Episode 55: Final Day

My final day was spent frantically trying to get my luggage, my money, and then get on my plane, followed by a 25 hour journey home. In short, it was the most hectic day ever.

When I left Tyler’s home for Busan last week, I had only taken one small suitcase for the trip and had left my other, larger suitcase there (at Tyler's home). I had planned to get the suitcase last night when I came back from Daejeon, thus saving me a trip in the morning, but due to Jun’s test I had to push back my departure from Daejeon, subsequently arriving in Seoul too late to get my luggage.

Tyler works during the morning and the afternoons, so I only had a small window of opportunity to meet him at his home today to get my luggage back before my flight back to Canada. The trip to his home takes an hour each way, and so I did not arrive back to Jin Guesthouse (where I was staying again) until 2:30 PM.

I still had to get to the airport for a 5:20 boarding call, and the trip to Incheon takes about an hour and a half. Before I could leave for the airport though, I had to first collect my salary for December from my boss. My salary had not been available before I left, because all the schools were on holidays, so I had to wait until today to get my salary.

Unfortunately, there were some issues with the bank, and the money did not clear until the last minute. I was too late to catch the unbelievably comfortable airport limousine (bus), so I had to hail a cab. I made sure this time to get a grey cab, instead of one of the unbelievably expensive black cabs like I got tricked into taking on the trip to Seoul from the airport back in August.

Thanks to my driver going 140 km/h in 80 km/h zones (Korean "bullet taxis" rule), I was able to make up considerable time and actually beat the airport limousine bus I would have been taking back to the airport (we passed it on the Incheon bridge). Unfortunately, a group of ten Koreans tried to buy tickets at the last minute in the Baggage Check-in Line, and so I was forced to spend 45 minutes waiting as I watched my extra time waste away. Just as it was my turn to approach the desk, the employee decided to shut down his station, and so I had to go to the end of another line and wait there as yet more precious minutes ticked away.

When I did finally get my luggage checked in, I had about 5 minutes until my plane started boarding on the other side of the airport. I was told to "hurry there", but I still had to exchange my massive wad of Korean won for Canadian dollars (I had about two month’s worth of salary in the equivalent of $10 bills to exchange).

Some may wonder why I would not just exchange my money in Canada and head to my plane, but The Royal Bank of Canada buys Korean won at about 75% of the going rate, and I wasn't about to lose half a month’s worth of money to the fat cats at the RBC. I did bite the bullet in the end and go to a currency exchange place at Incheon International Airport, because I didn't have time to find the right bank amidst all the duty free shops and restaurants. However, it didn't really matter because the rates at this booth were only 5/1000 of a dollar, per dollar, than the bank's rate to which I would have gone, and only 1/100 of a dollar, per dollar, more than the going exchange rate for changing Korean won to Canadian dollars.

After the man at the exchange booth took his sweet time exchanging my money (I can’t blame him too much, as he needed to find a suitcase in which to store it all), I had negative three minutes to get across the airport and board my plane.

At the security area, another plane was boarding at the same time, and so I got stuck in a swarm of people. To make matters worse, the line I was in shut down three people before I got to the conveyor belt to scan my carry on luggage, and so I had to go to the back of a different line and wait all over again.

When I finally did make it through security, I then had to get through immigration, race across the airport and down four stories to the monorail train that would take me to the International departures area, where I then had to race back up four floors to finally make it to my gate, where I made it on the plane with just six people to spare.

Unlike my flight from Canada to Seoul in August, the trip back across the ocean was quite comfortable. I even made it to the luggage carousel at the Vancouver International Airport and picked up my luggage in time to get to check it on my next plane (during my trip in May I nearly missed my flight because I forgot my carry-on in the overhead compartment of the plane from Seoul).

However, the young Korean I had met on the plane could not find one of his bags because another passenger had mistaken it for his/her identical piece of luggage earlier. Add to this delay the fact that I misplaced my customs declarations slip and had to retrace all my steps to find it again, and I once again found myself in another tight race to board my next plane. Eventually though I made it home, and my second journey to Korea finally came to an end.

Epilogue:

Many people ask me what my plans are now, or if I’ll ever go back to Korea. At the moment I have 8 Korean textbooks, and when I have mastered each book and committed them all to memory I plan to return to Korea to study Korean as a Second Language.

Eventually my goal is to master Korean so well, that I can become one of the few, if not the first ever Westerner to teach a subject in Korean in a Korean public school. In short, I hope to become a real Korean school teacher.

Episode 37: In Which DFM Helps The Chinese, And Blames The Japanese

On Friday (the climbing trip was last week), Ji-hyeun told me that her, Choi, and Na-ra (the only regular climber at Ace younger than me), were going out for an afternoon in Dongdaemun the next day. It had been quite some time since I had been to Dongdaemun and since I hadn't anything planned for the day I decided to come along (don't worry, I was invited).

