Set an open course...

The last few weeks have been a bit chaotic here in South Korea and I've gotten lax on my blog posting.  I have just had a bunch of things happening at the same time.  Since getting back from a sailing trip at the end of August, I've had one depressing thing after another happen.  I got a pretty bad sinus infection (first time I've been sick since leaving the country); I've had a student tell me that I don't belong in his country and that I'm stupid because I can't speak Korean.  I was told by another student that Koreans are the only pure bred race left in the world and they are superior because of this fact.  (This particular student was not being mean, she was just making a chilling statement of what she thought was fact, an aside that she believed to be a truth so obvious that it didn't require any other sort of explanation.)  In other racist news, I also had an entire class of 10 year old kids answer "Obama" when I turned over the animal flash card of a monkey.  Then, on a more financial note, I was the only teacher at my school that did not receive their paycheck before the 4 day Chuseok Holiday weekend that just ended.  The explanation given to me was that the other teachers where traveling to be with their families for this Korean version of Thanksgiving.  My check's now four days late and I'm rubbing two nickels together to try to make a dime.  Needless to say, it's been a rough couple of weeks.  Since this isn't a good place for my mind to linger, I figure now's a perfect time to write about the sailing trip that has become:

"The Weekend by Which All Others Will be Compared."

There's something about being on a boat.  I love the smells, the sounds, the freedom.  A house boat docked in a cove of Lake Mead or a speed boat pulling me through the goose shit of Southern Illinois... each of them have their own type of magic for me.  Given a choice on a place to hide from the world, I'll choose open water and an open bottle every time.  Salty air and the sound of waves just make a drink taste right.  It's like Grandma's spaghetti recipe that no one else can make, the sprinkle of this and pinch of that which takes a cocktail and turns it into a Cezanne.  Music, internal or otherwise, also seems to sound a bit better with the gentle wake of a boat beneath your feet, lulling you side to side and forcing you to dance.  Add a group of friends to that music and that tasty beverage and nothing else compares.  I'm just a different person when water's around.  You can feed me after midnight, but the water can still make the gremlins come out.  My demons look a little more like Puck and less like Stripe, but both can be a bit dangerous at the right time of night.  

The four hour bus ride to the marina started a little after 1am on Friday night after a long day of work.  My last class ends at 9pm and, with the excitement of the impending trip, sleep wasn't a viable option.  Lack of actual shuteye would become a major theme as the weekend progressed.  Of the thirty or so people on the bus ride over, I knew a total of three people, two from a previous trip and the tour guide himself.  It was obvious from the beginning that a large number from the trip knew each other well and that was intimidating at the start.  It didn't last for any amount of time, though.  To be perfectly honest, I was pretty hammer-drunk and I was having more than a few issues at the time.  My main issue would also become a bit of a theme over the weekend:  my pants would not stay up.  I was wearing a pair of shorts that had started the night in a bit of a loose-state and I was without a belt.  The use of my hands were, of course, being reserved for the cocktail I was currently drinking and the cocktail in which I planned to help wash down the first.  Factor in a psychotic bus driver and my pants fell off... regularly.  I have lost some weight since arriving here in May, but I haven't lost anywhere near enough for it to be this big of a problem.  After watching the sunrise over the coast and having a quick breakfast, I was able to find a "belt" to get me through.  (The "belt" was actually a bright lime green dog leash that I picked up at a little corner market... you can laugh now.)

In retrospect, I probably should have skipped the bus booze and the sunrise hike.  The lack of sleep would put an acid-trip-surreal-feel to the rest of the weekend.  It just wasn't in the cards at this time, though.  When we first got on the boat, we each loaded our bags into cabins that would never be used and toured the ship itself.  I don't have exact measurements, but I was immediately impressed with the size.  I had been a little curious how tight the quarters were going to be for thirty people, but it was never an issue.  Once the boat got away from the marina, the real fun began.


I need to take a second and give credit to the large group of friends that made up the majority of our sailing trip.  At least a few of them had taken the trip several times and were well prepared for the voyage.  The biggest contribution, in my opinion, was a selection of CD's made by one of the guys in the group.  Since he had been on this boat before, he knew that the mp3 players that most people were carrying weren't compatible with the stereo system built into the ship.  So, he took the time to make an eclectic mix of feelgood boat drink music.  This is the same guy who, along with his girlfriend, put together a massive amount of bloody marys and marinated skewers to grill.  These discs set the mood for the entire trip and, if nothing else, it gives some credence to his taste in music.  (I figure this justifies a small plug for his music blog... it can be found here.  He has download links at the bottom of each of his entries.  Look for the ((((0)))) symbol at the bottom of each link.) 

In the crow's nest...

After an hour or two of sailing, the captain turned off the boat and we were able to jump from the rigging and swim for a while.  I don't know the exact height from which we were jumping, but it was enough to hurt when you hit the water.  We walked out from the mast on the beam just below the crow's nest  and jumped in feet first, very fun, but also a bit painful.  There are many, many more pictures on Facebook of the entire trip. 


