No Spa for Us

Yesterday I drove to Wi Spa in Westlake because I had heard from a friend that it was the hot new Korean spa in LA. It opened in November last year so it's definitely a place my mom hasn't been to before, and what better way to treat her aching arms and shoulders (from holding R so he won't run away in parking lots). I called before we left to make sure children were allowed since some Korean spas have a no-kids policy. The woman on the phone said yes, so we made our way up there. Only to be told that H could not go in with us to the women's bath area because he is 3, and their cut-off age for babies to go in with their moms is 2. Excuse me, you couldn't volunteer this information when I called you on the phone earlier? Obviously there is a 50/50 chance that the person calling has a kid that is not the same gender, so that would have been something nice to point out! They offered to escort him to the jjimjilbang area, but he would still have to pay $15. What? He has to pay full price but he can't even take a bath? That makes absolutely NO SENSE to me. So we decided that was not an option. My mom went in by herself and the boys and I went in search of a park.

I pretty much drove around just hoping I would find a good place for them to play while we waited. Something told me to drive west and we found a great park on Beverly and Van Ness, the Robert Burns Park. It almost turned into a disaster after the first few minutes. H has a real problem with someone else singing Happy Birthday. For some reason, he thinks he owns that song, no matter how many times I tell him the rights belong to the Michael Jackson estate. There was a little boy singing the song next to him in the sand and this enraged H to the point where H threw a big handful of sand at the boy. The sand covered the boy's entire face, going into his mouth and eyes. Throwing sand into someone's eyes can be serious because sand can scratch the cornea. I immediately went over to H and apologized to the mom and victim. I put him in time out on a bench and very loudly berated him for throwing the sand, pointing out that the little boy was very sad and still crying. I was worried that he wouldn't stay in time out, but thankfully H sat through the entire allotted period. We then went back over to the boy and apologized again. Before the timeout the mom was so upset she didn't even look at us, but this time she acknowledged the apology. They left the park just after that and I was afraid we would not be far behind because I thought everyone would be looking at us, judging us as bad sand-throwing park infiltrators.

Then I saw another kid throw sand. And then another. And I let out my breath and felt better. I hope H has learned his lesson about not throwing sand, but I'm still glad that some other kid did the same thing so he didn't look so bad. Sometimes I feel like everyone else's kid is better behaved than mine, and, maybe it's schadenfreude, I feel better when there is some other little munchkin throwing the tantrum or acting like a wild animal. The rest of the time was relatively uneventful other than a little boy coming up to me and saying my sons were making fun of his friend Lily by calling her Wally. I said, "no, they are saying Wow-e" because they are having a good time. Good thing I could correct that misunderstanding. Thankfully, my mom called a few minutes after that to say she was ready to be picked up. I'm glad to know that there is a park relatively near K-town should I need a place to take the boys. But we'll be staying away for a good long while, thank you.