Nakey Time, Seoul Pt. 1

My week of summer break flew by in a flurry of international food, sweat, sight seeing, and the Olympics. Sean and I just recently had our summer break, and we decided we wanted to travel to Seoul (the capital of South Korea for those who do not know). We had not received our first paychecks, thought it was too soon to check out a different country and we wanted to spend more than a weekend in Seoul.

We left a few hours after work on a Friday and jumped on a train to Yongsan station (a station within Seoul). We finish work at 10:00pm and the train left at 12:51am so we headed home to quickly pack and make it over to the train station. We wrote down “train station” in Hangul (the Korean written language) so we could show the taxi driver.

Unfortunately if we try to say anything in Korean besides Anyoung ah say oh (Hello), Cam Sa Ham Knee Dah (Thank You), and Anyoung Gah Seh Oh (Goodbye), to the majority of Koreans they do not even realize we are attempting to speak their language and when they finally figure out we are trying to speak Korean they make NO ATTEMPT to understand us. -______- It is very frustrating but we are continuing to try to speak Korean anyway…

ANYWAYS, we had purchased first class train tickets to get to Seoul because we were feeling fancy and did not think the small upgrade in price was extravagant. Neither Sean nor I had been in a first class anything so we figured, Why Not? We got to the train station with twenty minutes to spare and went in search of our platform. It was relatively easy to find and there were more people at the train station than I would have originally thought should have be for so late at night. But apparently going to Seoul is a popular thing to do.

We had just arrived at the platform and were looking for signs in English to confirm that we were at the right place when an enthusiastic Korean approached us and spoke to us in English. A Korean had approached us willingly without any provocation and was not trying to sell us something? This was abnormal.

It was a good thing they had it in English as well =]

He began talking and his speech was a bit slurred. He seemed excited to be speaking in English but a bit embarrassed that he was talking to us at the same time. He was trying to make sure that we were at the right place, going in the right direction. He continuously asked for our ticket wanting to read it. It was a very strange and sketchy request but we pulled out one of our tickets and let him look at it. Nodding happily he confirmed that we were at the right place but that we wanted to be at a different location on the platform. Apparently we needed to get on a certain car. I have very rarely ridden trains and had no idea about any of this. We were very thankful for his help even though he was very interested in us and where we were going. I felt a little like I was watching the movie “Taken”, all of our answers were vague. When he asked us whom we were going to see in Seoul we lied and told him lots of people!

The train ended up being 10 minutes late and we talked to this guy the whole time we waited. I don’t know why it took us so long to realize it but this young college aged guy who was very excitable and slurring his speech was indeed intoxicated. This explained a lot.

Ttttrrraaaaiiiinnnnn!!!!!

The train pulled up and we got on with no problem, found our seats (numbers look the same in Korean and English), and put our backpacks away. The seats reclined back pretty far, almost uncomfortably so as your head ended up in the person behind you’s lap. But to tell the truth besides a little more elbow room and a slightly bigger chair, neither Sean nor I thought it was worth the increased cost. We managed to find some drinks and a can of Pringles before I passed out and slept the rest of the trip.

Sean woke me up as we were pulling into Yongsan station.  I would like to stop here and point out that on both the train trip to Seoul and back to Jeonju not one time were we asked for our tickets. There were people moving all over the train as “standing room” was an option, but not one train attendee checked tickets. Makes you wonder if we could’ve ridden for free!

There is not any written acknowledgement that you’ve made it to Yongsan, only the verbal confirmation from the speaker system. Sean spotted a sign outside of our train confirming where we were and we headed off to our first destination at 4:00am.

Our new friend Lindsay who we were seeing in Seoul had recommended we stay in a Korean sauna instead of a hostel for our first partial night in Seoul because it was significantly cheaper. There are apparently sleeping rooms in these establishments. These saunas are called “jimjilbangs”, and are pronounced as they are spelled (Jim-jill-bangs, actually a little ironic that they sound like that…) These “saunas” are more commonly referred to as public bath houses, and even though we had been forewarned about what lay in wait for us here, it was another thing completely to actually see it.

We were told the sauna was called “Dragon Hill Spa and Resort” and it was located right next to the train station. It was a 6 or 7-story building and full of more people than I would have preferred at this early hour. We walked in tentatively, looking for direction of any sort. We approached a counter with a couple of people and eventually figured out how much we needed to pay and were handed clothes and a key on a bracelet… The clothes were a bit of a surprise but they looked clean and comfy so I wasn’t complaining. As was normal Korean custom we removed our shoes as we entered the first floor. It took us a while but we figured out that the small lockers on the bottom floor were for our shoes. We put our shoes away and holding hands entered the main portion of the bottom floor.

We saw that there were arcade games and tons of sleeping people on the first floor. The man at the front had quickly and in broken English explained something about how some floors were for boys and some for girls and some for both… I didn’t pick up on much of it. I did however grab a brochure, which had some English, and we used it to help us decide which floors we were headed to.

One elevator was for only women and the other exclusively for men. We parted ways and decided that we would be brave! We would meet back downstairs in an hour and try and get some sleep. We wished one another good luck and reluctantly headed up.

