Haze of the North, Fog of the South: Ice Cold

When I told people that I'd be teaching in Korea for a year, I would invariably receive one of two different responses. The first was "Why?" The other was "Which one?" (And then, after specifying South Korea, people often asked if that was "the good one or the bad one"). Well, last weekend I broke the bonds of capitalist oppression and went to the North. That's the bad one.
That little strip of concrete in the middle there is the official Military Demarcation Line. This whole area is called the Joint Security Area, and there's a nice symmetry to the place. Or, there would be, if the North Koreans didn't insist on making all the buildings on their side of the MDL just a little bit bigger. Perhaps they think that if their side of the border is heavier it'll make the whole peninsula tip toward them and we'll all just fall into North Korea. Huttah! Over on the other side, if you squint, you can see a North Korean guard watching us. Sometimes they walk around the JSA and swear at the tourists, but we had no such luck.

The blue building on the left is neutral territory where negotiations between the two countries take place. Here's an inside shot:
Those guys in there, for all that they look a bit like bad guys, are the good guys. They're South Korea's very best; seventh-degree black belts who will punch you if you touch them and look great in aviators. They don't talk and they don't move, they just stand there. Cool.
This guy's job is the best. He gets to stand right at the border. The left side is South Korea; the right side is the North. The other guy in the room guards the door to North Korea proper, and as long as you stay out of roundhouse-kick-range, you can get someone to take your picture with him!
Max was down with the photo taking too. I'm not sure why they let him wear that bandana - it's a map of North Korea.
We drove by the Bridge of No Return, which is pretty much what it sounds like. I chose to stay on the south side. Note the haze of Yellow Dust, which wafts over in great clouds from the Gobi Desert in China every spring and makes my all my outdoor photos blurry.
We also visited a tunnel that the North Koreans dug under the DMZ in the early 70's. The South discovered it by accident, and in a wonderful twist of capitalist irony, they now charge people to go into it themselves. It's about 6 feet high and 6 feet wide, and very long. We weren't allowed to take pictures in the tunnel itself, but it's worth mentioning because Max got saddled with a 9-year-old ADHD poster child named Eric. His mom is claustrophobic, and when she said "I don't think I can go down there" to her son at the informational meeting, Eric simply pointed at Max and replied, "That's okay. I'll just go with him!" And he did. Max did good, though - after we came back from the tunnel, Eric made him mom buy a blue bandana so he could wear one just like Max. Awwww.

*commercial break*

Max teaches chemistry, and wanted to procure a little dry ice for a lab activity. The school's secretary may have misplaced a decimal point when she made the order, because a 50 pound box was delivered to the school this morning. Yes, that's 50 pounds of frozen CO2. Science!
Everyone learned a lot. For example, the 11th graders learned that you can pour dry ice fog on each other. You can also stab it with a knife.

The 8th graders learned that if you wear lab coats while playing with dry ice, you might get yourself into the school's advertising pamphlet.


And Gabriel the 3rd grader learned that he can look cute and a little goofy while holding dry ice soap bubbles.


Anyway, despite my best efforts, we still had about 30 pounds of the stuff left at the end of the day. It doesn't keep in the freezer very long, so it had to be used immediately. Good thing Max and I have a bathtub. I said science! Science again!







Here's the preparation.














The execution:












The effects:


What we learned: dry ice is cool. Science!

Cheese is why you're fat

And lack of it is why Koreans are skinny. But you know what? It might just be worth it. I'm going to go make a sandwich.

Yuletide Miraculous

Team Awesome reunited this past weekend for a triumphant return to Wando. Wando is an island off Korea's south coast, and it is appropriate to say its name in a loud call-and-response:

"Waaanndoooo?"
"Waannnnndooooooo!"

Do that a few times with a Louis Armstrong-style rasp and you get the idea.

Here's a brief run-down on what happened last time we visited Wando in September:

1. I swam with my wallet. My wallet, as far as I know, is still swimming.

2. Max and I got pulled onstage at an outdoor 300-person schoolkids' talent performance and handed a microphone. We were given no instructions (other than a vague suggestion to play "Taxman" by the Beatles) and so we opened and closed our performance in a hurry: "We love Wando!"