Dongdaemun is of course one of the main gates of the old city wall (mun means door/gate). While most of the other gates have been destroyed by natural causes or arson (Namdaemun), Dongdaemun is still standing tall. Apart from the large gate though, the Dongdaemun area is probably most famous for its massive market. When I came here in March I did not explore the market as much as I had Namdaemun Market with Nelson (my Filipino friend), so I did not get an appreciation for just how large it really is. All that changed today.

Dongdaemun market is massive. Ji-hyeun told me that during the Silla dynasty (57 BC - 935 AD), part of the area contained within the present Dongdaemun Market was the major market in the Silla Kingdom (the precursor to Korea). Obviously, from my wording of that last sentence, the present market hasn't lost any of its size.

While the massive, nine-floor Hyundai Department stores are impressive in the range of products they offer, customers are nonetheless often limited in variety. At Dongdaemun market though, customers will be blown away by the incredible number of stores, each specializing in a different product/service. I saw a few shops selling more or less just umbrellas, and one building contained three large floors, with 70+ merchants on each floor, all selling fabric and other sewing related materials (buttons, snaps, etc.).

Next, we strolled along Cheongyecheon (nothing new to talk about there) and through the famous Insadong street I've talked about many times. This is my third time walking the length of Insadong street, and at least my fifth time here in total. It's promoted heavily by the City of Seoul as a must see experience, and touted for the "traditional" souvenirs, but to be honest after five visits it is no more exciting than Whyte Ave in Edmonton (which is to say it is not entirely without its merits either).

(To be fair to Insadong, there were actually a few master craftsmen working their art, like this man making hand made tops that spin perfectly in place.)

When you tire of shopping in Dongdaemun Market, you can visit one of the numerous food vendors crammed so close together that if you rub your eyes whilst walking you will easily miss one. Compared with the over-priced, poor quality, poor service restaurants that are overrunning Alberta (or at least were, before "the crash"), Seoul's tiny, inexpensive, "hole-in-the-wall" restaurants and cheap street vendors are what I imagine dining in Heaven would be like, if there was dining in Heaven. I've written before about how much I enjoy the culture of eating and sharing food in Korea, and being able to share it with my friends from Ace was another highlight of this great day.

Before we walked through Insadong street, we went to Tapgol park. Tapgol means "pagoda," and there is a 12 m, 10 level marble pagoda in the centre that is National Treasure #2 for Korea (it's surrounded by an ugly glass case though, so I didn't take a picture).

Constructed in 1471, the pagoda was apparently the only thing left remaining from Wongaksa, a temple which was destroyed in 1515. While I cannot find any evidence to support it, and the date of destruction would seem to suggest against it, I'm going to go ahead and blame the Japanese for destroying the temple, because I'm half-Korean now and so I hate the Japanese.

Tapgol Park was also the site of the signing and reading of the Korean Declaration of Independence to Japanese Colonial rule, on March 1st, 1919. However, as Ji-hyeun said, it is now just a place for "old men to kill time."

Eventually it was time for my Ace friends to leave (we had been out for four and a half hours), but I decided to hang around in Jongnak station for a while (it had a book store) until I received a phone call I was expecting.

While I was admiring the subway map and how I had walked past three subway stations, on three different lines, during the afternoon, a couple of Chinese tourists approached me to ask me for advice.

They were in Seoul for only three days, and wanted to know how to get to Itaewon and Apgujeong, and which place I thought was more exciting. Having lived in Itaewon for two months, and having received second rate dental service, from a "first rate" dentist, in Apgujeong, I could happily tell them to go to neither, but rather walk along Cheongyecheon and visit the nearby Gwanghwamun and statue of King Sejong instead.

* * * * *

Back in April I met a young man from Slovenia, visiting his girlfriend, on the subway. His name was Mitja, and we had communicated with each over the summer while he was finishing up his degree in Physics. Coincidentally, he was back in Seoul at the same time I was, and today we decided to meet up in Anam-dong where he lives (Anam-dong is nearby my one of my schools, and is where I have coffee with Elise every Thursday).

I had only planned to talk for an hour, but anyone who knows me knows that is an impossibility. I felt sorry for Mitja's girfriend, because she was the odd person out on what amounted to a non-stop, four hour conversation between two people who really like to talk... way too much.

I probably should have paid better attention to the time, because when I tried to get on the subway I found out that the subway from Anam-dong closes a lot earlier than that from Jeungsan (my home station), and I thought I might get stuck on the other side of the city.