After the quick swim and a dockside delivery of 3 or 4 cases of Makgeoli, we continued the trip on to the Sado Isles.  The isles themselves supposedly have dinosaur fossils in several different places, but I never saw them.  There was a map showing the way, but my mind was in a different place at that time.  After a 2 or 3 mile paved walk, we came to a small inlet with a beach that we would fill up the rest of the daylight on Saturday.  We tossed a frisbee on the beach and then moved it into the water.  It was about this time that the pants issue came back around.... this time was completely my fault, though, no lack of belt to blame.  Please keep in mind that we have been drinking consistently for the last 18 or 20 hours at this time.  I caught a small 5 or 10 minute nap on the breakfast room floor, but that was the only sleep I had received since waking at 9am on Friday morning... and it's around 6pm on Saturday night at this point.  Whatever the reason, I decided I wanted to skinny dip in the ocean.  Now, this wasn't a Frank the Tank moment; I wasn't trying to talk anyone into joining me.  It just sounded like a good idea to me at the time.  All was well and good.  I was holding my swimming trunks and we were still tossing the frisbee when I suddenly lost my pants in the current.  One minute they were there and the next they were completely gone.  I had to borrow a towel and try to walk that same hike back to the boat, sans pants.  The old Korean ladies along the way thought it was hilarious as our tour guide was all too happy to explain what had happened.  Not my finest moment.  To top it off, I had accidentally left my Ray Bans on a rock near the beach.  By the time, I had made it back, the tide came up and the sunglasses joined my pants in the great kingdom beneath the sea.

The next few hours are a bit hazy, for some reason.  There was some much needed food grilled at some point and a continuous flow of not-so-needed drinks.  There was also a point in the night were another camping group called me and a few others over to their site for some fresh sushi that they had caught earlier in the day.  After the sun was down for the night, the majority of us made our way back to the boat for an evening under the stars with a couple guitars and a few good times.  The party was still going on the cabin roof well into the early hours.  Around 2 or 3 in the morning, someone discovered one of the coolest aspects of the trip.  There was a major bioluminescent show going on in the water every time that the surface was interrupted.  From what I understand, this type of event is fairly rare:  it only happens once or twice a year in certain parts of the world.  Pouring water over the side of the boat made a bright neon reaction in the water at every place that the surface was interrupted.  After being assured that this had nothing to do with the nuclear fallout in Japan, I jumped in the water.  There was an explosion of light as soon as I hit the water.  It was like a thousand glow sticks were attached to my body.  As we swam, small drops of water came off the front of our hands and those ripples would also start to glow.  It was ridiculous.  After a few minutes in the water, it would stop and we'd have to get out and allow the algae (or whatever was causing this particular event) to either recharge or regroup, then we could start it all over again.  This midnight swim and the subsequent rest in wet clothes would probably be a big factor in that sinus infection I mentioned at the beginning of this post. 

After a short half hour or hour nap, I woke up to the first fingers of light as the sky went black to grey.  I tried to sleep more, but it just wasn't going to happen.  I grabbed some morning Makgeoli and headed back to the beach to see if there was any chance that my things had washed ashore when the tide went down... no luck.  Some fresh grilled tuna and fruit met us for breakfast a few hours later and the rest of the day was spent with Bloody Mary's and more boating.  I'd love to go into more details about Sunday, but I was in a slight hallucination mode from lack of sleep by this point.  We got back to Busan fairly late Sunday night and I finally got some much-needed sleep.

I can't imagine being back in the United States and being able to find thirty people that were able to put their lives on hold for a weekend and step off the map for a bit.  You have to be a bit crazy to move to the other side of the world for a job like this one.  I think it just naturally attracts an adventurous soul.  It's hard to get a float trip for 5 or 10 people together back home, a sailing trip for 30 would be close to impossible, I think.  These weekends have made this job and this trip more than just bearable; they've allowed me to ignore or forget all of the downsides.  I miss my family, I miss my friends, but I wouldn't trade weekends like this for anything.

A Few of My Favorite Things...

On several different occasions, I've written about some culture shock issues that come with living here in South Korea.  I don't think that I've overly complained like "why don't they do it like they do in America?", but there have definitely been a few head scratching, WTF moments since I landed on these shores.  Luckily, there's a whole lot of things that make Korea really, really cool and so far they've overshadowed the strange for me.

The example that jumps out at me the most is the level of service you get at almost every place I go.  Now, admittedly, as a foreigner I don't always get that service, but any time that I go out with a coworker or have at least one Korean in the group, the service is usually stellar.  (Exceptions always apply, of course.)  Good service is just the norm.  In some of the higher end restaurants in which I've worked, an amuse or "gift from the chef" was common for any call parties.  Others did it for every table.  A half ounce of tuna tartarre over a crispy croquet is almost a joke when you compare it to some of the items I've received at no extra charge.  Order the largest pitcher of beer and more often than not, one of the workers will show up with hot wings and say "service, service" before placing it on your table.  Buy a deli sandwich at the local Family Mart, and you will occasionally get a free juice.  (The free juice is more like a coupon, but it's still nice.)  What does the server expect to get out of this little act of kindness?  Nothing.  For the most part, you don't tip in Korea.  That goes for taxis, doormen, servers, bartenders, barristas, you name it.  I do tip at some of the more western style bars, but most just assume that you made a mistake and force the money back in your hand.  Having worked in a tipping industry for almost fifteen years, it's hard for me to admit this, but it's nice to receive good service simply because someone regards it as doing their job... not because they think I'm going to leave a big tip.

Another upside to restaurants in South Korea is speed.  Eateries are set up a little different here than they are back home.  Variety is not as much of an option.  In general, restaurants are split up by the type of meat they serve and the style in which they serve it.  There are still "family restaurants" like Outback and TGIFriday's, but they are considerably more expensive and are usually reserved for more of a special occasion. We usually just decide that we are in the mood for chicken or pork or beef or octopus or whatever and we go to a restaurant that only serves that food.  If you have a large group, it can make the decision a little more difficult, but it usually ensures prompt service at every spot.  When a restaurant only has two or three items on its menu, you can have the majority of the meal prepped and ready to go almost immediately.  It's not fast food, per se, it's just food that comes fast.  It doesn't have all the MSG and other preservatives that make McD's and other fast food places so unhealthy.  One of my favorite local meals is a dish called Daeji Gukbap which is a pork soup with rice.  That dish is literally the only thing that's served in the restaurant where it can be found.  So, you're either in the mood for pork or you're not.  It's the same way with the Nakji Bokeum that has also become a bit of a staple dish for me since both shops are so close to work.  This dish is actually prepared in a small grill that's built into your dining table.  Here's a few pics of the dish as it's prepared.  Far left is uncooked and just placed over the flame.  The next pic shows the dish coming to a boil.  The bottom picture is the finished dish served over rice.

