Chuseok was upon me (see the previous post for an explanation of this holiday). And then it wasn't, so I had some time on my hands in Buseok. To be honest, there's not a lot to do. The neighbors started getting word that a weiguk saram (foreign person) was staying with the family, so one by one they'd stop by and gawk. One even yelled at me for not understanding her Korean. Hey lady, I tried to tell you that I don't speak Korean. You can tell by my round eyes that I might have a hard time with your language. No need to get fussy. I wish I knew the translation for all that.
It's pretty amazing that for this little town in the mountains, there is in fact public wifi available. I thought that I was leeching off someone's home network for a little while, but then I realized that I had a full signal when sitting on the porch. I guess I can get a signal in many places. Internet is a public utility in Korea, like water or electricity (which is semi private in the US). So I sit on the porch, sipping coffee and staring out at the mountains to gather some wit between sentences.
I want to talk about Korean coffee for a minute. Actually, let's back up and talk about all the other "foreign" stuff that we take for granted in the US. I can go out in any medium sized city in the states and reasonably expect to find a place for espresso (dumb ol' starbucks), or naan, or injera, or even Korean food. Korea is a bit of a different story.
Korean culture is famous for its unique ability to quickly integrate many foreign cultures into its own without really sacrificing unique Korean-ness. So for example, every place you go will be happy to serve you a cup of coffee. Every place. Like when you're shopping for a cell phone, or sitting in a PC bang, or wherever. It's very simple: they have a water cooler/heater and they have little packages of instant "coffee". This dehydrated "coffee" is pre-mixed with creamer and sugar, so it's really like a sweet mocha flavor more than coffee. I'll call it Koffee. Granted, it's about as good as anything you'd get at a gas station in the US (plus a ton of cream and sugar). This is really how just about all Koreans take their coffee. When they offer you Koffee, you're getting it with creamer and sugar. You want it black? No, straight Maxwell House coffee isn't my thing either.
So here in Korea, you can also get pizza. It has potatoes and mayonnaise on it half the time. Or you can get burgers, which are kinda like McDonalds or whatever. You can also get some expensive "coffee" like the crap they serve in starbucks. Somehow it tastes worse here. In general, don't think Koreans understand the subtle qualities of coffee. I've heard there are a few places around that will do the fresh ground barista thing for you, but they're very rare. Then again, I have a hard time finding one of those in my hood in Chicago (that's not starbucks).
So Buseok is actually doing pretty well for itself these days. They got a new park since the last time I was here. The waterwheel is really just for show; the water just magically flows up to this tower that makes the wheel move. It serves no useful purpose. But it looks nice. It doesn't really work either. Every half turn, it turns back the other way. Someone forgot to balance that thing.
My in-laws are cool enough to have an ATV to ride around town on. That's always a highlight of a trip to Buseok. The look on the townspeople's faces when they see me ride by is pretty priceless. We rode out to the waterwheel, and found some other cool spots. Last time, we went to the famous temple just outside of town. We didn't make it out there yet this time.
We did go out to the in-laws' apple orchard. They just quit farming it a year or two ago since they're getting kinda old to be running an orchard, but there are still apples there. We got to taste some of the awesome apples that Buseok can produce thanks to its sandy soil and high mineral content water. These apples are the best. My mother-in-law still makes juice out of the apples, and it's pretty much the best too.
My in-laws still grow some other things at the orchard too, like squash and radishes. Everything that is grown here tastes awesome.
Other than the ATV, the main way to get around (without walking for days) is to drive. There are some buses that will take you around, but those are pretty sparse. We had the car (thanks bro), so we made it out to some spots.
So we went to the tomb of this Kim Satgat character. He's a famous poet that was born and lived in the region. He was famous mostly for drinking and criticizing his grandfather. The tomb part of this park was kinda dull, but nice enough. The park had some other cool features though.
I really love the bug shots here, so I'm going to share them. These bugs are obviously smarter and harder working than their American counterparts.
I don't think Kim Satgat got to walk across this bridge, but it's a nice reminder of the history of bridge building. Or the fleeting nature of human construction. Or something like that.
We stopped at a very famous mineral water spring that is well known for its healing power. Skin diseases are especially cured by this special healing water. In my case it just made me wretch. The water is naturally carbonated and tastes like iron filings. I was nasueous for an hour. I wish I had a picture of this.
They have all kinds of interesting historical things around here for me to make snide comments about.
This dog pretty much owns ever other dog I've ever seen. He has learned the art of chilling on a rock. If I were a dog, I would definitely want to be this dog.
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