Sadly, I was able to flag down a taxi (sad because they were now operating on the increased night prices). I was hoping to just sit quietly in the back and watch my money disappear as the numbers on the meter raced higher, but the driver insisted on chatting to me in Korean the whole trip.

Amazingly, I was able to understand almost everything he asked, and we ended up having a pleasant conversation. The driver must have been appreciative of my efforts to learn Korean, because he soon picked up the pace, and it wasn't long before we were racing across Seoul at well over the speed limit. I can say for certain now that the grip on the Sonata's tires far exceeds the grip between the bottom of my jeans and the seat.

Korea Trip II: Electric Boogaloo

Before I left Korea the last time I was here, I promised my friends I would return as soon as I could. My boss joked about blocking my trip home so I'd have to stay, and Ji-hyeun at Ace even said she would hold onto the gift she had not been able to give me before I left the last time until I returned. I was touched by generosity I was shown, and really did want to return, but part of me wanted to follow the lemming-like urge to start my career too. Originally I had planned to work a year in Canada as a teacher before coming back to Korea. However, the high quality job prospects for new graduates are not favourable in education (not that they are in any other industry either), so I decided some time in June to return to Korea early.

I had hoped to return to the school at which I was teaching before, and so I went about the process of securing a work visa. The process was simple enough, but definitely required a lot of preparation on my part gathering the requisite certificates of health, blood work, letters of recommendation, etc. I had procured the necessary items well in advance of my intended departure, but I ended up having to wait an agonizingly long time to receive a bank statement proving I had enough money on hand to not get myself into any significant trouble in the possibility that I could not find work here.

After sending off my visa application via Canada Post's Priority Courier service, I waited in agony for my visa (and passport) to return from The Consualte General of Korea's office in Vancouver. Unfortunately, while the Korean government officials are relatively fast and efficient, Canada Post's courier service to Hillbilly Hell is not (not that I can blame them). I had to cancel my plane ticket to Korea and, since I now realise I was using the wrong tracking number, I could not tell when or where my return envelope was located, so I could not tell when to buy the new ticket.

This was on Friday. On Monday morning my visa and passport made a surprising arrial at my door, subsequently triggering a frantic race to pack up and find the earliest flight to Korea. I stayed up late into the night and travelled five hours by car to reach the nearest International airport for my flight the next morning. From there I embarked on about 20 hours of flying and sitting in airports finally arriving in Seoul the next day (I crossed the International Date Line), exhausted after having not slept significantly in the last 40 hours.

Before being allowed to board my plane to Seoul though, I was stopped by a Canadian Customs officer who was trying to investigate some sort of potential scandal involving the flow of copious amounts of Canadian dollars from the country. Now, whether my story seemed suspicious or the officer was just intrigued by my choice of "alternative lifestyle" I'll never know, but "a few questions" about my trip to Korea somehow turned into a fifteen minute interrogation about my motives for leaving the country. Eventually I was able to convince the officer I was not tied up in some international money smuggling operation (or whatever it was she was investigating) and was allowed to leave.

When I arrived at Inchon airport, just outside of Seoul, I was approached by a Korean man asking me if I had someone picking me up. I thought to myself, "this is probably a taxi cab driver looking to pick up the rich foreign tourist and make a few bucks." If I had only one suitcase, and a bit more rest I might have ignored him and taken the 2 hour subway ride to meet my friend Lee at our house. However, I did not want to roll around two heavy and bulky suitcases through the busy rush hour subway tunnels and trains, nor was I in the mood for a further two hour trip. I agreed to let the man take me to my destination, thinking that in the land of $1.75 taxis the trip couldn't possible cost more than $45. In fact, I'm pretty sure I remember reading that a taxi from the airport to Seoul was only $45 in my Lonely Planet guide book the last time I was here.

Typically, when you get into a Seoul taxi, the meter will start at 1900 Won (about $1.80). From there you will drive a few blocks before the meter goes up about ten cents every five seconds or so. In this cab, the meter started at 4000 Won (about $4.00). And from there, it would increase $0.25 every few seconds. The trip from the airport to my destination was about 40 km, so by the time I got home my ride had cost me $100. And as if that wasn't enough, I had to pay the $7.50 toll charge to enter the freeway too. You'd think for a $100 ride the driver could manage throw in the toll.

I wasn't too worried about it though, and I cannot claim that the driver was trying to go slow, or take a wrong route. The GPS definitely took him in the quickest direction, the roads were relatively free from traffic (especially compared to the completely clogged up overpass we went under at one point), and we travelled in the outside, fast lane the whole way there. Also, the air conditioning system did a good job helping me forget I had been sitting in a plane in the same clothes for 17 hours. It was in no way worth $100, but next time I'll know better. When I later told Lee about the ordeal he laughed and told me, "you are victim."

