Sleeping at a Jjimjilbang (a Korean bathhouse & sauna)

Spending a night on the wooden floor of a jjimjilbang. Photo: Grrrltraveler.
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Where can you sleep for cheap in Korea? For travelers and expats, here’s a cultural and budget tip for you…

A friend once mentioned staying overnight at a jjimjilbang as a way to hurdle hotel costs (which may run anywhere from a low $18-40). Those wishing a weekend getaway to visit friends in other cities or just to tour more regions in Korea, a jjimjilbang is a perfect way to do it, while getting an inside peek at Korean culture. Jjimjilbangs are popular with Koreans; it’s a 24-hour public bathhouse (read here) and board. Some jimjilbangs are enormous and grand, featuring many amenities to occupy your day; others may just offer a simple setting. A jjimjilbang isn’t elite but is like a gym or spa with an open membership. As long as you pay the 7,500W entrance fee, you’re in.

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Who comes to jjimjilbangs?

Everyone and anyone. From drunken or traveling singles, to couples seeking to escape the eagle eye of parental supervision (adults live with their parents until marriage) and traveling families… all come here to wash, sweat, bathe and sleep!  Is it safe? Yes, this is Asia and more specifically, Korea. The worst you might meet is accidentally getting an arm in your face if you’re lying too close to your neighbor.
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Achey-breaky and having spent the entire day sightseeing Busan on foot, I arrived at the front desk of Haeundae Spa at 1AM!  I asked for jjimjilbang service and gestured chaya (aka sleep). I paid my 7,500w, got a key to a locker, two medium hand towels and a pair of pink canvas smocks to sleep in. I was off to the female-only room.

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Shower, soak, sauna and wash.

This was my second experience at a korean bathhouse, so hopefully I’ve got the routine down.  After showering, I lounged in the jade sauna before taking my wash. Tonight wasn’t about experiencing the baths, but jjimjil beds! After showering, blow-drying my hair and preparing for bed, I took the elevator to the 2nd floor of the facility: the sleeping room.

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How do you sleep in a jjimjilbang?

It was 2:30 AM, when the elevator doors opened. My jaw dropped to stunned. Strewn over the heated wooden panel floors were over a hundred Korean jjimjilbangers; it was a giant uni-sex dorm! Bodies littered everywhere, the room looked like a minefield of fallen pink and blue-smocked Korean soldiers (pink smocks are for women; blue smocks are for men).  I walked over to a pile of “bedding” materials and  grabbed:

• two blankets

• a wooden block (for a pillow)

Then I searched for a spot on the floor to bed down for the night. I once said that ‘the wooden block’  pillow thing was a comfortable headrest. I  must have lied. That was before I had to sleep on it for an entire night! It wasn’t comfortable and with my mysterious dry cough, the hard floor wasn’t providing me with an adequate night’s rest.

The Korean bodies passed out in a co-ed jjimjil sleeping room.

My bed.

A jimjil home away from home.

The main sleeping room had its pseudo home-like comforts; a snack bar, massage recliner chairs, a dvd bang (aka “room”), saunas, PC bang and various other undefined rooms. People were asleep everywhere. The dvd room fashioned a wide-screen LCD screen, which played rolling movies for those wanting to fall asleep to entertainment. Some slept in the sauna room (which I didn’t understand), because it was still a sweat box by morning. Massage chairs lined a third of the wall space and this offered extra relaxation, as well as more bed support.
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PC Bang in the jjimjil facility

People crashed out on the massage chairs
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What is it like watching sleeping Koreans at a jjimjilbang?

I’ve never taken notice of other people’s sleeping patterns. Here it’s surprising. Young couples entwined in frozen state, entire families draped over each other in criss-cross and dead-like fashion, teens cuddled near a collected pile of manga magazines. Some  sleep mummified; others monopolize their surroundings with flailed arms or legs.
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A jimjil home away from home.

When I finally awoke at 9 AM in the morning, half-dazed and grumpy from my lack of proper sleep, I discovered much to my surprise, that half the night crowd was still asleep. Perhaps Koreans aren’t early risers on the weekends. I decided to take another tour around.

Walking over snoozing bodies, I realized, I had successfully spent my first night at jjimjilbang and I had done it solo!

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The balcony overlooking Haeundae district and the sleeping city of Busan

jjimjilbangers asleep in one of the sauna rooms

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Looking for a jjimjilbang in Busan?

Haeundae Spa
Open 24 hours
Cost: 7,500W jjimjilbang
4,000-6,000 W for just bathhouse
Haeundae, Busan

Getting there:
– 5 minute walk from the Haeundae Bus Terminal
– 5 minutes from Subway Station (Line 2)
-10 minute walk from the Tourist Information Center
– 5 minute walk from Paradise Hotel

Any jjimjilbangs you’d recommend? Where and why?

All photography are copyright GRRRLTRAVELER@2010. For usage rights please contact grrrltraveler@gmail.com