Korean Job Discussion Forums

[bogey666]

Ever since it got really cold a week or two ago, I've faced a certain problem:

my bathroom is obviously not heated and on top of things, it has a window. This means it gets a bit chilly during these times.

Accordingly, this means I turn up the temp on my daily showers to a hotter than usual to adjust for this, and the hotter water feels that much better on my exposed skin.

However, I can only get maybe a minute of water that's hot to my liking, despite cranking up the lever to hotter and then hottest. Ultimately it turns into what feels like a coolish warm temp and it essentially means I can NOT take a nice and long luxurious hot shower, they have to be fairly quick and fairly Spartan.

When I first told my landlord about this, he said... it will be better when you turn on your ondol (I had not turned it on until quite recently).
So imagine my disappointment once I turned it on - NO DIFFERENCE.
Also turning up the water temp contol on that ondol made NO difference.

when I asked him about this again yeesterday (btw he lived in the US and speaks communicative English) he said.. well Korean people take hot showers in sauna.

I'm like WTF - there did you shower when in the US?
at home he said.. but he said.. US is a very rich country and the water boilers are all big, allowing for large amounts of hot water.. here no.
so if you want a long, very hot shower you must go sauna.

I'm not impressed or happy with this answer (though admittedly the water boiler in my closet spaced appt is quite small) and I suppose I can "live with it" (unhappily) , especiallys since I won't be here in January, but do others have the same problem or issue?

[Return Jones]

Korean boilers are not like hot water tanks back home. They don't store heated water, instead they heat it as it runs through. A good idea in theory, but we all know the end product is often mediocre at best.

Try lowering the flow of the water just slightly. Putting the water at max flow often doesn't give the boiler enough time to heat the water as it passes through. If that doesn't work, you might be SOL since your landlord is being a bit stubborn and shrewd.

Many Koreans do indeed go to the sauna, but in 2008 they also find it normal to have a decent shower in the house. BTW, many Korean bathrooms do have a window. The chilly aspect, you'll just have to tough out. Most of us have had a crappy apartment bathroom situation at least once during our stay here.

[bassexpander]

They stopped going to saunas for daily cleaning about 15 or more years ago.

[PeteJB]

I have a boiler back home in the UK, and I can tell you know, it's a pile of shit compared to the instant-heat system my place here uses. I only wish I had a bathtub to fill in my bathroom! I'm going to have to buy an inflatable bathtub I think

[mindmetoo]

[Seoul'n'Corea]

[Css]

My hot water comes in waves..

It goes from arctic cold to scolding...Ive just learned to move the temp control when it starts to change...and to step out of the stream at the proper times..

[mindmetoo]

[bogey666]

[Ya-ta Boy]

One way to help warm the bathroom is to put that cling-wrap stuff over the bathroom window. It cuts down on the amount of cold air coming in without shutting out the light. (Some people put aluminum foil over it.)

[rusty1983]

I just moved from a house in the UK on which the hot/cold water didnt work properly. You had to turn the cold water on to get hot water, and then you got about 1 minute of decent temp before you either got burnt or it went super-cold.

It was effective in waking me up, but put me in the worst possible mood, and apparently beyond repair.

[Seoul'n'Corea]

[prideofidaho]

We had this problem a few weeks back. For about four days straight there was no hot water in the morning (around 7am)...but then the landlady turned our ondol on, and that was that. I think it needed to get a good boost, then it got used to being turned on.

Either way, cold showers suck....especially when the water runs cold just after you've put conditioner in your hair.

[pkang0202]

My old room used to do that. I had to reduce the flow of the water a lot. When I reduced it, the water got hotter. It wasn't a strong stream of water, but as long as it was hot, I didn't care.

[mindmetoo]