Many people will want to know about my house. My house is very similar to the very first place at which I stayed my first night in Korea on my last adventure, and this did not surprise me at all. There were two relatively large bedrooms that shared a common kitchen and bathroom. This seems pretty common as far as "teacher dwellings" go. The fridge was tiny, but at least I had one this time.

As for the company, Lee and his young wife are nice, and we get along well. She was born in Belarus, graduated University in Moscow and learned English in Australia. The house is a real multicultural melting pot where none of the words are really said correctly, but most of what is said comes through.

Now let the second, straight-to-DVD, DFM Korea Adventure begin!

Episode 36: In Which DFM Locks Himself In A Coffin And Buys Stale Rice Cakes

I have a busy weekend ahead, so I wanted to slowly whittle away at my sightseeing list a bit more today.  Up next on the list was the Seodaemun Prison.  

When the Japanese occupied Korea in 1910 they were met with a lot of resistance from the Korean people.  In an attempt to crush the fighting spirit of the anti-Japanese independence movement, Japan built what is now called Seodaemun Prison.

The first part of my self-guided tour (I didn't have time to stick around for the English tour later in the day) involved exploring the museum.  Unfortunately I was not allowed to take many pictures, but most of what I saw and felt could not be adequately captured in a picture.  

One of the few pictures I was allowed to take, it's a torture device called The Standing Coffin.  The prisoner goes inside where my backpack is, and the door is closed shut.  I stood inside and closed the door on myself.  My shoulders just squeezed in between the walls and when I closed the door there was barely enough room to breathe.  Prisoners would be locked inside for three days at a time and the lack of movement would cause paralysis.

My first "experience" at the museum involved peering over through the bars into a replica of a small cell.  The cell was about the size of my old gosiwon room, perhaps a little narrower, and was completely barren.

Because I'm so short I had to get right up near the "window" to be able to peer into the cell.  I had planned to see an empty cell, but instead I was greeted with a man sitting cross-legged on the bare floor by himself in his small cell.  My heart almost stopped beating I was so scared.  I jumped back, thinking it was a real person, but then I took a second peek and saw that it was just a life-sized model.  This first experience set the tone for the rest of the tour.

I next walked through the Torture Room.  Every so often I would trigger the motion-sensing device and ear-piercing screams would go off and a light in the formerly pitch dark cell beside me would snap on and a scene of unthinkable torture would be depicted by the mechanical models inside.  There was electrocution, ripping out fingernails, sticking a sharp knife under the fingernails, lashings, floggings, beatings, violent rapes of female prisoners, and of course having your finger prints forced onto a false testimony of guilt.  Before the end of it all my stomach felt sick and I started to dread taking another step and seeing what would happen next.  Eventually I got through the Torture Room though,  and was rewarded with a trip to the Execution Room.

The Execution Room looked like an interactive display.  I approached the box sitting on the trap door and above me hung a noose.  I wasn't sure what would happen, but there was a sign on the glass that said "not for children or pregnant women."  I started to get really apprehensive.  I thought that the trap door would fall and I would get a nasty drop, but sadly nothing happened at all and I was able to wobble away on my still shaking knees.

To be honest, the rest of the visit was less exciting than this first part.  I got to wander through the actual prison cell building and even walk into a real cell that was used to house a prisoner or twelve back during the Occupation.  Many of the buildings are now considered National Historic Treasures and while I was here some restorative work was being done on parts of them so I could not explore everything fully.

This photo was taking outside of the entrance to the actual Execution Grounds.  I wasn't able to take a picture inside (a sign said no pictures) but I was allowed to take a picture of this tree.  It's called the Wailing Willow and every Korean who was brought past it would grab on and wail before passing through the doors to the sit on the real version of the box I sat on before (the real box drops though).

I generally try not to  be a bleeding heart about things, but between the War Memorial Museum and this one, and also talking to many Koreans like Young San and Joseph (from the KTX ride to Busan), I've come to realize that war is nasty business.  Living in Western Canada it has always been convenient for me to view war as something that happens in other countries.  But here in Korea, war is something that has happened here, and is still technically happening.

After leaving the prison I wandered across the street to see if I could find some lunch.  I had tried to fill up on kimbab before I left home, but the rice steamer was empty (it's a much smaller steamer than at my other place and it runs out quite often).

I found a small mart (a mini-grocery store) and bought some orange juice for my cold and some strawberries and what I thought was tteok.  I took the strawberries and tteok to climbing with me and decided to share them with everyone since people are always sharing their food with me.  (It seems customary to bring food for others and then have them bring food for you).  

