Spring is sprang and then went. It was a very short spring that quickly turned into a humid summer. The same thing happened with fall. Climate change? Global warming? Yea, probably.
While I semi-hibernated during the cold and snowy Korean winter, I have been doing quite the opposite by running wild all over Korea (mostly Daejeon) since I returned from vacation in late February. Yes, it has been 4 months since I came back from my vacation in Vietnam, and I haven't really slowed down!
- Since I returned from winter vacation, one of my best friends from home, Colin, has come to Daejeon to teach English! He is teaching at a boy's middle school, and although he lives far away from me (and I mean...who doesn't, really?) we have been hanging out a lot. Before he came to Daejeon, I hadn't seen him in a year and a half, which is a very long time not to see one of your best friends.
It has been really fun helping him get acquainted with life here: introducing him too all of my favorite people and haunts. It's also been great seeing Korea through his eyes, where everything has been so new to him as it was for me back in when I first came here.
- I am in the best shape of my life right now. Since coming to Korea, I have lost about 15 pounds and am back down to my pre-university weight. In addition, I am the most muscular I have ever been in my life. These days I can bench press 5 repetitions of 265 lbs (admittedly, not with free weights, and that makes a world of difference, but I'm still quite proud of myself!). Furthermore, my normal fasting blood pressure is 110/70, which is the blood pressure that a lot of people have after strenuous exercise.
- A little while ago, my school had a Pop Song Contest, which I co-hosted with two of my students. I also performed two songs while the judges were making their final decisions ("Uptown Girl" by Billy Joel, and at the request of some of my girls' classes, "All The Single Ladies" by Beyonce). The performances were all great, including an all around excellent performance of "Mean" by Taylor Swift by some of my junior girls. Many teachers commented on how great of an MC I was, moreso than my actual singing and guitar playing, haha! I guess rather than an English teacher, I should have been an MC!
- About a month ago, three of my students were chosen to represent our school in a city-wide high school debate contest. I helped them to prepare, and I was invited to come to the event by my co-teacher who was also coaching them. My students passed the first round, but were narrowly defeated in the second round. I could tell they were very disappointed, but I told them that we were very proud of them and appreciated their hard work. Their disappointment definitely reminded me of how hard I was on myself when I was that age...and in some ways I still am!
- Speaking of, a month or two ago, one of my favorite students was absolutely bawling in our teachers' office while speaking to her homeroom teacher. I had no idea what it was about (because she they were speaking in Korean), so after she left (while still crying), I asked my co-teacher what she was so upset about. Apparently she had not made high enough grades to make it into the school's "academy". My school a designated elite group called "(the name of my high school) Academy". The 30-35 students of each grade who have the highest grades in the school are the ones who are apart of this group. I know it's totally unthinkable to a lot of people in the West for a variety of reasons, but being a part of this "academy" is a big deal when the students start applying to universities. Anyway, the student whom I mentioned earlier just barely did not make high enough grades to be in the "academy", and she was in it the year before. I felt so bad for her, because once again, I remember how hard I was on myself in high school, and how insecure I was about my intelligence. I decided to buy a pastry for her as a good gesture indicating "I know how hard that must be". Before I gave it to her, I told her that she is not her grades, and being a part of the "academy" doesn't make her who she is. When I pulled out the pastry and gave it to her she started crying and said, "Oh, Joshy!" and ran away from embarrassment. A minute later, I heard her happily tell another student, "Look what Joshy gave me!"
From what I know (and from what a few students have told me), the Korean teachers aren't very sympathetic towards the students, even though the students are going through hell, sometimes staying at school from 7:30 a.m. until 11:00 p.m. (something that I still can't even comprehend, even after a year here). From what students have told me, the teachers are more or less like, "Suck it up!" So, I think the student really appreciated that gesture. I'm not writing this to say, "Oh, I'm such a nice, sympathetic person", but I really just want to remember that moment.
- I’ve had some amazing weekends in Korea the past few months: Easter Weekend and Tony’s Sports Birthday Weekend are the two that spring to mind first.
