South Korea Saunas

Other ways to raise our core temperature are saunas, hot baths and steam rooms. Many cultures around the world believe in the healing effects of varying degrees of hot and cold therapy. In South Korea (and in Korean immigrant communities in the Western world), it is a common wellness practice to visit a jjimjilbang. Many of the saunas also feature different minerals, such as gold, amethyst or charcoal. Korean spa goers see these spas as a place to relax and socialize while attending to their health and beauty.

Most Korean bathhouses also feature massage, skin exfoliation and specialty skin treatments. More elaborate Korean spa complexes include in-house restaurants, movie theaters, hair and nail salons, or even karaoke. Popular in Russian culture, especially in arctic villages, is a hot-and-cold sauna experience called a banya. Traditionally, sauna seekers spend time in a very hot hut with temperatures for the bravest participants creeping up to 100 degrees Celsius (212 Fahrenheit). The sauna-sitting villagers then scurry to take a cold dip in the nearby outdoor water (lake, pond or sea). Indigenous peoples throughout the Americas—from the far south in the Andes, such as the Incas (Chulla Chaka), to the Mayas of southern Mexico and Guatemala (Temazcal), to the Plains Indians in Canada and the northern United States (Inipi— Lakota peoples)—have long used sweat lodges as a spiritual space for cleansing.

Depending on the tribe and cultural understanding of the sweat lodges, many believe that the extreme heat stimulates blood circulation and helps the body sweat out impurities and toxins. Sometimes herbs or medicinal plants, such as sage or eucalyptus, are incorporated for aromatherapeutic healing. Very famous are the hamams of Turkey. These are often immaculate bathhouses that are in spacious buildings typically made of marble. The standard Turkish bathhouse has the participant travel through a corridor of increasing heat intensity. This hallway usually leads to a room with divided-off slabs or stalls for the soap and massage experience of a professional masseur. Here you will get soaped up and scrubbed down before being doused with a cold-water rinse. After the professional bathing, often there is a steam room of a more comfortable (yet still quite warm) temperature in order to relax before leaving. For everyone from sultans to peasants, hamams are quintessential to Turkish culture, and a visit to Turkey is not complete without this spa experience.

How do you know when too much is too much? The absolute importance of listening to your body is essential when experimenting with heat and cold exposure. It isn’t a challenge of seeing how much you can endure or how miserable you can be for a given amount of time. Too extreme of either temperature can be dangerous and even fatal. Therefore, it is imperative to start off slowly and increase quickly. If you feel uncomfortable (besides a feeling like, “Wow, this cold-water shower sure would be nicer if it were a warm bubble bath”), then pay attention to that and adjust appropriate