To your helssu

On the way out every weekend, the Sanchon Hunjang has to walk by this shop with the name 종로건강원. I think it's great. A center devoted to my--and everyone's--health. But the health food on offer here is kinda weighted to only one gender. Actually, it seems to be focused on one body part of that particular gender...



Yep. Bottle after bottle of 뱀소주. Sure to flog the flagging stamina of any guy.

Of course if 뱀소주 is not your thing, you can always get a 해구신. I'm not quite sure how these things are harvested...

...but judging by the piles in the traditional markets, there are a lot of unhappy water puppies out there.

And on the subjects of stamina and 해구신 海狗腎... According to my 옥편, the word 신 腎 means kidney (콩팥). "Kidney" would sure be a nice euphemism for the part of the seal that they're selling. But there's a little note that starts with 國(국) enclosed in a circle--the cue that a Chinese word has been given a special meaning only in Korea--and says it is also "자지(신)." But this makes it difficult to explain the wealth of Chinese and Japanese sites that use the same phrase. At any rate, this word appears to be used as a sort of cultured way to refer to penes.

Some time ago, we had a lunch appointment with some guys from a local bank. Those bank guys really love Chinese hotpot, so we went to a restaurant called 중경신선로 to have their "신선로" (which is their Korean translation for huoguo, not to be confused with the real Korean 신선로). They ordered for us and for the huoguo meat, they chose cow penis. The younger guys around the table were all saying "소 자지," but our resident big-wig called them on their lack of manners, "'자지?' '자지'가 뭐냐? 소의 '신'이라고 해야지." Call it what you want, there was a lot of sausage swimming in that soup.