Waygooks Wandering

Finally the dry spell is finished! We haven't been to see a movie in Korea in AGES! And we were really missing it. Last week, we went to see Interstellar, which I thought was really good...at least until the ending. I thought Matthew McConaughey was really amazing in it. The ending fell a little short of what I wanted, but (little spoiler here) at least it didn't involve aliens or anything cheesy like that. The movie is about a time in the not-so-distant future when the Earth has been nearly completely destroyed. There is a group of scientists who has built a spaceship and sends out some inexperienced astronauts to attempt to find a new planet to settle on by traveling through a worm hole that has recently appeared. The movie hits close to home in dealing with the Earth's deterioration and the attempt to find a place to resettle. It made the movie really tense and real. Additionally, the idea of time being different on other planets and other dimensions is explored, with serious repercussions for Matthew McConaughey's character. That was the part I found really interesting and very sad.

This past weekend, we seriously had a movie weekend. I caught a cold at the end of the week, so we took some time off taekwondo, so I could feel better. We decided to relax by seeing a movie on both Saturday and Sunday. On Saturday, Gianni and I went by ourselves to see Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1. Now, I completely am against splitting books, especially short ones, into two different movies. I think it was Harry Potter that started the trend, and that I understood because the book is freaking huge! Still, the 7th Harry Potter movie (the first part of the last book) was a pretty boring movie. I figured Hunger Games was going to end up like The Hobbit, which is one short book divided into 4 movies. The Hobbit ended on a totally ridiculous and stupid cliffhanger. Most of the movie had almost no action, and as soon as something was going to start, the movie was over. At least Hunger Games is actually a 3 book series, but they are short books, so I was a bit worried about how they would divide the last book into two movies. I thought they actually did a really nice job on this end, and I was pleasantly surprised. There was action in the movie. The pace of the movie wasn't too fast or too slow, and it didn't feel like it was drawn out for time. Also, it ended in a place that made sense and wasn't too much of a cliffhanger. I thought it was a really interesting movie anyway. I really enjoyed the book series, and I think the movies are doing it justice. The second book was my favorite, but I think this third movie has been my favorite so far. The movie focused on the propaganda campaigns being flung on both sides. The Capitol using Peeta (poor guy being tortured and starved) to stop the rebellions in the Districts, and District 13 (the leaders of the Rebellions) using Katniss to incite further rebellion.

On Sunday afternoon, we met with Maria, Matthew, Sian, and Thomas to see Fury, a movie about World War II with Brad Pitt. The movie is about the five guys who have been manning a tank together since the start of the war. The movie starts towards the end of World War II, when it is clear that the Allied Forces are going to win. One of the five guys dies, and he is replaced by Norman, a complete newbie to both combat and tanks. It was a really interesting movie and very well acted. Even though you know what's going to happen (obviously, we know the outcome of the war), you really feel for these guys who are trying to make it out alive at a time when the Nazis are doing everything they can in a last ditch effort to win the war. This was the first movie I've seen Shia LaBeouf in for a long time (or I should say the first good movie), and he was, surprisingly, really great. All the guys in the tank were really good.

We saw two really good movies this weekend, and I got the much-needed relaxation and healing time I needed. Next week: double Thanksgiving weekend!!! I couldn't be more excited!

Photo by Marie Unruh

Photo by Marie Unruh

"Bang" means room in Korean, and there are all kinds of "bangs" here. At a PC bang, you can play computer games or surf the internet. At a noeraebang, you can sing karaoke with your friends in a special, private room. At a DVD bang, you can rent a movie and watch it on a nice, big screen on a comfy bed (and teenagers can have sex...not a joke!). Multi bangs take all the amazing things you can do at the other bangs, and put it in one convenient room. Gianni and I went to one for the first time last weekend to celebrate our friend, Stef's, birthday. There was a massive group of us that met at traveler's for a burger dinner, went to the multi bang for a few hours, and then went out drinking near Gogo's (the drink in a bag bar). The multibang only cost about 20,000 per room, so it was really cheap to split between all of us. We started out playing mario cart on the wii, which was awesome. Some of the other rooms were doing a bit of noraebanging. After eating Marie's fantastic oreo cheesecake for Stef's birthday (Marie is a superb baker!), we switched over to playing Just Dance, a game where you hold the remote in your hand, and you have to match the movements as they come up on screen. I thought it was going to be awful at first, but we all got really into it. Gianni and I want to buy it for my Wii when we come home. It was that good. It was really fun to play games in our big group of friends.

