The first day of spring. For many, it’s an almost meaningless day that is purely symbolic. A day that means, “Soon I won’t have to wear 5 coats every time I go outside!” Japan loves spring more than you do, however, because they made it a public holiday Therefore we just had a 3-day weekend. When deciding what to do with our short vacation, my friend’s first suggestion was, “Well, Korea’s cheap.” Because that’s what you do here, apparently. So Friday, after the 6th graders’ graduation (I almost fell asleep because I didn’t understand a lot, also I didn’t care because I teach at the JHS that they’re going to), I left like 3 hours early. I wondered if the teachers would care, but they basically applauded me as I left, jealous of my trip. So at 1:00, I took a bus to take a train to take a plane (to swallow the bird to catch the fly) to Korea.
Now, when you move to Japan, you’re given a special license colloquially referred to as a gaijin card. This is the card that says “I live here, but am not Japanese.” When we first get here, we’re told to have it at all times because of whatever law that we need ID. Mine is always in my wallet, so without looking, I always know I have it. I never take it out except when I need to show it to an official, such as the person at the hospital when I got the flu last week. And I would always put it back in my wallet, unless I was really sick and not paying attention and threw it in my pocket instead. So when I got to the airport with only my passport, there was some question as to whether I’d be allowed to return to Japan. 20 minutes and $30 later, I applied for re-entry and they put a magical sticker in my passport that lets me come back without hassle. Luckily I was there super early, so it wasn’t a problem. The flight itself was only an hour and a half. It was the trains before and after that took some time.
After getting out of the airport (which had a movie theater!), we headed to the train, which was at a futuristic-looking station. It was then that I realized that Korea seemed like an alternate-universe Japan (the kind of alternate universe like on tv where everything is just slightly different). The station, train, vending machines, and convenience stores were all almost identical to those in Japan, with the key difference that I couldn’t read any of it. I’m in no way an expert in Japanese, but I never have problems getting around or figuring things out based on what I can understand. You don’t appreciate being able to kind of read a language until you’re somewhere that you can’t at all. I better understood how my family felt when they came here. (Learn all about this trip in an upcoming chronicle coming to you this spring. Tickets on sale now.) We got to the Chocolate Tree hostel around 11. Next to it there was a series of awnings with the first 5-6 lines of Journey’s Open Arms (at the time I had no idea what they were from) for some reason. It was pretty decent, though the toilet and shower were the same room. Now when I say the same room, I don’t mean what you’re thinking. I mean that the whole room was a shower that also had a sink and a toilet (so you can shower while you poop!). Because of this, you had to bring toilet paper with you from outside so it didn’t get soggy. I thought it was too bad that I didn’t have psychic powers. Then I thought that that’s probably the most mundane use for psychic powers. Not stopping crime or helping people, but just knowing how much toilet paper you’d need.
The next morning, three of the four of us (one went off with her Korean friend) went to Gyeongbokgung Palace, also known as Gyeongbok Palace (no English shortcuts here, you’re gonna have to read Korean words, deal with it. Sound it out). Originally build in 1395, it was the largest of the Five Grand Palaces built by the Joseon Dynasty. However, it was mostly burned down during the Japanese invasion of 1592 and rebuilt almost 300 years later. Too often in Japan, you’ll read about how a temple was built hundreds of years ago, then rebuilt in the mid 1940’s for some reason. It was nice to be able to blame Japan and not be the reason for once. Honestly, even with the occasional signs with explanations, my knowledge of Korean history is limited to taekwondo form definitions. (I.e. Dan gun is named after the holy Dan Gun, the legendary founder of Korea in the year 2333 BC. Also, he was a bear. (That last part wasn’t in the definition, but I feel like it’s important enough to be mentioned.)) There was also a folk museum that contained more information about Korea’s history, as well as some interesting artifacts. The problem with part of it was that if you go back far enough, ancient things look the same from every country (here’s a stone axe, here they learned to make an iron axe). For lunch, we walked down a side street filled with various shops until we saw pictures of something we liked. Basically every Korean restaurant gives you like 6 starters no matter what you order, including kimchi, some kind of tofu, cucumbers, usually rice, and some other dark green vegetable (can you tell I didn’t eat much of it?). I got some kalbi beef, and the others got some spicy spaghetti-looking stuff (I really should review restaurants). On the way back to the palace, we found an ice cream shop. There were a few flavors that we had never heard of, and the names of the flavor were as helpful as Gatorade names. (“What flavor is that?” “Glacier Freeze” “…What?”) I was tempted to get the magic lamp flavor (covered in some kind of golden brown powder, likely some kind of nut), but went with the “Snow like sel“, which was just ice cream with cotton candy on it.
