Adventures of a Waegook (aka my trip to Korea)

After a long month of packing and stressing and preparing to leave, the day finally arrived. I headed off to the airport with my family well before the sun came up and we had a tearful goodbye. I managed to hold it together to make it through customs. Plus, being excited to see a friend I hadn’t seen in about 4 years helped distract me from the whole leaving home for a really long time thing.

I flew Singapore Airlines to Seoul, and let me tell you! I was impressed from the get go. When I walked into the plane I saw a flight attendant in a glamorous uniform that I remembered seeing often during my numerous layovers in Frankfurt. I never knew which airline these women were with, but I always wanted to fly on whatever airline they worked for because I knew if the flight attendants looked that glamorous that the airline would follow suit.

And I was right. The plane was big and the seats were roomy. That ended up not even mattering because the plane was nearly empty and I had a row of 3 seats to myself. The thing about Singapore airlines is that they combine the glamour of airline flying of the 60’s with the technological advancements of today. Every seat has its own entertainment system. The meals were served with real glass cups and actual metal knifes. Even the plane washrooms were nice. All of this made the 13 hour long flight a pleasure.

Once I got into Seoul I had no problem getting through customs and collecting my bags. I got some weird looks as I piled my massive suitcases onto my cart, but no hassle at all from customs as I wheeled them out of the baggage claim area. Laura met me at the airport, and thank god she did because I would have struggled without her. Laura has developed a pretty good command of the Korean language, and can read the alphabet fluently. (And by the end of my trip she had even taught me a bit of the alphabet, enough to not be completely lost when I saw something written in Korean.)

I just happened to be coming into Seoul on Lunar (Chinese) New Year, so Seoul was basically a ghost town when I first arrived. This at least made it easier for us to navigate the subway with my luggage. Of course, carrying my heavy suitcase up all those flights of stairs was not so much fun. Once we got out of the subway, we had to find our hostel. By this time it was around 10pm and neither of us really had a clue where we were. So obviously we got a little lost. But eventually we got ourselves to the hostel (thanks to Laura’s cell phone) and by the next morning we had mastered navigating our way between the hostel and the subway (which involved going through a narrow alley for a few blocks). Laura had booked us a double room at a hostel, so it was quite cozy. In Korea they use floor heating, which resulted in us having very warm clothes when we got dressed and a lot of melted chocolate.

Because of the holiday, most of Seoul was shut down for the first couple of days I was there. This made it easier to adjust to being in Korea as the pace was slower than normal, but it also meant that most things were closed. On my first day Laura took me to one of the Palaces, which fortunately was open. We got there just in time to witness the changing of the guard ceremony.
This Palace was a summer Palace and was decorated in lots of vibrant colours and flowers. I found it quite beautiful and enjoyed wandering around the grounds, imagining what it would have been like to live there. We saw lots of little kids dressed up in traditional costumes and many of them smiled and waved at us foreigners (waegooks). We checked out one of the museums, where they had some very realistic plastic models of Korea food dishes. It was an interesting museum.

Afterwards we headed off to Itaewan, the ex-pat district, where fewer things were shut down. We had lunch at a nice Indian restaurant then went to, oh the shame, Starbucks and chatted for hours. Then we went to a Thai restaurant for dinner.

On my second full day in Seoul we set off to find the USO to pay for our DMZ tour, but were unhelpfully (and very incorrectly) informed that we would not be able to find it from our location near the war memorial. So we went to the war memorial and museum instead. There I got a history lesson on the Korean War. I also got to get hands on in the Emergency Experience Hall. And what did that entail? A foam helmet and a tarp like cape! I wish I had a helmet and cape for when I was volunteering on the crisis lines and/or working in fraud squad! This was definitely a high point in the trip for me. ;) Afterwards we decided to wander around in Insadong, a cool and large market near our hostel. I fell in love, and now have the coolest fish earrings ever.

We were originally going to leave Seoul on the 9th, but opted to stay an extra day to meet up with some of Laura’s friends for dinner (we were supposed to on the 8th, but I succumbed to jet lag). During the day we continued our adventure to find the USO, and were eventually successful. That night we returned to Itaewan for dinner with Laura’s friends…eventually. That was not the highlight of my trip, not that Laura’s friends weren’t good people!. I actually got to meet a woman from Melbourne, so that was a good connection to make.

The next day we took off for on a bus to Jinju, the city where Laura has been living. The nice thing about taking inter-city buses in Korea is that there is usually a bus leaving every 15 minutes. After getting ourselves settled in at Laura’s, we met up with another of her friends for dinner (Korean food this time). We ordered a whole whack of mandu, which is like tofu dumplings. It was pretty decent. Afterwards we went to a teahouse for, obviously, tea. In the basement was a shop filled with various handmade ceramic products made by the owner. We went and had a look around at his work before settling down to a nice cinnamon tea. Afterwards we got in a cab and headed to E-Mart for my Korean grocery shopping experience! Kid in a candy store, that’s what I was.

On Monday Laura took me around Jinju and gave me the proper Jinju experience. We started off with a crazy bus ride, then went for a walk through the market. Afterwards we found ourselves a little kimbap place (kimbap is like a California roll and was by far my favourite Korean dish) for a light lunch. After lunch we went for soy ice cream. Yum!

