This weekend I went to visit Candice and Amsbry in Gyeongju, or Korea's "Museum Without Walls" as the Koreans like to call it. It's home to most of their historically significant temples and relics, although the girls and I decided in advance that we'd prefer a weekend communing with nature instead of playing tourist. It takes me nearly four hours by bus to get to Gyeongju from where I live, primarily because of the "layover" in Daegu. So, I miraculously convinced myself to get out of bed at 6 a.m. in order to catch a 7 a.m. bus. I think this is the earliest I've been awake since I got here. I mean, with the exception of the few times where I was wandering home at that hour from the festivities of the night before, but that doesn't count. It's actually very pretty in the early morning. The mountains were misty, the lighting made everything look less dirty, the sun wasn't up so the garbage that people toss into the streets didn't stink yet. So far, I have to admit, Korea has not been the most beautiful country I've ever visited, but it has its moments.
I got maybe 30 minutes of rest during the bus ride, as I was so paranoid that I'd accidentally sleep through my stop. This is only my second long distance bus journey in Korea. My trip to Seoul was pretty easy: it's a nonstop bus, you know what time you're supposed to arrive, and everything in Seoul is written in Hangul and English so it's far less disorienting. But this bus stopped several times before Daegu, I had no idea what time I was supposed to arrive in Daegu, and when we finally got there the driver let us out of the bus several blocks down the street from the bus terminal, so I just followed the crowd and crossed my fingers that I was actually in the right town. Then of course I had to find the right platform for my bus to Gyeongju, which with the foggy-headedness of a person who despises mornings and slept for 4 hours the night before, can be quite the task. A little before 11 I finally arrived in Gyeongju, and met Candice at McDonald's where I had my first American fast food since I've been here!
We met up with Amsbry and took a city bus about forty minutes out of town to a beach called Gampo. It was an absolutely beautiful day, and it was truly invigorating to see water again. I will definitely have to spend my life near water I've determined. I get claustrophobic without it.
Amsbry and I were walking along the beach and chatting about how living in Korea often feels as if you are trapped in a dream-like state, if that makes any sense to any of you reading back home. Sometimes, you're trapped in a nightmare, which I've experienced all to well. You think, I'm going to open my eyes any second and all this insanity will just vaporize because it's all stranger than fiction so it has to be a dream, right? I chased one too many rabbits and now I'm in a messed up Wonderland... Most of the time, it's a neutral dream. Everything feels hazy and disconnected though, because you're always at arm's length away from the people and activities going on around you. You don't understand the language all that well, so you start to tune out the sound of people's voices. You're most likely in a constant state of confusion, as very little useful information is ever passed along to you from whatever higher-ups are hoarding it. Advances in technology and sheer boredom at school have given you access to practically unlimited information about your friends and family back home, so you almost feel like you're still there. Except you're not. And you're not really here either. You're trapped in a weird limbo land, and its name is Korea.
Fortunately, every now and then, you end up in those pleasant, peaceful dream states. The day at the beach in Gyeongju was one of those days. For the first time, everything felt as vivid as the pictures on my snazzy new camera. And maybe getting to hang out with some good friends and have some meaningful conversations while being surrounded by beautiful scenery was just what my brain needed.
We ate a big, filling meal at an Italian restaurant and spent the evening in a chic new wine bar that had sort of a Turkish decor going on. I got a kick out of sounding out the Hangul characters and deciphering which region the wines were from.
On Sunday we slept late and then went out to these big yellow flower fields we had seen out the bus window the day before. It turns out the beautiful flowers were actually giant weeds that I remember my dad furiously pulling off of our hillside when they'd creep in from the fields, but in large quantities they looked surprisingly less weed-like. We had a great time shooting pictures in the fields, and once again taking advantage of the higher shutter speeds on my camera to take multiple jumping shots.
Despite a convuluted journey home, including two "standing room only" bus rides, I returned feeling refreshed, rejuvenated, and ready to visit again in a few weeks. I've got midterms all week this week, which means I don't teach but am still expected to warm the seat in my office, so you can probably expect a higher than usual volume of blog posts this week as I cope with the boredom.
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