This place was so beautiful. I have never seen that many colors so bright all at once; it was truly breathtaking. And no small feat to get there, I might add. This weekend was our second attempt. Last time we failed miserably, missing the key point that "train" actually means train, not subway like I assumed. I think it's a fair assumption, but it got us nowhere. This week we knew before going that we were actually going to have to remove ourselves from the subway system and find the train station. We didn't realize that our journey would continue for almost two hours after that.
Man, what a long day. Thirty-two subway stops to an hour train ride and then a thirty minute mini-bus ride through some serious slums in South Korea had us a little concerned about our destination. It turned out to be beautiful, and I certainly wasn't expecting it when we got there. They even had really nice, normal American style bathrooms! That was probably the most amazing part. Not only did they have actual toilets, there was room for me to change from shorts into jeans in the bathroom without touching anything. Oh, you have no idea how excited I was about that.
We intended to leave at 10:45 in the morning, actually left around 11:45 (all my fault), and made it to our destination around 4:30. South Korea is not big enough for things to take that long! We were able to stay about an hour and a half, which was plenty of time to see what we needed to see. Everything was so beautiful, and there were mountains surrounding the entire garden so we climbed a little bit.
It was the perfect time of year to go; in a few weeks all the leaves will be off the trees. It was also really interesting because getting there required that I do several new things. This was my first time to ride a train. Ever. I never realized that I haven't been on one until we were sitting down, and then it was such a new experience. I prefer it over the subway, because you can see the land while you travel.
Once we got off, we were in the most slummy place I have seen thus far in South Korea. Pretty slummy for anywhere actually. It was very strange; so far everything has been really nice (relatively speaking, of course). There was nothing nice about this town. When we went to find the bus (which we found out was free after we paid someone. Those jerks taking advantage of the weguken!), there were the mobile office type things set up and a man in one on the far end walked out without a shirt on. I'm not sure if this translates as well as it should, but it is really cold here. Really cold. And, this man had a belly on him. People Do Not have bellies in South Korea. Being overweight is very taboo, so it was really shocking to see that.
Driving up the mountain through the country side it was extremely desolate. There were many tents on the hillside with campfires set up, and greenhouses everywhere. We even saw cows! Everything was really dirty and poor. It was such a contrast to what I am used to seeing. Especially since at the end of our journey we were in such a beautiful place.
The trip back seemed much quicker than the ride up. We took a cab and cut the subway in half by stopping for food. But, it was definitely a very long day. And then I woke up at 9 am to watch the UT Tech game, only for them to lose. Those boys better get it together. Just because I left the country does not mean they are aloud to lose football games. Absolutely not acceptable.
2 comments:
This post reminds me of being in Kinsolving dorm when you wouldn't shave your legs in the community bath showers because you would end up touching the walls in doing so. And look at you now! Touching walls all the time in Korea! How things change!
Haha that is too funny. And, I still have a really really hard time touching walls and doors and things, but there are fewer alternatives in Korea. Sometimes I just have to go with it, and then wash my hands for 20 minutes afterwards!
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