That afternoon we wandered around the Jinju castle, which is the site of a heroic act on the part of an entertainer woman named Nongae. The Japanese had invaded Korea, and the general was quite taken with Nongae. She was able to lure him out to a rock in the river, where she linked her hands around his back and threw herself, and him, into the river and to their deaths. By doing this she saved Korea from the Japanese invasion. Nongae is now considered a heroine throughout Korea.

An important part of Korean culture is the jimjilbang, otherwise known as the public bath house. Laura happened to live right across the street from one (lucky!) so after dinner we headed over for some R&R in the saunas and baths. It was a lovely experience, and despite Laura’s concern, I didn’t get physically assaulted because of my tattoos.

Our next adventure had us on a 7 hour bus ride up the east coast of Korea, from Jinju to Samcheok. Now, the only reason we decided to go to what we figured would be a quite small city whose main industry would be fishing, was to see the infamous Penis Park. Boy were we in for a surprise!

To Be Continued...

In Melbourne Now

Okay, so I'm in Melbourne, got in yesterday morning, things are going decently. My visa, obviously, went through without incident. I managed fine with my 3 massive suitcases and have even developed arm muscles that I previous did not have! (Okay, maybe they aren't really "developed" but still, I lifted those suitcases like no one's business.)

So I'm going to do a huge blog entry about my trip to Korea, which was awesome. But right now I'm hungry and not having a cell phone is driving me crazy, so I think I'm going to head into the city to do something about both those problems. (I unlocked my Canadian cell phone, so I'm hoping I can just purchase an Australian SIM card and get a pay-as-you-go dealy going.)

A few things about my time here before I take off:

I figured out where I am, I'm staying in the suburb of Coburg in this tiny student apartment with an insufficient kitchen. I thought my room wasn't being cleaned, so I hope the cleaning people didn't mind the tripping hazards that are my suitcases. It's been...interesting. I'm hoping tonight I won't attempt to give myself a concussion again.

I'm a registered student now! Complete with ID card and horrible ID card photo. Horrible! Okay, so how's this. The administration people at La Trobe are super pleasant! Especially the people at the Research Graduate Office. They made me feel so at home, I know I'll have no problem contacting them about anything I need. Seriously, I could just take these ladies out to lunch they were so lovely.

I'm living on chocolate and peanut butter, neither of which customs had any issue with me having. I promise I will go get some real food! I have to anyways, I'm almost out of chocolate and I don't have anything else to scoop the peanut butter out with.

Apartment hunting is horrible. Mostly I have no idea what I'm doing and I think my life will be a lot easier once I have a phone. I'm dubious about using this hotel phone. I guess I could just use skype, but, it's really weird talking to my computer. (I'm sure Laura's laughing to herself saying that I prefer to talk to my make-up.) So I'm considering the whole roommate option. There's this website that matches people up quite nicely (much better than, say, online dating sites do) and today I messaged someone who I actually have quite a bit in common with and who I think I'd do fine with. Wish me luck! Although, I'd still be homeless until some time in March. So I may end up living in a hotel for a little while. Maybe not this one though, depends how long it takes me to get into the city.

Google maps lied to me! The result? I took a 2 km walk and got to know Melbourne's industrial side. Which oddly contains a lot of flower shops. Did I mention it's 34 degrees out? At least my little coffin-sized room has A/C. Plus, there's a pool...

Counting Down The Hours

It's hard to believe that in under 48 hours I'll be leaving. I haven't quite come to the point of comprehending the magnetute of this yet.

I had a good, relaxing time in Banff with my Mom. I'm glad we did the trip because it was nice to just hang out together, get a little spoiled, and spend time in the mountains (which I will miss).

As for my visa...well, fingers crossed that that actually goes through. It turns out that there are only 2 doctors in Calgary that do the medical examination, so I was fortunately able to get into one tomorrow. Tomorrow is going to be a crazy day. The doctor appointment is in the morning, and I'll have to tell the doctor to RUSH my results or whatever off to wherever it goes. After the doctor I have to go back across the city to the radiologist for my chest xray. I've also got an appointment with the lab, but I'm hoping that they got me to make that appointment just in case. The documents I have seem to indicate that lab work isn't really necessary. Hopefully the doctor will concur. I do not like needles.

The packing fiasco is mostly under control now. I shipped (literally) a box of stuff off to myself and I have 3 suitcases. Today I am going to go through the one suitcase and see what I can do without for awhile since Mary kindly offered to bring me a few things down the next time she's in Australia. Of course, I probably won't find too many things I'm willing to take out, but the fact that if I get there and am missing something I can have it sent out to me is a great relief.

The past few days have been all about goodbyes. Last night was my goodbye party with friends and the night before I had a goodbye party with family. It hasn't been easy, especially at 2:30 this morning when I finally had to say goodbye to my best friend. :( Saying goodbye to my pets has been sad too. I know they won't all be here when I come back. But I am looking forward to showing people pictures of my dogs and telling them I have a pet polar bear and a pet black bear back in Canada. ;) And, of course, saying goodbye to family is the hardest. I'm really not looking forward to that at all.