Coffee is another huge upside to living in Korea.  I know what you're thinking, "Starbucks is on every corner in the US."  In Korea, Starbucks is around, but the little mom and pop barristas are much more prevalent.  There are many other corporate-coffee places like Pascucci, A Twosome Place, and Coffeebean around the city, but it's the small coffee shops that I enjoy the most.  The Americano (espresso and hot water) is the beverage of choice over here and can be found at most of these shops for around two bucks.  (In the three months I've been here, there have been two seperate chart-topping songs dedicated to the americano.  I think the second one's a remix of Tu Vuo Fa L'Americano to a shuffle-beat but I don't have the heart to tell them it has nothing to do with coffee.)  The point is... Korean's love their capo and I love them for it.  It's close to impossible to get Monster, Red Bull, Rockstar, or any other true energy drink over here.  If they took coffee away, too, I might sleep for the rest of my life.

If you have some sort of strange aversion to a coffee shop experience, there are other ways to get your fix.  In the corner of every 7-11 or Family Mart, there is a stand full of bagged juice or overly sweet coffee options.  A sixteen ounce cup of ice comes complimentary at the massive total price of about $1.  I prefer to get my coffee freshly made at a shop, but these stands are great for a juice options.Strawberry or Blueberry Juice anyone?  Go with the blueberry, both are really good, but the strawberry tastes a lot more sugary.  

Another sheer stroke of genius is the milkshake-in-a-bag.  There a large number of little ice cream novelty treats at the local marts, all in different shapes and flavors.  There's a watermelon flavored ice cream that comes in the shape of a slice of watermelon, a drumstick-like treat that's a more flat and easier to hold, or a coffee flavored ice cream in a tube that breaks in the middle so you can share with a friend.  None of these are as awesome an idea as the milkshake in a bag.  You pull it out of the freezer and have to knead it with your hands to get it soft enough to eat.  Considering how hot it's been, crushing it up in your hands can be as refreshing as the actual ice cream.  Okay, that's bullshit... ice cream is always gonna be better than a cold hand.


These aren't my all time favorite parts of Korea, but each of them stack up nicely to make this trip that much more enjoyable. 

Fortnights and Fortitudes, part 2

(I've gone back and forth about whether to publish this story.  I do not want to ever single anyone out in these blogs and I go out of my way to try and leave names off the page.  These are my personal stories and you can take them or leave them.  Remember that there is a different side to every story told, though.  The guy referred to as Drunkie in this blog is just as alone over here as I am.  I do not know him that well, but everyone adjusts to a major life change in a different way.  He was very easy to target this weekend, but that doesn't mean I don't have a little sympathy for him.  Part 1 of this blog can be found here)

This past weekend promised to be a little more organized than the previous one, simply by limiting the number of people on the trip.  The more people on the trip, the more down time from bathroom breaks and stragglers.  Or at least that's the conventional wisdom.  We'd find out over the course of the weekend that it only takes one...

Most of the trips put on by this travel group are open to any of the 600+ members of it's Facebook page.  A few of them are a first come, first serve basis.  Every once in a while, Charles has an invite-only trip for people that have been on several excursions with him.  This was one of those times.  This one happened to fall right in the middle of summer break for many of the ESL teachers in the area and it was also a three day weekend.  The original plan was stream trekking all day Sunday, camping out that night, and letting Monday take us where it would.  A lack of camping equipment for everyone and a strong possibility of rain had us abandon the camping for a minbak, but that was the only real change.

I will start off by taking partial blame for the events that would transpire over the next 12 hours or so.  While I did not force anything upon anyone, I did provide the catalyst that would provide the group with a very, very long day.  I brought the Soju.  Now, this is not an attempt at braggadocio, but I've been known to imbibe a few times over the last fifteen or twenty years.  I've also been known to put myself in embarrassing situations.  I was once pulled over in a Jack in the Box drive-thru wearing nothing on but the skin I was born in.  (The cops couldn't keep a straight face long enough to ticket me, so they just followed me the one block home.  I miss Las Vegas.)  I understand that sometimes the thirst can grab you and take you to places that you didn't know existed... you're own little Oz.  Keeping this in mind, I try not to judge but it's not easy.  In retrospect, I should not have pulled out the first bottle of soju at 10am.

The five members of our little tour hit it off pretty much from the start.  Two friends had came together from a different city, but other than that, we were virtual strangers.  We played a few drinking games on the bus and basically set the table for the rest of the day.  We stopped for food around 1pm and that's when the first indication of future trouble really occurred.  One of the guys decided that he didn't want to eat lunch.  A beer or two would be enough to keep him going for the next seven or eight hours he said.  The rest of us gorged ourselves on the spicy duck with rice dish called oli bulgogi.  He continued to drink.  After lunch we headed to the stream and quickly saw that we were not the only ones who thought that the 3 day weekend would be a perfect time for a little nature trip.  There were people and tents everywhere.  The stream was completely inundated with Koreans on inner tubes.  At times, it looked like a lazy river ride at a waterpark.  Luckily, the further we went upstream, the more the crowds began to thin.  There were many good spots for jumping and swimming along the way, so we stopped when it suited us.  That was the best part about the small group; you can only be pulled in 5 different directions instead of 25.  Four of us were pretty much on the same page, but the lunch-skipper was starting to do his own thing.