- Tony is one of the most hilarious, ridiculous people I have ever met in my life. He is one of the most extroverted people I have ever known, and he’s always full of energy and up to something. He scheduled several events for his birthday weekend: a baseball game, Beer Olympics, and a soccer match. On Friday evening, about 15 of us met at Hanbat Stadium in Daejeon for a baseball game, featuring our very own Hanwha Eagles. It was the third baseball game I had attended while in Korea, and probably the most exciting. There was a lot of back and forth momentum between the two teams, and we ended up winning by a run. After that we went out dancing. On Saturday, the “day off” from Tony’s Extravaganza (hah!), I went on a beautiful bike ride to Daecheong Dam, which is an area just 15 km away from where I live. There is a nice walkway along the river that leads all the way to the dam. The weather was great, and I really enjoyed the time alone outdoors. Later that night, there was an International Party. A Korean university student, Eunseok, organizes an International Party once a month. Usually it’s at a club, and we pay 20,000 won (about $20) for all you can eat and drink. Usually about 150 foreigners, as well as Koreans, show up to these parties. It was the last one I will go to with many of my friends since the majority of them will be leaving in August and I will be in the States during the July International Party. When I finally woke up on Sunday (12:30 p.m.? haha!), it was time for Beer Olympics! About 20 of us showed up outside of Olympic Stadium for Beer Olympics followed by a soccer match. Beer Olympics involved games of flippy cup and beer pong, as well as a relays and a batting game (all of which, obviously, involved drinking). After 2 or 3 hours of Beer Olympics, the whole lot of us stumbled towards the stadium to watch what was pretty much a godawful boring game. This weekend made me feel like I was in college all over again, and I have Tony “Tone-Loc” to thank for most of it! I will say, though, that my 28-year-old self does not have the physical ability to do a weekend like that every weekend. But my 22-year-old self was happy to oblige.
- One of my other favorite weekends these past few months was Easter weekend. Our friend, Diisha, hosted an Easter picnic on Saturday. Unfortunately, after about an hour outside by the river, it got incredibly chilly and the rain started pouring. All 20 of us moved into Diisha’s tiny apartment, finished what was left of the food, and broke out the booze. I had a really good time talking with people, as there weren’t the distractions there normally are at bars and clubs that habitually break up conversations. Once night fell up on us, a group of about 10 of us went to one of the girls’ apartments and we played a dancing videogame and just generally were being silly. After that, we went to go see a funk and soul band perform at one of the clubs we frequent. After they were done playing, Jmo, Kate, and I went to a noraebox (imagine karaoke in a photobooth) and sang our hearts out. It’s worth noting that we sang “Summer of ‘69” two or three times…in a row. The next day, our friend Xavier hosted a BBQ/picnic in the park behind City Hall. A great way to end a great weekend.
- Another one of my favorite days was St. Patrick's Day. Since I was a freshman in university, St. Patrick's Day has usually been an all day and all night drink-a-thon for me, but this year was different!...slightly. On St. Patrick's Day I went hiking with Colin, Kate, and our friend's friend (long story) on a mountain called Gubongsan. As is Korean hiking tradition, and now my tradition, we drank makgeoli after we finished the hike, and had a great conversation as the sun went down over the hills. After the euphoric feelings of hiking, getting a little tipsy, and having good conversation with friends, we went to our respective homes to get ready to go out on the town! We met at a local watering hole called Cantina where we met the Andrews (one of whom was bartending). We had some Irish Car Bombs, and then moved to Yellow Taxi (a club) to dance and rock out. Let's just say the night culminated in my throwing cake in one of the Andrew's faces, and that started a bit of a cake fight in Yellow Taxi...good times!