At first I was worried that I had bought really old tteok that had become stale and hard, but Choi assured me that it was not tteok, but rather a Korean traditional cookie called yakgwa.  Whatever they were, they were delicious and I ate so many my stomach felt sick.  The strawberries were delicious as well and I got a few compliments on them.  

My gesture also seemed to gain me some cultural points, as Choi started to teach me the words reserved for friends so that I could become one of the gang.

At one point I saw Ji-Hyeun staring at something with the owner of the Suwon climbing gym, who was a guest of Choi's that day.  It turned out to be a large trophy that the gym had won by competing as a team in the annual Suwon climbing tournament.  The owner of the Suwon gym invited me to climb at his competition as part of the Ace Climbing Team, but unfortunately the competition was to be held sometime in late May after I would have already left for home.

After climbing I went to buy some new shirts for work because I didn't like the last ones I had  bought.  This time I went to another large Korean department store called E-Mart.  I found some nice looking shirts, and even a pair of pants, but unfortunately the sleeves aren't really meant for rock climbing arms, and they feel really tight when I move my arms above my head.  I guess this means no more "nopi!"(high! or "lift me up!") for the children.

It took me quite a while to find a pair of jeans that weren't pre-faded and/or had decorative holes in them (WWHHD: "I hate those pants more than life itself...").  In fact, it took me two hours of searching over the same few clothes for men and eventually I became late for my meeting with Hyeun A to learn more Korean.  I took a taxi from the store, but it was rush hour now and the car barely moved.  It cost 10 times as much as a subway ticket to take the taxi, but I did make it home a bit quicker, so it was worth it.

After dropping off my bags, I ran all the way to Hyeun A's office about ten minutes away.  I wasn't really thinking clearly by this time and managed to make a wrong turn again (where there was no turn).  I knew I was close but couldn't recognize exactly where I was or where I had gone wrong.  I phoned Hyeun A and over the course of the next half hour, Hyeun A, Lee and I played a frustrating game of hide and seek, except everyone was seeking, and turned out to be just tracing each other's footsteps in a circle.  Eventually I found Hyeun A, though, and we had our lesson.

I've been in Korea for long enough now that I'm starting to become more accustomed to hearing all the different suffixes that are used and why they're used.  I've also surprisingly picked up enough odd words from the children I teach that Hyeun A no longer needs to translate my lessons from Hangul to English.  I can now use the few key words I know to remember what each new sentence (written entirely in Korean) means.  It was quite a big moment for me, and I celebrated by running home and watching the newest Sasuke tournament (long time readers of the blog should recognize this as one of my favourite shows).

This latest tournament was historic in that it is the first time since the course was redisigned, five tournaments ago, that someone has reached the final stage.  Even though I was supposed to wake up early the next morning I was so excited I watched the whole 3 hour show until 2:30 AM.  It was so exciting I'll probably watch it again as soon as I get a free moment.

Episode 24: In Which DFM Comes Face To Face With A Man Eating Beast And Fish Learn How To Drive Cars

Wow, it's been a few days since I've posted. My Internet went down again and so I was unable to update you on my adventures. Time to make up for it, because today was the day I've been planning for all month - the day of the big shark dive!

I got up at 6:00 AM to catch an early morning KTX train to Busan. The KTX train travels at speeds up to 305 km/h. When it was first built it cut the time of the trip to Busan from Seoul down to 1 hour 50 minutes (from about 5 hours). But, since its creation more and more stops have been added and the the trip now takes roughly 3 hours.

The train is a lot like flying in an airplane, but a bit less comfortable and only half as fast. However, it sure beats taking a bus and it costs about the same price as a taxi to an International airport from the center of a big city.

My neighbour for the trip to Busan was Joseph. Joseph is a bit of an anomaly in that he managed to pick up a perfect North American accent for his pefectly fluent English, without ever having lived outside of Korea. Joseph was on a business trip this morning for his company which franchises English schools. Joseph was nice enough to give me a strip of his pastry, since I did not think to bring anything for the trip, and he also spent most of the trip explaining to me the history of Korea from the invasion of the Mongols to the beginning of the Korean War. Don't think he was boring me though, I was fascinated and kept begging him for more information.

I severely underestimated how long it took to get from Busan Station to Haeundae beach by subway. Quite soon I realized there were far more stops than I anticipated, and that I was not going to make it in time, so I jumped off and tried to catch a cab. I got in the first cab that stopped for me and tried to do up my seat belt There was only a strap with a hook, but no catch though, so I just imagined a seat belt.

The cab driver did not speak English, but he was so happy with my infinitesimally small amount of Korean and that I was Canadian that he phoned up (and woke up) his daughter, who had studied in Canada, to talk to me in English. This has happened to me quite often since I've come to Korea and it is always awkward for both parties.

