July 2009

Friday started with lunch with some of the kindergarten teachers that Kathy and Hyun worked with when they lived in Korea and Jasmine was a baby. They were customers of the “Watermelon” program to teach English. The restaurant was lovely and the food was good. Usually there are four people per table, and we had been told to move the previous night when we each had our own little table at the sting ray dinner. This place suggested that we sit three to a table. The reason became evident very quickly. I counted 39 little dishes per table, and there were three tables. Do the math! The food had some of the spiciest dishes I have had this trip and some of the sweetest ones as well.

After lunch, Keh met up with Jasmine and me, and we headed to the Chang Deok Gung Palace and the Secret Garden. As one usually boards a subway, you wait for the people to get off and then you get on. At a point there was a lull of people exiting the subway, and I started to get on. Then, a whole flood of people finally figured out that they had to leave the train and shoved to get off the train. Jasmine got on the train in time. Keh did not. Jasmine and I had no idea where we were going, so there was no “see you there, Keh!” I pantomimed something to him about getting off at the next stop and meeting him there. We did just that. As we waited for Keh at the next stop, we figured there were three scenarios: 1. Keh gets off at the next stop and finds us, 2. Keh sees us and we hop on his train, or 3. We don’t see Keh again, and we take a taxi home to jewelry city. Not only did the second scenario work flawlessly, he hopped on the same car that we did on the newer train, so his car opened right where we were standing. We made a major effort to make sure we all boarded the train in the future.

As we walked to the temple, it started to rain. Then it poured. We did not have umbrellas and I was not wearing my rain shoes. Keh and I bought very expensive umbrellas at the temple gift shop, and though it continued to rain a little, most of the downpour had ceased when we handed over the money.

The grounds and buildings were beautiful. We had an “English” speaking tour guide, but I had to put the English in quotes because her accent was so thick that it was very hard to understand what she was saying. Keh commented that we would have been better off with a Korean guide because at least one of us would know what she was saying.

After the tour, we walked to, guess where? That’s right, Insadong! It seems we are going there almost daily. The highlights of this trip: Jasmine was able to buy some splat animals and on the walk back to the apartment, we got to sample some street food. I had been eyeing some of these vendors that line the streets and to sample their wears was a treat. We had Turkish Ice Cream first. Like regular ice cream, it is cool and delicious, however, unlike regular ice cream, instead of breaking off when you bite or pull, it snaps off like Silly Putty. We then had a twisted potato. This man runs a potato through a spiral-er (for lack of a better word) and then puts it on a stick and fries it. I expected it to be more like a chip, but it was closer to a French fry. We dipped it in cheese and bulgogi flavorings. Yum. On the walk back to the subway, to drop Keh off, he said, “want to try that one?” Of course we said yes. The last street treat was like a pancake biscuit with a fully cooked egg in the middle. It was way sweeter than I thought it would be, but again, delicious.

For dinner, Kathy, Hyun, Jasmine, and I went around the corner and had fish. Hyun thought he had ordered some beef, but I guess they mislabeled something on the menu, so we got a lot of fish. It was good, though.

Saturday and Sunday we worked.

On Monday, the four of us and our luggage crammed ourselves into a cab and headed to Ansan, the area where Euigyoo, a wonderful artist, has his studio. It was a long drive, and I fell asleep even though I had a suitcase on my lap. I am a very good sleeper.

Jamyung met us when we got dropped off, and the six of us chatted for a bit before we got down to business. By business, I mean, Hyun and Euigyoo went to play ping pong and Jamyung, YK, Dad and I went across the street to drink. We ordered one of the largest pitchers of beer I have seen (see picture below) and finished that and a little one with anju (snacks). Soon after we had arrived, the waitress brought us four forks. It was the first time anyone had done that to me this trip. Many people had cautioned me that the food was too spicy for me or asked if I could handle spicy food, but no one had brought me a fork. I didn’t even want to touch it. If only they knew what kick-ass chopstick skills I have.

Soon, Hyun and Eigyoo joined us, shared a pitcher of beer and used the forks for the anju. I had proposed that the loser of the ping pong battle buy the beer before the official competition, but when they joined us, Eigyoo said Hyun was far too good. Then we were off to dinner. Jamyung said that since we were going to China and had been eating Korean food that we should have Japanese for dinner. On the walk, we ran across one of those South American reed playing bands playing outside a sushi restaurant. I found it particularly odd because I had just finished a book where the author, David Sederis, mentioned seeing one of these bands in Tokyo, and if they get to Tokyo, they are everywhere.

