Of Spas and Singing Rooms

Two of the rites-of-passage of life as a foreigner in Korea are the first trip to Jimjilbaeng and Noraebang (spa and karaoke bar, respectively). For better or worse, your correspondent has finally had both of them. Both were by turns memorable, fun, and incredibly alien experiences which offer tantalizing-albeit-marginally-intelligible glimpses into the Korean psyche. 

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Johan describes Jimjilbaeng as sort of an evolutionary throwback to a Dark Ages inn. Jimjilbaeng provide ultracheap, sleep-on -the-floor accommodations for travelers as well as a built-in public bath. Every wide spot in the road in Korea has one. Like about everything in this country, the vibe of a Jimjilbaeng is profoundly communal -- which is probably why going there was so off-putting to my American individualist's psyche. At least at first, anyway. 

Johan and I went to the Jimjilbaeng in Dangjin, an angular, steel-and-granite hulk located at the end of a narrow, neon-lit warren. Standard operating procedure at this one is to trade your shoes in for orange, jailsuit-type garb (your sleepwear, if you stay the night). In Dangjin, spa and sleeping mat together cost you less than the equivalent of $15, which makes the Jimjilbaeng one of Korea's most affordable fun things to go do. 

Sleeping rooms are found one the third floor. Most buildings in Korea are equipped with ondol, a gas-powered underfloor heating system, and the Jimjilbaeng is no exception. The sleep setup is kind of like an Asian take on a youth hostel, meaning it's minus the bunk beds and actually quiet enough to sleep. Whole familes curl up together on thin mats sitting on the ondol. I didn't stay the night, but next time I go someplace overnight in Korea I am definitely going to avail myself of the Jimjilbaeng setup. 

Two floors up, you find the two spas (one for men and one for women) -- a collection of hot and cold pools where everyone soaks, chews the fat, and hangs out together naked. And yes, I did say NAKED -- as in. stark, utterly, not-a-stitch on you naked. Normally, this would totally bug out a stiff Protestant character such as your correspondent -- and it still did some -- but after a Spaghetti-Western moment's consideration, I shrugged, doffed my boxers, and did as the Koreans do. 

Another of the jimjilbaeng's SOPs is the shower. Everybody takes one in full view of the soaking pools. This is done as a kind of a good faith gesture to everybody else that you aren't filthy when you hop in next to them. The hot pools range between 34 and 44 degrees Celsius in temperature. The combination of the heat and the jacuzzi jets built into the walls and floor of some of them work wonders on sore muscles and chapped skin. An occasional trip into a (relatively) cold, 18-degree pool chills and refreshes. 

All around us, Korean teenagers gave each other touchy showers and feely back-rubs that looked, shall we say, eyebrow-raising, to my American mind. Suffice to say, though, that same-sex tactile interactions that would be either tooth-grindingly awkward or incredibly sexual for a Westerner just aren't that way here. Being an American, I have not seen any of my close male friends naked -- let alone most strangers. Here friend and stranger alike hang out naked as a matter of course. And it's all good in the hood. Moments like these make you realize how far east you actually are living in Korea. 

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My first time at Noraebang was kind of like my first kiss – clumsy, surreal, embarrassing-in-retrospect, but fun all the same. Koreans like to hit up such singing rooms after a night out drinking. Hapdeok, the farming village where I live, is a town of maybe ten thousand that has at least ten Noraebang, which should tell you something about the popularity of singing rooms here. Maekju (beer), soju (a sugary vodka, usually about 19% alcohol), and makoli (rice beer) all flow freely at any social occasion, so by the time everyone stumbles into Noraebang spirits are high. Once at Noraebang, they drink more and very quickly, often going from completely sober to under the table and dreaming in about two hours. Every Korean I meet tells me about how getting drunk and singing together strengthens friendships. Even relatively light drinkers such as pastor's-daughter Grace espouse this view as if it were a Korean national mantra. They seem determined to get wrecked on schedule, so that they can rush home on schedule, so that they can then get up and go to work on schedule, since such revelry often takes place on weeknights. I went to the "Oh Korea" Noraebang located in Hapdeok's tiny downtown quarter. "Oh Korea" was a maze of polished marble and imitation wood-paneling bathed in a blue neon glow. Numerous sound-proofed rooms sat off the main hall so that the establishment's various guests did not disturb each other. 

Once inside, events progressed along predetermined lines. Korean beer was available in abundance and the lyrics to American Top 100 tunes and K-Pop scrolled across the room's LED screens. Teachers of the same gender held sweaty hands, stared deep into each other's eyes, and sang American love songs into the karaoke machine's mics with a fervor that had me gnawing my lip to keep from laughing out loud. Many of the Koreans seemed to take the singing very seriously and would have had good voices if they weren't about to pass out. Several weeks later, the traumatic-but-hilarious memory of all this is -- mercifully -- beginning to fade -- but I doubt if I will ever be able to listen to the BeeGees in quite the same way. Perhaps more frightening than the singing itself is the fact that the original meaning and sexual context of such songs seem completely lost on them. Korean affinity and esteem for English words are equalled only by their lack of understanding of their meanings. 

After several rounds of such songs and much peer pressure to "sing something," I decided it was time to put a stop to all the pop-iness, and dialed up "Back In Black" on the room's computer. Between all the booze and the excitement of the moment, I remember only flashes of what transpired next, but, since that night, nervous laughter and expressions of complete and abject horror will appear instantly on the faces of anyone at Hapdeok Steel High School if you so much as whisper that Erik Osburn might sing again. 

Shortly thereafter, Grace decided it was time for me to go home, and I was hustled out of the bar and into her gray Hyundai. My last memory of my first night of Noraebang is of me trying to define the word "pantheon" for Grace, so that I could explain how, in the Pantheon of Drunkenness, I really wasn't that high up Mount Olympus. Hermes perhaps, Apollo, maybe -- Zeus, no way. Apparently she couldn't understand my rather slurred explanation of all this, which, I am told, kind of served to disprove my point.