Homeward Bound

Well, folks, this is it.

I'm writing you from Seoul Incheon International Airport on a laptop that's much too small for my giant hands, overlooking the terrible weather that's hammering the runway at the moment, and yet, despite all that, still a little over an hour away from boarding my plane home.

It's been a wonderful month here; while I wish I could say I met a whole bunch of Korean students who made this such a worthwhile experience, I guess I'll just have to settle for meeting some great people from 'SC and enjoying their company (and all the antics that came with it) for the last month.  Not that that's a bad thing, mind you.

My Korean has, if my ailing grandfather is to be believed, improved considerably.  To that I say 다행이아 (dahengida--thank God).  Although I still have a long way to go before I'm fluent--maybe even another 8 years or so--it's a small victory for me.

I've certainly enjoyed seeing the sights, sampling the tastes, and living the culture for the last month, and I've certainly enjoyed writing about it.  So for those of you who stuck around to the end, I hope you enjoyed reading.  Thanks for sticking around.

But for now, I say 내일 봐 (neh-il bwa)...I have a plane to catch.

Korean Geek Culture

Instead of writing my final paper like I should, I have for you what might be one of the last blog entries from Korea I'll make.

Yesterday Hao-Hua's friend Travis came to visit--initially we were going to go to Namsan Tower, but Hao-Hua and Travis were both paranoid that the heavy rain would trigger a mudslide that would kill us all.  So instead, we went all the way over to Sinjeong station (way the hell over west) to go see a live Starcraft match.

Yes, you're reading that right.  Starcraft.  And televised, to boot.  We wound up going to the GOM TV studios in Sinjeong.  While the outside of the building looks like a small, abandoned school, the studio itself looks a bit like this:

Trojan Vision, eat your heart out.

If I didn't know any better, I would think this looks like some kind of ESPN Sportscenter game show or something.  It really does make an MMORPG look like a sporting event...and I'm told it gets even bigger for the finals.  The audience seating area was only three rows of chairs here...apparently, for the finals, they get a stadium-like arena in which to compete.

As someone who's worked at a TV station before, it was really fascinating to watch the whole production aspect of the show come together.  I could've cared less about how the games turned out (as I haven't played any iteration of Starcraft in many years), but it was interesting to see how each camera was preparing for each shot, how the jib camera nearly killed us with each swing, and how the commentators (who were to my immediate right) were reacting to each game.  Granted, I couldn't understand a word they were saying, but it was funny whenever they started going, "Ohhhhh!  OOOOHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"  (The text really doesn't do that justice.)

There were also a pair of English-speaking commentators who were doing their own thing independent of the Korean commentators, though I couldn't hear a word they were saying--for all I know, they weren't mic'd up at all.  Apparently they do an English edition of the same broadcast, but the Korean commentators were so loud that I don't think it mattered in the end.


And then, of course, there are the players themselves.  They're all little boys (there were no girls playing the day I went), and can't be any older than 18 years old.  They really do take this seriously, even if it would normally earn them who-knows-how-much ridicule at an American high school.  (Don't pretend it isn't true...)


And despite all this, we were all geeking out to some degree, although I bet for different reasons...

Catching up...big time

Apologies for being away for so long--class and day trips, combined with an abnormal amount of fatigue kept me away from the blogosphere for an extended period of time.  Hopefully my memory serves me right when I recount this past weekend's journey...

Last weekend we went to Jeolla-do in the southwestern part of the country, where the city of Gwangju is.  We were originally going to tour the site of the Gwangju uprisings in the '80s, although when we got there, all we saw was a huge construction site and a fountain with a tacky, bright orange inflatable flower on top of it.  Apparently that fountain is all that's left of the artifacts of the uprising!  (I didn't bother with a picture, because there really wasn't anything to see in that area...)


This thwarted our plans for much of the day on Friday, so a lot of that day felt like a lot of walking around aimlessly, hoping to find some history along the way.  We did, however, make our way over to the 5-18 cemetery (5-18 referring to the date of the Gwangju uprising).  People who died in the uprisings, as well as who we presumed to be family members of the victims who died much later, are buried here.  And if this doesn't take the cake as the most peaceful place in the country, I don't know what does...

Just past the main gate

View of the tower from the back, where the graves are

I apparently have a morbidly artsy side as well.