The sign on the left says No Swimming; the sign on the right says No Jumping.  Oops.

I brought a little mini-cooler filled with soju and beer for the trekking and we were dipping into it pretty consistently, but the four of us weren't getting hammered by any means.  It was more like a casual day drinking at the lake.  Drunkie didn't get the memo, I guess.  The further we walked, the more he stumbled.  The river didn't split anywhere so we would occasionally leave him in shallow sections as we kept walking towards the next series of pools and jumps.  Towards the end of the day, Charles took us a little off the main stream into a side tributary that ended up being the highlight of the day for rest of us.  About thirty minutes later, Drunkie stumbled to where our guide was waiting at the split.  Eventually, he made it up to join us.

While the stream itself had been pretty busy, the hidden alcove had only one group of four Koreans at a small portable picnic table.  They were friendly with us all and even invited us to share their samgyupsal.  The alcove was protected from the sun by a bridge overhead.  That left the deep water several degrees cooler than the river had been just a few minutes before.  It was very refreshing.  The only real downside to this spot was that the water was much darker than the rest.  It was still clear, but the combination of a lack of sun and the depth of the pools left it difficult to see the bottom.  This was a particularly large problem for us considering we were having an epidemic of lost sunglasses and necklaces.  No one could seem to remember to take off their sunglasses before jumping.  Two of of the party members were divers, so that helped considerably.  Lost items weren't the only issue with dark waters, though.  As I was floating beside one of the rocks, I managed to get my feet tangled in some loose kite string.  The more I tried to free myself, the worse it got.  Finally, I had to pull float while one of the girls helped me out.  After finally getting free, I started pulling in the string so it didn't happen again.  Eventually, I got to the end and pulled up a small catfish attached to a hook on the end.  The Koreans at the that had joined us said that this was somehow a sign of good luck.  I was just glad the hook didn't end up in my foot. 

As the sun continued to go down, the alcove got darker and darker.  We said our goodbyes and went back to the river.  At this time, Drunkie decided that he didn't want to go the way that we were headed so he climbed out and tried to walk above the stream instead of in it like the rest of us.  That translated into more waiting for him to try to make his way back to the group.  By this time, we were fed up.  We went a little further up the river and spent some time at a waterfall shoot that was a blast, but every stop took twice as long as it should because he could not keep up.  As you can see from the picture, the sun was going down fast and the walking would be pretty treacherous if it went down completely.  This didn't help convince Drunkie to walk a little faster... or even stay with the group.  He again went off on his own as our guide tried to corral him towards the path while it was still visible.  We finally got to our stop as the sun went down for good.  The worst of Drunkie was still yet to come, though.

When we got to the spot were we were supposed to sleep for the night, we found out quickly that it was supposed to rain that night and, if it did, we would be stuck on the wrong side of the river.  So we started a twenty minute walk towards our bus to go to another spot.  There was a little confusion and our group got split up a bit.  When we realized what had happened, everyone stopped on a small bridge and waited to get everyone back together.  Drunkie did not stop with the rest of us and no one really noticed.   He decided he'd just meet us at the bus.  He must've forgot that he had no idea where the bus was parked or which road to take at the four way stop to find it.  We're in the middle of the Korean wilderness.  There are no lights and there are cliffs on all sides going down to the river valley.  We spent the next three hours trying to find him.  No one had eaten since early that afternoon, and all of us were fresh out of energy.  Eventually, he hit resend on his phone and called the bus driver.  Luckily, the guide had used Drunkie's phone to call the first time.  Stumbling around lost for three hours seemed to sober him up for a time, but it wouldn't last.

We finally arrived at our actual minbak for the night and Drunkie partially redeemed himself by making dinner.  When he had gotten back to the bus, he had attempted to put the blame on us for him being lost, but he was quickly backed down.  Despite everything that he done so far, that dinner was delicious.  It was augmented by some delicious grilled eel provided by a friend of the guide.  Unfortunately, that goodwill was short-lived as he started to drink whiskey with a group of Korean marines that were also staying in our minbak.

Minbak picture from a previous trip

About this time, I had decided to call it a night.  It had been a long day and another long day was planned for Monday.  I didn't really sleep, though.  I read for a bit and just rested mostly.  About an hour later the rest of the group started to come into the room.  The Koreans that Drunkie had been drinking alongside begged us to put him to bed.  Begrudgingly, the other guy in the group helped lead him into the room and directed him into his own little corner.  In the picture, you can see how a minbak is just an empty room with a pallets laid out on the floor.  It's nice and cheap and is a great way for large groups to travel together.  Snoring tends to be the only real problem with these types of rooms.  We had a different sort of issue on this particular evening, though.  Thankfully, we pushed him off into his own corner, because somewhere over the course of the night, Drunkie pissed himself.

The next morning we woke to fresh omelets and Mandu Ramyun.  Then, we were quickly greeted with the sounds of a dying giraffe coming from inside the minbak.  Needless to say, Mr. Drunkie had turned into Mr. Hangover.  After keeping quiet for a while, someone finally broke down and told him that he had pissed himself in his sleep.  He then came up with some convoluted excuse about how when he drinks he pisses on his post prized possession... like some sort of inebriated enlightenment.  When he picked up on the fact that nobody was swallowing his bullshit, he finally relented and just slept in the back of the bus.  The rest of the day was fairly laid back and pleasant.  No trekking on Monday... just swimming and lounging around.  We even got back to Pusan a little early and enjoyed the last hour or two of Haeundae Beach before having burgers at the best Irish pub in town, The Wolfhound.  Drunkie stuck with his m.o. and disappeared before we even hit the beach.  Finally, though, he was not our responsibility to watch.  No one looked for him this time.

