Spaland

One of our co-teachers at school told us about this mysterious place called ~Spaland~, which is located in the largest department store in the world, Shinsegae in Centum City. Given that this department store is only a 5 minute subway ride from our apartment (as is most things - thank you Korean transit system), we decided to give it a try. As you enter this enormous department store, which is 10 floors, each being the size of a Walmart, the big Spaland sign draws you in. We enter, skeptical of why a spa needs to be titled as if it is an amusement park.

The cost of a trip to Spaland costs a whopping 20,000 won ($18 CAD). The ticket lasts a maximum of 4 hours, which ended up being plenty of time. We are given an oversized pair of shorts, a t-shirt, and a pair of sandals each and are pointed in opposite directions into the bath houses. The first section of Spaland is gender segregated, so Sarah and I planned to meet at the next section after about an hour. As I entered the male bath house, I am immensely glad that we decided to come on a Wednesday morning during our brief teaching break to avoid the crowds. Already, the baths were filling up with naked Korean men of all ages. Oh yeah, did I mention these were nude baths?? Don't worry, I was well aware and carefully avoided eye (and penis) contact.

There were about ten different bath options, which mostly resembled hot tubs with varying temperature, as well as four different steam rooms. I opted for the steam room, shower, cold dunk, hot tub cycle and repeated for about 45 minutes. Afterwards, I put on the spa loungewear and met up with Sarah to go and check out the rest of Spaland. We tried out all of the saunas (13 in total), each with its own theme and temperature. I particularly liked the body sound vibration and hard wood charcoal rooms, as they added another element to the sauna experience. Sarah like the cold one (named the ice room) because it reminded her that she was a tough Canadian, as the Koreans who accidentally stepped into that room usually yelped and ran out.

We were told at the entrance that we would receive a free snack during our Spaland stay, so we eagerly went to collect them. Little did we know, the snack consisted of three hard boiled eggs and a large cup of this sweet rice beverage I believe is called "sikhye". We managed to each eat one eggs each and take a small sip of the drink, which was not to our taste. Lastly, we went to the photobooth room and took pictures using some dress up ears and glasses that were provided. Next time, we definitely want to use the massage chairs and check out the restaurant, but all-in-all we found it to be a relaxing experience.