Photo by Marie Unruh

We also went to taekwondo last Saturday, which we usually don't do. The date for our black belt test is set as December 13th though, so we've really been trying to practice. Unfortunately, this week I had a couple really bad headaches and then I caught a cold, so we were only able to go twice. Hopefully, I'll feel better tomorrow, and we can practice at home. We are also planning on seeing The Hunger Games today and Fury tomorrow, so it's a big movie weekend for us. Our weekends this month have been really low-key and relaxing. Sorry if the posts are really lame :)

Pohang is a city on the eastern coast of Korea. It's only a little over an hour away from Daegu, so it's really easy to get to. I've heard a lot about the nice beaches in Pohang, the fireworks festival they have their in the summer, and the hand sculpture built on one of the beaches. Instead of seeing any of those parts of Pohang though, we went with Maria, Matthew, Sian, and Thomas to do a little bit of hiking to see some beautiful waterfalls and fall foliage. Matthew and Maria did this trip last year with another friend, and they liked it so much that they wanted to go again.

We left on Friday night right after school from two different bus terminals in Daegu. Sian and Thomas met Gianni and I at the bus stop near where the 4 of us live, and Matthew and Maria went from one closer to their house. We met up in Pohang at around the same time. We were all a bit worried about making sure we caught the city bus from Pohang Bus Terminal to Bogyeongsa Temple, which is the start of the hiking trails. Our buses arrived in Pohang really close to when the city bus was supposed to be stopping for the night. We ended up catching the last city bus, which is good because the taxi would have been really expensive. The city bus took a little over an hour to get us to the temple area. My coteacher, Sun Mi, was nice enough to book a Korean-style hotel for us, and it was right next to the temple. The hotel was really nice and clean, and our room was really big. Korean-style hotels are ondol (heating in the floor) rooms where you sleep on the floor on mats. Unfortunately, soon after we arrived at the hotel I realized I didn't have my phone. We tore apart the room looking for it, but it wasn't there. I went to the front desk, and the ladies who worked there tried as best they could to help. As we had taken the last bus of the night, the city bus office was now closed, so they told me to come meet them at the front desk at 6:50 the next morning and go meet the first bus of the day to talk to the bus driver and search the bus. I was pretty bummed, but I thought there was a chance of getting it back since we were on the last bus, and by the time we got off the bus, we were the only passengers on the bus. Also, Koreans tend to be very honest and don't steal as much as people at home. I've had several friends recover lost phones that were turned in to the bus lost and found. Anyway, I was a little bummed but I couldn't do anything about it that night. We spent a few hours before bed learning a fun card game called Shanghai Rummy and watching part of A Knight's Tale (my favorite movie, which Maria brought to Pohang just for me!). Maria and Matthew love playing card and board games, so they always have something new to teach us.

The next morning, I got up early to go look for my phone. The younger woman who works at the hotel, Hye Jin, walked me down to the bus stop, which is about 10 minutes walk away from the hotel. We chatted as we went, in broken English and broken Korean. She was very sweet, and I kept thanking her for bringing me and apologizing for making her wake up early. We had good timing because the bus was just pulling in when we arrived at the stop. Hye Jin talked to the bus driver and explained the situation, and he told us to take a look on the bus. I looked around near the seat I was sitting on the night before and under the seat in front of me, but I didn't see it. Hye Jin told me to call it, and I did. I heard my phone vibrate, and I was thrilled! I found my phone between the seat and the window, right on the window sill! It was amazing. I'm so happy I got it back. My phone had 1% battery left when I found it. If it had died, I wouldn't have heard it vibrating. Lucky lucky me! I went back to the room for a bit to sleep. We woke up and went in search of breakfast. Gianni, Matthew, and I opted for the free Korean breakfast provided at the restaurant on site. We got two free breakfast tickets, and Gianni paid for his. The food was a Korean stew and rice. It was pretty tasty. Sian, Thomas, and Maria had a bit of a difficult time with breakfast. There aren't really any breakfast places in that area, so I think they ended up with convenience store snacks instead. After breakfast, we cleaned up the room and packed up. We checked out and left our larger bags behind the front desk. At about 10:30am, we were totally ready for our hike. The hotel is very conveniently located right next to the temple, where the hiking trails begin. You pay about $3 to get into the temple and access the trail.