3. We ended up hanging out with a national celebrity comedian and his entourage. Here he is in the middle:
One thing led to another, and soon we were invited to a private karaoke room courtesy of his brother, Wando's gundal (Korean mafia) boss. All in all, a nice bunch of guys, and everything was free! That's respect, baby.4. The karaoke session ended with an epic rendition of "Creep" and Mr. Comedian Man giving Max a squid-suction-cup-style kiss on the mouth. I'm not going to go into the details. You can ask him.

So Wando (Waaannndooo? Waaaaannnnndooooooo!) had a lot to live up to. We were dedicated to re-experiencing Wando in all its Grand Wandosity. And because we'd never leave something as important as Wando-ridiculousness to chance, we made sure to bring the right equipment for the weekend: tents, meat, six airsoft pellet guns, and a 4.5-liter bottle of scotch, which was presently dubbed Robot Juice.

Waaaannnndooooooooooo!
Right. We set up camp at a campsite by the beach that was probably closed but otherwise quite nice. Tents went up, bananas were eaten, and soon we were a bunch of robots hanging out on the beach. One of the other robots malfunctioned and ran into the ocean, getting sand in all its joints and seawater on all the other robots that went to go retrieve it. It required a rather long system reboot.

Note to parents, grandparents, and potential employers: the above section in no way endorses guns, alchohol, or any ill-conceived combinations of the two. The Wando Robots were in fact model campers; practicing excellent fire safety, keeping noise to a minimum, and fastidiously cleaning up after themselves. The above passage is intended to illustrate the absurdity of The Robots' mission and the impracticality of their stated objectives. We, the Wando Robots, would like to thank you for your understanding. Or, we say in Robot: "Bleep! Bloopity-beep-beep-shaBloop!"

Naturally, as with all plans laid out as meticulously as ours, everything soon went horribly wrong. We got to Wando in Kory's trusted 1993 Hyundai Santomo, nicknamed "The Dongchim" after we had to use the dog's poop-tongs to break into it from the outside. Long Story. Anyway, the Chim has about 150,000 miles on her, but she's got a good heart and room for seven. So: we woke up early on Sunday morning and took a ferry trip from Wando city to a nearby island and back. When we hopped back into the car to get back to the campsite, it wouldn't go.

Bleep.

Well, it would go, but not faster than 10 mph or so. Which isn't really fast enough. While the Dongchim may have spirit, her lungs weren't working too well, and she'd backfire herself to a stall every time we took her past 1500 rpms. Here's a picture of Kory driving in circles in a futile attempt to cure the Chim of her sniffles.
We couldn't get the Chim repaired, because naturally none of Wando's mechanics work on Sundays. So we held our breath, gritted our teeth, and began driving back to the campsite at a pace just slower than a tortise that's eaten way too many burritos.

But hark! 30 minutes (and 4 miles) into our journey, we were visited by a Christmas Miracle! The Chim managed to crest a hill a few miles from camp, and once she got rolling past 25 mph, something inside clunked into place and she began running smooth as a Swiss dream. Her sickness may still be there, but the Chimmer not only made it to camp, she brought us all the way home to Gwangju the next day! Huzzah!

Our good luck held for the rest of the expedition: the weather was good, the burgers were great, and we made friends with some other robots who were camping down the beach. On Monday morning, victory was declared and Team Wando Robot Awesome headed home.
Waaaaaannnnndooooooooo!

And away!

We flew a plane. It was sweet.

There's a dude named Matt Walker who runs a flying club outside Taejon, and for 120 bucks, he'll let you fly his plane. No, really: you sit next to him in the 2-man cockpit, and while he handles the takeoff and landing, you're the person who actually does and hour's worth of flying. In the air.
And let me tell you, this plane ain't your uncle's Cessna. In the next two photos, Max shows us how fast the plane can go using creative poses.

By the end of the day, I could turn left and I could turn right and I could fly in a relatively straight line. We even did what Matt calls a "steep turn," which is a turn that is steep. But actually steep: the G-force pushes your cheeks back, and if you're not careful, the whole plane will start slicing sideways and you'll fall out of the sky. Which I didn't do. Take that, Lindbergh.

Moral of the story: flying planes is cool. It's a little scary at first, but once you start feeling that Borg-like man/machine symbiosis, it rocks. We all left feeling like this:
Yeah.