Fortnight's and fortitudes, part 1

(I decided to split this post into two parts.  Part 2 tomorrow or later on tonight)

So it's been two weeks or so since my last blog and a whole lot has happened.  Most importantly, the internet service and AC that was guaranteed in my contract were finally provided after 3 months of promises.  I've also gone on two more mini-trips; one was awesome despite random acts of buffoonery, the other left much to be desired.  I've also made a decision to take a more proactive role in cutting a few pounds.  Eating right over here is a fairly easy thing to do as long as you avoid the quick and easy pitfalls, but the copious amounts of alcohol that seem to be consumed on random Wednesdays needs to be curtailed a bit.  I've also been a lot more active on the weekends with these trips, but a little effort through the week will go a long way I think.  Unfortunately, gym memberships are two to three times the cost of a membership in the United States.  We shall see.

I'm gonna put a bit of a disclaimer for this particular blog entry.  The second weekend trip involved one drunken individual that did many annoying things.  The problem is that several of those things would be ridiculously embarrassing for him and I'm just not as malicious as I was in the past(or at least I'm trying to not be.)  I still want to write about the trip and everything that he did adds a helluva lot to the story.  So, there's my dilemma.  I have a little catching up to do before that tale gets told, so maybe I'll change my mind by then.

I've been going on weekend trips with a guy here in Pusan that organizes everything for us in advance and then acts as a guide the entire trip.  He's been hosting these events for 12 years now and everyone that I've been on as been a blast so far, until this particular weekend, that is.  First things first, none of the disappointment was the fault of the organizer.  Things just didn't quite work out right.  I still continued the trend of meeting more like minded individuals and that aspect of the trip was a success. 

The weekend was billed as a White Water Rafting & Tofu Making excursion.  The day started off slow with several stragglers that pushed our start time back.  It wasn't an overnight trip, so there wasn't as much wiggle room with the itinerary.  When we arrived at the rafting location, I could immediately tell that this might not be what I was hoping for in the trip.  To start, you could see a lot of rafts in the water... water that was calmly rolling down the river.  I've honestly seen more white water coming from my faucet, but I was pretty sure that there would be more actual rapids down the river.  We could only see the launching area from the road, so of course it was going to be calm.  When we got to the equipment shack we were given life vests and helmets and made to put them on immediately. 

I thought both were a bit ridiculous, but in general, Koreans can't swim.  Or at least they can't swim very well.  If you go to the beach and you get out past your chest, a swarm of ninja's on jet skis will descend on you and corral you back to the beach.  (I call them ninja's because they are covered from nose to toes in a wet suit and many of them also wear a mask and hat of some sort to keep their bodies from seeing any sort of sun at all.)

Our group of 22 were split into two separate groups because they only had two guides available.  The boats were crowded to say the least.  This is where the experience split for the group.  The ten that ended up on the first boat had a blast;  their guide was fun, they were organized, and he spoke at least a little English.  My group of twelve was not so lucky.  Our guide was always in a rush, he couldn't speak any English at all (or he refused to), and he was terrible at steering.  We managed to get stuck on protruding rocks at least four times on a two hour float trip.  That was the other problem: despite the helmet and life jacket requirement, the water was calm for 95% of the trip.  The overloaded boat also meant that we bottomed out every time the water got the least bit shallow.  The guide's lack of competency, lack of English, or our own lack of ability pushed us into every major rock in the river.  After about an hour of this, our boat had a full on mutiny.  Helmets and vests were flung to the side and we jumped out of the boat for a swim.  The guide of course was not happy, but we couldn't understand him anyway. 

After we got back to the equipment shed, it became apparent that we would not have enough time for the tofu-making portion of our trip.  I was looking forward to that portion of the trip, but I wasn't that broken up when it had to be cancelled.  After getting a bite to eat and drinking a few more beers, it was decided to call it a day and head back to Pusan.  I'm not sure what the soup was at this particular restaurant, but it tasted like the juice from homegrown jars of green cooked in bacon fat for hours and hours..... delicious.  The beer, of course, just tasted like beer.

Despite the poor turn to the day, the trip was one of smiles.  Back home, its just not that easy to get a large group of people together for anything.  At SIU-C and in Las Vegas, it was a little easier, but most of the time everything was a still a last minute decision.  It takes a bit of an adventurous soul to decide to move to the other side of the world, to start.  The majority of us are twenty or thirty-somethings, unmarried and without children.  There are exceptions, of course, but it seems to be the exact opposite of back home where getting settled down and raising a family seems to be the norm.  I'm just not that guy right now.  I might never be.... sorry, Mom.

Summertime and the living's easy?

So last week started the beginning of the summer vacation here in Korea, not that it's been any sort of real "vacation" for me.  Public schools and universities are out of school for 5 or 6 weeks, but hagwons don't have the same schedule.  Most of them actually extend their hours during the break and turn into an educational daycare of sorts.  Despite the longer hours, most of the private hagwons do take a week or so off, but I wasn't that lucky.  We were closed for Thursday and Friday.  It wasn't the reload that I was hoping to receive, but it was still alright.  I had friends over here that went to Thailand, friends that went to the Philippines, and Japan.  I had one friend that tried unsuccessfully to go to Shanghai (Visa issues when they actually landed in China).  I didn't have that opportunity due to the short break, but I did my best to make the most of it.

