The Waiting Game

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We find ourselves sitting in a precarious position stuck between seeing the holidays come and go, an interesting feeling half a world away from anything or anyone, having the weather representative of everything people hate about winter with its bitter cold temperatures with very little snow to enjoy, and staring at the calendar counting down the days until we depart for the Philippines. After finagling all of the plans, payment methods, email conversations with far too many people, we have most of our trip taken care of and paid for. With our bankbooks getting thinner, and for a good reason we’d like to think, we have tried our dandiest to save some coin (which may also be an excuse to stay out of the coldest weather imaginable). It hasn’t stopped us from checking out some cool sights, though.

Now that I am thinking about where the last blog left off, I should mention a, ‘Happy New Year’ to everyone! This year’s celebration was fairly low key, but still worth its weight in gold. Cass and I decided to head out for a nice dinner. We headed down ‘restaurant alley’ in downtown Yeoju, where seemingly every shop is one kind of restaurant or another. We settled on a small place that we’ve eaten at before and have enjoyed. In the middle of our duay gee galbe (grill at your table style pork rib meat), we were accosted by a nice young man. I know the words accosted and nice shouldn’t be in the same sentence, but this is just one of those times it is applicable.

He walked over to our table with a knife in one hand (don’t worry) and a cut up pair in his other (see why not to worry). He bent down next to Cass and gave a ‘hello.’ There is a phenomenon that happens so many times a day, when you are spotted and singled out as a foreigner and instantly this happens; either the person attempts to search the far reaches of their cranium for all that English vocabulary they haven’t used in several decades from their schooling (which is very nice, and they usually piece something together that is comprehensible, but totally random, i.e. my beard would be called a face jacket), or the person simply spots you and acknowledges you are in the foreign-est of all places, don’t know the customs, the language, practically anything, and takes you under their wing and, totally over the top, helps you by doing far too much than the original situation requires… or both those things happen at the same time. This just happened to be where the man was selling something and attempted to speak with us. You may remember reading about this, but I couldn’t help to be reminded of when I was practically cornered and driven to buy that silly Korean flag t-shirt in Seoul.

So he cut off a sample of pear and gave it to us. “Goot? Goot? I give you,” he counted the English numbers on his fingers stopping at eight momentarily and then continuing on to ten, “eight piers, ten sousand won. Berry goot, berry goot.”

“Very good, yes. New year’s tonight. We go party, celebrate. No pears, Quen chon eyo (no thanks/ it’s ok).” I whipped out my Korean pocket guidebook to look up something along the lines of, ‘we are going to a bar and don’t want to carry around ten pears the size of watermelons all New Year’s Eve.’ As I was thumbing through the pages, with a smile on his face, he snatched the book away, found the section about drinking and pointed to a phrase that said something along the lines of, ‘I’ll buy you a drink.’

“I give…” he made the motion of grabbing two handles of a bag.

“Bone to? Bag?” I said.

At this point the two waitresses, sitting nearby and witnessing this entire debacle, joined in on the laughing. “Ah, okay, okay. I give bone to. You go bar. Mashe nin piers. Eight and ten sousand won. Berry, berry good.”

At this point, I began to giggle at his persistence. He was a nice, good looking, guy about our same age trying to sell us a bunch of pears from the back of his pickup on New Years Eve. How classic? I looked at Cass and asked her, through all three of our laughing, if we should just buy the stinkin’ pears. She didn’t need to answer, the hilarity of the situation was all we needed. He came back with two, handle-less, plastic bags overflowing with the fruit. Just to complete this interesting Korean story, our ajima (waitress) at the restaurant walked over and handed us a large green plastic bag with handles to help us haul these things around for the rest of the night.

With New Year’s Eve just beginning, we took our newly acquired ‘gift’ to our favorite Yeoju bar, the Fox Bar, one of the few that serves cocktails to meet some friends and satisfy my fruity drink craving. Finishing up our Long Beach Ice Teas (or Long Islands, the jury is still out if the bartender knows which is which, but they’re both so tasty we don’t care), we began telling the same story to Jason, Rachel, Reagan, and Leandra that you just heard. We finished up our story and drinks and... what better way to celebrate a wonderful ending to 2008 than in a no rae bong? Mambo #5, Gold digger, Three Times the Lady, and Shake Your Tail Feathers were more than rocking, way more than rocking, the Soul Star No Rae Bong!! On the way out, we bought a one of the beautiful, more works of art than dessert item, strawberry cake that came with complementary sparklers, and went off to play some Taboo and ring in the New Year.