We spent about 4 hours on the hiking trails, taking our time to check out the foliage and the various waterfalls. It is a beautiful and relatively easy hike through the forest and mountains. There were a ton of people hiking with us, so it was kind of hard to stop for pictures unless you pulled off the trail for a minute. The river water was beautiful and super clear, and there were so many different kinds of trees in the forest, so we got to see the full spectrum of foliage colors. Since there was rain the previous day in Pohang, the waterfalls were really full. Some of the falls were smaller and more like rapids, but other ones were quite big. At one point, there was a bridge to cross over that took you to a really nice big waterfall. People were crowding around trying to get pictures, and we got some pretty nice pictures. My favorite picture that someone took for us includes a group of Koreans standing near the waterfall taking a selfie with a selfie stick. Such a Korean thing to do! It was really funny. There were a lot of people picnicking on the rocks in that area, but we decided to walk up some steep stairs and look at the view from a cliff face that Maria and Matthew went to last year. You actually have to rock climb for a bit to get to the top of the cliff, but once we were up there, we were totally alone. No one else came up, and we decided to eat our lunch there, looking at the picturesque view of the valley, mountains, and foliage. That point was where Matthew and Maria stopped last year, but we decided to keep going a bit further to see one other waterfall. We successfully crossed over the river without falling in and did a bit more rock climbing to get there. It was really fun. This waterfall was really beautiful and had less people around it because most people head back where Maria and Matthew did last year. I took some pictures from the bottom of the waterfall as well as from the top. There was a staircase leading to the top, and when you got closer to a rock wall at the top of the waterfall, the noise of the falls seemed to be muted a bit. The opening between the rocks at the top of the falls wasn't really that big, and you could climb around and take pictures from up there. It was very peaceful. The waterfall itself was also cool because there was a kind of circular indent in the rocks behind it, making it look almost like a little cave. It would be cool to swim by the base of the falls in good weather. After spending a bit of time at this waterfall, we decided to turn around and get back to the hotel. We were worried about making sure we got the city bus back to the bus terminal and also got a bus back to Daegu.

Notice the selfie happening behind us! hahaha

Back at the hotel, we collected our stuff from the front desk. As part of the hotel room, we got 4 free tickets to use the hotel's sauna. A Korean sauna might have one traditional sauna room, but it also has various hot tubs of different temperatures and a place to thoroughly scrub and clean yourself. Also, they are divided by gender because you are completely naked walking around in this big room filled with hot tubs. We all decided that we smelled gross from the hike (the weather wasn't that hot, but the hike made us all sweaty anyway), so we wanted to get cleaned off before heading back on the bus. The girls went in the girls room, and the boys in the boys room, and we all spent an hour in the hot tubs and showered. The ladies in the sauna were very interested in talking to Sian, Maria, and I, which was pretty funny. We did the best we could with our limited Korean skills. One of the hot tubs was a luke warm green tea hot tub, so we went in there for a bit. It felt so nice to take a good shower. I really didn't want to smell up the bus on the way home. We met the boys when we were done and started walking back to the city bus stop. On the way, we stopped for hobak jeon (pumpkin pancake) in the tourist village. Hobak jeon is my favorite kind of jeon in Korea. It is sweet and perfect for eating in the fall.

