Going to the Gym in Korea

Going to the gym in Korea is a TERRIFYING AND FRIGHTENING EXPERIENCE if you are a foreigner and you go to a very small gym in an area where there are not many (or any) other foreigners. Let me tell you my story.

Realizing around December that I had been subsisting almost entirely on deep fried pork belly and Baskin Robbins ice cream and minimal exercise, I decided that joining a gym would make me feel healthy and stuff. Luckily, there is a gym about a 5-minute walk from my apartment. I would stare at it every day, wondering what it was like inside, but being too afraid to actually go.

Then, in January, I made going to the gym my #1 New Year's resolution (#2 is saving money; #3 is drinking less Diet Coke. I am not being very successful in maintaining either resolution) and sucked it up and just went one day.

My first visit was so horrible and embarrassing and confusing. First, I didn't know what floor the gym was in the building, so I decided to take the stairs. I found the door to the gym, but it was blocked off with a ping pong table. I thought it was closed so I started to walk home. Then I decided to try the elevator, and it got me to the entrance. I guess you just can't take the stairs. Weird. But I was so confused and overwhelmed and had no idea where I was going I was getting really nervous.

I found the man at the desk and he was really friendly and knew a little English so negotiation was easy. I bought a 3-month membership for 150,00. This is essentially the same price per month I paid for Gold's Gym at home, with tons of free classes, multiple rooms, a pool, and every machine imaginable. This gym is probably the size of a Korean apartment and has 12 treadmills. And ONE elliptical. What??! Then he showed me where to pick up the gym uniform, an ill-fitting red t-shirt and matching orange LONG CARGO SHORTS that I am supposed to wear when I work out. I wear the shirt, but I can NOT wear long orange cargo shorts in public. It's OK because lots of other people wear their own pants, too. Then he showed me around to every machine, after yelling something loudly in Korean that made every person in the gym stop what they were doing and stare at me (something about the "American teacher". I guess he was asking if anyone spoke better English. He managed to recruit one woman who is probably one of my students' mothers to show me the locker room and she actually put the shirt on over my head.)

The thing about Korean gyms is that the locker room is just like a jimjilbang. NAKED PEOPLE EVERYWHERE. Women just chill out in the locker room post-workout shower, putting on lotion and drying their hair and gossiping. Averting one's eyes is a must. Needless to say, I do NOT EVER shower at the gym. It would just be too much.

After this literally every single man in the gym started to chat with me. Two of them were trainers and offered their services to me (I said I couldn't afford it and they said they'd give me special free lessons, but I think that just meant they wanted to go on a date with me) and one was a university student who talked to me for about 20 minutes while I could literally smell the sweat coming off my body and dripping down my face. He was nice but I never saw him again. Anyway, I just wanted to work out in peace, but I couldn't! And everyone was so 'helpful' I could barely walk across the room without three people jumping at me and show me the "correct" way to do it. It was just overwhelming the first day, but now it's a lot better.

Another fixture of Korean gyms are super-aggressive trainers. Sonya has told me many stories about the "Trainer Jake" at her gym who always bothered her to pay for personal lessons. At my gym I have "Trainer Cory" and several other trainers whose names I don't know who want to do nothing more than chat in simple English with me while I am sprinting on the treadmill and sweating all over myself, or to come up behind me while I'm lifting weights and show me the "correct" way to do it and tell me everything I'm doing is wrong. Haha. I really appreciate their help, it just makes me uncomfortable because then everyone starts watching me and I look (and smell) gross after I've been running for 30 minutes.

Anyway, other than the small size of the gym, the indescribably awful uniform, and being the only foreigner there, and the one time a naked old woman started yelling at me in the locker room in Korean for no reason, I don't mind going to the gym (especially in the afternoon when it's not crowded.) And I appreciate how helpful and friendly the staff are when they see me. Signing up was easy, and the machines are almost all in English (although I think the calorie counters are really messed up- no way does 10 minutes on a bike burn 120 calories, and 10 minutes on the elliptical burn 30!) and now I feel better about myself and don't feel bad for stuffing my face with delicious food every day.