Summer is here in Korea, and I figured I'd give a personal hygiene tip. I wanted to recommend a groin cleanser [seriously] I pick up here in Korea called "He's Clean."
There you will find all the info you need, including instructions on its use, lists of ingredients, etc. all in English.
The main ingredient is just plain old alcohol for sanitizing the area, but it includes a variety of traditional herb extracts that are supposed to have anti-fungal properties, including things like:
More is available at their Drugs.com entry:
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| He's Clean cleanser order form |
This is going to sound like a paid promotion but it's just my genuine unprompted opinion. Maybe it could make your personal swamp area a little nicer this summer. So here's what I'll say about it.
As a man who spends most of his day sitting on his ass and close to never exercises, I'm no stranger to some serious jock itch. Korean summers are the worst. I buy plenty of ultra thin "golf" type pants to wear to work but that wasn't really helping much. I ended up visiting my local pharmacy every week for a new tube of anti-fungal ointment until finally the nice old pharmacist man noticed my issue and recommended this product to me, and now I want to recommend it to you.
As a man who spends most of his day sitting on his ass and close to never exercises, I'm no stranger to some serious jock itch. Korean summers are the worst. I buy plenty of ultra thin "golf" type pants to wear to work but that wasn't really helping much. I ended up visiting my local pharmacy every week for a new tube of anti-fungal ointment until finally the nice old pharmacist man noticed my issue and recommended this product to me, and now I want to recommend it to you.
He's Clean is a bottle of this gel type stuff. You rub it on your crotch area in the shower after washing, leave it on a couple minutes (I'll usually kill the time by brushing my teeth), then rinse it off. I guess I've been using it about two years now and it usually works pretty well to curb the itch and those telltale red fungal spots.
Here's their official website.
You can see it's about 60,000 won for two bottles plus a bonus smaller bottle. That sounds steep but you only need about 2 squirts of it, and while I use it everyday in summer I go every other day or so in winter. Overall one bottle lasts me almost half a year so it's not a bad price. They say one bottle should last about 5 months but outside of summer season you'll get more mileage out of it.
By the way, you might notice they're advertising $100 underwear there. It has some kind of pocket for your junk for keeping a barrier between each thigh and each of your, uh, "mandoo". That sounds nice enough that I'm actually considering it but you can pick up the same basic thing from Duluth for 1/4 the price.
I guess I don't need to tell you most of this because they have an English website you can check out too.
There you will find all the info you need, including instructions on its use, lists of ingredients, etc. all in English.
The main ingredient is just plain old alcohol for sanitizing the area, but it includes a variety of traditional herb extracts that are supposed to have anti-fungal properties, including things like:
- sophora flavescens root
- chenopodium flower
- salix alba bark
- chinese cinnamon
- oregano
- chamaecyparis obtusa leaf
- purslane
- scutellaria baicalensis root
- rosemary
- basil
- houttuynia cordata
- fennel
More is available at their Drugs.com entry:
They even have a Twitter where they outline a surprising amount of other use cases for this. Seems it works on a whole range of skin problems, including women's intimate skin issues.
You can either pick it up in your local Korean pharmacy or online at various places both Korean and international:
Now take a moment to enjoy the phallic and ballic imagery of the Ebay ad:
If you're interested in picking it up, make sure to pick up the "He's Clean II" in the blue bottles. I've been a customer since the "version 1" in the white bottles and I find version 2 is a bit thicker and "sticks" a bit more which makes it work better. You really need to give it the full 2 minutes stuck on you in the shower for it to work well. Don't just apply and rinse off in impatience. I found that out the hard way.
Again, this is not a sponsored post or something. I don't get a cut when you buy this. I'm just thankful that the pharmacist pointed this out to me because I've tried all kinds of powders and nothing ever really worked. I've had almost every type of Gold Bond type powder shipped over here and none really did much to prevent this. At least now I've got it more under control. Yeah this sounds goofy but trust me having huge red patches of fungus between your thighs that burn, smell, and itch isn't funny. I know I should get off my ass more and probably eat better but oh well. For now there's this stuff. Hopefully it can help make your humid summers in Korea a bit easier.
And if you have any other good tips for dealing with humid Korean summers I am all ears.
Somebody popular must have shared or retweeted this post because it has exploded in views compared my normal posts. So let me take a second here to clear up some feedback.
Why don't you just wash your ass better?
I do wash my ass, thanks. I shower twice a day in summer. Trust me my jock itch is not due to a lack of hygiene on my part. The problem is the sultry combination of high humidity, an office where the aircon barely works, fat and hairy thighs, and spending 18 hours a day sitting. It gets sweaty and dank down there and there's not much I can do about that. Hey I'd love to just wear shorts to work or better just some loose boxers, but I have an actual job where you can't just wear whatever. The crotch rot is just something I have to deal with, and I'm sure a lot of other larger hairy white guys out there are feeling my pain.
Does this stuff actually treat tinea cruris (jock itch)?
In my experience, no. I usually use the actual antifungal cream from the pharmacy in conjunction with the He's Clean when there's a big flare up. A few days of using that will usually remove the problem. Then I can maintain it with just the He's Clean. So it's more of a preventative thing. Since it's basically alcohol gel plus a bunch of natural stuff I don't worry about using it day in and day out. Now and then I might get an outbreak but a couple days with the medicated cream takes care of that. But when I use the He's Clean daily, the number of those outbreaks really goes down. Remember I'm just one guy though and I'm not a doctor. This has just been my experience.
Well readers, I'm glad my tale has amused you. I never thought broadcasting my personal crotch issues would end up so popular but there you go. If this tip helped out a few guys out there then it's worth it.
Better than shoving a water-eating hippo down your pants.
And if you have any other good tips for dealing with humid Korean summers I am all ears.
--- Update
Somebody popular must have shared or retweeted this post because it has exploded in views compared my normal posts. So let me take a second here to clear up some feedback.
Why don't you just wash your ass better?
I do wash my ass, thanks. I shower twice a day in summer. Trust me my jock itch is not due to a lack of hygiene on my part. The problem is the sultry combination of high humidity, an office where the aircon barely works, fat and hairy thighs, and spending 18 hours a day sitting. It gets sweaty and dank down there and there's not much I can do about that. Hey I'd love to just wear shorts to work or better just some loose boxers, but I have an actual job where you can't just wear whatever. The crotch rot is just something I have to deal with, and I'm sure a lot of other larger hairy white guys out there are feeling my pain.
Does this stuff actually treat tinea cruris (jock itch)?
In my experience, no. I usually use the actual antifungal cream from the pharmacy in conjunction with the He's Clean when there's a big flare up. A few days of using that will usually remove the problem. Then I can maintain it with just the He's Clean. So it's more of a preventative thing. Since it's basically alcohol gel plus a bunch of natural stuff I don't worry about using it day in and day out. Now and then I might get an outbreak but a couple days with the medicated cream takes care of that. But when I use the He's Clean daily, the number of those outbreaks really goes down. Remember I'm just one guy though and I'm not a doctor. This has just been my experience.
Well readers, I'm glad my tale has amused you. I never thought broadcasting my personal crotch issues would end up so popular but there you go. If this tip helped out a few guys out there then it's worth it.
Better than shoving a water-eating hippo down your pants.
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