Be cool about fire safety, among other things

Wednesday
About a week and a half ago my dad made the trip to Korea and arrived Wednesnight. He was the last of our overseas visitors, and it was great to see him. Incidentally, if you ever need a pick me up a great place to people watch is at the international arrivals gate. Everyone's all smiles and welcome homes and hugs and happy tears. Dad was detained by swine flu checking just long enough for Brian to meet us at the airport, and then we were off for great things - namely, sleep after Dad's 25 hour journey.
Thursday
My school had a 2 day 1 night field trip on Thursday and Friday, so there were no classes and they were wonderful enough to let me have the time off to spend with Dad. So Thursday poor Brian geared up for school while Dad and I took off in the rain to visit the UN cemetery and the Busan Museum for an indoor sort of day. Then Dad had his first Korean meal: spicy tiny octopi. It was a great success. But jet lag inevitably took it's toll and we went home for naps until Brian got off school. That night we made it out again to the pajeon and makulli whole in the wall that we've loved ever since we arrived.

Dad was looking skeptical when the plate of tofu arrived, but he did like the pajeon and makulli. We tucked in early that night for the day to come, but not before a stop over in the arcade. Dad fell for the drum games at first drum roll.

Friday
Friday I was off again, and Brian went off to school again as Dad and I got packed up for a trip to Gyeongju, the old Korean capital during the Shilla Dynasty. We hopped on a bus and rented some bikes on arrival for a biking tour of the city. We went first to the burial mounds park where kings' tombs are enclosed in large mounds of rock, soil, and grass.

Next up was the oldest astronomical observation tower in all of East Asia. It was there we met Paul, an English muffin who saved us from our terrible self portraits in front of the tower with a proper picture. I thought he might be an English teacher from Busan because he was on our bus, but it turned out that he's just a guy ramblin round the world for a few years. Sounds like just the right thing to do.

The two Pauls and I had lunch together before Dad-Paul and I began the trek home. Getting back to Pusan we visited a bath house. I wasn't sure how much Dad would like it, but I think he was thoroughly impressed.

It was after the bath house that we discovered the whale meat district of Seomyeon, and Dad discovered the scrumptiousness of Korean barbecue. We even got free soju from the soju promoters. Those pictures are somewhere further down in this post.
Saturday
Saturday we finally got to play with Brian too. We got up and out and on a bus to Taejongdae, the much recommended but previously unvisited seaside park. It was lovely, but it was a long ride. Besides all of the lush greenery and beautiful seaside cliffs, there were vats of bondegi (a silk worm larvae (or possibly pupae)) for sale. And we got Dad to try one. In fact, we found a can of them for him to take home to spread the delicacies your way. Here he is with his bug before he eats it.

After Taejongdae we went to Jagalchi, the largest seafood market in Korea. Imagine a marine invertebrate specialist in a market full of spineless maritime squiglers - like a kid in a squirmy candy shop. Here he is admiring the things he never thought you could eat before this trip. But Jagalchi doesn't only have live fish and friends for sale; there's also a large dried market. Here are heaps of dried fishes of all shapes and sizes.
And below, the street market scene. It's a little grimy, but not as smelly as you might imagine.
That night we dined in the market place and followed up with hodducks, a chinese derived snickerdoodle on butter steroids. Dad got hooked when we mainlined a couple when we got back to Busan's bus station the day before.

Sunday
Sunday it was chilly and threatening rain, so we went to the Busan Aquarium for more aquatic delights. There are more fish photos than necessary because I got excited about the aquarium setting on my camera. It made this seahorse look like it came straight out of The Life Aquatic.
We tooled around Haeundae Beach for a bit before catching another bus to a seaside temple we'd been wanting to visit. This temple is unique for a couple of reasons. 1. Most temples are built on the mountain sides, this one on seaside cliffs. 2. This temple is dedicated to Avalokitsvara, the Bodhisattva of compassion, or in more western terms, the goddess of mercy. She is often shown riding on a dragon, and thus there are many dragon images at this temple, which are absent at others. For some very good reason unknown to us, there were also these two plump, jolly pigs at the temple.

There was also a plump, jolly Buddha statue.
This dragon is a painting on the outer wall of one of the temple structures.
This dragon decorates the rafters of the main temple hall.

These cairns dotted the cliffs outside the temple walls.
And the rest of the aquarium and temple photos are in the following slide show.

Monday I finally had to report back to school. But I only had 3 classes and got to leave at 12, so Dad and I had time to take a short hike up Geumjeongsan, a nearby mountain with a fortress wall (much talked about in this blog). We had lunch and got some snacks to take with us and then cruised up to some perches with nice lookouts. It was the first time I'd been there during working hours on a weekday and it was phenomenally more tranquil without the crowds.

Tuesday was our volleyball semifinals at school, so though I didn't get to leave early, Sun Ja and I picked Dad up at the apartment and he got to come to the games. It was a double header and we won the first game and lost to the second team we played. But the first team had our old pal Sunny playing, and Kyung Mi my co teacher from the school I no longer teach at was there too. It was fun to see old friends and for Dad to get to meet the people I work with.

