A Long Weekend in Busan

This past weekend was another long weekend here in Korea. It seems like they really like to pack all their vacations into the same month, but I guess it's just how things panned out historically. Our Korean teacher, again, was good enough to teach us a little bit about the history of the holiday last week. I'm really enjoying these little cultural diverges in our Korean class. October 9th is Hangul Day. Hangul is the Korean writing system that was created by King Sejong (he's one of the people on the Korean money!). Prior to the creation of the Hangul, Koreans had been speaking Korean but writing in Chinese. Writing in Chinese was very difficult, so only the rich and powerful--those who could afford an education--could do it. King Sejong wanted to bring the ability to read and write to the masses, which was an unpopular opinion at the time. Still, he invented and popularized Hangul. The basic vowels in Hangul--아,어,으,오,우,에,애,이--are based on 3 symbols for people (ㅣ), the sun (a black dot), and the earth (ㅡ). The black dot for the sun, used in combination with one of the other two symbols, is the small line coming off the large person or earth symbols in the vowels. The consonants have a much less symbolic origin. King Sejong studied the shape the mouth and tongue makes when forming these consonants, and that mouth shape became the shape of the consonants themselves. King Sejong accomplished the task he set out to complete. Hangul, in my opinion, is one of the most logical writing systems I've ever heard of. It is simple to learn to read it because it's all phonetic. Happy Belated 한글 Day!!!

Hangul Day was on Thursday this year, and my school was wonderful enough to give us Friday off as well, making it a 4-day weekend. Gianni was not so lucky, and he had school on Friday. We had planned to go to Busan together for 4 days, but Gianni ended up having to meet me there on Friday night instead. I left on Thursday morning on a "slow" train to Busan. Busan is less than 2 hours from Daegu, even by slow train, and I wasn't in a rush, so I didn't need to spend the extra money to take the KTX. When I got to Busan, I went right to the hostel to check in and drop my bags. The hostel was located about 10 minutes from a subway station, unfortunately. The area around the subway station was great; there were tons of restaurants and big shopping mall. Conversely, the area around the hostel itself was kind of seedy and dark. The hostel was really nice inside--great breakfast provided, including eggs. I booked a private room with a private bathroom, and everything was very clean and nice. The only problem with the room was that there was construction happening right outside my window, and it got loud in the morning. The reason I chose that hostel was that it was sort of in between two places I thought I'd be spending a lot of time around: Busan Station (the train station) and the location of the Busan International Film Festival. I was able to check into the hostel right away and drop my bag in my room. I headed right out to the Film Festival afterwards as I had tickets to see a film in the afternoon. I had to sell Gianni's ticket, but the Busan Film Festival actually has a good system for it. Since it was the day of, I couldn't get a refund on my ticket. Instead, I had to go to the exchange booth. People were milling around it, just waiting for tickets to be exchanged. A guy working at the festival took my ticket and basically said, "does anyone want to see this movie?" Someone grabbed it right away and paid me for it. It was really simple. The woman who ended up buying my ticket was really great. Her English name is Lucy. We talked before the movie started, and I got her phone number in case I ever go back to Busan.

I saw a Taiwanese film called "Paradise In Service," which I recommend to anyone who can see it. It was actually the opening movie at the Busan Film Festival, but I was able to catch it on another day and pay much less. Tickets to the opening and closing ceremonies were $20 versus $6 for all the other movies. It was a movie about Taiwan post-World War II. Communist China had taken over mainland Taiwan and pushed the Democratic Taiwanese people out to the islands. There is a draft, and all able-bodied boys must serve in the Taiwanese military. The story is about one of these boys, Pao, during his military service. He is classified as a "type A" body and placed in an elite unit known as "the Sea Dragons." The commanders discover that Pao can't swim, and he is moved to unit 831 also known as "Paradise in Service." The unit has this nickname because it is the unit that oversees the military whores on the island. The women who work at the brothel are very interesting and all have their own reasons for being there. A lot of the whores in service are actually working there to reduce their jail sentences. The end of the movie states that military brothels only closed in 1990 in Taiwan! I was really amazed to hear that since that's really not too long ago. The movie centers around Pao's relationship with Nini, a very interesting yet reserved woman whose only goal is to get back to her son. There are two other important relationships between servicemen and the 831 women as well. Pao's friend Hua-Hsing was placed in a unit that works in a cave all day. The poor guy develops a rash from the constant dampness and is nearly constantly bullied by his superior officers. He takes comfort in Sasa, and she in him. Pao also develops a friendship with one of the Sea Dragon commanders, Chang Yun-shan, who falls in love with an 831 woman named Jia. I won't give too much away, but this film is not to be missed. It was hilarious, sad, and heartbreaking all at the same time--not to mention cinematically beautiful. 

