Today I woke up and said goodbye to Joe and Mozzi. It was about a 5-minute walk to the train station where I grabbed my train FROM Busan. I got a little breakfast and a few snacks for the voyage. I walked to the platform, got on the train, then found my seat. I made sure to book a window so I could see all of Korea pass by. I lost count of how many incredibly tall apartment buildings I saw lining the tracks almost the entire way. I guess these are needed when a country has 51 million people living in place about the size of Kentucky. During my 5 hour trek, I listened to part of the book 12 Rules for Life. I could understand why this Jordan Peterson, the author, had such a high profile in the English speaking world.
I arrived in Seoul, and goddamn; the public transport system there makes New York City’s look like a joke. It took me about an hour to negotiate the subway in rush hour as well as find my hostel that had no street-level signage. I checked in, got my bed, locked up my stuff, freshened up, and let my friend know I arrived. I did some work and then waited for Fooch.
Now, Fooch (not his given name) was to be my first friend I would see along this voyage from my previous lives. We worked together back when I lived in Los Angeles. We always got along due to our similar world view, although he is about a decade younger than I am. As a native Angelino that lived his entire life in the Hollywood Hills, I was quite surprised by the fact that he was willing to give up everything he knew to move, live, and work halfway around the world. Most other Angelinos that I met had never even been out of the country. I was then subsequently amazed by how quickly he took to his new surroundings. He learned the language, secured work, and even applied to be a resident alien. He started a YouTube channel offering a western perspective on Korean current events and is an aspiring EDM artist. One of the reasons I came to Korea was for him.
I met Fooch on the street outside my hostel. It was good to see him and it is like no time had passed, even though the last time we saw each other was in 2010. We made our way to a bar to grab some Soju, a Korean liquor, but that place was closed. We went to another where he impressed me with the ease he spoke his non-native tongue as he ordered us Soju, two types of makgeolli (a milky rice wine,) an onion loaf, and of course, kimchi with tofu. We talked about life, what was going on back in the US, adventures as an ex-pat, and things going on in Korea. We also made plans for him to take a sick day to come with me to tour the DMZ, something he had never done. It is interesting, the world over, when one lives in a city, they rarely take in the tourist sites as a local. I know I have been guilty of that in New Orleans. We took a photo together, and I sent it to few friends of ours from work, one being an Argentine national turned US Citizen and the other our former favorite receptionist, both still living in Los Angeles.
After drinks, we headed back to the neighborhood I was staying in, the trendy Hongdae area by the university. With all the beautiful young women about, I can understand why Fooch suggested this place for me to stay. We headed to an ex-pat bar where he introduced me to his friend Alex. Unfortunately, that is when Fooch said he needed to leave to get some rest before work the next day. I stayed at the bar, which was like a mashup of an LA beer joint and a college dive bar. After a few additional Sojus and some local beer, I was feeling no pain. I hung out there a bit as the table spoke in English and Korean. After, I decided to head out. I made my way down the block when I noticed another bar called ZEN that looked interesting. I went down the stairs into the basement, and there was a room filled with more ex-pats. I got a drink and sat by myself. A very drunk German guy came over to me, and we started chatting. After a few pleasantries, he invited me to join the group. I thanked him but got a very weird, overly friendly vibe. So, I told him that I had an early day. I finished my beer, then headed back to my hostel.
I went to the showers and was taken back by a few things. First off, it was like a San Francisco bathhouse as all of the three shower stalls were clear glass. One could see everyone else in the room showering. Second, the exposed water pipes stick directly out of the wall. One toggles hot water to cold by turning a nob, letting either more cold water come out of the showerhead or turning the nob and allowing more hot water. The problem with this is that the hot water pipe being exposed, if you are not careful and your hand brushes it while turning the nob, it may burn you. After this education in Korean plumbing, I crawled into my bed and went to sleep.