New Year’s day was the second of two days both Cassie and I generously received off from working. It was a clear and relatively warm day, so we jumped on the cruisers and headed to the part of Yeoju that is known through out Korea as being a center for ceramics. We took a detour before quite reaching our destination and it turned out to be one of the neatest places we’ve found in Yeoju, Silleuksa Temple.

This is mostly just hearsay, but the general overview of the temple history is here. Back in the day, one of the Korean dynasties (which in particular escapes my memory at the moment) drove the Buddhists out of the mainstream and they took refuge in the mountains. Silleuksa, however, is overlooking a river, a rarity as far as Korean temples go. So much so, that it is the only, or one of very few in all of Korea that is not found in the mountains.

We walked along the river until passing under the entrance gate and into the temple itself. It must still be a functioning place of worship because one of the intricately designed building we walked passed had what sounded like a chanting coming from within. We put the pieces together when we saw a pair of worn shoes sitting outside one of the closed doors. The grounds were filled with ancient, weathered statues of stone, ornate buildings of the exquisite Asian architecture you would only see in movies back home, and the crown jewels of the temple, a 50 ft. stone pagoda and observation deck build upon a cliff overlooking the river. Whoever choose this site really knew there stuff. The brilliant sun shimmering off the surprisingly clear water, the vivid reds and greens of the structures, set against the striking grey of the rocks made for incredible images and memories of the day.

We did end up pedaling through the ceramic expo center after our slight detour. There were several shops with incredible pottery lining every square inch of their shop. The more we looked at the details and imagined the effort taken to create all this, we decided to support the artists and purchase some things. We all know that I get excited about some silly things, even I know that, and today was no exception. I bought two beautiful coffee mugs, and made it a point to go back and buy the matching saucers. Who uses saucers, you might ask? Answer: Jon Wick does.

The sixth of January, my co-teacher was scheduled to fly to Australia to study English for the remainder of the month. To show our appreciation for everything he has done for us, we invited he and his family over for dinner. The last time we ate together was the hotdog chopstick spearing episode the first week we lived here, so we were looking forward to having a bit of a more normal meal together. We got as many of the fixings as possible to make tacos (a meal not eaten here), but a lack of tortilla shells in this part of the world quickly turned our tacos in to taco salads. Mr. Kim, his brother, and two daughters came to experiment with a new meal. Dabi, in first grade, was the cutest because with every bite, she had an interested, ‘I’m not sure if I like this quite yet, but I don’t think it’s terrible either,’ look on her face.

Meanwhile, Cassie and I are in the swing of things with our ‘winter camps.’ There is no official school in January, but we are required to teach a specified length of English classes during break. There is no curriculum or book to work out of, and the goal of it is to focus more on fun than on pure teaching. I’ve been doing games and activities surrounding superheros, fantasy and Harry Potter, and I just started foods. Cass put together themes like under the sea, bugs, and fantasy. It’s much less formal which is nice having so much creative control, but has it’s own difficulties; I’m lucky enough to have an interested school staffer or teacher (sometimes multiple people) just sitting in the back of the class helping to rope in the kids and further explain directions from time to time. I’ve quickly learned that, no matter what dialect is exploding from their mouths; kids are kids are kids, no matter where you happen to be.

Last weekend, we headed into Seoul, with visions of sugar plums and Lotte World dancing in our heads, a version of DisneyLand with a huge indoor section of park right in the heart of the city. We navigated the bus and subway systems to arrive at our station when, while looking for our destination on a neighborhood map on the wall, we realized that we were already inside Lotte World. The station is somehow in Lotte World; this really is a magical place! We went in and decided to wander around to see what we were getting into when we caught a glimpse of the ice skating rink. Right then and there, my engines went from overdrive into ejection seat mode. We looked down to see more people on top of the ice than of water molecules making up the ice. It was a fun scene to people tolerant of the masses, we of which are not; there were speed and figure skating lessons going on in the inner circle of the rink, people were falling and laughing, the micro stories playing themselves out on the ice took me back to Silver Creek Park in Manitowoc. Cass and I however, didn’t think it fun to be elbowing our way through yet another dense crowd just to say we’ve been skating at Lotte World, we could just imagine ice skates on our feet as we ride the subway. Once we saw a pricy entrance fee, that sealed the deal for us… we were off to find other fun.

