the last weekend in Korea

So, I got back from my long gallop around K-Land, which I've explained elsewhere in this blog. I arrived at Adam and Elaine's apartment at noon on Thursday, after an uneventful and not entirely unpleasant two-and-a-half hour bus ride from Gwangju. The weather was hot, cloudy and muggy (same all over Korea) but at least it wasn't as bad as Jeollanam or Jeju, not by a long shot. At 1:30, we all walked down to Reading Town together. I got to say hi (and bye) to some of the kids again; I also wanted to speak with Jacob about a few pertinent matters. First, I got a definite "yes" concerning his giving me a ride to Gimhae Airport come Monday. (Splendid, that'll make things a lot easier.) We also made an appointment for going to get my police background check (Friday, 11:00) and that was basically it. I hung around the hagwon for a little while longer (long enough to see a few more of my former students), and then I headed down to Homeplus. I was on the hunt for burger ingredients. The one and only condition to my bumming a couple nights' sleep at A&E's was that I make hamburgers for them one more time. So I dutifully went down to Homeplus and scored four packs of ground beef, some ketchup, some fries, and some buns. They weren't burger buns (the Gohyeon Homeplus recently renovated their bakery and it looks like genuine burger buns got phased out), but they passed. I went back home, and when everybody got off work, Kevin and Jeff came over and we whipped up some burgers. Jeff wasn't feeling too well, poor chap. His coworkers Caitlin and Arie went home to New Zealand, and until their replacements clear immigration (there's been some reworked requirements that are slowing them down), Jeff has to do the work of three at UniWorld. It's a frickin' crock. I didn't think the burgers were my best work, but everybody seemed to like them regardless. It was eminently satisfying to sink one's teeth into a big hunk of meat in a country devoid of such. We watched a bit of Deadliest Catch, and then I spent my first of several comfortable nights on A&E's couch. Friday dawned. I was up at eight or so. I took the time to go down to Top Mart and replace some of the water, food and trash bags I'd used. I returned just as Adam was waking up (Elaine had awoken shortly after I'd left). We chilled in the apartment for a bit, until Jacob faithfully came to pick me up. First we headed to Okpo, a twenty-minute drive east across the rice paddies and through the hills and mountains, to the central police station on Geoje. It was a piece of cake. I handed my Alien Immigration Card and my passport over to the lean, lithe, deep-voiced police chief (but for the fact that he was Korean and lacked a cowboy hat, he could've passed for any sheriff or police chief in Texas). He checked them both; Jacob filled in a few forms; then I received the official document. It was all in Korean, of course; but I could at least read the part that said NO CRIMES (with Jacob's help. I only hope the language barrier won't be a problem should I ever need to present this document to a prospective employer. Following that Jacob offered to take me out to lunch. We tried a few restaurants in Okpo, but they were surprisingly closed, even at noon. I guess they wait until all the foreigners get off work or something, or maybe on Fridays they just can't be bothered. We returned to Gohyeon, stopped at the post office so I could mail all the marvelous (and bulky) gifts and my remaining miscellany back home, and then went straight to the restaurant I thought I'd never get to try but now got a second chance to! Charles had recommended it to me: Miru Jajangmyeon (or something), a noodle place specializing in jajangmyeon. This is simply a big bowl of thick noodles, based on the Chinese dish zhajiang mian (or something). This particular restaurant specialized in hand-pulling the noodle dough, instead of using machines like your modern-day noodle places. We didn't have their signature dish, however. We got bokkeumbap, a splendid mix of fried rice, fried egg and dark savory sauce. There was also tangsuyuk (I've mentioned that elsewhere; it's the Korean take on Chinese sweet-and-sour chicken), and a delicious spicy seafood soup. I was ever so thankful to Jacob for taking me out to eat again, even after that marvelous restaurant with the ocean view he'd taken us to (with the great makgeolli). I guess the guy's really going to miss me (as we drove to the restaurant, Jacob looked at me and said slowly, "I will