I spent Thursday with a friend and pretty much stayed at home on Friday, in preparation for a highly anticipated trip on Saturday and Sunday.  The Uljin Nature Trip (a river-trekking and windsurfing 2day excursion) was billed as being one of the tour guides "top three Shangra-La" spots in Korea... it didn't disappoint.  To get to the spot was not easy and was not fast, but it was worth it.  We started out early Saturday morning, a feat in itself when it comes to ESL teachers in Busan.  The drive was said to take around 4 hours, but traffic got pretty bad in one spot and we lost almost 2 hours.  Unfortunately, that lost time would limit us later on in the day.  There were twenty-four of us on the trip, but lunch and bathroom breaks were surprisingly well coordinated... otherwise more time would have been lost.  As far as "missing out" on some portion of the trip?  Luckily, none of us really know what we missed out on doing, so it didn't really affect us that much.  River-trekking was the main attraction on that first day.


In general, the only downside to nature trips in Korea is the sheer number of people on the trail.  Hiking is a very, very popular sport here, and you never seem to truly get away from large groups of people.  On last weeks trip, we saw probably 50 or 60 people while we were hiking.  That was not the case this week.  With the exception of some campers when we first entered the river, we were the only trekkers in the water.  After a long bus trip, it was good to get out and stretch out legs.  After a few hundred yards, it became increasingly obvious why a waterproof bag was required for the trip.  The banks were high and rocky and the spotty pools got deeper and deeper.  Eventually we were swimming against the light current attempting to hold camera bags and such above our heads.  While the trekking was fun, the diving was when the real fun started. 

After walking through the water for an hour or so, we came to the first spot where diving was available.  There was a small outcropping of rock that only rose a few meters above the water, but the pool itself was at least 5 meters deep... plenty deep enough to dive without any problems.  We spent a little time at this one, but soon continued down the river with promises of taller cliffs and deeper pools.  The next spot was twice as high with cliffs on two sides and a waterway shoot just upriver from it.  This is where we spend the largest amount of our time. 

I think that every member of our group jumped from this spot at least one time.  Took a while for some of them to work up the nerve, but I'm pretty sure that every one of them eventually made the jump.  While the height doesn't look too perilous in this pic, the view from above was a bit different.  You had to jump further out from this particular spot... only a few feet, but it looked a lot more daunting.  On my second jump, I got some sort of pressure headache from the way i was holding my breath.  The only obvious solution was to lounge languidly in the water and pull out the beer and soju that comprised everything that I had brought in my backpack... it's always good to plan ahead.  After last weeks trip, I learned my lesson and brought plenty of alcohol.  Or at least I brought enough to get us a through the first few hours of the trip, but don't worry, there was a fully stocked store just a few feet from the beginning of the trail.  I told you before, Korean's take their drinking and hiking very seriously and very vigorously.  I agree with at least half of this philosophy.

Entrance to the river... the only other people were in the tents in the background

The day was starting to get long and the next set of cliffs was another two hours up the river... this was when our driving delays started to catch up.  Knowing the trip back would not be safe as the sunlight began to wane, we started back down the river and began the next part of the trip... a limestone cave tour with lanterns.

By the time, we had gotten to the hostel, the sun was already down and it was time for the cave tour.  We joked around a lot when we were required to wear the hardhats into the caves, but the ceilings were low, the cave was black except for our lanterns, and the majority of us were on the far side of a good drunk.  (One opted to sleep it off in the bus and skip out on the cave all together.)  All that considered, the hard hats were probably a good idea.  I don't know if they truly saved us from being accosted by low flying bats, but I think they helped.  (Despite all the written warnings, I still jumped a bit when one flew at my face.)  The cave was interesting, but I grew up just a few hours from Meramec Caverns so this one didn't have a huge impact on me.  The hand carved marital aids sold in a small corner store outside the cave, however, immediately grabbed my attention.  As you can see from the picture, someone must've been practicing their technique. 

After the lantern tour, we came back to the hostel to a huge dinner with boiled chicken and pork dumplings.  I'd tell you that after dinner we all retired for the evening, but I assume that you'd smell the lie and know that we ended up playing drinking games on the beach until the early morning.  After an eventful night of "I never", "3 truths" and several other games, our host woke us with Naengmyeon and soju.  The next day would prove to be as fun as the first.

Sunday morning was overcast with very little wind.  Luckily, it didn't stop us from trying to windsurf.  The convenient store beneath our hostel was strangely run out of beer and soju the night before, but luckily, the alcohol truck must've arrived before we woke at 8am.  At least it was lucky for me, I was hurting in a way that only a full-fledged continuation could fix... hair of the dog and such.  Windsurfing was now on the plate.

I'll start off by saying that the day would've been a lot more interesting if we had been granted at least a modicum amount of wind, but it wasn't in the cards for this Sunday.  Despite a severe lack of airflow, windsurfing turned out to be a lot of fun.  The staff that hosted our training session were really the reason for the good times.  They fully understood that it wasn't the best day for windsurfing and the "training" reflected that knowledge.  We all made our attempts, some of us were more determined for success and a few of us were more hellbent for a full on training session.  There were trainers there to meet those demands.  Thankfully for the rest of us, the whole day was very laid back and when the wind gods didn't cooperate, they brought out a motorized skid and several 2man rafts to extend our fun.  Considering that gravity has not been my biggest fan for the previous decade or so, the rafts were a welcome alternative.  Through it all, of course, there was an ample supply of beer and soju.  (I hope that you, the reader, are beginning to realize that the drinks are just part of the experience over here.)  I spent the highpoint of the day lounging in a raft (as evidenced by the strange "life-jacket-sunburn" that I've been sporting since returning from the trip.)  A little frisbee tossing and some catch with an American football and our weekend came to an end. 

.... except of course for the 4 hour bus drive back to Busan. 