We in the States don't normally associate South Korea with dictatorships, but shortly after the partition (and even as early as the '80s) their government was also very chaotic, and even though a president was elected, it eventually turned into a dictatorship because the then-incumbent wanted to keep his position of power.  Korea--or at least Gwangju--was even under martial law at one point, leading to this uprising.  It was a little...sobering, for lack of a better term.  Quite horrifying to learn the price people paid for democracy, even if their uprising paid off in the end.


From the cemetery, we went over to the nearby city of Namwon and into Chunhyang Park, named for the eponymous folk tale.  It's also a peaceful place, complete with a bridge that's supposed to bless a couple with a happy relationship if they come and cross this bridge at least once a year.  Apparently this is also the park where the events of the story supposedly take place, as the government pavilion where Yi Mongryong first spots Chunhyang is in plain sight on the other side of the bridge.


Saturday (after probably one of the best nights of sleep I had gotten in a long time), we went to Independence Hall (독립기념관).  While an impressive sight from the outside, the museums inside (understandably) had a Korean slant to them, one exhibit going so far as to say how other cultures--namely the Chinese and the Japanese--are distorting Korean history.  I wasn't terribly impressed, although I will say they do make quite the impression on tourists.  I know they mean well by their wishes of reunification and whatnot, but the journalist in me couldn't help but wince at the blatant mud-slinging against Japan and China.  Then again, maybe they have a point if they're saying the other two gloss over the occupation period (~1910-1945) completely...


Having exhausted our weekend trip agenda earlier than we expected, we returned to Seoul via bus around 4 pm.  The next day was completely free, but I met up with my dad's friend's daughter, Hyunji, who will be attending Pitzer College in the fall.  She and I, along with a friend of hers, went to a fortune-telling café in Gangnam.  While it sounded like a load of hokey to me, I couldn't help but be intrigued by the different markings the fortune teller was making on the paper.  Was it bad that I started wondering whether there really was a purpose to some of the markings he was making?


Scam or not, we met up with two of Hyunji's other friends at Coex Mall.  The last time I was in Korea, I complained about the cave-like feel of the underground shopping center.  Except this time, it didn't feel very cave-like at all (probably because there was more stuff open this time around) and, while still crowded, was considerably less so than I remember the last time.  There's a movie theater in the complex as well, and I watched HP 7.2 yet again.  This time, I enjoyed it a little better, although I still have my gripes about it.  (I'll spare you the details...this is already getting quite long.)


This then brings us to Monday, where we took a tour of Incheon--about an hour and a half away by subway.  Shortly after getting off at the Technopark Station (what a name for a station), we were treated to this view:

Notice something missing?  Traffic, perhaps?

Never mind the fact that our plans to take a water taxi were thwarted when we realized the taxi is closed on Mondays.  What startled us the most was the modern look of this part of town (called Songdo) but the relative lack of people.  Even a stroll through what I think was called Songdo Park (pictured right) didn't help matters, as we were wondering why this modern-looking city--built on reclaimed land, no less--had virtually nobody around!  We suspect it has something to do with the prestige of Seoul and what status living there grants its residents.  You can't be just close to Seoul, you have to be in Seoul, I suppose.  Kim Yu-na, the well-known figure skater, invested in some properties in that area, and even that apparently can't attract people to come to this area.  Sad, really, as it looks like this city could have potential.  Apparently at night it gets a little more lively, although with what few people they have there I don't really see how much more lively it could get.


So we spent about an hour and a half walking around before we got taxis to Incheon's Chinatown, which wasn't much to write home about either.  Our plans were thwarted once again when we discovered the cultural center in Chinatown was also closed on Mondays!  (Monday is Korea's Sunday, I suppose.)  So with most of our agenda essentially shot down, we spent another hour or so--you guessed it--aimlessly walking around, although we did find a Chinese bakery out of the deal, so I guess it wasn't so bad.  I did feel, though, that our professor was trying to legitimize the trip by explaining some stuff about a statue of Confucius we found in a small pavilion...most, if not all of us, saw right through it.  I suppose the fact that we were all tired--one of us was borderline passed out--didn't help matters.


I was, quite understandably, wiped out from all these events--I think I was about to fall asleep in class for the last two days.  I spent most of today taking it easy (to think I wanted to hike Dobongsan with Wendy today!  I would've passed out!), although I did have a nice meal with some family.  And yet tomorrow, we're supposed to go on a downtown bus tour of Seoul...although whether we'll be able to go at all is still up in the air, as the rain (sadly) has returned.


5 days until my return to the States.  Time certainly has flown.