I entered the elevator and found that there was only one button in the elevator and pushed it. The elevator moved with the same apprehension I felt and when the doors opened I realized my apprehension was not without reason. Greeting me as the elevator doors opened were numerous Korean women… NAKED.

I had known they were going to be naked and had tried to prepare myself for the openness and casualness of this custom but my mind still wanted to reject what I was seeing. There is nothing like a public bath house… So many naked women and they are all so normal. The women were old and young, beautiful and plain, fat and thin, toned and soft. It was all I could do to keep my face straight, my eyes moving across the room, and my mind from exploding from the taboo of it all.

I found my locker and took a moment to get it together. I put my backpack away and quickly changed into my clothes while attempting to casually cover myself from the roaming eyes of the other women. It was so early in the morning, WHAT WERE THEY ALL DOING HERE?!?!?!? I left the area quickly and headed to the stairwell. I wasn’t ready for this. I was going to go to the top floor where I’d seen a sign for a garden. Sean would never know…

As I was going up the stairs I ran into my familiar red headed honey, Sean, headed down the stairs. We laughed as he explained to me that he was headed for the virtual golf game, as he couldn’t handle the nudity right off the bat as well. We found out that the garden was closed and that we were too tired for golf. We explored the open areas of the floors and found places to sleep on the floor, and in corners.

It was odd but it seemed that many young couples came here after a night on the town to spend the rest of the night sleeping away from their homes and families’. We just laid in-between all of them and did our best to catch a few hours of sleep. We woke up around 8am and decided to give the baths another chance. Leaving one another the second time around we were more determined not to chicken out.

I got off the elevator and immediately went to down to where I knew the baths were. The floor where I had stored my backpack was more of a locker room/ preparing yourself room. Nakey women were combing out snarls in their hair, shaving, applying various products, and very comfortably chitchatting… This last one was the one that made me feel the most uncomfortable (NOBODY TALK TO ME I’M NAKED IN PUBLIC is what I would have been thinking).

I went down some stairs and came into a really large room with numerous large Jacuzzis and walls of standing showers. There was a slightly partitioned area on one end of the room and interspersed areas for sitting and showering but I immediately crossed this off of my to do list because I did not want to bare bum it on any surface not in a pool.

I realized that these pools were considerably warm, very similar to a hot tub. I generally have to ease myself into a hot tub, and allow my body to become accustomed to the temperature. There would be no easing myself anywhere in this place. My plan was stripping down and jumping into a pool with little to no in between time, not to make eye contact with anyone, and to actually attempt to enjoy taking a nice hot bath (we have the little shower head so no baths at home ever).

I found the tub with the lowest temperature AND that was empty. These pools were decently sized (15ft by 10ft) but I still wanted to find an empty one. Now the undressing part and getting into the pool needed to happen fast but calmly. I was the only one in this area of the spa with no clothes on, I was the only foreigner and every eye (and there were a lot!) was on me. Of course nobody was staring because that would be very upfront and bold of a Korean woman, but make no mistake I could feel the eyes on my backside (and my frontside) as I took off my clothes. I kept my chin up and carefully got into the water.

It was so nice and I allowed myself to submerge up to my chin and close my eyes. I relaxed for a bit and then was curious myself. I opened my eyes and more thoroughly inspected my surroundings. Many of the eyes I met quickly looked away, apparently y people were not satisfied with my peep show and still wanted a peek. Honestly I began to not care, it felt good to soak and what did I care, right? They were all naked too.

Many women seemed to literally just come into the joint to take a bath and shower. Many women were soaking, and some were taking care of assorted personal hygiene maintenance things. My pool was close to the partitioned area and I could semi see inside. I could see a big table… Naked women on the table… And naked women scrubbing them? I was intrigued. This was the part of the spa you could have some other woman scrub and exfoliate your naked body. I had been told about this place, I shuddered looking at it. I could not fight the discomforting thought of even maybe doing this. I averted my eyes quickly.

I finished my soaking and calmly got out of the pool. I nakedly headed over and rinsed off in one of the showers. I bravely used the communal bar of soap that was left at the shower and washed myself. This entire time I was standing out in the open, naked, with everyone (and I mean EVERYONE) getting their fill of the foreigner’s body. I had half a mind to shot at them “Take a picture, it’ll last longer!” but I didn’t know how to say it in Korean so I kept my mouth shut. In retrospect it is not odd that they were curious. A blonde foreign woman makes up about a .25% of the population so staring is warranted plus I was naked! So the staring should have gone without saying.

After showering I redressed in the sauna’s clothes and headed back to my backpack. I took my time getting back into my normal clothes and realized that my experience in this odd place was actually enjoyable. I would have preferred to of had a full night’s rest and maybe a more thorough waxing but all in all it was a good experience. I would even go so far as to say I’d do it again! I went downstairs and met up with Sean. We split a pomegranate juice from the little café and made our way back into the world of dressed and self-conscious people.

To finish this blog I would like to give a shout out to my handsome boy who courageously bathed naked with the Korean men. Being a red head creates a bit of a different stare from your fellow bathers and that took guts on his part. So proud of you my love!

To Be Continued in my next blog are the stories of our delicious food experiences and the odd hours we kept while visiting.