The Korean Spa Experience

Enter with me a place that you have never imagined in your wildest dreams. Enter a place that will transport you to a world of relaxation and calmness... A place where you can be your true self, honest and open. A place that sends you back into the world refreshed, smooth skinned and fabulous.

Enter with me into the Korean Spa . . .

I've always looked up to my aunt for many reasons. One such is that she always gets "into" stuff...she finds amazing things out there in the world and gets really excited about them and shares it with her peeps in hopes of getting them turned on to her beloved stuff she's into. These include: Loccitane Products, Stila, Laura Mercier, Lush Brand, yoga, Raw-food-diet, etc. I like this because it narrows down my options and helps me explore new things with less of a sense of being overwhelmed by the plethora of choices out there, cause lets face it: "too many options may kill a man (/woman)".

I was back in Chicago visiting from NY (wahhh) one time and my aunt finally made plans to take me to this magical place. I had heard many myths about this legendary place: naked people and screaming Koreans and all,  and I decided that I was going to put my whole experience in the hands of my aunt since she had been through it and lived to tell about it. I was going to do as she did during this whole time.

We got to the check in counter. You pay at the entrance and get a bracelet with a number and a key on it. From this point on, you are a number. Everything you do in the spa is connected to that number. There is a separate entrance for guys and gals. You enter and the first set of lockers you take off your shoes. Then you enter the big locker room and here you strip off all of your identifying street clothes and stuff them into a locker. From there you are given one towel. Being that I was following my aunt, we went into the pool area. This area has a bunch of different hot pools, a cold pool, a wet sauna, a bunch of showers, and a bunch of sinks next to each other. There is also an area with massage tables lined up next to each other side by side.

Naturally, we walked inside this pool/wet area and were completely naked. I recalled hearing stories of the Korean women who staff the Spa yelling at our friends to get naked, no one is allowed in the area with any clothes, bathing-suits, etc. So I remembered that and did as the Romans, er, Koreans do. At that time I vaguely recall feeling a bit weird about all of this. But it took just a few moments to recalibrate my feelings/thoughts/sensations regarding this nudity business. I watched a group of women walk past me to the sink area where they proceeded to self-scrub themselves (more on this later). They were just letting it all hang out. This is who they were and there was absolutely no hiding it. It hit me that at this place you are exactly who you are: open and honest, the naked truth, literally. Perhaps this enforced nakedness is part of the cleansing process, not so much physical but more mental, spiritual, emotional. You cannot hide behind sparkly jewelry, designer jeans or handbags, a fancy haircut or a face-full of makeup. In this place, for a given amount of time, you are exactly who you are. It was really beautiful realization. It was that simple.

After going into the pools, we went to the wet sauna. I really dislike heat in my face. I could stand 2 minutes of this torture and then I am out. My aunt had requested a scrub/massage combo. I came to the place where they had the massage tables lined up. My therapist's name was: Jenny (mmm hmmm . .). She was not naked, however what she had on was even more bizarre. She had on a black-laced underwear and a bra combo. All of the massage therapists had similar outfits. It was a uniform of sorts. It would have been weird if she was naked too, but her "uniform" was strange in its own right. The communication between Jenny and myself was a series of verbal commands: "Turn-over," a lot of non-verbal body/sign language, and a bit of my broken Korean at the end to say, "Thank you."  I laid down on the table which was made out of green rubber. She started scrubbing me real hard yelling at me to turn over from time to time. As I was turning over I could feel tiny balls of clay starting to surround me until I realized that was the scrub particles. I felt like she was cleansing all of my sins from my body. She would squirt baby oil on me and do the acupressure massage and twirl me around to change directions. I felt like a walrus. She also applied this freshly grated cucumber mask on me. It was delicious and refreshing. I left her massage feeling so soft.

After the massage, my aunt told me to meet her in another area that houses all of the little rooms where you go and lay down. I exited the Pool room into the locker room. They have a choice of 3 different size/color outfits: shirt and shorts, for you to wear into the main area. There, everyone is walking around in the Spa uniform. We ate some Chirashi salad!! YUM! and laid down in the different heated rooms. I like the salt room because it's like an igloo made with real salt blocks (I know cause I licked it). After relaxing for a few minutes, we went back into the locker room, brushed our teeth, dried our hair, got dressed and came out into the world ready to take on anything that was in our way!

I have since been back twice, and ready to go again. People seriously LIVE there: they sleep, eat, study, lay, play chess, read newspapers, watch tv. . . everything and anything . . . it's open 24 hours....oh yea, another interesting fact: there is procedure/treatment there described like this: a pot  that you sit on with your butt and it effuses some kind of happy steam into your area to make you refreshed and invigorated, didn't try it, perhaps that will be in a later post!

So, who's down? Any takers?!?!