Dinner was again delicious and plates and plates of food kept coming. At this point, the drink at dinner switched from beer to soju, which the waitress put into a sake carafe to serve. I lost track of how many times she refilled the carafe. One of the dishes was a fried pork cutlet with sweet mustard and cheese crisscrossed on top. We even got a complimentary plate of meatballs for being such good customers. Eigyoo mentioned that he always brings VIPs there.

We staggered back to the studio and drank some more soju (left over from the night that Jamyung and Euigyoo visited us at the apartment). Slowly we each trickled to our sleeping quarters. YK and I shared a mat in a little room and Hyun and Dad shared a room next to it. I got to bed at a little after midnight and before I knew it, I was up at 6:15 for a 6:30 cab to the airport. Poor Hyun said he was up past 2 AM.

I slept on the way to the airport, which turned out to be a longer trip than anyone had anticipated. I think the point in staying at the studio was to be closer to the airport, but I think it didn’t really work out that way.

The airport in Seoul, Incheon, is ranked in one kind of travel somethingorother, the best international airport in the world. It did not disappoint. We flew through all the check points, except when we were checking in, the ticket did not say Hyun’s full name and the Chinese needed it to be exactly correct, so he had to pay 30000 won to change his name on the ticket. They never would have let “Christ Gallagher” pass.

While waiting, I was finally able to do one thing I have wanted to do for a while: have a Dunkin’ Donuts experience. Before the last trip to Asia in 2006, I had been on a trip with a friend of mine named Jay Dean where we went to Boston and daily had Dunkin’ Donuts coffee. Since there isn’t one in LA, when I came to Seoul in 2006, I was excited to see Dunkin’ Donuts everywhere. Now, Jason and I have Dunkin’ Donuts coffee at home nearly every morning. I had bought some earlier in the trip in Itaewon, but that was long gone, and now I finally was able to sit with a true cup of coffee and a donut from Dunkin’ Donuts.

They were out of the kind of coffee I wanted. However, I had another type and a vita donut. Yes, you heard me correctly, a vita donut. I have no idea if these are available in the US because I haven’t been to an actual Dunkin’ Donuts in years, but I got a flower-shaped donut with a mango peach jelly dot in the center that claims to have added vitamins. You can actually see the donut towards the middle of the picture below.

 

August 2009

Friday morning was nice and calm. We hopped in a cab and went to an area that I didn’t even know existed. It is called the 798 Art Zone, and it is blocks and blocks of buildings that used to be factories or other industrial sites that have since been turned into art galleries. You could spend days looking at all the art. We roamed from gallery to gallery enjoying the art on the inside, but unfortunately I was unable to take pictures of any of the fine art we saw. However, there were numerous statues outside that I could photograph. All were beautiful or very strange.

When I was in Beijing in 2006, Dad and I got a lot of stares for being westerners. These stares still come, but not as frequently in Beijing, probably because of the Olympics. Many Chinese tourists in touristy areas even asked me to be in pictures with their children. This only happened once this trip before today. One of the exhibits in a gallery was a hunk of clay where people were encouraged to make their own art. A little boy was playing with the clay and his mother used hand gestures to indicate that she wanted me to be in a picture with him. I knelt down to take the picture, and then she instructed me to move closer to him, grab some clay and pretend I was playing with the clay like the boy. I hope she was pleased with the picture she created.

Lunch was at a place called Café Pause where the clock was paused at 5:30. The day before there was a 100 day old birthday party for a baby girl. The waitress, who spoke English, was surprised when I asked about the party, because she had no idea that I had noticed a giant poster dedicated to the infant. Evidently celebrating the first 100 days of a baby’s life is very significant in China and Korea.

Since we were being joined by Jamyoung, Eigyoo and Hyangji in Shanghai, YK said that we should have some western food while we could. We had a club sandwich that had an egg in it, pizza, and penne pasta with chili and chicken.

We continued exploring gallery after gallery, when we were done eating. The use of space was so creative that we would walk down what looked like an abandoned alley, and then there would be this modern gallery out of the blue. I look forward to exploring these galleries the next time I visit Beijing.