always treasure your memory," which touched me quite deeply). We returned to Jacob's apartment to pick up Lily and Albert. Lily fixed me a cold glass of mango juice while I looked around the smallish but stylishly appointed domicile. Albert had two rooms: a study room filled with books and a computer, and his bedroom. That's Korea for you. After dispensing all the housing-related compliments I knew, I returned with the family to Reading Town in Jacob's car. The rest of the day was a mix of impatience, excitement, lethargy, and emotion. I was impatient to close my bank account, withdraw my money and exchange it for dollars. I did this during the first class period, going down to the Nong Hyup main branch office and waiting around during the busy midafternoon rush. I finally secured a seat at the foreign exchange desk and after some confusing half-Korean, half-English palaver, managed to communicate my desire to the teller. My money was exchanged and $3,147 were counted out to me. Tragically, the wait was so long that I missed saying goodbye to the first-period kids; they boarded the bus without me as I hurried up the street a few blocks down. Oh well, at least I saw them before class... I was excited to be holding three grand in my hand (I've never even held so much as a hundred-dollar bill before). I was also excited to be leaving. With the conversion of my money, every single pre-departure errand had been completed. My race was run; the preparations were done; there remained only to throw my packed bags into Jacob's car on Monday and depart. I was a free agent, with no more worries. There remained only to say goodbye. I spent the rest of the day hanging around Reading Town, sitting in the lobby waiting for kids to get out of class, then frantically waving and shouting farewells and well-wishes to hordes of retreating grade-schoolers when the bell rang. The long, slow waits during class time were the most difficult; the next class period's kids would come in, and sit with me on the couch in the Reading Town lobby, holding my hands, pinching my cheeks, or playing rock-paper-scissors with me. Emily, one of the Flukes, came and sat next to me, smiling, her feet not touching the ground, her little hands in her lap. Eileen and Amy, in AS2, ran up to me and echoed their last week's chorus of "Teacher! Gaji maseyo!" ("You can't go!") Eventually, the long day of farewells, cries, entreaties and promises came to an end. I said my goodbyes to the Reading Town staff (Rachel, Erica, Kelly, Swani, and Julia; Charles and Jacob I'd be seeing later) and departed with Adam and Elaine. ...and immediately caught a cab down to the bars with them. We went first to WaBar, and had a brew (the godawful WaBar house brew, which is the worst beer I've ever tasted, hands down). Then we went to Geogi, a marvelous little fourth-floor soju-and-hof place. There were lots of us: Adam, Elaine, Jeff, Jay the South African Scuba Diver, Andrea Suzanna Katz, Charles, Anne, and myself. Later Tonya (the New South African) and a some Scottish fellow whom I could barely understand showed up. It was a good time, lots of beers and lots of snacks (and even shots of soju with slices of watermelon in them, yuck). We yarned a bit at Geogi, then caught a cab to Jangpyeong (Andrea's neck of the words, a suburb of Gohyeon on the northwest side of town by the shipyards) to one of Tonya's preferred haunts, Crazy Bar. It was a nice place, with tasteful, dark, moody, blue lighting. The beers were good, and so was the rock candy. They let us choose our own tunes on YouTube, what's more. Adam went straight for Oasis and Kanye. We chatted a bit more, and then I walked a slightly worse-for-wear Andrea back home. By the time I got back to the bar (Andrea's house was a couple miles away, and Crazy Bar wasn't that easy to find), Adam and Elaine had departed. Charles and Anne left soon after, as well as the Scottish fellow. Jay hadn't accompanied us from Geogi, so that left Tonya, Jeff, and myself to make a night of it. That we did. We took turns as DJ, and danced and drank until 6:00 a.m., when the two barmaids' patience finally deserted them and they politely kicked us out. I staggered back to A&E's, managed somehow to be stealthy enough to get to their couch without waking them up, and slept until noon. So, the rest of that day (heh heh) was good. After an absolutely dynamite breakfast cooked up by Adam (buttered toast and fried eggs covered in baked beans, with a dollop of ketchup), I thought I'd take a stroll