The taxi driver then realized that I was speaking Seoulese (people in Busan speak a different dialect of Korean than do those people in Seoul) and decided to "correct" my Korean with some impromptu lessons, but I couldn't understand a word he was saying. He got me to Busan Aquarium though, and that's all that mattered.

The Aquarium is located right on Haeundae beach, which is a beautiful beach in a beautiful area of Busan, which is itself quite a beautiful city.

When I was dropped off I was five minutes late. I couldn't see any signs for the diving, and when I went to the front desk to ask where the shark diving was I was told that there was no shark diving. Undaunted, I went over to the Information Office and was told that I should go under ground. I went underground and someone pointed me up a set of stairs, but these stairs just led back out onto the beach. Eventually, after twenty minutes of searching, I finally found someone who could direct me to the course, which was in fact at Busan Aquarium.

After filling out the requisite paper work and watching some training videos the other four divers and myself got on our wetsuits and goggles and went over to the training pool.

On the way over we saw a separate pool of about eight Lemon Sharks swimming around. Lemon Sharks are about 9 feet long and are aggressive hunters and they had been separated because they were eating the other animals in the aquarium. These animals cost tens of thousands of dollars each, and the Lemon Sharks had caused an entire species of stingray to "disappear" from the aquarium as well as having torn the fins of and scarred the bodies of a number of the Sand Tiger Sharks. The aquarium had put a number of giant tuna fish in to attract the teeth of the Lemon Sharks instead, but Lemon Sharks are smarter than that and did not touch the tuna. We were actually one of the last two groups to ever see the Lemon Sharks, since they were being shipped to Thailand on Monday (this happened on Saturday).

This is my diving team. Michael, the instructor, is on the left, and then there are Takayla and Jake from North and South Dakota (not sure whom is from where), Justin from Baltimore, and Maggie from Pittsburgh. All four of the Americans are English teachers near/in Busan and probably had a much easier time getting to the aquarium than I did.

Justin teaches at a school for the children of rich parents. Many of his students are the children of doctors or lawyers and are rather spoiled. One of his students is the daughter of a Korean professional baseball player. His classroom is wired by CCTV and the housewife mothers spend all day scrutinizing his teaching in the viewing room. As stressful as that sounds he seems to have adjusted admirably and was very excited about the dive. I was happy to hear from him later that two of his students were visitors to the aquarium that day and had waved to him through the glass.

We took pictures of the dive with Michael's underwater camera, but since they aren't up on the website yet I'll just show some of the best pictures of past dives with a few extras I found on the Internet of some of the other animals we saw.

The Sand Tiger Shark, which I shot afterwards through the glass from the outside looking in. The Aussies, whom regular readers of this blog know are XXXX rated, only refer to this as a Grey Nurse Shark.

Lest you thought I was lying about being in the aquarium with sharks.

This is a picture of a Green Turtle, over some coral reef in Hawaii. The Green Turtle was my favourite animal in the aquarium. Apparently it is rather aggressive and thinks that every diver in the pool is going to bring him food. Michael put him in a holding pen behind us while we were training, and when I was not being instructed I would turn around every chance I could get to look at the turtle who was always staring me right in the eyes and/or snapping its mouth at my face. Being close enough to have my fingers (or nose) bitten by such a majestic creature was really exciting; it made my hair stand on end and my heart race.

This is a diver from another group, but I had a very similar experience myself. After lowering down into the giant tank (a round tank of roughly 30 yards diameter and 8 meters depth) I knelt down to wait for the other divers. While I was waiting I was welcomed by a curious Grouper fish. This species of fish has been caught in the wild and found to have an entire human inside of its stomach. Today it thought it would swim over and come within about two feet of my face. I was so excited I forgot to breathe and thought something was wrong with my respirator. How can a fish be big enough to eat a human, you ask?

This is how.

Obviously I didn't take this picture myself, but this is an exact reenactment of my first minutes diving in the aquarium, except I was on the other side of the glass.

After diving I was starving, so Maggie and I went over to an American pizza restaurant to indulge in some "Western food." Back in Canada I used to love pizza, but after eating so much fantastic Korean food with its exceptional spices and exotic flavours I found pizza quite bland. Maggie said that she used to love bacon but found it disgusting when she went home after her first year of teaching in Korea. I'm going to go back home in a month and not be able to eat anything but rice.

After pizza we went back to the aquarium and our shark diving experience counted as admission to the aquarium as well, so it was "free."

These piranhas look like they've already finished their last meal.

Catfish are called "maggie" in Korean, so Maggie insisted on taking some pictures.

This Jackass Penguin (that's its real name) spent all day diving down into the water to look at the guests. It was quite a hit with the children.