After a few glasses of Soju, some makgeolli, and some beers, needless to say, I woke up with a bit of a hangover. As wifi in the field was very unreliable, I took to writing the directions of places I wanted to go in a little notebook, kept in my breast pocket. This included which subway lines to take and where to exit. I even kept an offline map on my iPod. I traveled back out into the frosty early spring morning of Seoul, stopping at a local 7-11 for a breakfast consisting of Pokemon-themed biscuits. I hopped the subway after going through the extensive map to make sure I would be arriving at the right place. I headed first to Gyeongbokgun Palace, the historic seat of Korean royal power from which the blocks of current government buildings would spring. There were many more modern official buildings in this area of the city, including my very own embassy. I needed to get some currency to pay Fooch back for booking our trip to the DMZ, so that is what I did first.
While I was walking, I noticed what seemed like a temporary wooden building erected next to the statue of Korea’s most famous admiral, Admiral Yi Sun-sin. The wooden structure was part of an exhibition and memorial to the Sewol Ferry Disaster that happened on this day in 2014. 304 people died when the ferry sunk, including about 250 high school kids that were told to stay put in the boat by figures of authority, as those same figures fled for their lives. After the disaster, distraught parents, loved ones, and countrymen protested at this spot to have an investigation into who exactly fucked up. After some time, the captain of the ship was charged and got life in prison while some members of the crew got years for desertion. It was a pretty dark time in post-war South Korean history, but sadly, it would not to be the last of Koreans meeting a watery grave on my voyage.
Going back to the palace, I noticed many non-Koreans dressed in traditional Korean garb. After asking around, if one were to rent a Hanbok (the Korean kimono-like outfit,) their entrance to tour the palace is reduced to free. I could see what I wanted from the grounds before the entrance, and I was satisfied with that.
After the palace, I headed to the Namdaemun Market. A familiar scent filled the air when I arrived. I looked over and saw someone cooking grubworms. I got a lunch of noodles then headed to walk around the market. Namdaemun was gigantic. There were stalls upon stalls upon stalls selling every type of good you could imagine. Need a toilet seat, head to Namdaemun. Need some chickens, head to Namdaemun. Need pirated DVDs, head to Namdaemun. It is incredibly easy to get lost as most of the stalls look the same and go on for blocks. They also go indoors as well. It was here where I knew I could buy some postcards to mail.
I bought three postcards: the first for my nephews, the second for my cousin and his wife, the third was for an old college friend. Every country, and sometimes a few cities in that country, I always mailed postcards to my young nephews so they could track my voyage. Sometimes it was difficult to find a postcard, sometimes difficult to buy stamps, and sometimes difficult to find a post office or post office box. Here is was easy as there was a giant post office located within a skyscraper next to the Namdaemun Market. I sent the postcard to my cousin and his wife as she is a quarter Korean. Her grandmother was in Korea during the war and lost her entire family. She married a GI and came to the United States, where she raised a family. She never talks about it, and I cannot blame her. I sent the postcard as a way to try and help my cousin’s wife reconnect to her heritage. The final postcard was for my friend that joined the United States Army after college. He was stationed in Korea and I felt it was a nice gesture after he helped me figure out things to see here through Facebook Messenger exchanges.
Having been a long day already, I headed back to my neck of the woods. Fooch and his friends needed to work late, so I went to have dinner. One of the more interesting things about local Korean cuisine is their idea of worldly foods, filtered through an Asian lens. I went to a pizza place, which was filled with college students on dates. I wondered why everyone was dressed so nicely until I saw a menu. While it was entirely in Korean, the prices were using Arabic numerals. I did a quick calculation, and the price of a personal pan pizza was about $20 USD. I figured I had to try it. It consisted of: brown dough like pumpernickel, almost 4-types of tasteless cheese, sprinkled sugar, and a healthy dollop of butter right in the center. It took some getting used to, but in the end, it was OK. After dinner, I walked back to the hostel and sat up on the roof deck until I got sleepy.
