Dr Fish - an extreme pedicure

Ok, I know this technically happened during one of my earlier trips to Seoul and might not qualify for this post-move blog but it still happened to me, in Korea and is a beauty treatment.....of sorts.

It took 3 attempts for me to finally find a Dr Fish cafe because even though they are common throughout Seoul, they are hard to find unless you are fluent in Korean. Even though some directions can be found online, they are unreliable because they will undoubtedly use other establishments as points of reference instead of actual street names and numbers. This is common in Korea. You can probably understand how frustrating this can be when your original directions which read "walk 20 steps from Subway exit 6, right at the Burger King and down the alley until you find the red door" are quickly changed if the Burger King moves premises or the red door is suddenly painted yellow. Luckily for me I have a Korean friend who is naturally fluent in Korean but also doesn't mind the odd extreme beauty treatment.

So one day we ventured to Gangnam for a Dr Fish pedicure. This involves a cafe with a couple of tubs built into the floor with fish swimming around. For the cost of a cup of coffee (this includes free freshly baked bread, jam and cream) you also get a Dr Fish pedicure. So after we had our drinks and ate some lovely warm bread, we ventured over to the "tub" area. After a quick wash of the feet, we proceeded to stick our feet into one of the tubs. A timer was set for 15 minutes and from there I experienced one of the weirdest experiences of my life. These lovely fish started eating my feet. At first it was so ticklish that my friend and I were giggling non stop. After about 5 minutes your feet get used to it and it feels like a hundred tiny fingers are pinching your feet at once. It wasn't until after our pedicure was over that we realized we were given the big fish! At 2 inches long, our fish had very big mouths compared to the little half inchers that our neighbours were lucky enough to get. The result??? The smoothest feet I have ever had. The best bit??? My feet tingled for a good 30 minutes afterwards. Not bad considering it cost me only a couple of won and I didn't have to worry about how my feet looked. The fish really don't care!

I wouldn't recommend this for the squeamish or people with strong vegetarian beliefs (after all these fish are carnivores). But if you are ever in Seoul and looking for a unique experience, I would definitely recommend it. Directions to the Gangnam Dr Fish: exit 6 Gangnam subway station, cross street and it's on the second floor of one of the first buildings you come to. You'll know which one because the sign on the front of the building has a picture of a tree on it. The same one that's on the Dr Fish website.