over to Jeff's and see if he was up and willing to come to Homeplus. We were all going to go later on that night, but I thought the two of us could do a preliminary scouting trip anyhow. As of the previous day, I was in the market for a new CD player...my previous one had unexpectedly petered out after sitting in my carry-on bag for ten days. Jeff wasn't up to it, though. Turns out I'd woken him up, the poor chap, him feeling stressed and tired and hung over and all. So I let him be and went on my way alone. Whilst I was walking merrily down the street, whom should show up but Charles and Anne in their little green Matiz! Turns out they were on their way to Adam and Elaine's to look for me: Charles and I had an appointment with some dwaejigukbap. (It's a kind of soup, filled with green onions and delicious pork belly shavings, served with a side of rice. I'd never tried it and Charles had been promising to take me out for some.) Without further ado I hopped into their car and we went to Homeplus (Charles and Anne needed some coat hangers). I managed to locate the CD players in the Homeplus electronics sector. Unsurprisingly, they only had one model, and that was just for listening to English language CDs. I dithered for a bit, but decided to make up my mind later that night. (For nearly ₩60,000 I reckoned I could forgo listening to CDs on the eleven-hour flight home just so I could have a little more choice at Best Buy back Stateside.) Then we went for soup. Charles knew this wonderful little one-room establishment not far from his apartment, so we parked and walked there. It was truly delicious, spicy and satisfying. As grateful as I was to get it (Charles was treating) and ashamed as I am to admit it, I didn't finish. Adam's hunger-defying breakfast was still rolling around in my stomach, and this particular establishment served great heaping bowls of dwaejigukbap. I was forced to leave a little, and the thought still haunts me. Following this we adjourned back to Charles's apartment. He was originally going to show me how to play janggi, a kind of Asian chess game, but I'd already sent my board and pieces (presented as a gift from Jacob) home in a package. So instead, Charles got me a pack of Go-Stop cards at Family Mart and we played that instead. Go-Stop is a game played with Japanese cards (with elaborate paintings on them instead of numbers or faces), and resembles rummy in that you draw a card, try to pair it with what's already on the table, and keep the pairs (or triples, or quadruples). The amount of similar cards you acquire translates to point values; however, the game is not so simple as that. You can also "steal" cards from other people, win the game quickly by acquiring certain specially marked cards, and so forth. (If you win quickly by that method, you can choose to keep the game going and acquire more points for yourself, or quit while you're ahead..."go" or "stop.") You need exactly three points to win: not seven, not two, not three. Three shall be the number thou shalt score, and the number of the scoring shall be three. Four shalt thou not score, neither score thou two, unless thou shalt then proceed to three. Five is right out. Anyway, it was a blast. It's great to be in a foreign country (on the other side of the world, no less, in the Orient) and learning a game that is in no way similar to any other card game I've played, ever. I think that's what attracted me to learning Korean, too. I got the rules down pretty quickly after we started playing, though Charles had to help me the first couple of rounds. I didn't win (by myself), but I minimized my losses neatly. This game is extremely popular in Korea, played by families at holidays and friends the whole year 'round (usually for money). Then Charles turned on GomTV (a free online TV network) and we watched Death Sentence with Kevin Bacon. Man, it was a good film, but it was kind of a mood-killer, especially compounded with the cloudy weather outside. It's the most depressing, downcast and violent film I've seen in a while, but I enjoyed it (and Charles and Anne's company) nonetheless. I knew this was our swan song, at least as far as this particular Korean sojourn was concerned. After the movie finished, sure enough, Charles and Anne gave me a lift back to Adam and Elaine's (some four hours or so after I'd left...I told 'em I was going for a walk), we shook hands, exchanged manly hugs, and said goodbye. Then Charles and Anne drove away, and I shall not see them again for years. But