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Published: April 20th 2010
I have been trying to put off writing about this weekend because I knew it would take forever. But at the same, the longer I wait, the more I forget. And this was a weekend to remember!
Friday night after work, none of us got to bed until about 3am. So 6am came quickly. When the alarm went off, I had no idea for a couple of minutes, why it was going off, what day it was, or what I was supposed to be doing. After realizing we were supposed to meet a bus load of people at the church in only an hour, I jumped out of bed. Everyone was a little slow at getting up so we were running late. We didn't know how easy it'd be to find taxis at 7am on a Saturday because...we have never seen 7am on a Saturday, or ...any day actually. So Jake and I walked down the street, found some taxis and waited in them for the rest of our group. We have to take 2 every time we go somewhere which sucks because it costs more.
We got to the church a little late but it was no problem.
There was a nice, lavishly decorated bus waiting. It was pretty funny on the inside. Anyway, there were many Koreans and many foreigners and after receiving a banana a piece, we were off. I have no idea how long the drive was because we all fell asleep but it was supposed to be somewhere between 2 and 3 hours. Actually, I don't even know where we went! But we got there, and immediately saw blooming cherry blossoms. Yay for Spring! We walked along a river path for a while and then we reached many different temples. That was interesting because it was our first real Asian culture experience. Ha ha. Everyone always has there temple and buddha pictures. We walked/looked around and then split off into two groups. The group hiking the hard trail and the group hiking the easy trail. You know which one we took.
The hike began on a path/road...I knew it wouldn't be that easy the whole time. Within 15 minutes we were CLIMBING up. I could feel it and I was winded already. I talked everyone into going on this hike because I really do like hiking...so I had to keep up and not
look like a complete failure. At times, I was like WHY? Ha ha but it was totally worth it. We finally reached the top of a peak and from it we could see the Yellow Sea. Some of the group thought we'd reached our destination but we had 2 more peaks to go. We climbed back down, back up, great view, back down, and back up. We literally hiked all day. Well....from 9:30 to 4, which is pretty much all day. It was fun! I loved it! We saw temples, monks, Buddha's, and lots of lanterns. At 4 we met up with the rest of the group and boarded the bus home. Our 3 hours of sleep combined with hiking all day made for a pretty quiet ride home.
We got home at 7pm and this is where things got interesting. I had made attempted plans with Rachel & Ryan, who teach in the Philippines, but were visiting South Korea for a few days. The only time it worked out to see them, was Saturday night. They were coaching a soccer tournament in Daejon. Rachel and I both had no idea where that was but when I looked it
up, it was the next town from me! So I decided we should definitely try to meet up with them. (Sidenote: Ryan was one of Chris's roommates and teammates in college. His brother Garrett is married to my cousin Karissa- random connections) So after a long day, I was making Jake try to get to Daejon with me and luckily the rest of the group decided they were up for some adventure as well. We showered and met up for some quick fried chicken, then we were off.
First step, take taxi's to the bus station in Cheongju. We had asked one of the Korean teachers at school on Friday if there were buses to Daejon and there were...about every 15 minutes. Great...so we go to the first bus station and the lady says "aniyo..." followed by lots of Korean. Well, that means no. We stare at her hopelessly and keep hearing the word aniyo. Off we go, down the street, to the other bus station. "Daejon-Yuseong." "Aniyo.....opsoyo." Didn't know what that meant but considering we never got a bus ticket....I learned...it means there isn't or there aren't. Grrrrrreat.
It was 9:40 and apparently the last bus to
Daejon had left 8 minutes earlier. Great start! So then we find this guy who is looking to make some money with his taxi. We say "six....(point to each other) Daejon." He says no no no. "Two taxis." Knowing that would be an outrageous price we say no and start walking away. Finally he says he'll take us so we pack 6 of us, 7 plus him, into a small car and drive to Daejon, which is about 40 minutes away. The hazards are on and we are barely moving. Semi trucks are flying past us. Great...this has got to be good for the meter. If I wasn't squished next to 4 other people in the backseat, I would have stared at the meter and wanted to cry as the price went up and up. ha ha....So meanwhile, our friend Nick has his Korean partner/teachers cell number (who lives in Daejon) and he uses Ben's phone (the only one in our group with a phone) and has Jin talk to the taxi driver to tell him where we need to go. Also, it's 10:30, we aren't there yet, and I had told Rachel and Ryan to meet us at this
place at 10. Oh and the taxi was $60(US). That's a lot.
FINALLY, moving at the speed of zero, we get there. Daejon is big and bustling and there is traffic and people everywhere. All we knew about Daejon thus far was that it had Costco, which was great news. We finally make it to Sponge, our destination for the evening, and go inside and get a table. Rachel and Ryan weren't there so I was worried that they had come and left already since we were an hour late. We hung out at Sponge until about 3 or so and Jin, the coworker, showed up with her Korean friend and they spoke Kenglish with us for most of the night. Ha ha, we had a lot of fun!