One of the highlights was when I got to hold this real live sea urchin in my hands at the petting tank. Maggie said that it was rare to find an urchin that still had all of its quills. I guess they tend to get broken off by all the people handling them.

"Do you know what that sound is, Highness? Those are the Shrieking Eels! If you don't believe me, just wait. They always grow louder when they're about to feed on human flesh!"

What do you get for the fish who has everything? How about a car. Hyundai shows what the inside of James Bond's Lotus should have looked like after he drove out of the lake in The Spy Who Loved Me.

Best day of the trip so far by a long shot. If you're in Korea make sure you head to Busan for the shark diving experience. You can find more information here.

Episode 16: In Which DFM Gets Taken Away In The Back Of A White Panel Van

Today was supposed to be the day that Lee Young San (the guy I met at the bath house/sauna the other night) and I were going to meet with some of his coworkers from his office so that I could help them with their English.  Lee phoned me to confirm that I could make it and I made my final preparations.  Then, with only a few minutes before I was ready to set out Lee phoned me again to tell me he was swamped with work (at 7:30 on a Friday night?) and that he would not be able to make it, but I was to go meet his coworkers anyways who would come meet me.  He said that he had "sms"d me her name and phone number (what a text message is called everywhere else in the world), but he did not know that I had not yet figured out how to check my sms messages on my Korean phone yet.

I set out for the prearranged meeting place to meet my blind date.  In a country where "everyone looks the same" and I didn't even know what my date looked like, I was basically waiting for her to find me.

Along the way there was a massive argument as some young Korean man was having some sort of problem with the white owner of the pub attached to my gosiwon.  It was quite a yelling match and all the middle-aged white, pot-bellied bar owners from the street (quite a funny sight in Korea) had gathered to show consolidarity.

After about fifteen minutes of waiting I started to get worried that one of the many women waiting behind me was my date.  I met a Korean woman who was also waiting for her date and we had a pleasant chat.  Her name was Amy and she spoke in impeccable English.  Apparently she had lived for six years in America when she was younger and now possessed a fluent version of both languages.  I told her my predicament and wondered if I was just missing something, or if I was just trapped in Korean Time.  She asked how long I had been waiting, and when I said my date was fifteen minutes late Amy said that there was still lots of time left in Korean Time for her to arrive.  Eventually my date found me after a half-hour of waiting.  I was not bored in the mean time though, for even after Amy left I still had a young Korean man I met the other day try to set find Korean women to talk to me (unsuccessfully), and a 65-year-old prostitute tried to get me to take her home.

My date's name was Song Hyeon A (the first time I've seen a Korean name only one letter long).  She spoke very little English and was understandably quite nervous at first.  She tried to express in broken English that she would like to eat, but did not know anywhere to eat in Itaewon.  Being the true gentleman and ladies man that I am I of course took her to KFC, where I was more than happy to let her pay for both of our meals.  (Note:  Lee Young San later told me that he made her pay for the meals because "his friend was doing her a great favour by helping her with her English...")

After dinner and a surprisingly good conversation we set up another date when we would both prepare some material (me in English and her in Korean) to teach the other participant.  I suggested a BBQ place across the street that had been recommended to me, but later regretted it as I figured I might have to actually pay for my meal and maybe hers this time.  

Special note on the KFCs in Korea:  My classic chicken combo came with only two small pieces of chicken, small fries (the kiddie sized ones in the bag) and a small soda.  I tried to tell Hyeun A that in Canada we get about two to three times that amount in our combos, but she could not grasp how a person could eat that much and not get fat....

We went back to the street to wait for Lee (Young San likes to be called Lee).  Lee came up dressed to party with his English teacher Canadian friend, Thom, from Vancouver.  I started to think the whole "busy at work" line was just a ploy.  Hyeun A had to go home so Thom and Lee decided to take me along to the B1 club very near to my gosiwon.  I decided to come along for a bit thinking I'd stay for an hour and then go home (I didn't want to seem rude).  Little did I know what I was in for.

Lee is of course a very friendly guy and so is Thom.  Thom had the same bottom of the line phone that I did and he told me stories about how his eleven year old students laughed at him the first time he took it out in class and then showed him their state of the art touch-screen phones.  (I have since been informed that it is next to impossible for foreigners to get a good phone with an actual contract in Korea.)  Thom was able to teach me how to send and check my text messages and also how to save numbers in my memory.  He said that it was the veteran ex-pat's job to teach the newbie how things worked in Korea.

The B1 club was a really nice club.  Like many thing in Korea it was rather small, but a lot of money had been put into the decor.  There was even an area that was like a couch and a bed combined, with cushions.  I observed that to get these seats, you could reserve the table with the cushions, or just be a woman trying desparately to attract the attention of a man.