Hiking trip in Cheong-do 07-24-2011

Charles Jeong... the guide and event planner

This past weekend, I went on a hiking trip as a little prequel to the big river trekking trip mentioned here.  I knew that I needed at least a little warm up to give me an idea of what I had gotten myself into.  I realized at some point that maybe it wasn't the best idea to jump in feet first to a lengthy hike when I don't really like walking to the mailbox, but the things that I'm capable of accomplishing always seem to be a bit more extensive in my mind than they tend to be in real life.

My preferred mode of transportation

Emerson or someone like that said that the journey is often better than the destination.  I say fuck that guy.  Sometimes the journey hurts and the destination is freakin' awesome.  We met up around 8am on Sunday morning, a true feat in itself.  There were a total of five us in the expat portion of the group; one girl had been up drinking since Saturday.  She got less than an hour of sleep on the bus ride over and she still managed to embarrass me on the trail.  Truth be told: everyone managed to embarrass me on the trail.  The biggest issue for me was that it seemed to be never ending.  Every time I'd glance up, I'd see more hill to climb.  It wasn't steep enough to require us to tie off or anything, but the incline was still pretty rough in places.  I had a small tie string bag to hold a few bottles of water, a change of clothes and a towel.  The fifty-year-old Korean men that comprised the other half of our party looked like Frodo and Samwise with their 200 lb bags.  Lucky for the rest of us, their bags were full of many, many essentials.

Korean hiking is an entirely different beast from what I was expecting.  The trails tend to be a lot busier; hiking's very popular here.  There also tends to be a lot of drinking; drinking is very popular too.  We started the first leg of the trip with a quick Soju and rice wine toast.  Then we had some beer that they had frozen from the night before.  (Learned a valuable lesson regarding frozen beer... plastic bottles don't explode in the freezer.  They expand with the ice.)  Then, we had another quick shot and started up the hill.  I don't know for sure how far we traveled, but it was a 2 km minimum (2 km was the lowest distance on the marker, but we might have gone further.)  The twelve of us got spread out due to the difficulty of the slope.  I had to stop several times to catch my breath.  Another older Korean couple stopped at one point to make sure I was okay.  They offered me Makgeoli from their personal supply to help me up the hill.  So, everyone on the trail brings a little alcohol for the hike... always good to know.  At this point, I was completely split off from the group.  Most were in front of me and a few were behind me, but no one was within my eyesight.  Luckily, the trail only went up.  I came around a curve and saw another large group kind of forming a gauntlet on the trail while they caught their breath.  All of them had passed me at one point in the last hour while I was sucking air.  As I walked up, they started clapping and giving me high fives as I walked through their makeshift tunnel... very gratifying.  Of course, as soon as I went around another bend and they couldn't see me anymore, I went back to hoping there would be a defibrillator at the top.  I caught up with the group at a small open space and the drinks came out again.

After the that little breather, the terrain got much easier.  We went a little further up the trail, but then we started down the other side to where we would ultimately have lunch by a cold mountain spring.  Considering I was dripping wet with sweat, the cold spring was a welcome sight.  Once we actually got to the stream, I also felt a lot more comfortable.  Something about using my hands to help climb over the rocks makes me feel a lot more balanced... gravity can be a bitch when you're a guy my size.  Four points of support are just safer for me.  The water felt great and there was also a light breeze coming along the stream.  Nice little change from the stagnant, claustrophobic air on the first part of the journey.  (I'm sure that the air was not that stagnant at all, I'm just out of shape.)  Regardless, the stream was a welcome change, in my opinion.  We set up a small camp and that's when we discovered what else the Korean's had hidden in their backpacks.  They pulled out a bunch of cooking utensils, food, alcohol, propane tanks, burners, more alcohol, snacks, and finally, a little alcohol.  They had spicy chicken gizzards that I hadn't ate in a very, very long time.  They're not for everyone, but I've loved them since I was little.  The other expats and I asked to help, but we were quickly shooed away and the Korean's went to work.  The main food ended up being cold noodles that they made fresh with some pork cutlets, hard boiled eggs.  They had carried all of this stuff up the mountain while I was silently crying about my clean underwear being too heavy in my bag.  Here's a few more pics of the spot were we camped.

Grilling pork cutlets

Ever- present beer

Our lunch

The food was delicious.  I'm still impressed with the little things that they thought to bring to add to the meal: fresh cucumbers, onions, garlic cloves, spices.  They've obviously done this many times before. 

After lunch and a quick downpour, we started back on the the trail.  It basically wrapped around the valley and ended up at Unmunsa Temple.  It is the largest female monastery in Korea, housing over 300 female monks (nuns?).  The large evergreen tree in the following pictures is believed to be over five hundred years old.  The stilts that you see have been put there to help the branches from slagging too much and breaking off.  I'm running out of steam for this blog, so I'll let the other pictures below speak for themselves.

All in all, it was one helluva trip.  I was pretty beat up when it was all said and done, but I wouldn't pass it up if the trip was offered again.  It had been a long day, so we made our way back to the bus and started our drive back to Pusan, but not before stopping off at the local market to replenish our beer supply for the road....

The day of medicinal mud

I survived the Boryeong Mud Festival.  As I was looking for some pics to publish for this blog I saw that KMOV in St. Louis published some pics... kinda strange to see it referenced on a St. Louis station when I'm so far from home.  Kinda strange, but kinda nice at the same time.

This event had been on my radar since the first week or so of me getting to South Korea.  The little bit of research I had done billed it as one of the biggest events for foreigners in Korea and I decided early on that I didn't want to miss out on it.  I'd mentioned it to several friends, but only two decided to join up in the end.  One was really the first person I'd met when arriving in Korea.  We met at the ferry from Japan to Korea after I finished my visa run and had stayed in touch through FB since then.  The other that joined up was his roommate, an Irishman with a pension for drunken debauchery... we were immediate friends, obviously.  (We actually lost him for 7 or 8 hours on Saturday, but more on that later.)  The bus itself left at midnight from Pusan and took about 4 hours or so to get to Daecheon Beach in Boryeong.  We went to the hotel and got some much needed sleep in preparation for the next day.  No sleep would really be enough to offset the sheer hedonism that would follow on Saturday. 