The next day, I wrote out my commute and headed out. The first stop was the War Memorial Museum. To say that it was intense would be an understatement. Ringing the outside of the building were all the vehicles, boats, tanks, planes, and armaments of the ROK (Republic of Korea.) They even let you climb on some of them. At the entrance to the museum, they have memorials for all the countries that helped fight under the UN flag during the war. They even have a few lines of Thucydides commemorating the sacrifices made by visiting armies.
The inside of the museum started with an exhibit of a remade site where they identified the remains of soldiers under plexiglass that the patrons were forced to walk over. The exhibits got more austere from there. They chronicled almost every aspect of the war, bringing the hell it must have been alive for the viewer. One of the things that stood out was an incredible live-like simulation fo taking enemy fire from across the Yalu River Bridge. They talked about the role of the Red Chinese and Stalin in providing help to the North Koreans, the heroism of Douglas MacArthur, and rooms upon rooms filled with guns. Other parts of the museums included artifacts like the liberated automobile of Kim Il Sung, the father of not only North Korea but of Kim Jong Il and grandfather of Kim Jon Un.
At the exit of the museum, they had a multi-story tree where people could attach paper leaves with what they learned, hoped, or wished after going through the museum. I found my leaf, wrote on it, then attached it to the tree. I etched that moment in my memory, then walked back out into the cool Seoul air.
I needed a break, so I decided that no trip to Seoul would be complete without stopping in the Gangnam district. Gangnam, of course, made international fame from the song Gangnam Style by Psy, is a trendy and rich district of Seoul; like Beverly Hills is to Los Angeles. To honor Psy for putting this district on the map, they erected a sculpture in Psy’s honor. I needed to wait for my turn to take a photo in front of it. Also around this part of Seoul is the Tae Kwan Do international headquarters.
Finishing my morning of war and pop stardom, after lunch from a convenience store, I went to the Jogyesa Temple. This Buddhist temple, located in the middle of Seoul, serves as a quiet respite from the noise of the city. Honestly, walking through the gates, it is like the rest of the world was put on mute. I do not know what festival was coming or going, but a ceiling of brightly colored paper erected on wires spanned the complex. I went over to the temple, but since it was packed, I did not enter. I did stand outside and record the chanting, which was otherworldly on its level of relaxing. I just stood there for a few minutes awash in calming sound. As I was walking back, I helped an older woman climb the stairs to the temple by holding her hand and lifting her wheeled basket. I wasnʼt thinking it at the time, but after I almost broke down in tears at how beautiful that was. We didnʼt speak each otherʼs languages but instinctively knew what needed to be done.
I headed back to Hongdae and just walked around the neighborhood. I had dinner and some Soju, then went back to my hostel. I took a porn shower then went to bed. I needed to rest up for the main reason I came to Korea.
Today was the day that I came to Korea for: my trip to the DMZ. As mentioned back in Busan, the Korean War never really ended. There was an uneasy truce with troops staring at each other across the 38th Parallel. I met Fooch at the Subway Exit 8 for Hongik U. We were early, so he took me to a nice breakfast. Across the street from the cafe was where the bus got us. It was an English speaking tour and our guide was a lovely young woman named Sue that had an excellent command of English. We found our seats and the bus took us North. Sue gave us a lot of information about the war, the current political climate, and what we would be seeing. Out in the distance, as we sped along the highway, we saw North Korea and a few “political villages” arranged at the border in an attempt to persuade those in the South that everything was just peachy across the narrow divide in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea.
Our first stop was the “resort town” of Imjingak. Imjingak is in the city of Paju on the Imjin River. This place is important as it has several memorials dedicated to those the died in the Korean War, the Mangbaeddan shrine where the faithful can pray to their North Korean ancestors that the war divided, and the Freedom Bridge. The bridge was a thoroughfare where POWs from the war were allowed to come home. Also located there was a small amusement park and even Louisiana’s finest, Popeye’s Chicken(?).
