5 Days of Chuseok: Part II

The author would like to state that he has just come back from his first Korean lesson and was not aware that he would be having the lesson today since his employer, from whom the classes are offered, did not bother to inform him or his two friends that the classes began today. He is thoroughly confused but thinks that he is getting a handle of the 3 dozen kinds of “U” sounds but is feeling uneasy about the consonants whose sound seem to change with the wind.

But you the eager and well informed reader of this classy, little “web log” has not come here to necessarily hear about the author’s unplanned joust with the Korean language. No, not at all; you are here to complete the saga, the epic, the odyssey that was the Chuseok vacations here in the “land of the morning calm.” Fear not for we find ourselves in a new city, the city of Busan where anything can and does happen…

So Day one went down like any day in a new city; Rosie and myself asking each other where we think we should head and since neither one of us had ever been to this particular metropolis that didn’t seem to get us very far. We found the subway and were pleased to find that it worked very similarly to the system that we have in Seoul but not before I went up to a Subway attendant and asked a question in slow, English teacher English thinking he wouldn’t understand me and only to have him respond in fluent West Coast English. We then explored some, found a map to guide us, got lost and eventually decided to head to the beach since it was a muggy 70 degrees outside.

We took a taxi since the subway in Busan runs nowhere near the beaches and were pleasantly surprised to find that the rates were much less than in Seoul. We arrived at Gwang-alli Beach which makes a huge case for Busan being better than Seoul. See the link on the right for photos. We eventually started to hunger and made our way to a cheap looking noodle house with a very friendly elderly couple beaming at us as we entered their restaurant. Since we have little understanding of the Korean language, both of us, we rely on pictures and bad translations to order food. So we ordered #4 since they were all noodle varieties and everyone seemed to have soup and that seemed fine to us. We did not get soup. We received cold noodles. I’d like to state a fact: warm noodles > cold noodles. Okay, enough about the noodles.

After slurping up a reasonable about of spicy but very cold noodles we headed back to the beach area and took some amazing pictures of the bridge (and by amazing I mean I am still figuring out how my camera works so please forgive me) and the surrounding areas which give Busan a lot of charm—including its colorful “Millak Raw Fish Town”.

Come evening we headed to a bar on the beach and had some beers, played some darts, and eventually found a taxi back to our hostel to start again Friday.

Friday morning we explored the area around the hostel and eventually found ourselves starving but I love food so that was okay. We found a Korean pizza place (some of the tastiest pizza in the world is here) and split and overpriced half-shrimp and half-potato pizza. We ate the pizza with forks and knives (Koreans are the biggest fans of eating with one’s hands) as our neighbors are theirs out of little paper cups which seems to be the style especially for take-out pizza.

After the potato pizza (trust me, you want some) we got lost again but in 70 degree weather you can’t complain. I decided I needed to take out some more cash only to find myself in a similar position as I was in at the beginning of my time here in South Korea: hardly any ATMs accept foreign debit cards! I began to stress out as Rosie was also running low and had been covering things for me for the first half of the trip with the assumption that I would be reimbursing her. We tried what seemed like hundreds of different ATMs—even the bank that works for me in Seoul but only to be rejected by every single one. We made our way to the train station hoping that something there would work but even there none of the ATMs would give. We then asked some random foreign-looking girl if she knew of any international ATMs and she suggested down in the subway. I was about to give up all hope when alas! It worked! The nice lady candy vendor next to the ATM also celebrated my being able to take out cash and so we bought $2 worth of her candies. It was the worst tasting candy that either one of us has ever had but even that couldn’t ruin our elated state.

We decided we needed some coffee or tea to wash out the bad tasted from the candy and to regroup our thoughts as well as to wake up a little. While drinking some “southern sweet tea” we found on our map a large Buddhist temple that was nearby and promptly took a taxi right to the entrance. We took a ton of photos but I’m not sure that I did it justice given out big and grand it was and how terrible my photos make it look. Inside I was able to take photos of some people chanting and from what we had read we think that this was prayer to the Buddhist goddess of mercy. It was pretty cool and we were delighted that we were able to take photos inside of the temple.