- On a more solemn note, I keep forgetting to write about this particular experience that we had back in November. I had organized a group of friends to meet at Weizenhaus for dinner and beer one Friday night. Right before we converged at the meeting point, I heard a large crash across the street. It sounded like a car crash, actually, but anything that indicated that it was a car crash. Once I got to the other side of the street, I saw some of my friends looking like they just saw a ghost. Then I saw a bunch of people all standing around in a circle. I looked to the center of the circle and saw what looked to be a woman lying on the ground with a shirt covering her face. I put the pieces together after talking with my friends: the woman had jumped from an apartment building window to her death (assuming it was suicide). The medics were just arriving as we were leaving for Weizenhaus. A very dark start to the evening, everyone was pretty quiet for the first 15 or 20 minutes at dinner. Some of my friends seemed to take it very hard. They were in some sort of shock. I wasn't nearly as shocked as some of them, and I'm not really sure why it didn't affect me as much as it did everyone else. Am I desensitized to it for some reason? Do I just process it differently than other people? I wanted to talk about death and suicide at the table. I wanted to talk about why Westerners, especially we as Americans, have a difficult time talking about and accepting death. But everyone seemed to want to get AWAY from the subject instead of addressing it.
When I seriously consider my own death and the fact that I will die some day, it does make me anxious. But I want to eventually get to a place where I can be very comfortable with, even find peace in, the idea of death and dying. As Robert Jordan wrote, "Death comes to us all; we can only choose how to face it when it comes."
- I'm am preparing myself emotionally and mentally for the exit of many of my friends around mid-August, after our contracts end. I signed on for another year, and I'm very glad to be here another year with my friends who are staying, but it's going to be so difficult missing so many people. To say the least, it will be a lot different. Out of everyone, I'm going to miss Kate and Liz the most. Kate and Liz have become like two little sisters to me, and I've become closer to them than I ever have with anyone while living abroad (Daniel would also be included in this, but he's staying here another year). Kate and I, especially, operate on very similar wave lengths in a variety of ways, and I really consider her the little sister I never had. There will certainly be a lot of tears come mid-August!
- I'm going home for two weeks in two weeks! I'm getting very excited! Although I love it here, which is why I'm staying for another year, it will be a nice to have a break from life in Korea. I can't wait to see everyone, as well as to eat and drink everything I've been missing here!
Sunday, July 7, 2013
Friday, July 5, 2013
Family Trips to Seoul and Gyeongju
In Korea, my family away from home is made up of my best friends: Kate, Liz, Daniel, and Colin now that he moved here back in February. Although two or three of us have taken trips together, never before had we all taken a trip together...UNTIL NOW! In May, I we took two "family" trips in Korea, although Colin couldn't make it for the second one.
During the first weekend of May, we decided to take our first group trip to Seoul. On the third weekend of May (a long holiday weekend for Buddha's Birthday), we went to Gyeongju on the east coast.
*****
Seoul
Our original goal for the weekend in Seoul was to party, shop, and tour. Retrospectively speaking, I can confidently say that we definitely got the party part down pat, but not so much the other two.
The beginning of our family weekend in Seoul got off to a rather inauspicious start. I left my apartment a little late to catch the bus to the train station (late being an hour and a half before the train was scheduled to depart (I live far away and it was rush hour)), and we ended up missing our train, but we were luckily able to get another one only half an hour later. I was silently thinking to myself, "I hope this isn't a bad omen for the rest of the weekend...” Luckily, it wasn't!
We had a lot of fun giggling and being silly on the train, as is our wont on any sort of public transportation in Korea. However, like all public transportation in Korea, trains are deaaaaad silent, and YOU WILL BE shushed if you make too much of a racket. So it was less like “giggling and being silly” and more like "barely suppressed giggling and silliness".
After arriving to our hostel in Seoul (mad ups to The Pencil Guesthouse on being such an awesome hostel), we went to a very tiny pizza place whose name escapes me. What I do know about that very tiny pizza place is that they serve the best damn pizza I've had in Korea. We also ate their New Year's Eve. Not sure how to direct anyone there, but it's in the Hongdae area...? Hah!
We went a little wild on Friday night, I must say. Highlights included going to my favorite microbrewery in Seoul (Magpie), my favorite dive bar in Seoul (Go-Go's), and my favorite hate-to-love fast food restaurant (Taco Bell)*. Getting back to our hostel at five in the morning was probably not the best decision, but we had so much fun staying out and dancing, there was seemingly no other option at the time.
The next day was spent sleeping in, and then sitting on the patio of our hostel conversing and drinking coffee. There were suggestions for going to the N’Seoul Tower, going to a water park, or any of the various other activities and tourist locations that Seoul has to offer, but the consensus was pretty much “I don’t feel like it.” Ultimately, we made our way to the Trick Eye Art Museum just a stone’s throw away from us in Hongdae, but once we got there, no one felt like actually entering the museum. We elected to go back to the hostel and chill out once more. I think everyone was getting cranky, and we were all in desperate need of a nap!
After dinner, we elected to go straight to the bars, because if we started drinking early enough, we would be in bed earlier, right?! Easily the highlight of Saturday night was playing beer pong. We noticed these three foreigners playing at a bar called Thursday Party (an American style club/sports bar hybrid). The whole weekend, I had been making a joke that my 20-24 year-old self was coming back into action. I even made up a song to the tune of "My Boyfriend's Back" and it goes like this: "The bro king's back, and you're gonna be in trouble". I, personally, thought it was brilliant. So, while Kate was the one who was really prodding us to play beer pong, I resignedly said, "Well, I guess I'm the bro king, and it's my job to play beer pong whenever possible."
Our game against Team U.N. (our name for them came from the fact that one was a New Zealander, one was Swedish, and ones was Swiss-French or some bullshit like that) did not go nearly as planned. We sunk our first couple of shots, but then totally laid an egg after that. After that devastating defeat, Team U.N. decided to leave the premises. Probably because they were desperately frightened of the Bro King getting warmed up for more beer pong. We decided that Daniel and I would play against Kate and Colin. Amazingly enough, Daniel made a behind the back shot, and I joked that he should start playing beer pong every day all day (from my experiences, Brits find the idea of drinking games confusing, to say the least**)
After a while at Thursday Party, we wondered back to the part of Hongdae we were at the night before. We spent some time at Go-Go’s again, and ran into our friend, Andrei, who teaches in Incheon. After that, we went to a convenience store*** a couple of minutes away from Go-Go’s to have a chill beer or two. After that, Kate and I went back to the hostel (Liz had left earlier), but I guess Colin and Daniel stayed out until the wee hours of the morning yet again. I guess they also got soundly rejected by girls for the rest of the night, haha!
The next day we got moving late once again, but this time actually made it to a neighborhood in Seoul that is well-known for its name brand shopping. After that, it was time to head back to Daejeon!
******
Gyeongju
We had been debating a while as to where to go for Buddha’s Birthday weekend, one of the few three-day weekends we have during the year. We decided on Gyeongju on the east coast of Korea. It’s one of the most historical cities in Korea.
We waited too long to purchase train tickets, and by the time that we actually did, everything was sold out for Thursday night, so we came to Gyeongju early on Friday morning. The only notable part of our train journey was when we accidentally got off at the wrong stop. I quickly asked someone if we were at the right stop, and they said, “No! Next one!” So we quickly jumped back on the train before the doors shut.
We had booked a room in a hostel with five beds, but there were four of us. Once we had arrived at our hostel, we found out that indeed there was another person already staying in our room. The hostel owner referred to him only as “Mr. Lee”, which for some reason struck us as slightly funny and mysterious...not sure why exactly…maybe because the hostel owner referred to him in such formal terms. For some reason, that referent started a plethora of jokes and stories among us. We decided to make up anecdotes involving Mr. Lee. For instance, I said that Mr. Lee had been a crack-addicted prostitute in L.A. until he discovered his true passion in designing shoes made from recyclable material (or something like that). The funniest inside joke we made concerning our fictional Mr. Lee was when we saw an older, drunken Korean man yelling at passing people and cars for no particular reason that we could surmise. Daniel said, “Looks like Mr. Lee is at it again, you guys.”
Once we did actually meet Mr. Lee late Saturday afternoon, he unfortunately didn’t meet our expectations. He was just some regular guy from California. He seemed pretty normal. The fictional Mr. Lee was a much more interesting character who had had a rough go at life.