When I travel, I always bring a couple of things with me. One of these things is a deck of cards. I did not pack a deck of cards this trip. So, I set out to buy one after enjoying the galleries. In Beijing, instead of bringing a product up to register and paying for it, many of the stores do things a little differently. When I found the deck of cards I wanted, I got a receipt from the deck of cards lady at the stall. There are many people throughout these stores to finding someone is never a problem. Then you take the receipt to the cashier, whom you also give the money, and she gives you back a claim receipt and a payment receipt. Then you have to go back to the stall and find the lady to give her the new receipts to get the deck of cards. Seemed like a lot of work for something so small.

In 2006, the group went for a quest to find a particular well known Peking (Beijing) duck restaurant named Da Dong. We were unsuccessful and had to settle for another duck place. Since then, YK found the restaurant, and we had dinner with Aihua and Xuesong there. We ate a whole duck, which was carved tableside. In fact, there were four people carving ducks all around me. We also had beef tongue, which was actually pretty good, and a number of other dishes. Again, we ate a feast.

Lastly, we had Chinese whiskey. Xuesong wanted to get drunk, and had brought with him two additional bottles of whiskey that were given to him by a university professor at a communist officers’ university. Two former students, who became high party communist leaders, had given the professor the whiskey bottles. Xuesong’s plan was to order one bottle at the restaurant and then replace it with one that he brought in so we could have the better alcohol. However, even though the original whiskey bottle was special, the other more expensive “communist” bottles looked so different they would have stood out, so we saved them for later. Both Xuesong and Aihua laughed when I asked if I could take the original whiskey bottle home. I think it would make a lovely vase in the guest room.

Since we were going back to the apartment to drink the whiskey, it was clear that though Hyun had bought anju earlier in the day, we did not have the customary little whiskey drinking glasses. I went on a quick quest to find some at the supermarket, but found shot glasses instead. I bought 7 even though there were only 6 of us that evening, because I anticipated that we would use them in Shanghai with Jamyoung, Eigyoo, and Hyangji. On the walk back to the hotel, I realized how odd it was that I bought 7 glasses when 8 would have not only made more sense, but would have been a Chinese good luck number.

I met up with everyone else at the hotel room, and they were eating the anju and waiting patiently for the glasses. We opened both bottles so we could compare. After a couple of glasses of whiskey, the doorbell rang. Xuesong had dipped into the No. 9 Café next door, where he had gotten a snack earlier in the day, and ordered delivery because he was worried about anju. So, in addition to the anju that Hyun had got, we had two complimentary drinks, a salad, a plate of fruit, soup, and chicken and potatoes. There was not enough room in our stomachs to eat all that food. We sat, ate, drank, and chatted until the blue bottle was empty. Xuesong suggested we save the other bottle for Shanghai, and so we did.

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August 2009

Every day since our arrival, someone, a hotel employee, has brought an apple, banana, and peach to our room. Thursday’s breakfast was fruit. Xuesong picked us up solo because Aihua had meetings. We took a long ride to the Tanzhe Temple. None of us had ever been there before. On the way there were about a dozen people trying to sell incense. When we got there, I could see why. To us, this temple was like a museum, but there were many people there to pray and burn incense at all the temple shrines throughout the property. Xuesong said back in the day people would go there to pray for rain.

Each room was dedicated to one god or theme. Unfortunately, pictures of the interior were forbidden, but they were beautiful. Many of them had either one huge statue of Buddha or other Hindu gods, or they had hundreds of little ones. One room that was particularly memorable was about Hell. On the walls were intricate paintings of humans getting tortured, cut up, or squashed for the bad things they did in their lives. The paintings were very graphic.

Throughout the temple grounds, certain trees were highlighted for their age, beauty, or because they were rare. Two trees in particular grew side by side as if they were sharing one space, which was rare. They said that they were wishing trees and if you touch both trees together and make a wish it will come true. I totally touched both, but I’m not going to tell you what my wish was!

When it came to the incense, I have never seen such a variety. I am used to the skinny little stick incense, but here some were two feet long and in bushels with about a three inch diameter. Worshipers were burning chunks at a time and they were pretty smoky, at times, but never too odorous. My favorite kind was a giant spiral cone that hangs and burns from the bottom to the top. Each one had writing on it, which I can speculate was a wish or prayer.

The temple continued up the hill which meant a lot of stair climbing. After we climbed to the Tiger Cave, a cave with a ceramic tiger in it, we spent some time in an area where one could buy a fish or a turtle and place it in a deep well. Xuesong bought a round of tea and had his fortune told. We were there for quite a long, but the fortuneteller had good news to say, so it was worth it.

