Mokpo(Korea)

December 2011

A few days before we left for Mokpo, yk received an itinerary put together by our Mokpo host. When she translated it for me, I said, “Who’s he kidding? No way we’re doing all of that in one day.” But he pulled it off.

Our train left at 1:20 on Saturday, arriving in Mokpo about 4:40. We were met by our host, D.H., who is in charge of sports activities for the city. After giving us a brief tour of the city, he took us to dinner at a small restaurant. We had local crab prepared three different ways.

More tour followed, including a stop at the wholesale fish market. The fish, yellow croaker in this case, were being sorted by size and boxed for delivery to area restaurants. Some of the fish we saw we found ourselves eating the next day.

We were joined at the hotel, a “traditional” Korean hotel, by one of D.H.’s friends and gifts were exchanged. We had brought a bottle of tequila, which has a growing following in Korea but is difficult to find. I received two gifts. One was a display case containing 8 refrigerator magnets featuring the eight wonders of Mokpo. I was told it was from the mayor’s office to a distinguished visitor from America. The other was a box set of a Korean whiskey made from 100-year-old ginseng along with two shot glasses and a small sample bottle. The shot glasses and the small bottle will make it back to the US if anyone wants a taste.

Yong Soon decided she wanted to play Oh, Hell, so we taught the game to our Korean friends. They added an extra twist. Whenever you fail to make your bid, you have to drink.

Sunday morning we were taken to another restaurant where breakfast was already on the table. It featured, among myriad other things, yellow croaker.

The next stop was at Korea’s only Formula One racetrack. The first Korean Grand Prix was held in Mokpo in Oct., 2010. There are currently no Grand Prix races in the US, though it appears there may be one in 2012.

It was Sunday morning, but D.H. had used his connections to get us in. We got a tour of the VIP suite ($5,000 apiece for tickets,) a model of the eventual F1complex which is to include a marina and a small city located inside the track, F1 simulators, pictures of all the drivers, model cars, and indoor seating near the starting line. We then went out on the course and took a couple of laps (a lap is 5.8K) around the track. There is something about driving on a Grand Prix course that turns a driver into a maniac and Dae Hun seemed intent on showing us how fast his car could take the tight turns.

Next, D.H. had arranged for guided tours of the Natural History Museum and the National Maritime Museum. The Natural History Museum had a fairly extensive collection of the usual mammals, insects, amphibians, and full-sized dinosaur skeleton reconstructions. The Maritime Museum consisted largely of the findings from a 14th-century shipwreck found off the coast. The ship was apparently bound from China to Japan when it foundered and many interesting artifacts have been recovered, shedding light on the trade of that era.

Lunch was BBQ – pork, clams, mushroom, onions, and garlic. The restaurant owner sent over two bottles of the ubiquitous Korean raspberry liqueur.

We were joined at the restaurant by the president of the Mokpo Water Skiing Assoc. DH had imposed on him to provide transportation to one of the literally hundreds of islands off shore. We proceeded to a small shack at the end of a short pier where we were outfitted with life jackets. I wondered why we needed them for a short trip to an island. Within minutes, I understood.

The boat was a small speedboat, obviously used for water skiing. It was not designed to carry 6 passengers plus the owner. It ran low in the water and the owner seemed to think he was on an F1 track. He got the boat up over 45 kph, which is very fast when you’re right on top of the water. He also hit some big chops, two of which slammed me onto the top of the windshield leaving me with a nasty bruise on my arm and a sore back that escaped a bruise only because I was wearing the life jacket. He also enjoyed hairpin turns that had the boat sideways to the water.

 

We eventually made it to Love Island, a resort island closed for the winter. We walked around most of the island, which was virtually deserted. We did come across a restaurant owner and DH asked if he would serve us some sashimi. He replied that to do that he’d have to go out to his abalone farm and get it, pointing to the area in the water. We passed.

On return, DH said we had to climb Mt. Yudal, a228-meter high rock in the back of Mokpo. Meeok demurred, but yk, Yong Soon and I set off with DH up the steps that had been carved in the rock. It seemed that every time I thought we had reached the top, the trail turned and more steps appeared, but we finally made it. A lovely view of Mokpo, the bay and the islands beyond.

Dinner was raw beef and octopus along with the usual yellow croaker. Afterwards talk turned to Moe’s Bar.

When I had earlier done a bit of research on Mokpo, I saw that there was a Moe’s Bar on Rose Street and had mentioned it in an email to, among others, Meeok. She mentioned it to DH and he said he’d never heard of it, but we should look for it.

The Street is actually called Street of Roses and is a walk street through trellises that, we were told, are covered with roses in the summer. Moe’s is a second story place somewhat off the street. When we entered, DH remarked, “My god, it’s like walking into a foreign country. I’ve got to bring my boss here.”

The place was full of young kids, overwhelmingly women, from various English speaking countries. Apparently they had come to Mokpo right out of college to teach English. The only Korean in the place when we entered was one barmaid.

There was no place to sit and I suggested going someplace else, but the guys had talked to the Korean barmaid and she somehow found a place. Then we encountered another problem. The place didn’t serve food and Koreans can’t drink without some kind of food, called anju. We were about to leave again and again the Korean barmaid came to the rescue with several bowls of popcorn, which everyone agreed would do.

It was apparently trivia night at Moe’s, conducted of course in English. In this case, a Christmas themed trivia. I knew the answer to the first question, Isaac Newton, born Christmas day. At that point, DH decided we needed to get a piece of paper and play, even though most of the group, including him, couldn’t understand the questions.

Sadly, I only got only one other answer – Dean Martin.

The second round, however, consisted of a list of Korean words, each followed by a hint to its meaning. You had to give the English meaning. YK nailed every one, even before the hint.

Before the game ended, however, we had to head to our train. We were on the last train out at 10:20, arriving in Seoul at about 1:30, after the buses and subways had stopped for the night. I was tired enough that I probably would have wanted to take a cab anyway.