Artsy Adventures in Insa-Dong

Or, When Idiocy Strikes Again

Camera troubles seem to be a recurring problem for me.  First the battery dies when I leave the charger in the dorms, then the battery dies on me in the middle of a day trip, then I remember to charge the battery, take the camera with me, but forget to put the battery back in the camera.  So there we have it, I have no pictures for today...

But I'm definitely not short on adventures today!  (A wonder I still had some today, given how wiped out I felt early this morning...)  Class felt like a drag, and I simply conked out for an hour afterwards...then got up again, watched a clip montage of movies (that weren't synced properly, I might add), and then somehow mustered up enough energy to go to a tea house in 인사동 (Insa-dong).  It did revitalize me, somewhat--the cold teas of Jeongtong Dawon Tea House actually did wonders for the soul, even if my cold powdered green tea did get a little bitter near the bottom of the cup.  I should've gone with either the citron tea (which I'm convinced is made from yuzu) or the omija tea (literally "five tastes", essentially a fruit punch of sorts).  We were all addicted to the yugwa (유과), though, which are essentially sweetened rice puffs.  A shame that they ran out of the rice cakes when we got there, though...

From the tea house, we ventured the streets of Insa-dong and did a little souvenir shopping.  I managed to get myself a rather interesting t-shirt (with the design of King Sejong's first Hangul script, or something along those lines), as well as a pale pink necktie for my dad (or, if it doesn't suit him, me).  Jackie and Caroline, who were giving me that extra bit of reassurance as to whether or not to buy it, thought it was the "manly pink" (their words, not mine).

We had a little amusement with the street vendors, one in particular who sold Turkish ice cream.  He kept tricking Julie out of her cone, then pretending to drop it as he handed it to her (only for it to stay perfectly frozen onto his scooper-stick-thing).  I'm not sure what he was saying to her after he finally let up and gave it to her, but the crux of the matter: she didn't know what the heck he was harassing her about, and I chased him off by simply saying "She doesn't speak Korean!"  That shut him up, even if he was a little cheesed off.

Some more ambling around before we finally made our way back to E-dae, replenished our wallets with our latest meal disbursement, and headed for--what else?--a round of Korean barbeque.  We thought we were getting a lot of food (two orders of bulgogi, two orders of kalbi, and an order of samgyupsal), although Hao-Hua decided he hadn't had enough and got a Big Mac (with fries!) afterwards.  To be honest, it was the perfect amount for me...the table was a little too small to accommodate our group of five, though.  At least we didn't smell nearly as bad as we would've, given that there was a...vacuum, for lack of a better term, that sits right above the grill and sucks most of the smoke up through it.

Tomorrow, we head for Jeolla-do and Kwangju.  I promise to bring my camera this time, battery and all.

Time Machine: Destination 1796

We took a little trip back in time today as we made our way to Suwon, a city that's just a 20-minute bus ride from Seoul (provided, of course, that there's no traffic--more on that later).  Somehow I'm coherent enough to write this at 11 PM, seeing as I was probably about to pass out from heat exhaustion earlier in the day.  I'm still a little delirious from that, so if I don't make sense at times, you have been warned.

One of the most impressive sights was Hwaseong Fortress (화성), the still-standing fortress protecting King Jeongjo's palace in the middle of Suwon.  Quite an impressive feat; the wall by itself stands about 20 feet high and runs three-and-a-half miles long, enclosing about half a square mile of land.  Though I tried to capture as much of a traditional view as I could, you can see an interesting side-by-side view of the fortress walls with the high-rises that line the horizon.  Kind of an old-meets-new kinda thing, I guess.  You can actually see it better in the picture below, though very faintly so.  I could've spent the whole day just in this one spot, right under a small pavilion nearby, but there were other (read: more exciting) things to do.

If you notice in this picture to the right, you can see what looks like archery targets near the far right of the picture.  In fact, that's exactly what they are; there is, in fact, an archery range right by the fortress walls.  We got to use traditional bows and not-so-traditional-looking arrows for a short period of time.  Considering 2,000 won (~$2) each got us 10 shots, it's definitely worth it, even if you end up embarrassing yourself when it comes to actually shooting the arrows.  A quick tutorial later, and you're already firing away--I only wish I got more arrows, because I would love to learn how to do this in the long run.