For our Friday afternoon, we wondered around Gyeongju. One thing that Gyeongju is famous for is its tombs. It has these tombs that look like really out-of-place hills. The parks in Gyeongju were absolutely beautiful. There were a lot of people out having picnics and flying kites. We walked around and through the parks, and we also walked to a “traditional village”. Unfortunately, it was a bit misleading, because we could tell the village had either been extremely remodeled, or rebuilt just to attract tourists. After getting some dinner and drinking some coffee, we made our way to an artificially made pond called Anapji Pond. There was a cluster of people there, but the space was so wide open that it wasn’t that big of a deal.
After that, we just grabbed a few beers from a convenience store and drank on the back patio of our hostel with the other guests.
The next day, Saturday, we went to one of Korea’s most famous Buddhist temples. It took us a while to actually hike up the mountain to reach the temple, but it was a nice hike, and wasn’t that grueling. I’m just glad I didn’t wear my heels (but really, if I can count the times that I’ve seen Korean women hiking with heels…(albeit, usually not on really difficult hikes)). Of course, with it being Buddha’s Birthday weekend and all, there was an assload of people there. Everyone was in line to see an old and storied statue of Buddha. While we waited in line for an hour and a half or so, one or two of us would take turns holding our place while the other one or two went exploring the surrounding area. We laughed at ourselves for staying in line that long to see the statue for about one minute.
On Sunday, we had decided to go to a water park, but once we saw the ticket price, we decided to turn back. Since it was rainy, we basically spent the entire day in a coffee shop reading together, like introverted friends are wont to do.
****
While writing about these two weekends, I feel like I haven’t been able to aptly translate what was so special about them. I think it had a lot do with the company. There is something really special about traveling with your best friends. These are people you already have intimate relationships with, and traveling together just brings you closer together in so many ways. Sure you can get annoyed with each other, but I think it’s hard for that to happen during such a short weekend getaway, haha!
To be a bit more...abstract, there have been times in my life when I feel wholly "in the present" and some major endorphins fire in my brain. Call it "the ecstasy of life" or "the infinite of a moment", but it's a feeling I used to experience a lot more when I was younger. There were definitely some points over these two trips where I felt myself approaching this kind of feeling.
* I'm happy that I haven't really eaten fast food in a long time (as far as McDonald/Taco Bell type places are concerned), but I was drunkenly happy to break my fast food fast with a delicious crunchwrap supreme.
** My favorite quote concerning this is a teacher from Liverpool during my EPIK orientation telling us, "We don't really understand you Americans and your drinking games. It's like...why would I want a to stand in the way of my drinking? Well, I guess we do have a sort of drinking game in Liverpool. It consists of drinking a beer at a pace of your own choosing, and then when you’re finished with that one, going up to the bar and buying another one." That's paraphrased, but you get the idea.
*** I can’t really recall if I’ve mentioned this phenomenon before, but it is common for people to pregame (drink before going out) outside of convenience stores. Many convenience stores offer seating outside (mostly because it’s not really culturally acceptable for Koreans to eat on the run…except maybe in Seoul or Busan), but many foreigners, as well as Koreans of lower socio-economic classes (I was TOLD that latter part, not sure if it's actually true), choose to just buy cheap drinks from the convenience store, and then just drink right outside of the store (public drinking is legal in Korea). (sorry for the parentheses overkill)
During the first weekend of May, we decided to take our first group trip to Seoul. On the third weekend of May (a long holiday weekend for Buddha's Birthday), we went to Gyeongju on the east coast.
*****
Seoul
Our original goal for the weekend in Seoul was to party, shop, and tour. Retrospectively speaking, I can confidently say that we definitely got the party part down pat, but not so much the other two.
The beginning of our family weekend in Seoul got off to a rather inauspicious start. I left my apartment a little late to catch the bus to the train station (late being an hour and a half before the train was scheduled to depart (I live far away and it was rush hour)), and we ended up missing our train, but we were luckily able to get another one only half an hour later. I was silently thinking to myself, "I hope this isn't a bad omen for the rest of the weekend...” Luckily, it wasn't!
We had a lot of fun giggling and being silly on the train, as is our wont on any sort of public transportation in Korea. However, like all public transportation in Korea, trains are deaaaaad silent, and YOU WILL BE shushed if you make too much of a racket. So it was less like “giggling and being silly” and more like "barely suppressed giggling and silliness".