We got to the bus stop a bit before the bus came, and there were a lot of old women waiting for the bus. When we first got to the stop, there wasn't a line, and we were standing up waiting. Apparently, a line formed at some point, and we didn't notice. One of the older women told us to get to the back of the line, so we ended up behind about 40 people! Even though we had to stand for a good portion of the hour-long drive, we did get a seat eventually. We got back to the terminal and bought bus tickets to our respective bus terminals in Daegu. Before leaving, we had time to get some dinner at the food court in the Home Plus next to the terminal. This is a massive Home Plus with a movie theater and shopping mall inside, so we had to book it down all the stairs and escalators to catch our 7pm buses back to Daegu. Sian and I played a few games of our favorite board game, Ticket to Ride, on the app on my phone on the way back.

Today is Sunday, and I plan to just do a few errands and get some chores done. It will be a relaxing day. That was the only trip we had planned for this month because we really need to start saving up for China. After being gone every weekend in October, I really need some relaxation time. I think for the last trip for a little while, Pohang was excellent! The weather, mountains, waterfalls, and foliage were all stunning, and it was great to hang out with our amazing friends. I couldn't have asked for a better weekend.

Last week, Gianni and I finished up our second Korean class at the YMCA (our third Korean class total since we've been here). I feel like I'm really started to understand more, especially in reading it. I've learned a few more useful phrases and things to use with my students. I still really enjoy learning Korean, but we're going to take another break until Spring to save money and get a lot of practice in for our black belt test in December.

On Friday night, it was Halloween. Gianni and I decided to have a Halloween/scary movie marathon with Maria and Matthew. We met them at Costco right after school. We did our shopping quickly and picked up a big bag of chocolate and a pumpkin pie to share with them for our 4-person Halloween party. We took a taxi back to our apartment, which took forever because it was raining, and I'm convinced that people around the world get stupider when it rains and forget how to drive. We watched House of the Devil, Casper, and Nightmare on Elm Street. It was so late by the time we were finished that Maria and Matthew decided just to sleep over. In the morning, we watched Paranormal Activity as we ate breakfast. I know there are a lot of sequels to that movie, but I can attest to the fact that the first one is actually really good and very freaky. I don't usually like scary movies, but I think I was feeling bold with my friends there. Also, I'm okay with scary movies as long as there are no body contortions and things--that's the part I really hate.

When Maria and Matthew left, Gianni and I got ready to go to Magic Flute, an opera being performed at the Daegu Opera House as part of the Opera Festival. I got free tickets for working for the Colorful Daegu blog, so now I just have to write about it. I'm not really a big fan of opera, but I think it's nice that they have a festival in Daegu. It teaches people about a different time and culture, bringing art and music to the city even further. Outside the opera house, they had a few interactive booths set up. In one booth, both children and adults could dress up in period costumes, immersing themselves in the time of the opera. People really like "photo zones" in Korea, which is pretty silly but cute. So at this festival, they had a fake stage and curtains set up to use as a photo backdrop, and tons of people were taking pictures by it.

The cast of Magic Flute

Magic Flute is an opera in German written by Mozart. The opera provided both English and Korean caption screens to either side and above the stage. The opera was about a prince who is found by a Queen. The Queen enlists his help to find her daughter, who was stolen by Sarastro. Turns out, the Queen is actually the villain in this opera. Sarastro stole the princess, Pamina, in order to unite her with the prince, Tamino, her true love. A prophecy said that Tamino and Pamina needed to be together, so he captured the princess in order to introduce them to each other. The opera has a really funny character named Papageno, who is Tamino's friend. He is the comic relief of the show, and he was totally pandering to the audience. He even ad-libbed a bit of Korean, which the audience ate up. It was really great! Another random note: the girl who sings opera in Miss Congeniality sings a song from this opera--if you remember that part in the movie.

On Sunday, we slept in for the first time in a long while. I helped Gianni change the scores on his students' writing tests. We ate dinner at home and met Maria and Matthew downtown to see Gone Girl. We had never been to this movie theater before, and it was okay, but the seats were definitely older than we are used to. It was a little bit more of a run-down place. Gone Girl was a fantastic movie! I recommend everyone go see that. It's a movie where Ben Affleck plays the husband of a woman who is missing. He is suspected of having murdered her. I won't give away any details. There were some disturbing scenes, but it was a great movie.