The targets in the above picture were 140 meters away from where we took our positions.  Obviously, since (I'd venture to guess) none of us had ever handled a bow and arrow before, we shot at much closer targets (about 30 meters away from our spot--see left).  That's supposed to be a bear's head we're aiming at.  The video game geek in me got excited at the prospect of shooting arrows just like in the Zelda games, although one thing was soon very clear--I'm just as bad of a shot live as I am in the video games.  Although my accuracy leaves much to be desired, I hit the target maybe four or five times out of my 10 shots, which I guess isn't so bad for a first-timer (considering every one of us overshot the target at least once).  Not to mention the bowstring hit me in the arm a couple of times...that left a mark.

Break the targets!  (Or at least hit them.)

Link, if he were real, would've been disappointed with most, if not all, of us--we had to go scoop up our 10 arrows after our quivers were empty, and discovered that a lot of them wound up well past the targets.  I actually thought about shooting my last one at the far targets just to see how close I could get to them, but I guess I was too absorbed with trying to hit the close ones to worry about that!  There's just something funny about seeing a bunch of arrows sticking out of the ground behind the target, though...

The next few stops after the archery range were a little fuzzy, due to the blazing hot heat interfering with my memory for a little while.  I do remember taking a trolley around the fortress and near a huge statue of King Jeongjo (it had to have been at least 30 feet tall, probably more) and walking all the way down to the main palace grounds.  This was also around lunchtime, so we stopped at a local restaurant to try the famous Suwon kalbi (수원 갈비).  Because the BBQ would've burned holes in our wallets and made us smell like it afterwards, we opted for a much more inexpensive option: kalbitang (갈비탕) and naengmyeon (냉면); short rib stew and cold noodles, respectively.  I went for the kalbitang, which was quite good (if a little labor-intensive to eat).

After lunch, we went inside the main palace, Hwaseong Haengung (화성 행궁), which is evidently the site where they filmed the classic Korean drama "Daejanggum" (대장금).  The heat was starting to get to us, though; on the bus to the folk village (which was another 15-20 minutes away), most of us were completely knocked out!

Yet somehow, we were ambling through the folk village (read: staggering through in a dehydrated stupor...or maybe that was just me) without much of a problem.  My camera battery died (again) about halfway through our visit there, which was another letdown, but by that point I was too tired to do anything about it.  Another downer, too, was the fact that all the performances were finished by the time we got there.

I did, however, manage to snap some slice-of-life photos before the battery fizzled out on me...

In the courtyard of a nobleman's house (?)

Garden view of a part of the village

Traditional wedding procession.  Ignore the person on the far left who managed to get into the shot.

Exhausted on the steps of the local government building

Two Updates for the Price of One

That's right, folks, you're getting TWO updates for the price of ONE!  Chalk it up to me (gasp!) actually forgetting about the blog for a little while I had a little fun over the weekend (and today, now that I think about it).  First, take the time machine all the way back to Friday...

We took a class day trip to Cheorwon (철원), a small town near the DMZ.  It's mostly deserted except for some military outposts and cultural museums, which include an observatory.

Yes, I know I got more sky than I meant to.

Yes, we actually got to creep on North Korea from afar.  You see, this observatory has a deck where you can look out over the DMZ itself and, just 2 km away, the North Korean border (right).  What surprised me the most about the DMZ, though, was that it's not the barren wasteland a lot of people (who haven't been there) make it out to be.  We found out that it "accidentally" (for lack of a better term) became a wildlife reserve, due to lack of human activity in the area for the last 60 years or so.  It's a bizarre juxtaposition, the tranquil wildlife preserve with the observatory, telling of Korea's war-torn past.  It's probably the biggest irony the world has.

We also got to see one of the tunnels (left) the North Koreans dug to invade the South.  I couldn't take any pictures inside the tunnel itself, but it was quite the trek, never mind cold inside.  I wasn't terribly happy about hitting my head on the low ceiling about 10 or 11 times (thank goodness for that helmet they gave us), nor was I too pleased with these Korean schoolkids (probably middle or high schoolers) who were going in as we were coming out...and wouldn't get out of our way.  I mean, the tunnel's narrow enough already, and yet they insist on walking two-by-two anyway?  I was just about ready to pop my huge umbrella open and charging through to the end of the tunnel, bowling over any poor saps that happened to be in my path.

Also of curious note was this sign (right) that was just outside the tunnel.  That's 21,172 days since the cease-fire agreement that ended the Korean War all the way back on July 27, 1953.  (Well, by the time I publish this post, that'd be 21,176 days...)  It almost seemed--to me, anyway--that they're still waiting for something to happen.  Reunification, a northern attack, a plan to invade the north, whatever--just something so that they can stop counting the days and start anew.  I guess this is their way of saying the Korean War really isn't officially over, per se.  Eerie, if you think about it.  Just brought to light how tense the situation really is out there.