After the movie, on a whim, I decided to go to Spa Land, located inside the largest shopping complex in the world, Shinsegae Department Store. It costs $15 to get in and spend 4 hours there, but way more was included than at the spa we went to in Daegu. Korean spas are really different than American ones, as I have mentioned before. First, you are given comfortable, baggy clothes to change in to and use at the jimjilbang, or sauna and resting, part of the spa. Spa Land is amazing! They had all kinds of saunas set to various temperatures and themed! There was both a Turkish and a Roman bath house theme, a pyramid room, and a wood and charcoal room to name a few. Outside the sauna, there were lounge chairs with umbrellas and comfortable floor cushions facing a wall of windows. Light could be let in through the windows, but no one from outside could see in because water flowed down the curved windows like a waterfall. Upstairs, there was a DVD room and a "relaxation room." The relaxation room consisted of massive, cushioned lounge chairs with tray tables and TV screens attached for you to watch as you pleased for no extra cost. The room had a nice view over the city as well. Also on that floor were paid massage rooms, a cafe, a restaurant, and something called an oxygen room. I guess you can pay to have more oxygen put into you somehow. I opted for one of the amazing massage chairs. It was only $2 for 15 minutes, and these chairs are fabulous! After spending some time in the saunas and putting my feet in the amazing outdoor foot baths, I went into the hot tub part of the spa. In Korea, spas always have gender-segregated locker rooms with hot tubs. Everyone in the hot tubs are completely naked, and the people in Busan didn't stare at me as much as in Daegu for being foreign. Even though it is a little awkward at first, I was there alone, which made it easier for me. You don't have to feel self-conscious because there are people with literally every kind of body type that go to these spas. There were many different hot tubs of all different temperatures, and there was even a wonderful outdoor hot tub (with high walls all around it) with a waterfall that you could sit under. The hot tub room always has showers and scrubbing areas, which is really important in Korea. All the Koreans take really cleansing showers at the spas. Spa Land is great in that it provides soap and shampoo as well as sterilized hair brushes! The spa we went to in Daegu didn't have any of that. I felt very relaxed and cleansed after my 4 hours at Spa Land. I definitely recommend it to anyone who is visiting Busan.

My last stop for the day was Gwangali Beach. The beach is famous because it has a "rainbow bridge." Every night, they play music and a coordinated light show is done on the bridge. It was pretty cool to watch although I almost missed it. I thought the bridge was just lite up nicely; I didn't know about the light show. I was about to leave when the music started to play. First, there was a show to the can-can dance. The song played after was a really abrupt departure from the upbeat and happy can-can song. It was really somber, and pictures of people were projected onto the side of the bridge with their names. I'm not totally sure what that was about, but it was pretty still. Aside from the bridge, the area around the beach was really cool. I realized lately that I don't have a lot of pictures that capture what Korea is like on a daily basis, so I tried to get some on the beach. The lights of the buildings around the beach reflected really beautifully in the water. For those who are unaware, Korea is built vertically, so many times, there are restaurants and stores way up on the 4th floor or higher with neon signs along the sides of the building to tell you what is up there. I tried to depict a little bit of that with my beach pictures.

The next day, I decided to buy a ticket for the loop city tours. I should have gotten there earlier in the day to make it more worth my money. You pay $15, and that price includes both loop tours that the city has. It's a hop-on, hop-off system, so you can see as many or as few stops on either tour as you want. I had seen most things on the Haeundae Tour before, so I chose to go on the Taejeongdae Tour. I only really wanted to see two things on the tour, but it would have been really difficult to get to Taejeongdae Park if I didn't take the tour. The first place I got off was Taejeongdae Park. This park is named after the 29th king of the Silla Kingdom, King Taejeong. He enjoyed shooting arrows in this park. It is also famous for the ritual for rain, performed when there were droughts. The park is basically a path built into a forest on the sea cliffs. You can choose to either walk around on the path, which is a loop that takes about 2 hours to walk all the way around, or take the tram. The tram is a hop-on, hop-off service, but the line was so long that I decided to walk. It was a much more active day than I had planned to have, especially since there were a lot of steep hills along the path. There was a beautiful rock beach where I stopped to take pictures of the ocean, with boats passing by, and the cliffs of the park. As I continued on, there was an observatory where you can see nearby islands, including one Japanese island on clear days. I stopped at a lighthouse where you could actually walk down onto the cliffs themselves. The wind was so strong that I had to struggle to stop it pushing me. I cursed myself for leaving my hair down that day because it was blowing all over the place! Near the lighthouse and along the cliffs, there is a rock called Sinseon Rock. There is a myth that says gods and goddesses went to that rock to relax. Near the rock is a figure called Mangbuseok, named after the story of a woman who waited for her husband who had been taken to Japan. The park was really beautiful, and the weather was really nice that day, but I was done walking by that time. I made it all the way around the park, and I got back on the bus.

