Themed Villages in Daegu

Daegu is a very large city, despite being only the 4th largest city in Korea. As far as I know, there are about 2.5 million people in the city, which puts Boston's 600,000 to shame. I've been taking part in the Daegu Stamp Trail since March, and while I've finished the English version of the stamp trail, I still had 9 locations left to go in the Korean version before this past weekend. I have finished all the easy-to-get-to locations and moved into the territory of taxis or driving. The reason these places are in the Korean book is because they are hard to get to for foreigners without their own cars. Even still, I had just 9 of the 30 locations left to finish, how could I just give up? I have to at least try to finish.

Last weekend, I decided to see where these last locations are and see if I could get to a few of them without a whole lot of hassle. I ended up going to two themed-villaged both in the southern part of Daegu, not very far from where I live.



The first village we stopped at was a mural painting village (mabijeong village). By all accounts online, it's not too hard to get to. The problem was that I kept asking the bus drivers if they were going to my stop, and they all said no. We found out, from a very kind woman, that the bus we wanted has a lot of different branches, and it only takes those branches 10 times a day. We decided to take a taxi, which we split with the woman, to avoid an hour an a half wait at the bus stop. The taxi dropped us off at the entrance to the village. I'm not sure why this little village decided to paint their walls, although I'm sure it has something to do with increased tourism to that part of Daegu. But even the entrance to the village was beautifully painted. Throughout the village are all these paintings depicting traditional scenes from Korean life. The paintings of people were adorable--
everyone with their round faces. These mischievous-looking children seemed to follow you around the village in the paintings. My favorite part of it was the attempts to make the village almost interactive. There were 3D parts of the paintings that you could actually play with, sort of like an optical illusion painting. You could hold a real leash for a dog to make it look like you were walking it or hold a wooden spoon as though you were stirring something. I also loved all the beautiful and colorful flowers they had painted to look as though they were growing out of the walls.

the adorable painted kids

The village seemed to be the start of some short hiking trails, so Gianni and I walked up one a bit to get a nice view of the mountains. There isn't much in the village besides a few restaurants and cafes, but we shared some delicious kal guk su (a kind of noodle soup) and ho bak jeon (pumpkin pancake). I'd never had the pumpkin pancake before, but it was AMAZING! Outside the cafe, a band was setting up to perform for the tourists coming to see the village, and we got to hear a bit of their concert. When we finished eating, we went back towards the entrance of the village to see about getting a taxi back to the subway area, but instead, the bus was already waiting there to leave. I guess the stop must be the end of one of the branches, so the bus driver was taking a break. We waited for a half hour for it to leave, but it was only a short ride back.


Gianni was too tired/hot to go to the next village, so I went alone. Again, it was just a short ride on another bus. The second village is called the Samunjin Tavern Village. As far as I know, there used to be a village in that location by the Nakdong River that basically became non-existent when the bridge was put in right next to it. The village used to be an important part of trade along the river, but became unnecessary with the installation of the bridge. Recently, the village was reopened/rebuilt in the same place as the old one as a sort of historical monument to the old way of life. The history might be interesting, but the village itself is quite unimpressive. Having already eaten, I didn't want to get food there. It was also really busy with Korean families on the sunny afternoon. The village entrance is guarded by traditional Korean totem poles, which were pretty cool. I did end up enjoying myself in this village, but not because of the tavern aspect. The village is a great place to walk, picnic, or bring kids for a fun outing. Next to the village houses is a relative small hill with a tower on top. You can go to the top of the tower to get above the tree line and see the beautiful marsh area of Daegu and a panorama of the city in the background. It was really beautiful, and I even saw someone paragliding on the river! The hill is surrounded by a nice big park perfect for exercise and playing. It would be a good place to go for a run or just relax. Korea tries to keep things natural a lot of the time, so there are a lot of trees and plants in the park, offering plenty of shade. I had a lovely walk around on the hill and in the park for an hour or so before catching the bus back to the subway and heading home.

It was a really nice Korean adventure, and I'm happy to have seen both of the villages, even though they were a bit harder to get to than some of the other places we've been. The stamp book, as I've said before, is really great for getting you out and exploring the city.