Take a Hike

I apologize for neglecting my internet web log these few days. Last week was my final week of teaching classes for the school year, but I've still been very busy. People keep inviting me to do things and I keep accepting. Until I learn how to say "no" in Korean, or make this web log more of a priority, you'll just have to use your imagination for how I'm doing (I update my internet photo album very often if you need a starting point). I've also been busy working on getting my Teaching English as a Foreign Language certificate through an internet class, and I've been planning lessons for next week. You see, even though last week was officially the last week of school for the year, I get the privilege of teaching an English Winter Camp for one week. I'll have two 90 minute classes each day that have inconveniently been separated based on grade level rather than ability. There's no book for me to follow, which is both good and bad, and my co-teachers suggested that I teach basic English conversation. I'm still trying to iron out my lesson plans, but for the lower grade I'll probably try and focus on a different question word (who, what, when, where, why, how) for each day and also have a theme for each day. There will probably be a lot of overlap for the second grade class, but I'll try to use more review material from what they have learned this last year as well. If this all sounds very boring to you, then don't worry, I'll probably end up teaching them conversation by having them watch reality dating shows and VH1's The Pick-Up Artist.

Last month, my main co-teacher informed me that the teachers of our school belong to various school clubs and that it was necessary for me to join one as well. I think the choices were something like a movie watching club, a badminton club and a hiking club. I always picture badminton as an outside activity on a summer day with some cool refreshing lemonade, and since it is winter I couldn't choose this club. So I ended up going with the hiking club. I went on my first hike with the club a couple of weeks later. We went to the park near the reservoir outside of the town. It wasn't really as much of a hike as it was a casual stroll through a park. I had actually already been to the park during my first week here when I was exploring my surroundings. Here's a couple pictures from then:



It's a small park for a hike as a loop around it is probably a kilometer. There's also a center for learning more about the wildlife that we visited. Inside, I learned about how nice the reservoir will look in the spring when the flowers bloom. There was also a room with pictures of birds that frequent the area, and some of the pictures had a button underneath that you could press to hear the bird call. I impressed the other members of the hiking club by cupping my hands to my mouth and blowing into them to imitate the bird calls. Near the center there was a little zoo/shack that housed various exotic animals. The other hikers weren't feeling adventurous and didn't want to go look at it, but when I went before I saw some pigeons, ducks, seagulls, rabbits and turkeys.

I enjoyed talking with all of the teachers, but the best part of the hiking club was learning that one of the teachers, Yeong Ki Bi (영긔비, which turns out to be a joke name because it is the name of a past beautiful Chinese empress; kind of like the Cleopatra of the far East), is in a real hiking club that travels to national parks and hikes the mountains there on the weekends. She said that I was welcome to join her and her husband with the club at anytime. The next week I asked her how her hiking trip with her club was, and I think she got confused and thought I wanted to go with them that upcoming weekend. Rather than try and sort out what I was asking, I ended up agreeing to go hiking.

I woke up early that next Saturday morning (blasphemy) and met Yeong Ki Bi and her husband at my school. They drove me to Suwon, the nearby city where they live and where the hiking club is based. The hiking club rents their own private bus for their hikes since there are about 50 people that go every weekend. It was a three hour bus ride south to Byeonsanbando (변산반도) National Park. I slept for most of the way, but woke up near the end and talked with the lady sitting next to me. She taught me some of the Korean language and showed me where we were going in my guide book.


Here's where we started. Our leader pointed his fancy hiking stick at the map and I assume he explained where we would be going. His tone was serious, but also inspiring. I felt like we were about to march out and fight the North.

We hiked past a temple, through a small gorge and by a 30m waterfall. After about 30 minutes we took a break and some pictures. We were at a big rock face and there was another hiking club drinking beer and having their break too.


Here I am with Yeong Ki Bi and her husband. I dressed for very cold weather and if you watch the slideshow of pictures at the end of this post you'll see how I'm wearing progressively less clothing until I'm finally naked and one with nature. Koreans all wear very fancy hiking clothes and carry the hiking poles. Yeong Ki Bi's husband gave me one to use. I told him how we just use sticks back home, but he didn't like the sound of that.

We hiked for a while longer until we got to the top of a small mountain. It was time for lunch, and I came prepared with kimbap, which is like Korean sushi. I learned that our hiking lunch was communal, which was nice because people shared their hot soups with me. Yeong Ki Bi's husband was disappointed that I did not bring any kimchi (spicy pickled cabbage), which is a necessity with every meal here. I felt awful and I hope to someday redeem myself and earn his respect. Seriously though, he's a cool guy that likes to joke around and is very friendly.


At the end of our hike was an old Buddhist temple. I really like how there are so many old relics and places in Korea. It makes the hikes really interesting and rewarding. In this picture, you can see some people in the upper right-hand corner, whom are drinking some special water. My head is blocking the orediden(sp?) or old tree, which has sort of significance that I can't remember.

That was the end of our hiking, but not the end of the day. We only hiked for about 3-4 hours, which didn't seem too long since the bus ride was nearly the same amount of time. We ended up going to a nearby town on the beach. A guy in our hiking club bought some raw oysters on the beach, and we all ate them and drank soju, a rice liquor. Someone also bought and shared some small hermit-crab-like seashells that were steamed. You have to suck the little guys out, and it was worth it as they were pretty good, but I might be biased since I love seafood. One of the guys was being nice and held out his hand for us to put our empty shells for easy disposable. The other hikers pointed at him and said something in Korean, which I'm assuming was a joke about him collecting the shells since they all laughed. I asked/mimed if he was making a necklace out of them and they thought that was funny too.

The club was really prepared, they brought a big gas tank, burner and huge pot with soup in it. They made an ahmu (fish noodle) soup and a ramen soup. They brought out a big case of soju and there was this little lady in a pink hat that went around filling up everyone's dixie cup and getting hers filled in return (in Korean culture you never pour yourself a drink). It was a really fun and cheerful way to end the day. I had a really good time hiking and meeting the members of the club. They were all very friendly and kept wanting to get their picture taken with me during the hike. They would speak as much English as they could with me and I would reciprocate as best as I could with my limited Korean. I'll definitely be going with them again, so expect some more pictures of the Korean land in the future.