I shall see them again. Not five minutes after I let myself into A&E's (they'd given me the key), A, E and J came back from Homeplus. They'd stepped out while I was gone (I found a manila folder with a note scribbled on it on the ottoman). We unloaded the groceries, then set out our next plan of action: movies. We'd plotted to catch Public Enemies, the new Johnny Depp movie about John Dillinger, for some time now. Accordingly we caught a cab down to the Homeplus cinema a little bit after dark. I was pumped, as I'd never been to this theater before. Unfortunately, all I saw of it was the lobby: Public Enemies wasn't playing there. Figuring that since it was a smaller cinema that perhaps it didn't have room, we moved over to Lotte Cinema, but they didn't have it either. It premiered in South Korea on July 9; this was July 11. It should've been there by now. Oh well. We fell back on our Plan C (though we had a Plan D in mind if necessary, which I won't divulge): screen golf. We caught a cab back to the public library, near Jeff's apartment. There's a lovely little screen-golf place there with about seven rooms that we've frequented in the past. Things didn't go quite as planned, but they were interesting nonetheless. We walked in and found there were no rooms available until about ten, in an hour's time or so. We figured we'd head to Family Mart (a block or so down the street), grab some beer and munchies and wait it out. Easier said than done. It was pouring rain. It was only sprinkling while we were transitioning from theater to theater, but now the cloudburst began in earnest. By the time we reached Family Mart, we were pretty wet. We dried off a little during the hour we spent under the awning out in front. I was eating triangle gimbap, still trying to make myself sick of it; Jeff and Elaine were sitting down, Elaine smoking and eating candy, both animatedly talking; Adam bought some beer and then had to run back to his apartment for a bathroom break. He returned with his pea coat and an umbrella (and toweled hair) for our trip back to the golf place. While we were all standing outside and talking, a little man with a swollen chest and back (some form of Dowager's hump, it appeared, though he was of no great age) walked up. He talked animatedly and amiably to us, gesturing to the beer bottles, and shaking our hands and touching our shoulders, but we couldn't understand a single word out of his mouth, not even me with my few months' Korean practice. For the next few minutes he wandered in and out of the store, alternately trying to talk to us and engaging the two bemused teenage clerks. Soon he caught a cab and wandered off, without ever having made it clear what he wanted. Such things happen in foreign countries. We returned to the screen golf place in due time, in due wetness. There was only a coat and an umbrella between us. Adam and Elaine took the umbrella, and I let Jeff have the coat; I volunteered to run. My hair was already wet through anyway. So I sprinted the quarter mile or so to the golf place in the downpour, managing to get there fairly dry (no matter what Mythbusters says). After a bit the others caught up. Then followed the embarrassing bit: they had us wait in the lobby to dry off a little while they covered the couch in our room with garbage bags so we wouldn't wet it. Hmph. That was the end of our indignation, however. For the rest of the evening the staff was polite and indulgent, even letting us stay until one in the morning until we somehow managed to finish nine holes, all of us about 31 over par. Adam and I got within putting distance a couple of times, but each time the hole eluded us by a hair (much to our comic frustration). It was a grand night: we chatted, drank soju, ate the complimentary hard-boiled eggs and crackers, and basically sucked at golf. Awesome. Jeff split, A&E and I went back to their place and drank a little more, then hit the sack at four. Elaine stayed up until dawn watching Dirty Sexy Money. Sunday was, as always, the day of rest. We woke up about one o'clock in the afternoon and lazed about a bit until Jeff arrived at a quarter of four (a few hours after our appointed meeting time of one, but Jeff works on his own schedule, bless his nonconformist heart). For breakfast, I'd gone down to Top Mart and procured some doughnuts and sausages, which satiated us pretty well. While I was in Top Mart, Brian came up to me. I'd almost forgotten that he'd asked me to come by. He wanted to give me some gifts, he said. I