Again we found ourselves with that condition known as hunger and decided to head back to Gwang-alli so that I cook take part in Korean style sushi. We wandered around for a while and were recommended an area, by some young police officers (all police officers in Korea are young), which turned out to be the “Millak Raw Fish Town.” The first place we went to had a small platter starting at 80,000 won which is in the range of US$70 so we decided to politely back away slowly and look for another place. That totally would have worked except this particular fish lady seemed to have some sort of bet with the devil that she could get us into her restaurant or she’d lose her soul because she wouldn’t take no for an answer. She became a little louder and we tried to leave but found ourselves unable. Eventually I began mumbling at her in some Spanish and a fair bit of gibberish which confused both her and Rosie; so she turned to Rosie assuming that she understood what the crazy fish lady was saying. Rosie did not and soon the woman was grabbing Rosie by the arms hoping that she would understand, “eat my over-priced, uncooked fish” through the scientific principle of osmosis.

Somehow we MacGyver’d an escape which involved a paper clip, a hair pin, our collective shoe laces and some terrible tasting Korean gum. To be honest, I’m not sure how we made it out of there alive. We checked another restaurant—with a much less high pressure staff, only finding the price 20,000 won cheaper so I used the power of my imagination to remember what raw fish tastes like and decided that chicken was the meal for me. We found a small chicken restaurant, recouped from the crazy fish lady and had the world’s spiciest chicken along with the world largest pitcher of yellow Korean beer. All for less than the sushi would have been, especially considering that Rosie doesn’t eat fish.

We then headed back to the beach to join in the Chuseok festivities which were slightly underwhelming but ducked into the bar from the previous night to use the rest room. While having a beer at the bar we met a man with the English name of Terry who works at a savings bank in Busan. He was a lot of fun and had very good English. Several beers later he took us to his friend’s restaurant where we tried North Korean style dumplings with the owner of the restaurant. The dumplings were 4 times larger than normal and wrapped in chicken skin instead of dough. They were delicious. The pumpkin tempura is also something that I would recommend.

The next day, Saturday, was Chuseok and also our last day in Busan. In morning we were examinging a map confirming our way to our destination of the UN War Memorial at Busan and thinking about breakfast (since virtually everything is closed on Chuseok) when jaundice man appeared as if a specter off my right cheek. He was a pale color almost yellow-tinted and very thin. I didn’t notice him, given my love affair with maps, until he asked in near-perfect English where we were headed. I then noticed him hovering just off the right side of my face and took a step back and told him assuming he knew something we didn’t, like that it was closed on Chuseok. He then volunteered to take us there, which was only a little bit creepy, when Rosie saved the day saying that we needed to get breakfast first and we had to meet someone and probably a few other lies. The then turned around and descended into the subway like some sort of HG Wells inspired morlock.

 The UN War Memorial was very moving and we learned a lot—a lot more than I had ever learned in high school or college about the war. Things like the nation of Turkey fought in the war and suffered some of the highest casualties outside of the US and the UK. It was a very beautiful cemetery and guarded by one UN soldier—my first time seeing a UN soldier in person which was refreshing to see. I can’t go on too much about the site but please see the photos on the right for only some of what I was able to see.

Upon becoming tired from mild sun burns we headed back to the train station to nap and wait for our train since all of Korea seemed to be inside their homes celebrating. We kept hoping that some nice family would invite us in for some songpyon or other holiday refreshments but was a dream never realized.

After a brief nap in the train station we found “China Street” which happened to be located inside of a good sized Russian neighborhood and eventually went and had some more coffee across the street from the train station.

It turns out that our tickets for the 3 hour ride were in “seats” for 1 hour and for 2 hours we would be hobos of sorts in between cars in the standing room only section. This turned out to be more fun anyway as we ordered beers every time the attendant passed by and danced outside of the restroom, Korean staring at us all the while—which they would have been anyway since we aren’t Korean. At one point we gave up our “seat” which was a luggage shelf to a family, who was banished to the standing room only with us, to be rewarded with dried squid jerky by their young daughter which reeked of squid and ocean a little much ever for me.

The rest of the weekend in Seoul was fun too but this entry is already longer than the Bible so I will force myself to stop.

Anyang!

Comments please!