It was here that I saw a strange sight. A toddler with a Mohawk. This is not something I have ever seen in China. Also, he was wearing something that has come to fascinate me in my travels in China. Many of the boys wear pants that have a waist all the way around, but the crotch through the butt region is missing. This leaves all of this part of the small child exposed. I have figured out that these pants are worn quite frequently to avoid the cost of diapers. When the baby pees shouldn’t be a problem, but I can’t help but wonder what someone does when a baby starts pooping. I have never seen poop on the floor of any kind in Beijing, so do people clean it up or anticipate it happening and have a plan? Also, I noticed that only boys had these pants on, but after thinking that it might be a pride thing in showing off that one has a boy, I soon realized that girls could have the same level of freedom with a dress. You can see a little peak of the tush of said Mohawk toddler below.

 

We climbed down the temple stairs and ate at a place right outside the temple grounds. What was cool about this place, was it was completely vegetarian (probably even vegan, dad surmised) but many of the food items were shaped like what they were trying to imitate. We had “seafood” shaped like squid-like things, “hot dogs” on sticks, and two “fish”. Below is a picture of the “fish” after YK and I ate their heads.

We hopped in the car and I fell asleep as I do every time I am in a car lately. I thought we were going back to the hotel, but instead, we went to another temple. The Jietai Temple did not have nearly as many visitors or incense burners. It had its own charm, but was nowhere near as impressive as the Tanzhe Temple. We walked the grounds and again trees were highlighted. Two of my favorite parts were two giant pagodas. The one that is covered much of the pagoda in the background is significant, but I do not remember why. Notice the benches on the floor, that’s how massive these pagodas were.

As we continued climbing the stairs of this temple, we found an odd feature. A tennis court. We laughed about how the monks meditated after a hard day on the court.

Xuesong dropped us off on the earlier side so we could shower and take it easy. We first went to a supermarket around the corner to pick up some supplies. We ran into a tall Caucasian man who noticed Dad’s shirt and said, “Did you actually go to Boston College?” When my Dad said “why actually yes” the man asked him “Do you know where I can find shoes here this size? Is there a New Balance store in China?” It was an odd transition, and we weren’t able to help the large-footed, socially-awkward man.

We showered and rested back at the hotel room. Noticing we were out of toilet paper, YK called to the front desk and asked for some. She was then asked, “What size, big or small?” Finally the person understood that what YK was asking for did not come in sizes, and we were brought two new rolls.

Before the trip, I bought a number of dresses to wear in the warm weather. I was unable to wear one dress in particular because it was scraping the floor long and I feared for it when it was raining so frequently. I finally wore the dress this night with my flip flops. As we were waiting for Aihua and Xuesong to pick us up, it started pouring. I joked that our visiting the rain temple earlier in the day must have caused the rain.

Aihua and Xuesong were actually at the No. 9 Café next door getting a little snack before dinner. Dinner was supposed to be at an Italian restaurant that YK had been to many times. She said the food and atmosphere were great, but it was in a weird little neighborhood. When we got to the restaurant, the whole building was gone.

Plan B was at a place called The Noodle Loft, which YK had been to before. One of the major benefits of traveling with a large group is that we have a wide variety of dishes from which to choose. Since YK was last at The Noodle Loft solo, she did not have the luxury and yearned to have a true sampling of the noodles. To the left of the entry doorway one could see many men making noodles with big chef hats. One was cutting noodles into strips with scissors. Another was shaving off chunks from a roll or dough. Two others were working together to make hand-rolled green noodles.

We had quite the spread. Some highlights were chicken in apricot sauce with pineapple and oranges, a tofu pyramid with dill and parley, mutton with onions, and brown, warm Chinese whiskey with fruit. When we couldn’t eat anymore, we noticed that we hadn’t gotten the green noodle. It turned out that it was called “one chopstick noodle” because it was a bowlful of one giant long noodle and you need the one chopstick to chop it. This noodle came with a brown sauce called jajangmyon that is not only Eigyoo’s favorite dish, but he was a judge in a jajangmyon contest. Thinking of Eigyoo and though we only had a little room in our bellies, we ate what we could, and for dessert, we ate sweet potatoes with hot caramelized sugar. The dish is so hot that you must dunk the sugary potato into the water to solidify the sugar and keep it from burning your mouth.

That night, as we were getting ready for bed and throughout the evening, the rain, which had stopped during dinner, came back in the way of thunderstorms. The view from the 17^th floor of the lightning as it brightened the whole sky was beautiful.

 

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