Some Like It Hot. I do.

The sauna has been part of human history ever since mankind discovered the joys and benefits of extreme heat.

I’ve just got back from the local “jimjilbang” or sauna here in South Korea. Heaven!

Koreans do this so well and it’s one of my favorite things about Korea. Cheap too. $6 for soaking in a 100 different ways.

It’s an elaborate affair, even the most basic sauna here. My neighborhood one is on the 4th floor of a building. You walk in, pay, put your shoes in a locker and then with that same key, go to the main room, take off all your clothes and then enter heaven. A big area filled with bubbling pools of water, different colors with different types of minerals. There are tanks of cold water, of different degrees to plunge in. Saunas a plenty, set to hellish temperatures. And of course, tons of Korean men scrubbing themselves to nothing at the bathing, and grooming stations. It’s paradise! There are also cheap massages, haircuts, and various other medical treatments available.

Saunas are almost always open 24/7 and young people use them as hotels. Cheap, you just relax in the cooling-off room, on a hammock. Most even have a TV. You are set.

I just love the sauna lifestyle. Nothing better than a hellishly hot sauna and then jumping into the snow or a cold lake if possible. I’ve experienced Finnish saunas and various others with guys beating each other with birch branches - I still prefer the Korean approach.

I guess I became enamored after reading about the World Sauna Championships as a kid. My dad had a subscription to Outside magazine and I’d read it and it would take me places a TV never could. It’s a freakish event, the guys compete through many rounds, staying in the sauna as long as possible.

I lived in a spa town in the Czech Republic and there was nothing better than to go to the old Communist-style Hotel Thermal and sweat everything out. Unisex in Eastern Europe. I remember an American friend who visited and I told him you couldn’t wear shorts, you had to go in buck naked. He refused to go naked and sure enough - the short, stout babushka who looked after the place, peered in the small sauna window and saw him. She opened the door and gave him a good telling-off, flicking her towel at him. Poor Americans, they are so uncomfortable with their bodies, for the most part.

Of course, there is Budapest. Loved just hanging out at the bathhouse near my hotel in Pest. And yes, I did play chess while soaking away! They love their chess while in hot water.

I’ve done sweat lodges and hot mud pools. Though I’ve never soaked in a geothermal bath, say, like in Iceland. The closest I got was reading Outside magazine about a guy who got caught in a freak ice storm in Yellowstone Park. He developed severe hypothermia and was lost, his clothes frozen solid on his body. The only way to survive was to take those clothes off and jump in a hot pool of water. He was there 6 days until rescuers found him! He’d lost half his body weight and when they pulled him out he was covered in green moss from the neck down. He survived but had to undergo over 70 surgeries to remove the moss that had set roots deep into him. Moss man. True story, before the internet so sorry, I have no link.

There is nothing better than a good sweat if it is communal, even better. I’ve had some of the best conversations ever while sitting in a sauna. And no, I’m not nor ever have been a member of the mob. Something about sitting there naked, it’s so democratic, so base - so everyone seems to open up and be at ease.

The history of the sauna is fascinating and millennia old. First, a means of survival in caves but then they became a rite of passage and a way of maintaining health. In Finland, they’ve got 5 million people and about 3 million saunas. That’s how important saunas are to Finns.

I’m going to keep enjoying these Korean saunas a few times a week, over the winter season. Joyous. Who knows, maybe even a poem or two will come out of it. Like this one wrote in my head, today!

Never Settle

Never settle
even if the price seems good
even if you’re in a hurry and
need to get the job done
even if it seems much easier
and good enough.

You’ll regret it.

Not right away but
soon enough
all this settling
will add up and
one day you’ll
discover
you’ve never really
had it good,
just so-so
your whole damn life,
like a hot bath that
really isn’t that hot
but you drew it
and laid in it
anyway.

Never settle.
Hell, your standards
are all you got.
I know it ain’t much
but they’re yours so
set your bar high
and wait for the
moments to jump
over it.

Then one day
you’ll at least get to say
that you once
had it good.
And that memory can
keep a man on his feet
for a long time.

So don’t settle.
Cuz the only thing
that settles
is what’s left at
the bottom of the pot
and you don’t want
to live down there,
do you?