When we had arrived the night before, we really didn't know how close we were to the beach.  It was 4am and the festival didn't officially start until Saturday, anyway.  Now, I've been going to the beaches in Pusan since I first arrived in Korea.  For the most part they are pretty, but they are very, very small.  They are surrounded by development and the beaches feel a bit claustrophobic because of the tall buildings and cove-style of the more popular ones.  As you can see in the picture, that's not the case in Boryeong.  Daecheon Beach is much more massive than anything that I've seen in Pusan.  It feels like more of a beach community, too.  The sand was incredible, the water was warm, most of the people on the beach were actually wearing swim suits, as opposed to the regular clothing that Pusan residents mostly wear when they swim.  (You have to see this to believe it, thousands of people swimming in jeans and long sleeve shirts in Pusan.... ridiculous.)  In short, it was what I was expecting an actual beach to be.  We bought some beer and soju and walked along the beach until we finally came to the main area for the festival.  Supposedly, there were almost 400,000 people on the beach for this first day... a quarter of them were foreigners.  This was by far the biggest number of non-Asian faces that I'd seen since landing in Korea.  There was a pretty large military contingent on the beach, but the overwhelming majority of foreigners seemed to be ESL teachers and expats.  It was great to have a 'we're all in this together' sort of vibe going on... at least from my perspective. 

For those of you who don't know, I am the only native speaker in my small hagwon (i.e. academy).  Most of the people that I've met over here work with at least one other native speaker.  It'd be nice to have at least one other person that's going through my situation, one other person to talk to about life at this school.  Instead, I've been typing away in our teacher's office and haven't heard a word of English in the last 2 hours.  I get told to come to meetings that are entirely in Korean with no explanation before or after as to what was being said.  It can be a bit unnerving at times.  I've started to grown used to being the invisible token in the back of the room, but it still weighs heavy at times.  Being on a bus with 25 other native English speakers was refreshing... being on a beach with almost 100k native English speakers was a fucking godsend. 

This is where I found myself around 10am on Saturday morning; surrounded by (mostly) friendly faces and heading to the epicenter of the Boryeong Mud Festival 2011.  When we finally arrived, we of course immediately headed to Club FM (Family Mart) and reloaded our recently depleted supply.  It was about this time that we first noticed an overwhelming lack of mud at the Boryeong Mud Festival.  We had been promised large pools and pits of the skin-rejuvenating mud, massive areas of mud wrestling and body painting.  We instead got a few bins loaded with 4 inch brushes and a limited supply of said mud.  Luckily.... we didn't give a shit.  We meticulously covered ourselves from head to toe with the brush:  "When in Rome" and all that.  It was about that time that the skies opened up and buckets of rain erased any evidence of this attempt.  It was an obvious sign that this party didn't have anything to do with the Mud... the mud was just the vessel.  (Anyone that has been to the "Sweet Corn and Watermelon Festival" or the "Murphysboro Apple Festival" or "Cajun Fest" should know exactly what I mean.) 

The short downpour did nothing to shake our resolve.  In fact, that's about the time the gloves came off.  (That's also about the time that whiskey became the preferred catalyst for the day, but I'm not pointing any fingers.)  The hours that followed embodied a level of depravity that should probably never be put to paper.  (Of course, taking my own advice has never been one of my strong suits.)  Large amounts of life were consumed; dignity was trampled on and then ignored entirely; the living was good, but for future reference, when you remove the waves that were previously helping to keep you aloft, gravity becomes the unfaithful ex that you had always known her to be.  That's when your face becomes a makeshift airbag and your arms cease to help in the endeavor. 

At some point about this time, we lost our drunken Irishman in a wave of saltwater and whiskey.  We found him 8 hours later walking aimlessly in front of that same Family Mart, hoping that we would venture back to the scene of the crime.  Coincidentally, our third amigo and my constant compatriot for the day had been convinced that we'd find him in that exact spot.  Sure enough, there he was stumbling around in a shade of pink that should never exist on a human body.  We had his wallet, his phone, and all of his money, but he'd still managed to get the most out of the party.... except sunscreen of course.  Sunscreen was not very high on the list of goals, obviously.  Shortly after finding the wayward son, an impressive display of fireworks started over the beach.  I took a few pics, but my camera did not do the display any justice.  Then it was back to the beach to lounge around under the full moon and people watch.  When the sun went down, inhibitions seemed  to come down, too.  The drink Sex on the Beach started to become the beverage of choice.  That and a strange cocktail called Forty Naked Korean Men Screaming and Running into the Crashing Waves.  Don't know what inspired the second concoction, but it was met with many cheers and shouts of encouragement.  This country had previously been in great need of random public acts of nudity.... it's good to go for awhile. 

I won't go into too many of the other sordid details... mostly out of embarrassment, somewhat out of confusion and general haziness.  I will say this, though:  this was one of the funnest times I've had since stepping on this shore.  I didn't even really mention the friends I made on the bus, or the people I met in the sea.  The whole weekend was exactly what I was looking to find.  If I decide to turn this one year into two, Boryeong won't necessarily be a factor, but it will be on the shortlist of can't-miss-weekends.  Fresh faces, good times, and a few new friends made up for any lack of mud.  I hope to see many of those faces again.  And to the random girl in the middle of the ocean... my name is Chris.  I'm not sure if I mentioned that.