Anyway.  A long Friday in Cheorwon led to a day or two of rest (and writing a paper that was due Sunday at noon).  Saturday I got to meet up with my grandparents again for lunch, as well as some family friends who had moved back to Korea a few years prior for dinner.  Though this didn't exactly do me any favors when it came to writing my paper that night, at least I didn't write on an empty stomach.

Sunday itself was rather uneventful, thanks to most of the group going to the Mud Festival in Boryeong.  To Hao-Hua, Caroline, and I, rolling around in the mud all day didn't exactly sound like our idea of fun, so we decided to stroll around E-dae and the surrounding area instead.  We decided to make the trek to Hongik University via subway for lunch--Hong-dae, as it's called, is known for being a more hip hangout for college students.  It's certainly busier at nighttime, although we didn't feel like going at night (when it tends to get pretty crazy, in more ways than one).  We managed to find a pretty good Chinese restaurant in Hong-dae for lunch--victory for Hao-Hua, who had been craving good Chinese food since we got to Korea.  For dinner, we went back to E-dae and went to our reliable sullungtang restaurant--victory for Caroline, who was in the process of getting over a bad bowl of said soup from the day before.  And both of them are hooked on my favorite Korean dish--victory for me, who will eat said dish any chance I get.

(pause to catch breath)


Class resumed today, although most of us spent a good part of the day today in Apgujeong (압구정), a busy shopping/dining district not terribly unlike Hong-dae.  We met up with Esther's SAT tutoring student (who had been taking lessons from her in the States), who took us around.  After much discussion about what to go eat--most of us didn't care, although Matt adamantly insisted we have K-BBQ for the 24,198,687th time this trip--we wound up finding a chicken BBQ place, which actually wasn't too bad--it reminded me a bit of Mom's homemade 춘천 닭갈비 (Chuncheon-style chicken, for the Hangul-challenged).  Although I made the mistake of eating one of the raw Korean peppers; flesh, membrane, seeds and all.  Even though it wasn't so big, needless to say, I was in a world of hurt for the rest of the meal.  How can that puny little pepper be spicier than all the spices rubbed onto the chicken combined...?

Fight on, Wendy.  Doesn't it look good?

The rest of the night consisted of a board game café that smelled vaguely of cigarettes, though I definitely had a lot of fun playing (and failing at) pool, as well as learning some card games from Janina (pictured above, left) and Julie.  I'm pretty sure we were the loudest people in the room, as I was too busy laughing my head off at our ineptitude at some of the games, as well as our rather baffling explanations of the rules.


If there's one thing I can't stand about this trip, though, it's our consistent "what the hell are we going to do now?" meetings that we hold basically out in the open.  Most of the time (after wasting about 30 minutes figuring out what the hell we're going to do) they result in half the group splitting off to go drinking/clubbing/something along those lines, while the other half hoofs it to the nearest subway station back to E-dae so as not to show up to class with a hangover the next morning (or at least not running on <4 hours of sleep).  I'll leave you to figure out which group I went with, although one of the guards was, again, hell-bent on stopping me before I got through the gate, only to be foiled by my key card.


I swear, that guard must have it out for me or something.

Time Zone Shake-up, Movie Night

Sounds like something I should've posted on the first day, except now I feel like we've gotten used to it by now.  As evidenced by me waking up about 20 minutes before class and somehow still making it on time (despite not eating breakfast).

The real reason why I say this is a time zone shake-up: we caught the last Harry Potter movie here in Seoul two days before its scheduled American release.  And while I love that I can brag about having seen it before my states-side friends can, I must say I was...well, I'll keep quiet until it comes out in the States before I say anything.

I will say this, though: the Korean subtitles were distracting, but if I don't learn another speck of Korean while I'm here, at least I've learned "시끄러워" (shi-keu-ruh-wuh) means "shut up," and "미쳤어" (mi-chyuhs-suh) means "Are you crazy?"

Now you can't say I didn't learn any Korean while I've been here.  Nyaahhh.

Also, for our class, we watched "Taegukki," a Korean War-era film.  Easily one of the saddest films I've ever seen.  I nearly cried during this one.  And that's saying a lot, considering I virtually don't cry at all during movies.  There was a rather awkward silence after the film was actually over...our TA, Lucy, was bawling her eyes out.  Some of us were wrecks.

And then Hao-Hua and I each had a bowl of sullungtang (설렁탕) and forgot about it completely.  Korean soul food for the win.