We went to dinner with the school after the game, but after that Brian came and met us and all of the young teachers for drinks and a night on the town. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures that night because the camera was dead. But it was fun to have all my favorite teachers meet Dad and Brian. They even taught us some new Korean drinking games, and of course, the night ended at the norebang (or kareoke room). Yes, Dad sang too.

Wednesday was Dad's last day in Korea, and he came to school with me to meet the kids. He even co taught with me a bit in a roll play we performed for the kids. It was 6th and 5th grade that day, and I wasn't sure how well they'd respond because they're just at the cusp of teenager hood. But they were all so excited to meet him and wanted to compare their hand sizes and arm hair. They all said "he's so handsome guy!". My co teacher got some photos of us in action which I'll try to get hold of to post later.

After school we got to leave early. We relaxed at home and had Korean style tea til Brian came home. Then we started our snacking tour of Korea. We had to fit in as many foods as possible in a short amount of time before going to see the night view of the bridge at Gwangan Li. We all performed admirably.

Once on the beach we found it chilly, so in we went to Russel Crowe bar to have a last night of talk before the departure. These are all the photos Dad took on his last day in Korea.

And these are all of the miscellaneous photos of food and drink and night scenes that didn't fit elsewhere.


I think this final photo of Dad really sums up how he felt about his entire Korean experience. Pretty fantastic.

He left Thursday morning, but Thursday afternoon at school was exciting enough to make it into this post. All of a sudden in the middle of my after school class fire alarms and sirens start going off (and didn't stop for an hour) and all the kids run to the windows. I can't understand the announcements being made, so I check out the window scene. Lo and behold, there's a fire in the middle of the school yard, but an intentional fire, an instructional fire. There's a fire truck and kids getting to use fire extinguishers to try to put out the flames (unsuccessfully; the fire hose was used in the end).

As you can see from these photos, these kids really know how to be cool about fire safety. I should know, as I consider myself a semi-expert on the subject of fire safety because I had to take a course at Furman for a dorm violation involving candles and string lights.

And speaking of fire safety, if you're reading this to waste time, I highly recommend this video. It's hilarious and informative. And if you enjoy it, you should really check out the second and third parts. The second part features Little Richard singing about crawling out of a fire with really awfully funny PowerPoint add ins.

This weekend we mostly rested after the flurry of activity with Dad, but we managed to make it to Haeundae for the sand festival going on there. This was my favorite sand sculpture. Anti-whaling, if you can believe it after all of the whale meat we found and showed on this post.

But there were many more to gawk at. Friday was actually a cultural education day for my teachers' team, meaning that we got to leave around 1:30 for a movie and dinner and coffee. That's where the graphic image of eel heads comes from in this next slide show.

And now we've only 7 weeks left including this one before our summer vacation. We're not sure how much time we've got off at this point, but depending on that crucial bit of information we may go to Mongolia or Indonesia. Either way, we will definitely go to Beijing for a few days. We've got 4 months left on our contracts, but it feels like our time here is already running out. We're trying to fit in any last experiences while we plan our next adventures. It's all so exciting!

A Rebutal! and our temple stay

First of all, I'd like to back up and say that shortly after the video from the arm wrestler post Mi Yeon and I wrestled with our left arms (her "strong arm") and I won. And I want a rematch now that Brian and I have been pumping kilos in the gym. Incidentally, our gym is called city sports, but in Korean an s sound followed by an i sound always makes a shi sound. So naturally, we work out at shity sports.

But aside from all this, last weekend Ryan and Shannon suggested a temple stay in nearby Gyeongju, the old Shilla Dynasty capital of S. Korea. David and Duck opted out but Brian and I were excited to go, so early Saturday morning we all hopped a bus to another bus to Golgulsa (sa means temple), which is the headquarters for sunmudo. Sunmudo is a martial art one monk told us was developed in India at the very beginning of Buddhism. It is an "active meditation" meaning that it's a tool for enlightenment rather than a tool to defend yourself. It focuses on breathing as well as intensely controlled movements and it's beautiful to see in action.

We got to try it out on our first day there, but the second session and the demonstration from the monks were cancelled due to rain on the second day.

So our first day at the temple was lovely but cold. When we arrived it was lunch time, so we headed into the dining hall where Shannon and I had to sit with the women and the guys with their fellows. We had plenty of time to talk and wander around together between activities, but within any temple structure we weren't to "associate". So we associated as much as possible while exploring the temple grounds after lunch.

We found this happy little guy guarding the watering hole.

The higher we climbed the more charming the characters we found.

A little higher and things started turning a bit more stately.

And regal.

Til the crowning glory at the top. This rock carving that supposedly happened in the 700s. It was beautiful and had a commanding view of the temple grounds. Check it out further down.

