Jjimjilbang you separate by sex and shower and soak in a large pool... completely naked. All ages mixed together. Then you don great looking, short, pajama type outfits, wrap your hair in special towels, and meet up with both sexes in a communal area.

So let's review our visit through American Eyes. Firstly we try to explain to the front counter attendant that we wanted to skip the naked shower and naked soak. He looked askance at us and said "You don't want to shower?" ('Yikes, that means you'll be filthy' he thought.) We tried to explain that we weren't adverse to showering, but we really, truly did not want to get naked with each other. Niece and daughter were shuddering with even the Idea of getting naked with me. After much back and forth, miming, and showing him scenes on our phone he explained that we could just change into the pajamas 'carefully'.... So we thought, okay, we can do this and proceeded to the ladies area.

Lucky for me, Niece led the way. (This is also Bumblebee Niece from previous post.) In single file she opened the curtains and was met by the sight of 2 naked grandmas. I got a brief glimpse and exited immediately... this was not the scenario of changing 'carefully' that we had in mind! Niece wanted to be respectful so she went to a locker and fumbled around...only to have one of the grandmas come over to help her. Meanwhile I had regained my composure so Favorite Daughter and I decided we couldn't leave Niece alone with the nakedness and we entered also. I must confess that it is somewhat disconcerting - at least to these Americans - to have 6-8 women of all ages - from elementary school through grandmotherly years - walking around without even a towel casually held in strategic areas. But the 3 of us were able to get into the pajamas while facing away from each other; so at least we did not have to see any naked Americans.

At that point we entered the co-ed area of the Jjimjilbang. There is a snack bar (it sells alcohol so Bumblebee Niece thought she could cope) along with other snacks and drinks. You then get a mat and korean style pillow and line it up with all the other visitors' mats. Kind of like kindergarten naptime... We noticed several couples who apparently were on dates at the Jjimjilbang as well as families with children. A kindly group taught us how to do the towel wrap for our heads which is such a great look. You pay either for 3-hour sessions or 10-hour sessions and some people even spend the night in these saunas. We visited all 5 of the actual sauna rooms which ranged in temperatures from Hellish to Freezer. (My favorite was the freezer.)

Different cultures have different behaviors and customs; neither culture is better or worse than the other. They are simply different. Jjimjilbangs are clearly a cultural difference!

Love the headpieces and can offere tutorials on how to do this!