Thanks to the Lonely Planet Guidebook for Korea, that other fun came in the form of the COEX Aquariums. The aquarium was part of a huge mall in the city that we have already spent some time at so it wasn’t creating a headache trying to find. The cheaper entrance fee was right up our alley, so we went in. The first couple of exhibits were nothing special, native species, I believe, but the signage wasn’t too English. Then we walked through a section of interestingly strange items; every household appliance acting as a fish tank for some unsuspecting creature. Picture this, a refrigerator with its door wide open and on every shelf inside there is a fish tank taking the place of last night’s leftovers. Fish in sinks, fish in mirrors, all very unique. Then, after passing the jungle room that had a crocodile and a neat bat cage (where the most memorable thing there was the ‘boy parts’), we got to the crowning jewel of the aquariums.

The Deep Sea exhibit was where we spent most of our time. A huge saltwater tank with all kinds of great white sharks, schools of fish, and crazy looking things all right there in front of us. The labyrinth of pathways was the best part of it; they take you on a moving walkway in a series of tunnels around, through, and under the tank for a wild perspective of the animals. My favorite part was a section of walkway that opened up to an almost stadium seating section. There, you could hop off, take a seat, and observe the tank through the floor to ceiling windows. We stumbled on an underwater show of Korean games the aquarium staff was performing in full traditional dress, complete with scuba equipment. It was wonderful, and neither Cass, nor I, had ever done anything like that, so the experience was all the more fun. To finish up our time there, we spun passed a less than impressive penguin exhibit on our way out the door.

At a coffee shop in the mall, we discovered that Reagan and Leandra were coming into Seoul for the night, to a part of the city Cass has been in, but I haven’t explored yet, Hongdae. They knew of this great ice bar they were going to meet some people at so we invited ourselves along, pretty much. They were going to be in a bit later, so we headed over there early, grabbed dinner, and would meet up with them later.

There are decidedly two ‘younger’ or ‘touristy’ parts of town, Itaewon and Hongdae. They often get compared and pitted against each other as to which is the better place. I have been to Itaewon several times, night and day, and have never had a bad time. It is lined with restaurants and shopping that you could find anywhere back home, which is nice if you need that kind of thing. There is a U.S. Army base at one end of the Itaewon strip, so there is an undercurrent of machismo to the place. One can also walk Itaewon all day and see very few Koreans, while Hongdae, on the other hand is located between a few Korean universities, and has a much classier, clean, welcoming energy. In my experience, I am reluctant to call Hongdae touristy. The crowd is that of younger Koreans with the tourists and expats intermingled, the sidewalks are much wider, and just overall more the environment I see myself in. It is a bit more expensive, but what is a few thousand won here or there anyway? In the competition between the two parts of Seoul, it is, hands down, Hongdae, for this guy.

Reagan called to let us know the bus was backed up and probably wouldn’t get there until real late, the one downfall of the Yeoju to Seoul bus on weekend nights. So we went to attempted to follow his directions to the Ice Bar, but to know avail. They went something like this, “exit out subway station #6, travel about 200 meters to the Prince No Rae Bong and turn left, another 100 meters or so, and you take a right at the tall building. Then you should see the sign on the right side of the alley, and go down to the second basement and there it is.” Sorry Rea, we are mere Seoul rookies. We finished up our drinks, and realized we had to skidaddle because we had plans to hook up with Renata who was going to stay in Yeoju for the night. Sprinting through the subway stations and bus terminal, we found Renata minutes before the bus pulled up and we were off. Another successful night in Seoul.

Our next two weeks, as of now (and we all know how consistent and solid plans are in this part of the world), should consist of planning and worrying about winter camp. Cass has her second grade camp the week of Jan. 12-16. I absolutely love the teaching the little ones, but they are new to her since she doesn’t teach them during regular school classes. She will be more than fine, and have far more games, activities, and songs ready for the little munchkins. I keep telling her, when it comes right down to it, they are the cutest little bitties in the universe!

We’ll let you all know how things go! Stay warm everyone!

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Comments

[Debbie (H.I.)]

Happy New Year
Happy New Year to you both!!! It looks like the cold weather you are having is the same we are having. Have a good time in the Phillippines! Deb