The second stop on the city tour that I got off at was Jagalchi Market, the traditional fish market in Busan. It was my good luck that there was also a festival happening around the market itself. There were tents with people selling all kinds of sea food, dried and fresh. The actual market is a 7 story building right next to the ports. The first floor is dedicated to fresh sea food of all kinds. Vendors keep the fish and other sea food alive in small tanks, and visitors can buy whatever they want. There were octopus, the biggest crabs and lobsters I have ever seen, fish of all kinds, and some animals I could not identify. On the second flood, there are dried seafood products as well as restaurants. I stopped at a restaurant where a man wearing Japanese-style sushi chef clothing came over and spoke English to me. I, inadvertently, haggled a deal with him to get a small, barbecued mackerel as well as a small plate of sashimi with raw salmon and white fish (I forget the name) for $20. The haggling was more just me telling him, truthfully, that I only had 20,000 won to spend. The food was delicious and really fresh! He showed me how to eat sashimi like a Korean--wrap the raw fish with vegetables and sauce in a piece of lettuce. He made the first one for me and fed it to me! It was hilarious. By coincidence, there was another foreigner eating at his restaurant who was also from Daegu! Even more, he lives just a few subway stops away from us! After dinner, I headed back to the city bus and caught one of the last buses back to Busan Station.

I had tickets to see a movie at the Film Festival again. This time, it was at the big, outdoor theater that they set up especially for the festival. I had to get there a little bit early in order to get a good seat because seating was not assigned. I was lucky enough to go there on a night that it wasn't too cold. All I had on was a long-sleeve shirt, and I wasn't that cold. The second movie I saw at the festival was an American movie called "Whiplash." It was about a kid named Andrew who wants to become one of the greatest jazz drummers of all time. He ends up getting into the best jazz band at his music school, but the instructor, Fletcher, is very hard on his students, especially Andrew. Fletcher pushes Andrew to his limits. The music in the film is fantastic, and the audience is kept on the edge of their seats. You never know if Fletcher will approve of go off like a rocket on Andrew. The entire movie, I was really tense and rooting for Andrew to succeed. It's an American movie, so definitely check it out if it comes to theaters.

After the movie, I went back to the hostel to meet Gianni. Unfortunately, my phone had died, but we figured it out and met up at the hostel. It was already late, so we didn't have time to do anything except eat a midnight snack. 

The next day, we didn't have to get up very early because I had only planned on us taking a city tour starting at 2pm. This time it was an actual route that we had to reserve in advance. There is a temple by the water in Busan that I really wanted to visit, but Maria and Matthew said it was hard to get their by public transportation. Instead, I found a city tour that would take us there without the hassle. It drove to a few famous places throughout the city and made one stop at a beach before getting to the temple. The beach was pretty, and there was a nice park along the water to walk around in. We got a snack at a store by the beach before heading back on the bus and going to the temple. Haedong Yonggungsa is a beautiful temple built right into the cliffs on the water. This is the only Korean temple I've been to that wasn't on a mountain! It was first built in 1376. When the waves hit the rocks, you can feel the ocean mist when you're walking there. On the path leading to the temple, there were people selling food and things. There was also a path of stone animals, representing zodiac animals. The temple has a big stone statue of the Goddess of Mercy on a platform overlooking the ocean and temple. There is also a big statue of a fat Buddha next to the main temple buildings. My favorite part was a small cave that has been dug out underneath the temple. There, you can drink some natural cave water and see a stone Buddha carved into the wall. The candles they had set up in there were beautiful, painted with Korean writing and blue dragons. The best view of the temple is from the gold Buddha statue built on the rocks near the temple buildings. The temple is definitely the most beautiful that I have seen in Korea. It combined elements of temples I had seen in Korea before as well as ones I had only seen in Thailand.

After the city tour was finished, Gianni and I were both tired and hungry. We decided to head back to the hostel area and get some food at a nearby restaurant. After walking around the block once, we finally settled on a stew restaurant. I thought it was delicious. At your table, the servers cook your stew. Ours had pork ribs in it. After dinner, we didn't really have plans, so we just went back to the hostel and relaxed. Gianni was a little bit bored until "Psycho" came on. I'd never seen it, so he really enjoyed watching it with me I think. I thought it was really interesting and scary psychologically, but the action/death scenes did not stand the test of time; they were kind of silly to me. Everything except those parts were great though.