Every time senior officers finished their shifts, they would take a shower and rub skin lotion into their hair. “What is that about? Did a nightclub open nearby? Are they getting ready to go there?” The same thing happened the next day, and the day after that. Leave work, shower, apply skin lotion to their hair. The behavior was repeated, and there was a certain order to it. It was almost like a ritual. Curious, this reporter asked them. The answer was brief. “Don’t you know? They’re getting rid of the prison smell.” Some correctional officers wash themselves two or three times and launder their uniforms. Each in their own way, they struggle to remove the scent of prison from their bodies. “You won’t understand unless you’ve felt it. You really won’t.” The officer calmly recalled how older colleagues considered applying skin lotion a ritual — a way of shedding the prison smell after a day inside. Tracking prison smell: Sweat “Are you afraid of inmates? Not at all.” On June 20, just before the start of the rainy season, I headed to Incheon Detention Center, a place t