Then we decided we needed to go to a norebong. I am really starting to love this karaoke idea. So much fun! We sang our voices away until 4ish. Actually, I fell asleep for a good chunk of the time. Even while blaring speakers with loud music were surrounding me. But everyone else sang and danced to Taeyang. I'm not used to logging those kind of hours.
Since
we had nowhere to stay and knew nothing about Daejon and spent way too much money on the taxi, we started asking random Koreans where the closest jimjilbang was. There was one 7 floors above where we were standing and we had no idea. Ha ha, thank you kind Korean man who helped us. I was pretty excited to check out this spa/sauna place that is open 24 hours and lets you stay the night. Spa meets hostel I guess. So we pay 7 bucks and the boys go to there locker room and Jen and I head to ours. Immediately we take off our shoes (of course) and then we are directed to lockers where we put everything else. Luckily we were given a pair of shorts and a t-shirt for the night. So we locked everything up, saw a few too many naked Korean women, and then headed upstairs to meet the guys on the sleeping floor. There were people just sprawled out all over on mats, along with lots of different hot rooms you could sleep in or relax in for a while. There was a cafe/library/internet store too. What a strange concept! But I love it,
and jimjilbangs are apparently every 50 feet around here. So we slept for a few hours until we were all awoken by an outrageous snorer who didn't stop for hours. We all threatened to kill him and then decided it was better to leave. I headed to the spa/saunas for about an hour. I'm sure I was quite interesting to look at naked simply because I was the only non-Korean in there. Yay for that! Not. I could hardly bring myself to take off my clothes but the hot pool and cold pool looked so good after a long night of bad sleep. Finally, I was like "Oh well...here I go ....1..2...3.." Yes I actually had to count down. The pools felt amazing. The absolutely freezing one was a nice refresher and then I relaxed in the hot one for a while. I was intrigued myself, watching Korean women bathe other Korean women, all of them naked. I'm sure they have great meaning behind it but it seems so strange to an American who has hardly ever had to be naked in front of people. Yay for cultural differences!
It was also funny to see women sitting in the
locker room completely naked watching the soap opera and eating hard boiled eggs, which were available for purchase. I bought some. They were brown/green. I was disappointed, extremely. Around noon we all met up in the lobby and decided our first jimjilbang experience had come to an end. None of us were feeling very hot at this point. I learned later that sitting in a sauna after consuming alchohol and not a lot of water, is not good for you. ha ha. yes....I am lacking in experience.
McDonalds had stopped serving breakfast and so had Paris Baguette. Sad news. We were all starving. Hooray for Dunkin Donuts breakfast sandwiches that are served all day! After those we went to Coffee Bean for a nice cold, cup of joe. It's funny how they do coffee shops. They're all very nice. But there were 4 on all 4 corners, facing each other. They are everywhere! I love it!
We asked a white guy we saw in the coffee shop where to find the bus station and he gave us directions. We piled in to 2 more taxis and arrived at a very small, everything in Korean, bus station. We said
Cheongju and paid 3,600Won for our tickets. That's more like it!! We will be taking the bus from now on. The 40 minute bus ride was enough for all of us to fall into a deep sleep. We arrived at home around 4 and made plans to meet at 4:45 to head to the baseball game that we had told some people from the church we would meet them at. Jake decided that since the weekend was already so "epic," we couldn't bail out on the game, even though we were all exhausted. So we kept going. Back in 2 taxis and off to our first Korean baseball game.
There was fried chicken, squid, corn dogs and boiled beetles outside the entrance. Perfect! We were all hungry. I had a corn dog and chicken on a stick which was pretty delicious and we went inside. The Cheongju Eagles are apparently pretty bad. They lost by a lot. But it was fun and entertaining. They do baseball differently here. Everyone stands and claps and yells when people are batting, rather than getting quiet. There are cheerleaders too. It was pretty fun! Taxi ride home....and finally to bed after a very
tiring but completely awesome and fun weekend. Minus the fact that we didn't get to see Rachel and Ryan. But exploring Daejon was worth the trip and we all hope to be heading back soon....by bus.
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Jeanne Curtis
non-member comment
Oh, Bet!! What a weekend!! But so much fun and so many adventures!! I'm so glad that y'all are taking advantage of everything!! Sorry that you missed your friends but it sounds like the trip was still plenty worth it. I'm also so glad to hear that all of your friends are as adventurous as you and Jake!! Give him a big hug for me!! I love you guys and thank you so much for all of the news!! Jeanne