Lensless Glasses

Ok now this is something you see in Korea everywhere. I first noticed it when I was talking to my classmate years ago, back when I was taking a Korean language course. I was talking to her and I noticed she had really nice frames, but then I thought... wait... where are the lenses? o_O

My friend was Chinese and she probably thought it was a weird question to ask. "They're just for fashion" she told me. I've honestly never seen that in Europe anywhere. So I just didn't get it. Why would you wear glasses without lenses, it doesn't make you look fashionable, it just looks stupid...

But we all tend to be a bit negative or critical etc when we see new things that we don't know. I've been living in Korea for 3 years now and I just got used to it.

In Korea, glasses don't only serve for vision correction but they're also fashion accessories. You can wear them with lenses that have no prescription or without lenses at all. Even some of my friends do that. I already mentioned my Chinese friend from Korean language class, and then there's one of my best friends in Daegu. He's actually Korean, but he spent most of his life in America, so I see him more as an American, than Korean. He thinks lensless glasses are stupid. BUT he wears glasses with lenses that have no prescription, because he think they make him look cool (actually 'sexier' was how he put it if I remember correctly).

These are my boyfriend's glasses and as you can see they have no lenses. But he wears them sometimes! Especially when he wants to look really good. Last time I arrived by bus from Daegu to Jeonju and he came to pick me up at the bus station. He wanted to dress up for me, so he put on a nice shirt and trousers, even a tie AND these glasses.

He really does look good with them, but I really wish he'd put lenses in them, especially since he needs them anyway. He always wears hard lenses and almost never takes them out, so I think it would be good if he used prescription on these glasses and wear them sometimes instead of his hard lenses. But... oh well...

I googled this a bit and it seems that these lensless glasses originate in Japan. According to wikipedia, they first became popular in 1960s but then the trend died out. Now they are again popular in South Korea, China and Taiwan.

Have you ever seen anyone wearing lensless glasses? Would you wear them? Feel free to share your opinion in a comment. Thank you ^^

Pain relief patches

I'm not sure if this is the best subject for my first post, but... oh well :)

Pain relief patches... not necessarily something that originates in Korea or something that can't be found in any other country, it's just that I never got to use it before I got to Korea. I'm sure they had them in Japan when I used to live there, but anyway, I tried them here for the first time.

Pain relief patches are actually a really good thing. I sometimes get a pain in my lower back when I sleep in a weird position at night. Since it's hard for me to actually stretch that part of the back, it's also hard to get rid of the pain. So... during my last 3 years in Korea I learned how to get rid of it.

1. do a simple 15min yoga for lower back pain that I found on youtube

2. put a pain relief patch on the lower part of your back and take some painkillers

About number 1 - it seriously works!!! Who would have thought, such a simple yoga exercise that doesn't take more than 15mins and you feel such a relieve after you're done! I don't know how I managed to live without it. I was going to post a link to the video, but I can't seem to find it. I hope it's not gone forever :'((( I'll include that later if I find it.

And number 2 - so convenient! These patches are really cheap and can be purchased at any pharmacy or even in a convenience store. There are usually 4 or 5 of them packed together and you can wear one for 24 hours. I never need more than 2 of them to get rid of the pain.

But, as I have recently learned, there is a big difference between the patches you buy in the pharmacy and those you buy in the convenience store. Or was I just really unlucky this time? The things is... I used two of the patches before going to sleep; one on my back and one on my neck. And I was going to change them the next evening but... I couldn't get them off!!! Not without screaming anyway... omg such pain!!! o_O All the hair on your back sticks to the patch and it is a torture trying to get it off! I tried both, taking it off really slowly and carefully, and kind of just pulling it off quickly all at once. I seriously don't know which was worse... terrible... Well it was kind of funny at the same time when I think of it, but still so painful.

Here's the difference.

This is the pack that I bought at the pharmacy. There are 6 pain relief patches in one pack and they are about 8*12cm big. They have a strong smell of medicine (which I kind of like) and they work amazingly. I paid 5000krw for the whole pack, so that's about 5$ or a bit more than 3.5eur.

And this is the one that I got from a convenience store. There are only 4 of them in a pack and the size of each patch is 10*14cm. I am not sure about the price 'cause I wasn't the one paying for it. You can see it looks completely different. It also works well, has the same smell of medicine (maybe not as strong as the one from the pharmacy), it's just the.... taking it off part that's the problem....

I've never ever had that problem before and I've used several of these pain relief patches. Another good thing about getting them from the pharmacy is that you usually get painkillers to go with them. I'm sure you can buy some painkillers at a convenience store as well, but pharmacist usually knows better, I guess.

So, to sum up:

+ they start working as soon as you put them on
+ you can usually get rid of the pain in less than 2 days

+ you can use one of them for 24hours

+they're cheap

+you can easily buy them pretty much anywhere

+/- they have a strong smell (some like it, some hate it, I rather like it actually)

- it hurts like hell trying to get it off if you don't buy the right kind

So lesson learned:

pain relief patches are awesome, but DON'T BUY THEM AT CONVENIENCE STORES!!!

Again, as far as I know, these types of patches can be bought pretty much anywhere in the world. I just never heard of them before and here, in korea, it seems like everyone is using them. As soon as you mention a little bit of pain to a friend or anyone, they go "let's go buy you a patch".

Have you tried them? Have you had a similar painful experience with them? :) Post a comment and let me know! ^^