5 things I like about Korea: Part 1

It's funny, when you live somewhere for long enough it begins to feel like home. Small things that used to shock or amaze you on a daily basis begin to feel fairly routine. Oh, there's a guy driving his motorcycle down the sidewalk (sometimes cars, too)? No big deal. What's that, we're having octopus, squid, and seaweed for lunch? Just a typical Wednesday meal.

Here's a quick list of 5 random observations, or things that I've gotten used to that I rather like.

1- Ridiculously cheap yet high quality food. For any given meal, you can expect to pay around or under $4-5 at a restaurant. This may not seem like a big deal, but, when you consider the 4-8 side dishes that accompany every meal (banchan) it's a great bargain. These side dishes are refillable, too. The servers wait on your beck and call and are more than happy to fill these back up ASAP.

2- This kind of ties into #1 and the low cost of dining. No tipping. Anywhere. Ever. They won't accept it so don't even try. This includes taxis, delivery men, and every other service-related thing you'll pay for.

3- The subway. Seoul has one of the best public transportation systems in the world. Buses run everywhere and the subway is usually only a 10-15 minute walk away from wherever you are. Oh, and it's dirt cheap. I can take a 45 minute subway ride from one side of the city to the other for around $1. They can get very crowded, though. You usually only get a seat if you're an older person and it's common courtesy to give yours up if one gets on. See the map below.


4- Cheap movies, sports, museums, etc. Being away from the land of Stars and Stripes on our nation's birthday left me with one option; engage in our national pastime. I went and saw the Doosan Bears take on the LG Twins at the Jamsil stadium (KBO). Admission was 6,000 KRW which is about $4.50. You can bring food and drink in, too. They had vendors outside selling Hite tallboys' for $2. Also, had a Burger King vendor so yeah... baseball, beer, burgers is about as close as one can get to the 4th without being on US soil.

5- Anything that ends in -bang. In Korean, 'bang' means 'room'. So, on any given street you'll find a number of -bangs.

First, the PC Bang. It's essentially an internet cafe where hordes of young kids come play internet games. You can also check your email or do whatever for around $1.50 an hour.

Next, the jjimjilbang. I wrote about this before but I'm a huge fan of the bath house.

And last but defintely not least, the noraebang. Usually a night out goes as follows: dinner first, usually lasts 1-2 hours. Once everybody eats we go to another place for drinks. But, it's not custom to drink without eating (most places, hofs, won't even serve you without ordering a snack of some kind) so we'll then take a 2nd dinner of light snacking and soju. After a time there it's usually off to go the noraebang to go belt out some hot tunes. They use some kind of software there that processes your voice to make it sound better (studio magic?). Also, at the end of each song they rate your performance. Here's a good video of said noraebang. The English song selection is quite comprehensive, I might add.

So that's it. The first 5 things that came to mind about about things I do and see everyday that might be different for those not living here. I've got tons more I'll probably write about but this will be a nice little bite of kimchi.

Jjimjilbang

The sign above is ubiquitous on almost every street in Korea, the almighty Jjimjilbang. A jjimjilbang is essentially a public bath house. If you're cool with stripping down to nothing in front of strangers (see: 30-50 naked Korean men) it's a fantastic place on so many levels.

Most importantly, it's a nice one or two hour place to relax. The drill code is this; you walk in and pay the receptionist approximately 5,000 won ($4.00 USD) and she will give you a key. You put your personals in a locker and receive a key to said locker. If you're planning on staying a while you will get a uniform, which is a set of loose fitting clothes to hang out in after the bath experience. There is no check out time, you can stay as long as you'd like. In fact, many people stay the night here because it's cheap and they also offer mats and pillows to sleep on, usually by a hearth that heats the hot pools, (there's been a few late nights where I've done this).

Once you've paid and you walk in (naked), you'll usually take a shower to clean up, which is similar to most western public pools. After that, you will find a number of different pools. Some of which are scalding hot, and other are very cold. They also have the traditional steam sauna to add to the mix. The best rotation, I've found, is to go from scalding hot to ice cold, and then to a steam room, and then back to cold. The rotation between hot and cold stimulates blood circulation, and actually provides a sense of euphoria (confirmed).

These places are open 24 hours and are everywhere. It's a great place to relax and hang out at or also really effective at battling a late night. The western conception of bath houses, at least in my own experience, are that they are gay or weird stuff goes on inside them. Not so in Korea, families come to these on the regular, even couples go on dates.

After you're done hanging out in the pools you put back on your uniform and head inside. A legit jjimjilbang will offer many other amenities, such as: fitness rooms, massage rooms, health and medicine spas, snack bar... hell, you can even grab a beer and watch some television after you're done relaxing. For the price and how great it is, it's money well spent.