made the usual polite attempt at passing it off (You know, "Oh, you didn't have to," or "That's so very kind of you"). He presented me with some curious and wonderful articles. They were two pairs of toe socks (which he'd heard didn't exist in the States; he wanted to give me something I couldn't get anywhere else), and a bamboo wife. A bamboo wife is a cylindrical framework, hollow, made of bamboo, and is am implement used to keep you cool while sleeping in hot countries. You embrace it as you would a sleeping companion (spoon with it, so to speak) and the breeze flows through the framework and keeps your body cool. Awesome, I'll be needing that in the desert. Though I never turn my nose up at gifts, I was less than thrilled with the toe socks. (You may be certain that I concealed this, however.) I've always considered them, well, a little goofy, and not my kind of goofy. But heck, the Buddhist monks here wear them, so you won't hear me turning my nose up at them. I accepted them with good grace. Brian gave me his e-mail address, wished me a warm farewell, and made me promise to keep in touch. Another farewell gone. I love that guy. We went at five to grab pizza. J's Pizza was a tiny one-room shop a few blocks down and one block over from A&Es. An extra-large pepperoni, combination, or Italian (cheese) pizza was only ten thousand won, a real steal. So we ordered four (three pepperoni, one Italian) and waited at the plastic dining table while the adorable middle-aged lady whipped it up for us. The room was...interesting. It was filled to the brim with pizza boxes, but crammed in there beside them were a cot, a desk, a computer, a TV, and a water cooler. We chatted a bit while the ceiling fan blew hot, humid, still air all over us (it was hot in that shop). We got our pizzas, went back, and ate them as we watched a few episodes of Deadliest Catch. Adam is a whiz with downloading stuff, ain't he? After catching the end of Total Recall on the TV (same channel we'd watched Speed on before we got the pizzas), Adam, Jeff and I briefly stepped out to a PC room. I'd promised myself I'd try one for real before I left Korea. Unfortunately, it was a bust. The first one we went to had an unhelpful clerk, who clicked around a little bit on our computers without telling us anything and then told us we were screwed (and then charging us 1300 apiece for maybe ten minutes of staring at his machines). The next one was friendlier, but no more able to give us a good time: turned out we needed to have a membership and a login to play online, even after getting on the computers. That we didn't have, so we had to abdicate. Bummer. Back at the apartment, we perused an interesting little documentary called Beer Wars, made by Anat Bacon, former president of Mike's Hard Lemonade. It was all about how the big, bad, evil triumvirate of watery, disgusting beers (Annheuser-Busch, Miller, and Coors) are forcing this crap on us while squeezing smaller, more artistic and grassroots beer brewers out of the market. There was some truth in it, but it was quite clearly propaganda, and I viewed it with a grain of salt. It made me thirsty, too. Right when that little 90-minute show ended, the final act came on TV: Live Free or Die Hard, subtitled in Korean. I hadn't seen this fourth installment in the Die Hard series (I'd heard some bad things about it, and Die Hard was never that high on my list of favorite movies anyway, despite how good the franchise and the action is), but I loved it. The action was really ramped up for this fourth installment, and Willis was pretty good at portraying the older, sadder, wearier version of John McClane. The villains weren't quite as detestable but the daughter figure was smokin', so I wasn't complaining. As the film ended (with CCR playing "Fortunate Son"), we called it. I had to be up at 5:30 the next morning. Jeff left after a somewhat awkward goodbye. Neither of us are good at those at all, by our own admission. We passed it off with a laugh and parted. Umpteen down, three to go... After a surprisingly restful night's sleep, despite the brevity and the howling wind (the wind had been fierce all day), I woke up, zipped up my bags, and hauled them the stairwell with A&E's help. Then we sat and watched the thunderstorm. It was banging and thundering and pouring like mad, a real fierce summer T-storm. Figures. The very day I'm leaving it's assured that I'll (a) be soaked in loading my bags in the car, and (b) probably have my flight canceled. Neither distasteful