Chusok Road Trip to the East of Korea

(Note: click on the pictures to make them larger.)

This past week we've been on holiday here in Korea. Chuseok is the equivalent of American Thanksgiving and a time when most Koreans travel to their family homes to eat and pay homge to their ancestors. People, icluding our students, go away for the week and Seoul is practically empty. Empty, that is, until everyone returns at the exact same time, causing a massive gridlock (here's a little more about Chuseok).

Anyway, on Friday, after school was let out, Abigail and I, along with three other couples, rented the school van and toured around eastern Korea. Following are a few highlights: We first went to a beach town, which was completely dead. Also, the beach was completely covered with clotheslines with gutted and drying squid everywhere. Mmmmm mmm! The nice thing about it was that we were able to swim and body surf in the Sea of Japan, so that was fun.

A note about the places we stayed: Korea is full of small, hotel-type places called minboks. Minbok rooms are nothing more than a large room with rollout "mattresses" and a heated floor. And when I say heated, I mean hot to the touch. And when I say "mattress," I mean a thin, duvet-type blanket. Ouch! Not built for people with European frames. In any case, there is no furniture and all 8 of us could stay in one room, for about 10 dollars each. Not bad.

The Korean peninsula, far as I've seen, is a really beautiful area. It's very mountainous with good roads and nice, rustic villages all over the place. As might be expected, it's quite organized and efficient, so no problems when it came to getting around.

After the coastal town, we made our way down along the sea and eventually over to an area called Andong, where an annual mask festival was being held in a small village nearby. This festival is interesting because it invites Japanese dancers every year. This is nice to see as generally Koreans and Japanese don't hold each other in very high regards. Here are a few pics from the village and the festival:









Above: the village








A few of the Korean dancers. i think this one was about order in society as the guy on the left was clearly a "drunk" character who often did disrespectful and funny things. He, being a member of a Confucian society, got scolded in the end.









Here are some old ladies preparing the Korean national food, a fermented, pickled cabbage called kimchi. Why fermented and pickled in jars underground you ask? Long winters in Korea and no veggies. Kimchi is often referred to as a "living food" for its good bacteria and many studies have been done with bird flu concluding that kimchi is what has kept bird flu out of Korea. I love it; Abigail doesn't. Boo for us.

We also visited some temples in the ancient capital of Gyeongju. It was really nice to see all of the beautiful temples, but one of my favorite parts was seeing the kids playing in the rock garden. Here are a few pics from the garden:





















Unfortunately, we had two deaths along the way.
















Despite the deaths of our friends, we made the best of their existences. Pictured below, going clockwise from bottom left: Sam's hand (California), his wife Robin (Hawai'i), Tracy, her husband Matt (both from Vancouver), Pridipi, and his wife Claude (both from New Zealand).












And last but not least, yours truly: