Too Long but We went to Busan

Oh, Busan. Why did I buy a silly hat in you.

Hello Everyone! (that's how I open my classes)

Well, I don't feel like doing any work right now and it's been a while since I've written here. There was a brief period where nothing exciting was happening so I didn't feel the need to write anything.

We've been to a few places since then. Busan was probably the highlight, though.

Taken by Christina from Busan Tower. 

We live in a very small, old city where speaking can become a struggle because most Koreans here don't speak English very well or even at all. Busan was a totally different story. It seemed that everywhere we went, the local Koreans spoke almost flawless English.

Scenes from Yonggungsa Temple. Go there, please.

Busan also had its moments when one might feel like they are in Korea. For instance, this Buddha within  beautiful Yonggungsa Temple on the ocean was one of the most beautiful places I will ever visit. 

I'm a horrible photoblogger because I have 0 pictures of the baseball game between Lotte Giants and Hanwa Eagles. In short, I went to see a baseball game between the aforementioned teams and had a ball. I wasn't much interested in the game so I essentially paid $7 to drink beer and have long chats with my old friend from home for a few hours. 

More from Yonggungsa.

After the game, we were out with friends and ended up falling asleep on the beach. 

Haeundae Beach.

We woke up to this after an hour and headed back to our hotel. After a not-so-great meal of Indian food (First Nepal in Gwangju is everyone's favorite), we visited the aquarium. 

Here were some cool jellyfish in the aquarium and of course, there were some sharks.

Anyone can pay some money and swim with these guys but we didn't get to sign up before the trip. The application has to be completed online so I'll save that for next time. After the aquarium, we headed back home to Gwangju and I went to Burger King. I knew we were back in Gwangju when I had to slowly explain and point to what I wanted to eat. 

As a whole, Gwangju and Busan are very different from each other. Busan is huge and has many more international people which gives the Koreans more impetus to speak perfect English. In Gwangju, struggling to speak Korean with the locals isn't always a bad thing and sometimes, I pick up new phrases from helpful taxi drivers or even kids who visit English Village. 

Busan is a great place to visit. I would just prefer living somewhere that feels more like Korea. I know we stuck to the more touristy areas of Busan so I can't say it's all this way. It's just that traveling to Busan actually made me appreciate this city more. At first, I was angry for having chosen to live in Gwangju but I changed my mind after hearing English spoken so much. Sometimes I prefer to just disappear in a haze of another language. 

Christina and I in Mokpo

Other than Busan, we took a brief trip to nearby Mokpo. We had higher expectations for this place than what we actually saw. There was no beach although being near water was pleasant. Mokpo is a port city about an hour south of Gwangju. While there were no beautiful beaches, this place made for a nice escape from Gwangju for a couple of days. 

View from our Hotel in Mokpo.

The town was not very busy on this day and we were able to walk up to a hotel not far from the water and stay for only $40. That's how not-happening this place was when we visited! There were some cool sites though. 

You guys will be so delicious. 

Mokpo is home to a pretty large fish market that boasts many different types of seafood. At some point, I'll gather up enough courage to eat some live octopus. For now, my comfort level is at merely taking pictures of them waiting to be purchased and eaten. 

As a whole, Mokpo is underwhelming but the city has hiking opportunities and some nice views of the water. Many people travel there to get to Jeju Island by ferry so Mokpo benefits from lots of tourist traffic. 

Walking down a path on the shore.

I believe the next trip is definitely going to be to Seoul. There we will get to see one of the world's largest cities and I will get to see one of the world's Electronics Meccas. 

Until then, Anyeong Haseyo!

Mudeung Mountain, Shenandoah River

This week was one filled with many funny encounters with little kids but thankfully, we got some much needed rest on Saturday evening. The two Americans and 3 South Africans who work at Gwangju English Village were so worn out and wasted from the long day of teaching that all of us were joking about the need for a brew. Our Korean coworkers must've been reading our minds because we were surprised with an awesome cake, beer, and champagne to celebrate Teacher's Day (picture forthcoming).

I was so tired that I struggled through eating the equivalent of a piece of cake. The Kiwi was awesome though. Anyway, we spent our Saturday night getting some well-deserved rest. After a lengthy sleep, Christina and I awoke and debated our plans for the weekend. I had a vision of traveling to Seoul and maybe satisfying my need to touch millions of electronics at Techno Mart. After a moment, I realized that a trip to Seoul might need a few minutes of planning. Christina said "abracadabra!" and a moment of religious awakening occurred. We decided to hike at the biggest of Gwangju's mountains, Mt. Mudeung.

After breakfast at The First Alleyway, we took a bus at 11:30 to the area where everyone prepares to hike. There are many trails one can take and we decided to hike to Sae In Bong which was about a 3 or 4 kilometer (1 or 2 miles) walk and 648 meters (2125 Feet) high. So we began our trek but first had to buy some proper hiking gear. Actually, Christina and I just bought a windbreaker to fit in with the locals.

When reading travel books preparing for the trip to Korea, I sensed exaggeration but was wrong. Koreans really have to LOOK like they are hiking and have to dress appropriately. They buy hiking jackets and hiking pants. I saw women wearing multiple hiking scarves in an effort to completely block the sun and men wearing hiking hats. Of course, everyone knows that you have to wear hiking boots! However, I learned that boots will be essential to hiking because my adidas running shoes didn't really cut it amongst the many rocks that we walked over.

Anyway, we began our adventure at noon and took in some of the local scenery.