That night, we met the other two (and another) for dinner. I learned that basically every Korean person seems to have an English name, based on the sound of their own name. I wanna have foreign names. There’s never an equivalent of Curtis. In Spanish, I used Guillermo (William), in Latin, I just chose a badass sounding name (I forgot which), and in Japan, it’s katakanized to Kaatis. I can’t even have a kanji (Chinese) name because they don’t make the right sounds. Anyway, we walked down a big shopping street with restaurants, shops, and street vendors. While girls kept checking the makeup shops, I would continue looking around, usually finding a nearby candy store. One had a lot of US candy not available in Japan, including Warheads, Fruit by the Foot, Milanos, and various other sour candies that I’ve missed. They also had those giant tubes of Jelly Bellies, Prego marinara sauce, and a bunch of British snacks. Outside of one restaurant, an old Korean lady was handing out flyers. She handed us one, and pointed to the elevator behind her, indicating that it was on the third floor. We smiled and nodded, trying to indicate maybe we’ll come back here. She grabbed my friend’s arm and pointed again. When we made it clear that we weren’t going to the restaurant right then, she came up to us and grabbed the flyer back out of his hands. Well now we definitely weren’t going there. Then we found an interesting outdoor mall. It had pretty normal small shops with souvenirs and toys. One shop was a pet shop (stuff for pets, not actual pets) with toy cats and dogs and stuff. I asked the Korean girl if that was a restaurant and if the toy animals were like the menu. She eventually realized it was a joke and said it was just a pet shop (and explained that you only eat a certain kind of dog bred for eating. Also you have to go to a special restaurant to eat dog). There was also a photo booth studio where girls could wear hanboks, traditional Korean dresses. I said that I was going to wear one and asked which color I should wear. Even more than Japanese people, Koreans don’t seem to understand sarcasm (in their defense, I can trick even people who expect it from me), so she walked in and asked the guy if I could wear one. He said no because of course I wasn’t allowed. After looking around a bit, they took us to a small restaurant with a loft area, by which I mean the restaurant equivalent of a bunk bed. We climbed the ladder up, and even I had to crouch because the ceiling was so low (you sit on the floor, so it’s not really a problem). We got the 6 starters again, as well as some bulgogi, kalbi, and “stuff Curtis can’t have” aka seafood. To drink, we shared basically Sprite mixed with plum wine. The Korean girls said to mix it up in the kettle we got (as was tradition “since the 70’s”), to which I jokingly said, “Ok, I’ll just use my finger.” They excitedly said, “Oh, you know!?” I did not know. As is sometimes the case, my sarcastic comment was actually correct (although you use your finger in your own cup, not in the kettle).
