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Published: April 20th 2009
April 15
So today I hit Busan. Dana dropped me off at the bus station and I took the short 1and 1/2 ride down. The first thing I did was go to the center of town to mail my guard application. Well see if it makes it home before I do or not. Haha then I walked around a little bit just to busans needle like tower. I opted not to go up though because it was pretty hazy and nasty out. I didn't think I'd see much. Then I headed to Hae-unde beach. When I was getting out of the subway a guy started talking to me and even gave me 10cents because I was short on coins when I got out. He was nice. He pointed me in the direction of the beach and then went his way. The beach was a true city beach small but nice boardwalk and buildings right upto/on the beach. I came to this beach to eat the live baby octopus. Thee was a place in the LPG that they said spoke English and explained the fish. It took me a bit to find this tiny place and when I did the woman there didn't speak English. But I managed to tell her what I wantted. After some confusion she told me to go up stairs. I heard a few loud chops and then she appeared with my plate if chopped but still much alive and wiggling/swigglibg octopus. Game on. It was hard to get the little bits off the plate because it was still alive or at least had some sort of motor skills some how because it was sucking on hard. First bit in I chompped right away so it wouldn't wriggle around. It tasted pretty good actually with the sauce she gave me which I think was some butter and salt sauce it was quite tasty. I gained confidece after the first few bits and let him suction my tounge and cheek. It was really powerful and weird. The ultimate of playing with your food I suppose. The only bit that was not as good was the actual body. It was very slimy and snot like sort of hard to swallow that consistency but none if it had a bad fishy taste or anything. The woman brought me up a few massive shrip as well. Which were pretty good coming from someone who doesn't really like them they must have been really good haha. Then I walked back to the subway and picked up some grilled egg salad sanwich for the bus ride back. I took 10 steps and had another guy talking to me asking wheiter I liked the price of the sandwich and then the normal why am I in Korea and what I thought about it. This guy had a thick accent and was hard to understand but nice. I could meet some one on the moon that would stop and talk to me. Haha Anyway I'm just on the bus now headed back to Pohang.
April 16
Today I headed to guygongu. The ancient city, museum with out walls. So I managed to bang out most of the cites in the central area with in a few short hours. The first two sure were Noseo-dong Tombs and Tumuli Park. The tombs were sort if cool but they were just large mounds of grass. One was partly excavated and you could sneak in but the others were just large mounds of dirt and grass. Then I headed to the Cheomseongdae observatory which was a small stone tower but the oldest in east Asia. Then I went to Banwolseng fortress but there wasn't really anything left there at alii most of it was a park teaming full if children running around. The only part if it that was left was the ice room because it was partly underground. Then I headed to the Anpji pond which was a nice little pond with some building rebuilt to look at and some articlfacts that were found nearby. By this time it was getting late and I had to catch the bus to Golgulsa temple for my temple stay. Lucky I got in the bus behind a woman who spoke English and her husband helped me out. She was a Korea painter he was a Mexican turned French man who was a sculpture. They met less than a year ago in Venice or sinething and got married last week. Crazy but they were very nice and we walk to the temple together. When I found the office I signed in then this American girl came to help me out. She use to teach in Seoul and when here contract ended she voulintered to work here. She showed me my room which is a floor a heated floor and some sheets. I have the room to myself but I think it could fit 6-9 or so. After I dropped my stuff off I walked around and checked out the beautiful buda sculptures that are carved into the side of the mountain. There are a decent amount of them scattered on the cliff and you have to take some sketchy paths to them but there worth it. After that it was dinner time. It was a Buffett style all veggies but pretty tasty. Then we had a little free time before the nightly chanting and sunmudo traning. The chanting was alot if bowing and kneeling. The sunmudo training was similar to tai chi I guess or yoga. Atleast the stuff we did. We got to see some of the older guys do some stuff and it's actually martial arts but they don't fight. They consider it a form of body movement meditation. We did moslty slow static moves. Its was pretty cool. There aren't any other westerns stating but a few Koreans the USA girl told me they come to prepare for a big event or rest and recharge or if they are sick things like that. I'm just here for a cool new experience. Well I better get to bed apparently there is a 4am wake up for sine chanting and mediation. Sweet.
April 17
So I had my 4am wake up call which was a guy walking around the sleeping area with a stick and a hallow piece of wood chanting and druming away. I got up and walked to the main shrine where we chantted bowed and kneeled for around 1/2 hour then we had about half hour of sitting meditation. Durring which I couldn't stop thinking about food the Chegg and summer. I don't know if I was meditating right. Haha. Then a few of us did a walking meditation where we circled a statue a few times and then took the 20 min walk to the main gate which was considered walking meditation. It's about 6:30 now and I am starvingly awayting breakfast. I don't know how they or veggitarians don't eat meat.
Well I over ate at breaky rice and more veggies. But I was able to squeeze in a nap before our sunmudo training. This time they decided to go to the beach to do the training. However the beach was rocky so it made it a bit hard to balance and do the yogaish tai chi stuff. We moved to the sidealk half way through. When we got back to the temple we did 108 bows (full standing to kneeling with head on floor) it felt more like a few 100. Each bow is supposed to mean something, to reconogize your bad habits and try and fix them. After our bowing we had a short break then had lunch more rice and veggies awesome. I'm so bloated and full because I know there isn't much nutrients and I'll be starving again soon. We were supposed to do archery after lunch but the changed plans and now they have to make these lanters because apparently this month or next is the budas birthday. So I think I'm gonna jam out to gyeongju for a bit
Then back to pohang and figure out my moves tomorrow. When I got to town I immediately got 1/2 liter of milk then a pizza cone thing then 2 boiled eggs and a yogurt drink. Can you say protien deprived haha. So when I got back to pohang I sort of figured out what time I need to catch the bus tomorrow then ran into the home plus (walmartish store) to find Dana a new can opener I had tried many stores but they all had the same crappy ones. I managed to find one of the cool new ones that cut it on the side. Anyway I went back to his place used the net then fixed danas sink. It was super clogged with hair and gunk. I had to use chopsticks to get to some of it. Dana finally came home we hung out watched some daily show and then went out to eat. We had bulgogi which is a meat stir fry that you make little sandwiches/wraps with lettuce or pickled radishes. It was pretty good. Then he took me by the red light district to check it out it was really weird. Many of them were older than you'd think and it was basically their house with red lights. Some were sitting watching tv others were cleaning or something and few were just sitting there. It was really weird. Then we headed back watched some more daily show and went to bed.