After Imjingak, we continued closer to the DMZ. After passing through a military barricade where they checked everyone’s passport, we continued on. The attraction at this stop was the 3rd Tunnel. Apparently, in preparation for the Second Korean War, the North had started digging tunnels under the DMZ through the dense bedrock. The idea was to mobilize their entire army through these narrow tunnels And this was the third they had dug after the others were discovered due to the localized seismic activity of dynamite demolition to clear the path. Not just a way to prepare for earthquakes, when the North Korea detonated their first nuclear bomb in an underground test in 2006 (provided with technical expertise by the previously mentioned villain A. Q. Khan), it was a way for the South Koreans and the rest of the world to verify their activities and claims. Continuing with their tunnels, NoKo kept going deeper.
After watching a video at the visitor center that seemed all too keen at the prospect of war, Fooch and I donned hard hats and descended 170m (557.743ft) below ground. At the end of the path was a spring then concrete barrier constructed by the ROK to keep the NoKos out. We then climbed back up into daylight.
After the 3rd Tunnel, some photo ops, and a gift shop that somehow had North Korean goods to sell (like NoKo whiskey), we headed to the Dora Observatory. Vice President Mike Pence had a pretty badass photo op here that Fooch and I, filled with alacrity, wanted to imitate.
Dora is interesting for a variety of reasons. 
First, before the prospect of peace was being negotiated, the ROK set up gigantic speakers blaring loud music across the border. They were removed to help the process. Since this is the actual DMZ, it is one of the most concentrated places in the world for landmines. This is another reason the NoKo army wanted the ability to mobilize underground. There were signs all around the site warning of the dangers that could occur should one stray from the path. Out in the open field dividing the countries, the North Korean constructed the fourth largest flagpole in the world, at 160m (525ft.) This was just 10 meters short of how far we went underground at Tunnel 3. The final interesting thing about this place is that the South Korean side is flush with trees and bushes. On the North Korean side, it is just barren grassland. The guide said this was because, during the winter, people would cut down whatever they could to use for heat. Having read Escape from Camp 14, a book that chronicled the life of a boy that grew up in a North Korean political prison that miraculously escaped to Tarzana, California, I knew exactly what he meant. One of the more memorable passages from this book was when he and a friend rooted around in cow shit to find undigested pieces of corn to eat.
Our final stop for the day was Dorasan station. This was the Northernmost train station in South Korea, which would then connect the country not only to the North, but to the rest of the world, by land. Throughout the station, they had mementos from other world leaders, including a signed concrete piece from George W Bush as well as a scale model of the hop that Kim Jong Un made at the Joint Security Area. This was a pretty big deal as the last time someone crossed the border into the North without an invitation, they were butchered with an ax.
Our tour concluded, we headed back to the city. Fooch wanted me to meet some of his friends, fellow ex-pats from England and Ireland, Adam and Joe, respectively. We got a few beers at a local convenience store then headed out for Korean Barbeque. It was delicious. After we headed out for drinks at an interesting if not riskily constructed bar on a second story. We talked about the current state of the world, Korea, America, and Europe. Joe’s views were a little too anti-Semitic for my liking, but Adam made an interesting point. As an expat, he felt that life in Europe, with its high taxes, socialist programs, and seeming endless need for immigrant labor, was falling. More astutely, failing the young and hopeful people from his generation. He said that Asia was the place where people should be manifesting their destinies. Fooch had to leave as it was already late, as did Joe, but Adam and I talked a few hours more, sipping English ale in Seoul. Relieving myself, I saw someone wrote on the wall ‘Do what you wanted to do when you were twelve.’ I realized at that moment, I was.
I made my way back to Adam, and as he needed to leave too as the workday was fast approaching. We said our goodbyes, and I headed back to my hostel. I packed what I could, took my final porn shower, and tucked into bed. In the morning, I would head to Hong Kong.