The next day, we headed to Changgyeounggung Palace (I promise that’s the actual name and not me slamming my hand on the keyboard (which I considered because you wouldn’t know the difference)). These palaces were very similar to Japanese and Chinese temples because of the Buddhist influence, however these were much more colorful. Because it was the lunar new year or something, a bunch of girls were walking around in hanboks (or toddler clothes as we started to refer to them as). I took a few pictures from a distance like a creeper, but they kept hiding behind trees and stuff. I almost got a really good one of a couple, but then this lady showed up. After lunch, one of the Korean girls drove us to the DMZ (Demilitarization Zone), the border between South Korea and the Buffer Zone. Between North and South Korea is the aforementioned Buffer Zone, a few mile wide stretch of land used as a political safe zone. There’s actually a tour you can take in the DMZ that has a conference room that is technically in North Korea, but we arrived too late to go there. After about an hour drive, we see a big arch with a sign that said something in Korean. I jokingly read “Welcome to North Korea!” As with earlier, although I was sarcastic, I wasn’t completely wrong. We actually were told to make a U-turn there (thankfully) and took the exit to where we were actually going: a beautiful scenic park. That’s right. On the northern border of South Korea is a park where people can fly kites, ride bikes, go to music festivals, or ride the rides at the giant carnival/amusement park. If that doesn’t make the North Koreans want to defect, the Popeye’s surely will. After we had seen everything to see in the DMZ, we drove back to Seoul. While driving, we noticed that most cars had little blue foam squares on the door to stop them from hitting things, as well as the sticker from the dealer. One car had the two foam squares, and then a giant scratch underneath. I guess it didn’t help much. For dinner we ate at a restaurant called the Ginger Pig (many jokes were had at the expense of our red headed friend). There were two grills/hotplates on our table, and we chose whatever pig meat we wanted (belly and neck). As I grabbed the last piece of belly, the Korean girl warned me that it was all fat. I pointed at my stomach and said, “so is this.” Unfortunately there was no bacon or bacon fat. After dinner, we went to a boring shopping area known as Gangnam (the song is a joke because Gangnam isn’t that great). After doing some quick shopping, we headed to get second dinner. Apparently Korea has their own delicious fried chicken, so of course we had to get some. We got some chicken and fries, then went to another small shop for a little bit of cake, and took them all down to eat at the Han River. Once we had filled ourselves on chicken and beer (or mini-Cokes in my case), we took a walk down the river. There was a restaurant that looked like a Tennessee steam boat, and under one of the bridges was a bunch of exercise equipment for some reason (and it was actually in good shape). It was getting late, so we finished our river walk and headed back to our hostel.
I had my last day of classes on Tuesday, so I left Monday morning. The bus was completely backwards from Japanese buses, which was confusing at first. On Japanese buses, you enter in the side door, then exit at the front and pay at the end. Here, I payed when I got on in the front. I wasn’t sure if this was the case at first, so I kind of pointed at the machine like, “pay here?” The driver nodded, and before I had even put the bill in, had taken off with an acceleration of someone who was in a street race. I found an empty pair of seats, confident that no one would sit next to me (Korea is more racist than Japan). At the next stop, two high school/college age girls got on the bus. I didn’t pay much attention to them until the driver once again sped off before they sat down and they yelled「早い！」 It took me a second, but then I realized, “Wait! I understood that! Japanese!” I listened in for a bit, happy to understand something again. I couldn’t understand when they talked fast, but most of what gyarus consists of yelling an adjective (usually hot/cold), then saying やばい [yabai], Japanese for “I literally can’t even.” On the flight home, I got the exit seat, and therefore the leg room I so desperately need. Also, the cheapo airline wouldn’t let us put our stuff under the seat in front of us for some reason, so I was able to stretch out my legs entire body. Luckily, it was a flight between Korea and Japan, so there weren’t any fat people. However, the Korean couple next to me must have been on some romantic vacation, because they were pretty close to just making out on the plane. I know their Korean because Japanese people are way too conscious of PDA, unlike those slutty Koreans (living in Japan has made me pretend to be prudish). Finally I arrived home and prepared for my last day at my Tuesday school (a story for another time).
This weekend I’ll go on another adventure with some surprise people from my past. Is this the official return of The Gaijin Chronicles? How am I able on so many trips? Who am I meeting? Where will I go? Where did I come from, Cotton-Eyed Joe? Find out next time on the Gaijin Chronicles! Dah dahh dadahhh da dahh duuhhh.