After arriving to our hostel in Seoul (mad ups to The Pencil Guesthouse on being such an awesome hostel), we went to a very tiny pizza place whose name escapes me. What I do know about that very tiny pizza place is that they serve the best damn pizza I've had in Korea. We also ate their New Year's Eve. Not sure how to direct anyone there, but it's in the Hongdae area...? Hah!
We went a little wild on Friday night, I must say. Highlights included going to my favorite microbrewery in Seoul (Magpie), my favorite dive bar in Seoul (Go-Go's), and my favorite hate-to-love fast food restaurant (Taco Bell)*. Getting back to our hostel at five in the morning was probably not the best decision, but we had so much fun staying out and dancing, there was seemingly no other option at the time.
The next day was spent sleeping in, and then sitting on the patio of our hostel conversing and drinking coffee. There were suggestions for going to the N’Seoul Tower, going to a water park, or any of the various other activities and tourist locations that Seoul has to offer, but the consensus was pretty much “I don’t feel like it.” Ultimately, we made our way to the Trick Eye Art Museum just a stone’s throw away from us in Hongdae, but once we got there, no one felt like actually entering the museum. We elected to go back to the hostel and chill out once more. I think everyone was getting cranky, and we were all in desperate need of a nap!
After dinner, we elected to go straight to the bars, because if we started drinking early enough, we would be in bed earlier, right?! Easily the highlight of Saturday night was playing beer pong. We noticed these three foreigners playing at a bar called Thursday Party (an American style club/sports bar hybrid). The whole weekend, I had been making a joke that my 20-24 year-old self was coming back into action. I even made up a song to the tune of "My Boyfriend's Back" and it goes like this: "The bro king's back, and you're gonna be in trouble". I, personally, thought it was brilliant. So, while Kate was the one who was really prodding us to play beer pong, I resignedly said, "Well, I guess I'm the bro king, and it's my job to play beer pong whenever possible."
Our game against Team U.N. (our name for them came from the fact that one was a New Zealander, one was Swedish, and ones was Swiss-French or some bullshit like that) did not go nearly as planned. We sunk our first couple of shots, but then totally laid an egg after that. After that devastating defeat, Team U.N. decided to leave the premises. Probably because they were desperately frightened of the Bro King getting warmed up for more beer pong. We decided that Daniel and I would play against Kate and Colin. Amazingly enough, Daniel made a behind the back shot, and I joked that he should start playing beer pong every day all day (from my experiences, Brits find the idea of drinking games confusing, to say the least**)
After a while at Thursday Party, we wondered back to the part of Hongdae we were at the night before. We spent some time at Go-Go’s again, and ran into our friend, Andrei, who teaches in Incheon. After that, we went to a convenience store*** a couple of minutes away from Go-Go’s to have a chill beer or two. After that, Kate and I went back to the hostel (Liz had left earlier), but I guess Colin and Daniel stayed out until the wee hours of the morning yet again. I guess they also got soundly rejected by girls for the rest of the night, haha!
The next day we got moving late once again, but this time actually made it to a neighborhood in Seoul that is well-known for its name brand shopping. After that, it was time to head back to Daejeon!
******
Gyeongju
We had been debating a while as to where to go for Buddha’s Birthday weekend, one of the few three-day weekends we have during the year. We decided on Gyeongju on the east coast of Korea. It’s one of the most historical cities in Korea.
We waited too long to purchase train tickets, and by the time that we actually did, everything was sold out for Thursday night, so we came to Gyeongju early on Friday morning. The only notable part of our train journey was when we accidentally got off at the wrong stop. I quickly asked someone if we were at the right stop, and they said, “No! Next one!” So we quickly jumped back on the train before the doors shut.