Unnecessary, in Two Acts

An interesting feature of having disposable income in a relatively guilty-free foreign setting: the ability, perhaps even the desire, to spend money in ways befitting nothing but the internet. Korea's a great place for it. There are a multitude of diversions strewn about the country, and as long as one has a few bucks and a well-developed sense of irony, there's plenty of blog material to be discovered.

Example one: Korean New Year was in late January. It's one of the few vacation days that teachers at hogwans (private English academies) actually receive, so Max and I decided to do something with our friend Kara. Someone stabbed a finger at a map and it landed on Yeosu, a small city on the south coast. So the next day, bright and early, we all hopped a bus out there.

This photo sums up our first impressions of Yeosu.
It was cold, gray, and except for Max's impish enthusiasm, lifeless. All the shops and restaurants was closed - we had forgotten that national holidays apply to other people, too - and while our map put Yeosu on the south coast of the country, the ocean was nowhere to be seen. The Port Authority building was landlocked and empty. The fun we found at a nearby church (see below) was fleeting at best.
We were rescued by a taxi driver who partially understood our desire for a bata yaepawwa (pretty beach) and proceeded to drive us to a cliff 45 minutes and $26 dollars away. We spent most of the cab ride alternatively fearing for our lives and admiring the miniature porno calendar the man had dangling from the inside of the windshield. Fortunately, the island he took us was actually pretty cool.

There were trucks,














rocks,

and a great big beautiful Buddhist temple. On a mountain.













It was a nice place to sit and ponder.
Here's my fave shot of the temple. Last one, I promise.

So we hiked to the summit, chatted with a precocious 6-year-old, and made it back to the 'Ju with little further incident. Altogether, the experience was fun, not too expensive, and wholly superfluous. At least we get points for whimsy - but nowhere near as many as this next place.

Example two: Puppy Palace

Imagine a typical Saturday night with friends in downtown Gwangju. If you've never been to Gwangju (and of course you haven't) imagine that you're in the social hub of some other city of 1.5 million residents. After a dinner and a few drinks, someone says, "Hey what do you guys want to do next?" You don't feel like barhopping, or catching a late movie, or dancing, so you say, "Hey, I know! Let's go to a room upstairs where we can drink bad coffee out of travel mugs while fully dressed, perfumed dogs climb all over our bodies!"

Now, see, if you weren't in Gwangju, your friends would assume you've had too much to drink and would send you home. But if you are in Gwangju, they'll assume that you've had too much to drink and so it's time to go to Puppy Palace!

It's a coffee shop, it's a pet shop; it's so much more. It's got a sweet mirrored front hallway:
And a number of very special friends that you may snuggle with/purchase. Here's one that I named "Nana."














And here's Meatball. He has a skin condition so he's not allowed to play with the others.



















Other special friends include Pebbles, Grim, Pinkerton, Ed, 360, and the ringleader, the "Wizard" called Icepop (credit: Toni Martello).
After visiting twice, I can safely say that it's really not as cool as it should be. Don't get me wrong, I like being mobbed by pets as much as the next guy, but I guess I just prefer them naked. Shirts on dogs are just so redundant. Besides, I want to play with them, not look at them - I want action figures, not dolls.

And the whole place smells like dog pee.

So, moral of the story: when you're teaching English in Korea and you don't speak Korean, your options for fun quickly devolve to the goofy. Whether that's good or bad I leave to you - but it's definitely not necessary.

Visiting

The best part about working at KFS is the amount of time I'm not required to be there. I got a good three weeks off for Christmas; the typical hagwon teacher gets one solitary day. So, to celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, my girlfriend Toni and I took a shlep through the only nearby countries virtually guaranteed to be Christian-free: Malaysia and Thailand. Let me tell you: it was a good call.

Malaysia is a strange place. It's a cultural melting pot but also fiercely Islamic; it's got a fantastic influx of oil wealth and foreign investment, and yet it's still in relatively early stages of economic development; and while nearly everyone speaks English, the taxi drivers still pretend not to understand when you ask them to just use the meter.

Kuala Lumpur is cool. It's famous for these,
The Petronas Towers. Toni and I went up to the Skybridge, but before they let us on the elevator we had to sit through a 12-minute video telling us about how great the Petronas Corporation is for us. Pictures of smiling children, new houses, etc. Look what having an offshore oilfield can do for you! Though to be fair, the Towers were really cool.