Actually, all the tables at the club seemed to be reserved, and we didn't have a reservation, but Lee knew one of the bartenders/waiters and so we got to rotate around the tables and sit there until their rightful owners came along.

Eventually Heedo (in the black) and David came along and we took Heedo's turbo-charged Hyundai panel van to Sinchon (wherever that is).  Thom, Dave and I had to ride in the back of the van.  There were no seats in the back since it was basically a transport van.  The ride was bumpy and we slid around a lot.  It felt like we were Albanians being smuggled out of the country to freedom.  (You can see from the picture that David had this wallet that shot out a giant flame, and he was quite eager and happy to show it off any time you asked... or if there was a girl around.)

Sinchon is a big University district and the clubs there are much more American style.  The rooms are still small, but the music is loud and everyone packs in to the center of the room and "dances" (or whatever the young people do these days).  The first club we went to was called "Mike's... Something, Oh I Forgot (not the name of the club)."  They played a lot of popular Western dance music and at least 35% of the club goers here were white.  A good chunk of them were probably English teachers, but there were two or three middle-aged white guys standing at the back who seemed really out of place.

Dave and Heedo were having a great time on the dance floor (Dave has his hands by his face, "raving" I assume, and you can see Heedo trying to get his face in the picture down in the bottom left-hand corner).  Lee and I do not dance so we stood on the side and/or played Foosball.  Thom had gotten sick from the van ride over and decided to take a taxi back to Itaewon.

 

Lee and I met Ed, an English teacher from Norway, who wrote the message regarding the Swedish.  Ed explained that the Norwegians and Swedish were always taking friendly pot shots at each other, because "they were basically the same... except that Norway had oil."  Ed was very generous and was always trying to give me things.  Unfortunately those things rarely belonged to Ed, like the beer he tried to give me that belonged to Heedo.

Heedo liked the Mike's place so much that he decided to stay, and Dave, Lee and I decided to move on.  The taxi cab drivers are shifty characters in Seoul and so they only pick up fairs who will be traveling a long distance late at night (more money for the drivers that way), so we had to walk.  We even saw two cabbies get in a fight because one had parked in the other's spot.

Lee bought Dave and I some real kimbap (apparently what I've been eating is just kim) and some tteokbokki (pronounced something like "dock bo-key") and then it was on to the next club.  Up until this point I actually thought we were walking to find a cab home, but apparently we were just on our way to another University district for more clubs.

We came to a place called The Club, and there was a Led Zeppelin cover band on the stage.  I'd love to make fun of them here, but they were actually really good.  There were a lot of white people here though.  I'd estimate roughly 65% of the crowd was white, or more.  Lee confessed to me that this was not his scene, and we sat on the side and watched Dave try to pick up white girls (apparently Dave only goes for white girls, which means he should probably move to a different country).

Eventually 4 AM rolled around and Lee and I left to find a cab (the cab fares drop back down to normal price at 4 AM).  Dave had moved on to some other club, but I was amazed that when Lee and I left at 4 the streets were still packed with people, and the clubs were still as full as at 12.  I was even more amazed to see people walking around trying to sell kebabs or operating street food vending stands.  I don't think the clubs close down until 5 AM, and you can bet that they will still have to kick people out even then.

Outside we saw a couple of really drunk people stumbling around in the streets.  I'm not sure if this is for show or what the deal is, but drunk people in Korea all act the same way.  One person will assume the role of absolutely hammered person, while his friend plays the only partially drunk person.  The partially drunk friend will hold the arm of the hammered friend while the two stumble down the street in a large weaving pattern.  Every few steps the hammered friend will pull a great escape move and attempt to stumble back into the street in between the taxi cabs.  The semi-drunk friend will then lead him slowly and in a three steps forward, two steps back fashion until they get back to the sidewalk where the whole routine happens again.  I've seen the exact same performance with men in business suits as well, so I think it's just the accepted way of being drunk.  Regardless, it's quite humerous to watch.  The taxi cabs for their part seem to expect it and always go slow by the clubs.

Eventually I got back to Itaewon at around 4:30 AM, and went to sleep.  Before I knew I would be staying out all night I had agreed to meet Conor in Dongdaemun the next morning, so that meant I will only be getting about 5 hours of sleep this night.  Sounds like fun.

Gloating:  Despite the "promises" of those around me I was able to make it all night while only drinking one beer.  I only drank that one because it was a Korean beer that Thom had bought for me before I could say no (I'm not a drinker).  Korean beer, or maekju, is rather light and is carbonated.  It actually tastes like someone added club soda to a Coors Light.