Then it was time for archery. We headed over to the Sunmudo center where archery was to happen in time to catch the tail end of a game (can never remember it's name) of foot volleyball between 4 monks. In foot volleyball you have a regular volleyball net and 2 or more players per team. The ball can bounce once between each kick, but a person can only kick it once. It's amazing to see them spike it. Then it was time for archery, which at Golgulsa is also a meditation. We all got pretty good, but it was really cold in the shade where we had to stand and I was glad when it was over.

After some more downtime (spent warming up in our separate girls and guys quarters) it was sunmudo training or bust. There we heard chants to Buddha and learned the proper way to bow to Buddha along with our kicks and hand meditations. It was fun and hard and beautiful to watch the monks who were perfectly amazing at it. And then it was bedtime because morning comes early at a temple. 4 Am early, and the penalty for missing 4:30 morning chants is 3,000 bows to Buddha.

The dormitory (girls on top floor, boys below)

So Shannon and I retired to our room. I've never loved the heated floor so much. There were no beds or even mats, just 2 blankets per person and a small pillow - traditional Korean style, plus an added dose of minimalism for the temple. And our room had paper doors, also traditional. I was amazed at how warm we stayed though, slept like a baby. It was especially nice during Sunday's downtimes when it was cold and drizzly outside and you could hear the rain so nicely through the paper.

At 4 AM as promised we were awakened by a monk with a booming voice and a wooden gong walking by our paper doors chanting and gonging. I'm not typically a morning person, but I was excited to wake up that way, and we were off to morning chants, morning meditation (cold!), and then a short walking meditation up on a hill where the sky was just starting to glow red with the beginnings of dawn. It was cold and quiet and peaceful. Below is where we did walking meditation, only it was dark then.

From there we were on to the mess hall for Baroogongyang, a ceremonial meditative meal.

Baroogongyang has a protocol not only for eating, but for the setting and cleaning of the dishes as well. Eating, between bites you put down your chopsticks and chew slowly and mindfully each bite. However, this was a shortened version for laymen to experience, so it was quickened. Ryan and I were the last ones finished cleaning up with the kimchi because we took it to heart when they said chew slowly. I had to speed eat the last bit of my meal to come in last place while everyone waited for us to finish. Oops.

I forgot to mention the other selling feature of Golgulsa, it has the only cave temple in all of S. Korea. That's where the monk that chanted us awake started out and marched on down from there. Here are some pictures of that lovely spot.

Temple entrance above and altar below.

Buddhas in the wall of the cave temple.

Then, somewhere around 6:30 AM, it was naptime. Then at 8:30, tea time with Q & A with one of the monks! He told us about sunmudo and how he became a monk. Then many of the questions came our way being amongst the only foreigners there. Everyone wanted to know how we found out about Golgulsa, what we thought about sitting on the ground, if we knew about Korean traditional dance and so on.

After tea time there's usually community service, but at that temple it's usually gardening, and it was February, so more downtime. Eventually it was lunch time again and time to go home because most of the daily activities were cancelled due to the rain. But here are some photos of where it would have happened.

Above is the view from the Buddha rock carving of the main temple hall where we meditated and had morning chants, and where the sunmudo demonstration would have happened.

Fighting monk murals.

We were sad to miss a lot of the second day, but happy we'd come to Golgulsa. We'll just have to go back sometime. Sometime warmer. We had to get all bundled up as we waited for the bus back home, but we were all smiles too. Great job Golgulsa!

We made it out of Busan!

This Saturday we made our first escapade outside of Busan proper. Brian, David, Duck, and Ryan and Shannon and I headed out Saturday morning to see Gyeongju, a city about an hour north of Busan by bus that was the capital of Korea during the Shilla Dynasty. The Shilla Dynasty began in 56 or 57 BC and lasted over 1000 years. It was during this reign that peninsular Korea was first unified, and it's amongst the longest dynasties on record in Asia. Therefore, Gyeongju is loaded with Shilla era architecture and ruins.

We met at the express bus terminal Saturday morning, and I was amazed at what an easy time we had buying tickets. For 4000 won (about 4 USD) we got a luxurious cross country ride with leg space even for the freakishly tall amongst us. But before the bus ride, we stopped in Lotteria, the Korean McDonald's, where hidden between the normal beef items on the menu is the delicious shrimp and avocado burger. It was my first time in a Lotteria, and I think I'll go back, which is strong language for me and fast food. When we got to Geongju we stopped by the tourist information center and got maps and some advice. Then we hopped on some rental bikes and headed out to see the sites. Some of my favorites were the Gyerim (chicken)forest, where the 김 (kim) lineage was born - something like 85% of Koreans have Kim as their family name - and Cheomseongdae, the oldest standing astronomical observation tower in all of East Asia.

After an amazing dinner we found ourselves a cheap "love motel", which means you can rent it by the hour, but we took it for the night. Unfortunately, I felt really sick the next day, so Brian and I headed back to Busan early. But Duck has some great pictures of the temple the rest of the crew visited Sunday on her blog. Sunday night Brian made some traditional Korean food at home and it was better than many restaurants that we've tried. Hopefully we'll be pros when we leave so we can bring home the tasty treats we've tried here.

Jess