contingency materialized. When Jacob rolled up, he and Adam and Elaine made a sort of umbrella relay between the door of the apartment building and the trunk of the car. I only got a few drops on my hat and shoulders. And then...suddenly it was time to say goodbye. Goodbye, to the friends who'd given me shelter for nearly a week in total, who'd invited me over for dinner countless times, friends I'd bummed around with for ten months, who'd sheltered me, helped me, lent me money, and given me some of the most helpful advice and the most heartfelt compliments of any friends I'd ever known (Jeff had done the same). The split was not messy, but it was not painless, either. We shook hands, exchanged hugs, promised to meet again before the wedding, and then just like that I was in the car and rolling down the street. But I will see them again, too. Darn it. After a rather sublime ride through the dawn and the storm (with a beautiful break in the clouds to the northeast letting in some refracted sunlight), we reached the ferry station at Guyeong, on the north of the island. Jacob was a bit worried: he feared the storm might bring about a ferry cancellation. Fortunately this was not true, either. (Hey, looks like my travel karma's getting its act together.) We boarded the 7:00 for Jinhae and had a relatively smooth and very scenic passage. Jacob didn't talk much, but he did point out several of the sights: the island in between Geoje and the mainland that was one of President I Myeong-Bak's official resorts, and the half-finished bridge between Geoje and Busan. It's actually a brunnel. The southern half is a standard bridge, massive, supported by concrete pylons; the northern half is a tunnel that goes under the water. Jacob explained to me the reasons for this. "There is a luff crunt," he said. I begged his pardon. "A luff crunt," he repeated. I realized this was just good ol' Jacob having trouble with some tricky English phrase, as he occasionally does. I didn't bother him any more and set my mind to the task of deciphering it. Fortunately it wasn't too hard. Luff crunt. Rough current. Jacob also explained that, since the northern regions of Geoje-do housed massive shipyards, whose fruits needed to pass out of the Geoje Straits and into the open Pacific Ocean, it would be impractical to dam their passage with a bridge. So the half-tunnel idea was hit upon and implemented. The bridge is slated for completion in 2010 or so, and it will probably destroy Geoje-do as I know it, with the amount of weekend tourists likely doubling, tripling or quadrupling. Saeongjima. We arrived at Jinhae, offloaded easy as pie, and drove to the airport. Jacob escorted me inside, showed me to the Japanese Airlines ticket counter (which really wasn't, as I'll explain, but I don't blame him for that), and then... ...well, dang it, it was time to say goodbye again. We shook hands. I promised to look him up again if ever I was in Korea, as he adamantly asked me to. He reiterated just how much he'd treasure my memory (gosh) and then with a wave, a smile, and a couple of looks over his shoulder, he left. And that does it for farewells. I haven't cracked up yet, and so far it looks like I'm not going to (I'm too excited to be off into the wild blue yonder again), but I won't forget these people. And neither will you, if I have anything to do with it. The JAL counter wasn't open for another half hour, so after I got some snacks at a small deli curiously named Sand & Food (which served expensive, soggy, only-slightly-less-than-godawful soggy sandwiches), I went back and discovered that no, it wasn't the JAL counter. The real counter, across the way, wasn't open until twelve. Great. I spent those three hours in the free Internet room (doing this) or reading The Three Musketeers. I imagine I'll finish it during the flight. Seeing as how I'm into the sixth chapter already, that could be saying something and then again it could not. When the time came, I got in line. I chatted a bit with a middle-aged American lady at the head of the line, suddenly remembered to get my bamboo wife wrapped, slid off, got it wrapped for ten grand, slid back in line, got my bags checked, had to go back over to the same counter I'd started at and pay 110,000 won for excess baggage (three pieces instead of two), passed security and immigration like a breeze, then went up to the other free Internet room in the terminal proper and finished writing this. (Whew!) Next entry coming to you from Apple Valley, California...