Let me backtrack and define. A jimjilbang is a Korean spa, usually featuring multiple baths, saunas, pools, restaurants/snack bars, game rooms and evening overnight sleeping facilities. For around 10,000won (about $10USD) entrance fee you have full reign on the facilities and can pay extra for other services like massage, body scrub, facials, or anything spa oriented you could imagine.
Jimjilbangs are mostly gender segregated. There are usually some communal areas, which can anything non-spa oriented (games/eating/internet etc) as well as saunas. At my Seoul jimjillbang experience there were at least nine co-ed saunas ranging from Egyptian Jade Pyramid rooms to tradition hot wood rooms. In these areas everyone is clothed in a standard issue gym-class-esque garb.
While these main halls are fun, the good stuff is all in the segregated areas, the true jimjilbang bath house experience. Full of different temperature pools with varying massage jets and medicine/herbal infusions and LOTS of naked women, its what Hugh Hefner's dreams were made of. Of course, there's actual nothing sexual about a jimjilbang.
Seriously though, Jimjilbangs are like being transported back into a 70s era all Asian Playboy magazine. I say this because .....HOLY BUSH! I remember hearing from male friends dating Korean women that is was often difficult to get them to, shall we say "landscape" because pubic hair associated with fertility. But hot damn. This 'disparity' certainly contributed to my initial desire rock a bathing suit in the bath area but when surrounded by so much nakedness, it's actually more conspicuous to be the wae-gookin who isn't naked rather than the one who is and is judged as "infertile".
After a couple hours in the saunas and baths, I decided to go for it and receive a classic ajumma beating, I mean massage. I'm pretty sure that amount of slapping, punching, clawing, and general abuse should be called assault & battery but apparently in a jimjilbang that passes as massage. Perhaps I'm being a bit harsh, I'm just a bit spoilt. I definitely needed the body scrub that came with it. The amount of Asia that was apparently still caked to my freckle-y white exterior was only mildly repulsive. (You're welcome, pubic hair and dead skin all in one!)
Laying naked on a table, getting beat up by an old Korean woman in her black lace lingerie uniform, I started to reflect on all the different cultural bathhouse/massage experiences I've had over the years. This seemed like a much better option than staring at the wirey bush of the girl laying wayyyyy too close next to me. While I am partial to the Thai massage (I mean how can you go wrong with $7 and one hour of awesome?!), I am typically happy to experience the art of relaxation anywhere my feet lead me. I've had variations on the Thai yoga massage all over SE Asia. Body scrubs on Jamaican cliffs. Chinese reflexology in the PRC, ROC and HK. And of course, the Turkish Hamam (bathhouse).
The Hamam is precisely where I found my mind wandering to during my beating (massage) last night. While the similarities are many, what I found most interesting is my own prude reaction in both cases to the nudity factor. Perhaps it's just me (I don't think it is) but I do find it interesting how puritianical American culture is when you really get down to it. Korea in most cases is pretty conservative, manner panties and all. Turkey, predominantly muslim with very pretty covered public dress. And yet in both places, public bath culture prevails and nudity is completely embraced. I can't imagine a bunch of Americans going to the Y and wandering about for hours naked with friends/family/strangers alike. But I do wish there was a way we could introduce on a broad spectrum to the states. I think it be good for us culturally, not to mention helpful in promoting more positive body image for young girls.