Here's a shot from the Skybridge. It's a little fuzzy because we were in a cloud.














Nearby KL are the Batu Caves, a series of big 'ol limestone caverns that have been converted into a Hindu holy site/capitalist tourism bonanza. This statue is Lord Murugan, to whom the temple is dedicated. He is tall.












The caves are the perfect place for a spiritual experience: dimly-lit, stalactite-filled, and ethereal. So naturally I went straight to hanging out with the monkeys, who populate the caves in great abundance, due almost certainly to the huge amount of people-food that gets thrown to them daily.

I guess I should include a photo of the caves, too.
From KL we headed to a little island called Pulau Pangkor off the west coast, where we stayed at a nice little place run by some nice little people. Lowlights were confined to the both of us sick and confined to the bed/bathroom on Christmas. On the other hand, highlights ranged from renting a scooter and circumnavigating the island to drinking fresh fruit juice all the time, floating in the ocean, and making friends with the Jungle Puppies, a litter of pups we found living in a pile of trash in the jungle.





Awwwww.




Next: Thailand. This part was going to be easy: bus to Butterworth, Malaysia; overnight bus to the Similan Islands, Thailand. Ha!

We arrived at the Butterworth bus station on the 26th to discover that there wasn't a bus station. Butterworth, just so you know, is a city of over 100,000 people. Yet the bus station is a parking lot - an unpaved one, for that matter. After being herded off the bus and wandering around the parking lot for a while, we discovered the ticket booth, which is in fact an unlabeled shack by the road. The lady in said shack said that the overnight buses weren't running since it was the day after Christmas. The next bus left at 5:30 am. Toni and I, undeterred, found the least sketchy hotel we could find (all the places in the area charge by the hour) and hit the hay. The next day, which happened to be my birthday, went as follows:

5:30 am - arrive at bus terminal to discover that our bus is actually a minibus with no room for us or our luggage. We squeeze in anyway.

7:30 am - we arrive at the Thai border where we are instucted to hand our passports to the driver, who promptly disappears.

8:00 am to 11:30 am - wait in line to get through the border.

11:31 am - a family of 30 unnecessarily sweaty folk attempt to cut me. Elbows get involved, but no eye contact. I am larger and I win.

11:35 am - back on the bus. Passport has reappeared.

1:30 pm - Bus driver drops Toni and I off on the side of the road somewhere in Hat Yai. Another minibus picks us up. Onward.

3:00 pm - bus arrives at a parking lot with a small building on it. Toni and I are sent into the building to wait for a different bus. I am still not sure where exactly this place was.

4:00 pm - our other minibus arrives, the impatient driver sends us aboard.

4:01 pm to 4:35 pm - the impatient bus driver idles the bus' engine and stands outside smoking cigarettes. I contemplate hijacking the bus and driving to the Similans my own damn self, but I refrain, in large part because I don't know where I am.

6:00 pm - Impatient bus driver turns left where I know he's supposed to turn right. My free tourist map says so. I say something to him, but he ignores me/doesn't speak English.

6:10 pm - we definitely should have turned right back there. I show him the map, he swears in Thai, and points to his head while making that wide-eyed "Aw shucks, I forgot!" face. He does not, however, turn around.

6:40 pm - impatient driver drops Toni and me off at a convenience store by the side of the road outside Phuket. He explains the situation to the owner, who relays to Toni and I that a bus to the Similans will be coming by soon, and we need to buy a ticket. Impatient bus driver skedaddles off before I can get my money back.

6:45 pm - in a flash of insight, I ask the convenience store owner to call the Similan Islands' bungalow office and double-check on my reservations. After about 20 minutes I get on the phone with an English-speaking employee, and start getting a bad feeling.

7:15 pm - the bus to the Similans arrives. Our "bus tickets" apparently didn't guarantee us seats, or even walls, for that matter; fortunately, it is at this very moment that the Similan employee finally gives up the truth: our reservations have vanished. The bus goes on without us.

9:30 pm - we follow the convenience store owner's hot tip and make it to a bungalow place not too far away from the beach. I am tired, sick, and have not eaten in 36 hours. Still - all in all, not a bad birthday.

Yikes, this post is too long. To be continued.