We had booked a room in a hostel with five beds, but there were four of us. Once we had arrived at our hostel, we found out that indeed there was another person already staying in our room. The hostel owner referred to him only as “Mr. Lee”, which for some reason struck us as slightly funny and mysterious...not sure why exactly…maybe because the hostel owner referred to him in such formal terms. For some reason, that referent started a plethora of jokes and stories among us. We decided to make up anecdotes involving Mr. Lee. For instance, I said that Mr. Lee had been a crack-addicted prostitute in L.A. until he discovered his true passion in designing shoes made from recyclable material (or something like that). The funniest inside joke we made concerning our fictional Mr. Lee was when we saw an older, drunken Korean man yelling at passing people and cars for no particular reason that we could surmise. Daniel said, “Looks like Mr. Lee is at it again, you guys.”
Once we did actually meet Mr. Lee late Saturday afternoon, he unfortunately didn’t meet our expectations. He was just some regular guy from California. He seemed pretty normal. The fictional Mr. Lee was a much more interesting character who had had a rough go at life.
For our Friday afternoon, we wondered around Gyeongju. One thing that Gyeongju is famous for is its tombs. It has these tombs that look like really out-of-place hills. The parks in Gyeongju were absolutely beautiful. There were a lot of people out having picnics and flying kites. We walked around and through the parks, and we also walked to a “traditional village”. Unfortunately, it was a bit misleading, because we could tell the village had either been extremely remodeled, or rebuilt just to attract tourists. After getting some dinner and drinking some coffee, we made our way to an artificially made pond called Anapji Pond. There was a cluster of people there, but the space was so wide open that it wasn’t that big of a deal.
After that, we just grabbed a few beers from a convenience store and drank on the back patio of our hostel with the other guests.
The next day, Saturday, we went to one of Korea’s most famous Buddhist temples. It took us a while to actually hike up the mountain to reach the temple, but it was a nice hike, and wasn’t that grueling. I’m just glad I didn’t wear my heels (but really, if I can count the times that I’ve seen Korean women hiking with heels…(albeit, usually not on really difficult hikes)). Of course, with it being Buddha’s Birthday weekend and all, there was an assload of people there. Everyone was in line to see an old and storied statue of Buddha. While we waited in line for an hour and a half or so, one or two of us would take turns holding our place while the other one or two went exploring the surrounding area. We laughed at ourselves for staying in line that long to see the statue for about one minute.
On Sunday, we had decided to go to a water park, but once we saw the ticket price, we decided to turn back. Since it was rainy, we basically spent the entire day in a coffee shop reading together, like introverted friends are wont to do.
****
While writing about these two weekends, I feel like I haven’t been able to aptly translate what was so special about them. I think it had a lot do with the company. There is something really special about traveling with your best friends. These are people you already have intimate relationships with, and traveling together just brings you closer together in so many ways. Sure you can get annoyed with each other, but I think it’s hard for that to happen during such a short weekend getaway, haha!
To be a bit more...abstract, there have been times in my life when I feel wholly "in the present" and some major endorphins fire in my brain. Call it "the ecstasy of life" or "the infinite of a moment", but it's a feeling I used to experience a lot more when I was younger. There were definitely some points over these two trips where I felt myself approaching this kind of feeling.
* I'm happy that I haven't really eaten fast food in a long time (as far as McDonald/Taco Bell type places are concerned), but I was drunkenly happy to break my fast food fast with a delicious crunchwrap supreme.
** My favorite quote concerning this is a teacher from Liverpool during my EPIK orientation telling us, "We don't really understand you Americans and your drinking games. It's like...why would I want a to stand in the way of my drinking? Well, I guess we do have a sort of drinking game in Liverpool. It consists of drinking a beer at a pace of your own choosing, and then when you’re finished with that one, going up to the bar and buying another one." That's paraphrased, but you get the idea.
*** I can’t really recall if I’ve mentioned this phenomenon before, but it is common for people to pregame (drink before going out) outside of convenience stores. Many convenience stores offer seating outside (mostly because it’s not really culturally acceptable for Koreans to eat on the run…except maybe in Seoul or Busan), but many foreigners, as well as Koreans of lower socio-economic classes (I was TOLD that latter part, not sure if it's actually true), choose to just buy cheap drinks from the convenience store, and then just drink right outside of the store (public drinking is legal in Korea). (sorry for the parentheses overkill)
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