April 18
We woke up early to get a sprint work out in which was pretty harsh. Then we went back showered and he dropped me off at the bus station. We said our good byes and now I'm on a bus headed to samcheok. To see the limestone caves and the penis sculpture town. Should be fun/interesting. The bus ride up the coast was beautiful. I finally get to shemock where I found a hotel dropped it stuff and headed to the penis town. At first I thought I was just the penis shaped light house but then found the actual penis park. It was such more of an adult theme park. There were giant erections everywhere most around 8 feet tall or so. They were all dressed up too. Some had smiley faces others had defferent funny faces some were penis humans with pensis. My favorite was one with a woman on the bottom praying/worshiping the penis. They had others that looked like cannons. I guess I should explain the reason for the erections. Apparently there is a story that a girl had drowned and her boyfriend couldn't save her. So this unfulfilled girl was cursing the fish in the area. Then one day a man had I guess taken care if his urge facing the ocean and the next day their catch increased. So they started erecting erections to satisfy this girl. So back to the park there were stools and benches all penis shaped one had a vagina on top of the penis. There was also a historic fishing museum there as well which was decent but could not have ever expected what was yet to come. I started down the path and saw a building that I thought might have been a toilet but realized it was a replica of one if the old fishing towns. However what was intresting was what was inside. They had portraid a couple having sex complete with large erection but better yet was the room next to it was a guy peeping in the curtin. I was stunned shock and just started saying what the fuck. All the women that had just started to walk away started laughing hysterically. It was truely unbeleivable. But wait there's more and it gets better. So I walked on up the hill. Now there are statues of men with full erections some lets say are taking care if business. So as startling as this was a group of old Korea woman walk by and start laughing and pointing. Then one of the women grabbed the erection and started moaning and then started humping the statue. It was absolutely amazing. So funny I couldn't beleive it. They were all laughing histerically. Then they noticed me staring at them and the woman turned gave me a piece sign and strted saying "I love you" in English. She must have humped this thing fir about 5 mins. Mind you these women were probably in their 50s or 60s. Then they finally started to walk away and the woman waved at me to come over so I stopped and she came up to me and gave me some dried squid even broke done off and put it in my mouth. Haha crazy. I walked in one direction and their tour group was headed in the other so she said bye and carried on. After that my day was made I laughed at every other penis shaped thing I saw even when iw as walking down the wodne staris that had that really old strong wood smell i said" ahh i love the smell of wood" then started laughing that i said wood i felt like i was back in junior high. There was a guy even taking a photo of his girl friend and she was behind the penis with her head pratically resting on top if it. I laughed and laughed. That was definatly one if the top highlights if my trip. I wish Dana or someone was with me or my video camera work for that spectical.
I caught the bus back to town got some crappy romen for dinner since I have no idea what to order in resturants. When I was walking around I witnessed something else amazing. I had heard a loud music that I thought was comming from a car but turned out to be a bus complete with guy singing karoke and women dancing. All again olderlyish. As the Discovery Chanel sates "The world is just Awesome"
April 19
I headed to Hwanseon Caves the biggest caves in Asia. I unfortunatly missed the first bus so I used the net and fugured out my next move.
Then on the bus to the cave I met some American teachers. I walked around mostly by myself but we met up at the end and had a good lunch together which the one girl paid for. But back to the caves. I was hoping to do some exploring I had brought my head lamp. But it was all tracked out, no going off path. It was still amazing and beautiful. The caves were huge some 2km of walking track. You could fit multiple house inside there. Some of the formations and flowerstoned were beautiful, there were even waterfalls and streams inside. It was truely and underworld. Again this was almost a theme park because the track was lit with neon lights and there were bridges, even 2 suspension bridges and a theme park feel one side was the wish and dream side the other was hell and demonesque.
When I got back to town I used the net some more and took a nap just gonna go get some food and hit the sack.
April 20
So today I headed to Gangneung to see the unification park. Which was a north Korean spy submarine that got stuck on shore and then caoatured by American and south Korean forces September 17 1996. Apparently the officers shot the crew members burnt and records and information they had and tried to escape back north. How ever they were all shot before they made it back. It was 35 meters and housed 11 crew men and 15 soldiers/officers.
There was also a usa warship there to check out. It was built in 1945 and donated by the gov in 1972 then retired to it's current location in 1999 I think. It's the only warship that is on land. It was massive. Both the sub and warship were really cool even though it was raining out still made for a nice stop. I went back to Gangneung to catch another bus to Chuncheon in hopes to do another bungee jump tomorrow if the weather clears otherwise it's on to Seoul to chill for a day or so and save some money. Everything is really expensive here. It's crazy I must have spent more here in the last 2 weeks than the past month and I was stating with dana I don't know where the money went? T minus 10 days.
Sorry if there was alot of mispselling in this one. this computer didnt have firefox to spell check for me and its coin operated and im running out of time. i need to add some to april 20th as well. but thatll be in the next one i guess
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Avinash Victor
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