This is a group of people washing their feet after hiking. The first part of the hike felt like any normal walk we take everyday. There was a bit of an incline but nothing too noticeable. The stream to our right was truly an indicator that today was going to be nature-intensive.

Even though Gwangju has 1.6 million people living here, it doesn't feel like it in our part of town. We live in a quiet part of the city called Pungam. The city still has that feel of a beehive that never stops moving so getting out to Mt. Mudeung was obviously refreshing. We continued walking.







We came to our first tough stretch at about 100 meters. After our first really steep incline, we came to this large set of stairs. Earlier in the day, the nice man at First Alleyway told us that much of the hiking trails only recently had these protective ropes installed to help hikers along the way. Thankfully, we just arrived here a little over a month ago and didn't have the experience of traveling without protection.







Christina and I kept pushing on and forced ourselves to keep moving.








It grew tougher but we reached the top!







Uh.... Or did we??? Oh god, why? We didn't reach the top! Did that mean that we had to keep moving??? We kept moving.







This time we were at the top of Sae In Bong. I sat down and looked around without speaking. Staring into nothing occupied my time while Christina sat near the edge and stared out into the vast mountain range here. Sae In Bong might not have been the highest a human has traveled but I can understand why monks climb mountains and meditate.







Two friends smoking cigarettes and having a drink on a rock at the top.







An old man was sitting behind me having his moment of meditation. So beautiful! This truly is what I want to do now, forever, yesterday! I loved this moment.





Unfortunately, what goes up must come down. And you know what, why did it have to be so damn rocky at the start? This is why Koreans buy hiking boots, I thought. It took us roughly 1 1/2 hours to get up to the top and we spent about an hour at the top just taking it all in thinking about everything in the world.




To get down, seemed like a race. At other times, we were carefully traversing winding and narrow staircases to reach the bottom.

Location:Chungjang-dong,Gwangju,South Korea

Green Tea and MORE Green Tea

Taken from a trail opposite the tea plantation we came for... tee hee

With our extended vacation, we planned on visiting Seoul for the first time. However, those plans fell through and we had to find something else to do here in lovely Gwangju.

Thanks to this week being full of Holidays (May 5th was Children's Day and May 10th is Buddha's Birthday), we were given some time off from our jobs. We only had one work day which many people referred to as a sandwich day since Friday was packed in between days off.

With all this said, we had to make something out of our rare holiday and decided to go to Boseong for its Green Tea Festival. Boseong is apparently the perfect place for Green Tea to grow - according to the pamphlet given to us as we entered the plantation.

Piney.

 This is part of the beautiful array of trees we encountered as we walked into the plantation. The man who established this field planted around 3 million trees here as a "shelterbelt". This tea plantation is known as Daehon Dawon and honestly, it's beautiful. 

I need a duffle bag for my stash of Green Tea. 

But it kept going. Yes, there were these amazing views throughout the whole place but something kept telling me that we had to keep going up. Luckily, we had a path and people to follow. The first picture at the top was from the trail we took by mistake. We had to climbing a pretty large staircase to get there as well so that was discouraging. Digression!


Anyway, we kept moving after taking some pictures. 

Keep moving!

So we kept moving towards the top. In case I didn't show that part yet, here's what we were trying to climb. 

I never felt so high.

Of course this isn't the highest peak in Korea but to me (out of shape), I felt like this was Mt. Everest. This experience truly woke me up as to what needs to happen. I need to do this stuff more because it may have been a grueling experience but truly worth it. I was too tired to take pictures at the top but trust me, it was rough. Here are some pics from the top. 

So High.

Behind those mountains is Deukryang Bay. Something says we'll be back here.

Personally, the tea plantation is far prettier from below than above. From the looks of the tourist pamphlet, there's loads to do around Boseong. Anybody wanting a good day-trip should travel to this area because it's serves a great example as one of Korea's many beautiful places. 


-Carl

Location:Pungam-dong,Gwangju,South Korea

Dust in the wind and food

One of the "Eight Views of Gwangju Reservoir"

As we get closer to summer, I'm starting to notice the beautiful scenery appearing around Gwangju. We hiked a bit up a mountain nearby and were able to take some decent pictures from there.

The Guus Hiddink Stadium in the background.Another shot from above the Lake. This road will eventually lead to Downtown Gwangju.

Compared to the beginning of April, this city definitely looks like Summer is approaching. However, there is one last thing to experience before the heat arrives.

Dust! Lots of Dust!

Satellite photo of the dust cloud of 2006

Today was supposed to be a very dusty day but I didn't really notice a difference in air quality. Gwangju seems to have very clean air compared to other metropolitan areas. Nevertheless, we wore masks for most of the day until we realized it wasn't dangerous to breathe without protection.

Preparing for the worst. All we need now is a bomb shelter full of food.

So outside of working, we've done lots of exploring and have successfully made a few ex-pat friends. It's good to meet up with people and talk about stuff you have in common.

As far as food goes, I think I've found my favorite restaurant for the moment. It's a Shabu-Shabu place in Lotte Mart's Food Court.

I can't get enough of this stuff.

Lots of food put into bowl of broth = awesome

Take the cooked beef and veggies and place them onto your rice paper.

Roll into a ball and you have a rice burrito full of amazingness.

As of this post, I'm putting that restaurant down as my favorite. We had an amazing there today and spent a little more than usual (about 25 bucks for this). It's totally worth it and considering we don't pay for lunch during the week (our school covers that), this is a splurge that we can handle. One thing about Korea is that if you take more people to these types of meals, the cost per person decreases. So if you want Shabu Shabu and want to save money, bring a few friends and you get a cheaper yet amazing meal.