Love motels

While traveling through Korea there are a few choices of where one can rest their weary had. The first is a regular hotel which what you would expect it to be though somewhat expensive and boring.For bottom of the barrel you can go to a Jimjilbang which is just a public bath house. This may be good if you're too drunk to tell the taxi driver how to get home. One big negative is that you are sharing the room with a bunch of other drunks who may become bi-curious when they see the foreigner passed out in a corner.

A step up from the jimjilbang is the minbak, which is a room in a house that you can rent with blankets but probably no (western style) bed. You may have to share the toilet and I don't remember the one I was in having a shower. The owners may provide some noodles and rice though.

After that we have the love motels. I have stayed in many of these because 1) they are everywhere in Korea and 2) they are cheap for what you sometimes get and may be cheaper than a late night taxi home. Always a hit or miss, it is a good idea to ask to see the room before you agree and pay. My friend Steve and I stayed in one not so clean place in Seoul after a long day of traveling and were too tired to find a better place. We asked to see the room and noticed the bed was still unmade from the previous guests and there was nastiness everywhere. We had to rock, paper, scissor it to fight for the cleanest place to sleep (which was the uncarpeted floor). I lost. The bathroom wall had a hole in the wall in which you could see into another room. Classy.

tiny bathroom door in a disgusting room

Other times you can get a place with a 46" flat screen tv, computer and mood lighting. I stayed in one of these for a few weeks while waiting to get into my apartment this past August. The room was much bigger than a normal hotel and there was a nice big bathtub if the urge was to hit. Some try to be a bit more romantic than others providing heart shaped tubs and beds, Korean porn on the tv (like skinamax, but without the quality acting), king sized beds and glass bathrooms.

Can't say I am a fan of the glass bathroom walls. The shot above was from the bedroom.

In case you need to check your email

If you need to spice things up a bit, in the hallway you may find a small library of Japanese porn or perhaps something else that will tickle your fancy!