Taebaeksan Trip

We just had a 4-day weekend for Cheosok, so we decided to go up to Taebaek, the center of coal mining in South Korea, for a little climbing and relaxing with our friends Kate and Chad. Taebaeksan is one of the holiest mountains in Korea. Something having to do with the Dangun Wanggeom - the founder of Korea, whom we celebrate with the national holiday Gaecheonjeol (ie. day off work) October 3. So atop each of the mastiff's peaks there are alters built to Dangun Wanggeom. Exercise, views, friends and culture -- who could ask for more?



Downtown Taebaek - the most cosmopolitan environment we've seen in a while!


Evidence of the cosmopolitan nature of Taebaek!


Walking around Taebaek we found a bookstore with some western literature, perhaps turned pornographic?


We had dinner at a little ajuma's place. Clockwise from the top left: naeng kong guksu (cold, soymilk noodle soup... probably the least appealing vegetarian dish I've found in Korea), naeng guksu (cold noodle soup, only marginally better than the soymilk version), bibim naeng guksu (mixed vegetable noodle soup - that red paste made it less bland than the other two soups at the table, and the hot broth next to it made it warm. I wouldn't seek it out again, but definitely better than the other two), and bibimbap (mixed vegetables and rice, the old standby). Check out the size of the chunks of radish kimchi in front of my bowl! No one was crazy enough to try to put one of those down. Besides Melanie's bibimbap, no body ate much of their dinner, so Kate, Chad and I went out for pizza a couple hours later. I guess we can't claim to have it too hard here if we can always go get a pizza! ;^>


We stayed in a "love motel", a pretty modest one as these things go. It was nice, the elevator was trippy though!


This beautiful lonely red tree greeted us as we started our ascent of Taebaek Mountain (Taebaeksan).


About an hour into the hike we came upon this beautiful temple hidden in the woods.


Us inside a tree!


The top of one of the several peaks we summitted.


An airfield just off to the side of the mountain, with what seems to be a dirt runway and landing strip. Note to self: don't fly into Taebaek!


An alter atop another peak.


Us just beyond the previous alter.


At the end of the hike we found this lake, which is the shape of the Korean Peninsula, and has labels for each of the major cities, and Taebaek.

So that was long weekend number one. The next is only two weeks away, at which point we'll have been paid and will be running off to Seoul for chickpeas, Mexican food and exotic spices, like cinnamon.

Trip to Seoraksan

Seoraksan is the third highest mountain in South Korea, and the highest in the Taebaek Range, in which we find ourselves living. On the fourth day of our orientation to the Gangwon-do EPIK program, we were bussed up to Seorak National Park and let loose. Having been couped up in a hotel for five days, we were pretty excited to get out and do some hiking. So we took off from the group, hoping to get some exercise and a nice view, and were immediately impressed with the mountain.

We went in a ways and found this quite helpful, if slightly cartoonish, map of the park. It's amazing how they can turn just about anything into a cartoon here!

Just a bit further up the path, we came across a gigantic statue of Buddha. I'd estimate it at 40-50 feet high! I love this photograph. If ever one of my photos has captured the contrast of modern and traditional Korea, this must be it.

After that we started hustling, as we had about two hours and really wanted to make it up to a cave called Geumgangul and had heard it's a tough hike up there. It was indeed a tough hike up. This next picture is from a platform just below the cave. You can see how tough a hike it was by how proud I look to be there. In the interest of full disclosure, the man who took this picture was wearing loafers. I don't know how Koreans do it.

Here's a look at the hike that remained from there. Thankfully, in Korea, there tend to be stairs leading to just about anywhere you might want to go.

I had left Melanie a bit down the mountain because we thought we wouldn't have time to make it up together. But lo and behold, just as I was leaving the cave, up the stairs she came! Here's a look from within the very modest cave. It contained three small statues of Buddha, a woman selling Buddhist wares (and coffee, of course), and lots of these hanging lanterns, the significance I'm unsure of.

We made it back to the bus in just over two and a half hours. It was a great hike for such a short time... plenty of culture, beautiful scenery and athletic challenge.

View from the Living Room

The title of this blog comes mostly from the idea that we each have our own perception of, and perspective on, reality. Whether reality exists independently of the observer or not, each of us clearly perceives it differently - based on our experiences, cultural values, expectations, and so on. So the title View from Gangwon-do (the name of the province in which we are living and teaching) is based on the fact that my ramblings might be of interest because I'm seeing different things day-in and day-out than those of you on the other side of the world, and also because my perception of the world from here will be different than it was when I was in the US, and different from yours. More different, I would guess, than the people you encounter on a daily basis, since their experiences are more closely paralleling yours.

But I also picked it this morning because of how striking the view from our apartment is. I had to choke back the tears when I opened the blinds this morning. The entire south wall of our living room is glass, which should be great. Yet we're planning on covering it with a tapestry. Here's is the view out of our 15 x 8 foot living room window:


Koreans have an amazing ability to make thier residences look like penatentiaries.

The view from my office (that's right, my office... we have been blessed with a 3-bedroom apartment, so I have an office for the first time in my life!) is slightly better, though through a much smaller window.



I'll post soon about our arrival in Samcheok, our first night of dinner and drinking with our bosses and co-workers, what we know about our school, and our day out yesterday with a co-worker. But for now the score is +1 for a nice 3-bedroom apartment, and -1 for a view of prison walls.