Sunday, August 01, 2004
Anyeonghi-gye-se-yo Mokdong
My time in Mokdong is coming to a close. Probably tomorrow, I'll be leaving this section of town that has been my home for these past couple of months. I feel really bonded to Mokdong, since I would literally be in Mokdong for days at a time. Eating, sleeping, working, hanging out, everything all in Mokdong. Also, even though it hasn't been so long, every day has been notable for some reason or another so it feels like I've been here forever. I can't remember what New York was like the same way I could never quite remember Pennsylvania when I was in NYC. Anyway, I'll have the whole story of my departure once I'm back on American soil, as it's going to be an adventure in and of itself.
Let's finish off with a trip to the local market. Here is the entranceway to the market. If you've seen the movie "Bloodsport" with Van Damme (who is a candy-ass, in my opinion), you know "it's time to protect your nuts".
We go in a little further and we realize that the market is a hopeless maze. We walk around for a little while (it looks like one of the tiny malls in Chinatown but MUCH MUCH bigger and with all kinds of stores. Some sell food, some sell shoes, some sell toys ... all sorts of things. There was even a used Korean bookstore) and we inexplicably come out on the same street that we entered, but maybe 20 feet further down.
Anyway, we turn around and forge back in, only to wonder if we should actually change our name to "Captain Nemo" as we come across fresh squid and octopus.
We exit the market after a half an hour or so and go back out into the sunlight. Here is what greets our return to the world where photosynthesis is able to occur:
At first, we're surprised because it looks so strange. Then we stop and remember "yeah, this is Korea where there are little character guys on EVERYTHING. It's cool. In fact, I bet 20,000 won that if I turn around ..."
And we are correct. Turning exactly 180 geometric degrees around we see this:
The strangeness is oddly comforting here in Korea. If normal things started happening, we would panic. It's like in New York City ... when you see some random halfnaked homeless guy wearing a chainmail helmet, clutching all of his worldly possessions and saying "Ants! Ants! They're everywhere!", it's normal. But you take that same guy and drop him in front of a movie theater and watch him say "Ants! Ants! Um ... one for Spiderman, please. I'm a big fan," and you've got yourself a story.
So we pick a random street and walk down it. It is random for two reasons. One is that they all look the same. The other is that it doesn't have a name, so any name that you give it is good enough. Here is what you see:
Notice the ajummas staring at us. Get used to it if you're going to leave the main areas of Seoul. Looking up, all the buildings kind of look like this:
Just when you start to get depressed by the crushing similarity of everything, we come across this gem of a door:
When you think about it, most of Korea outside of Pusan was leveled by 1953. Seoul was taken by the North Koreans and retaken by MacArthur in his famous amphibious landing at Incheon (which is where all international flights arrive and depart from). The Koreans rebuilt their country almost from scratch, so that helps explain why things tend to look VERY similar within each neighborhood.
As we near the end of Random Street, we come across this place, which is inexplicably closed even though it is 7:30pm and the sign on the door CLEARLY says that it is open EVERY day from 5:30pm to 1am.
We resolve to come back to this place, so that we can say that we went to Valhalla and had a beer.
Interestingly, when we reach the end of Random Street, we come to our workplace, which is a 5 minute walk from where we live. So, all of these things that we saw today are within about a 20-25 minute walk from our apartment.
**************************************************
So, so long Mokdong. It's been interesting ...
Let's finish off with a trip to the local market. Here is the entranceway to the market. If you've seen the movie "Bloodsport" with Van Damme (who is a candy-ass, in my opinion), you know "it's time to protect your nuts".
We go in a little further and we realize that the market is a hopeless maze. We walk around for a little while (it looks like one of the tiny malls in Chinatown but MUCH MUCH bigger and with all kinds of stores. Some sell food, some sell shoes, some sell toys ... all sorts of things. There was even a used Korean bookstore) and we inexplicably come out on the same street that we entered, but maybe 20 feet further down.
Anyway, we turn around and forge back in, only to wonder if we should actually change our name to "Captain Nemo" as we come across fresh squid and octopus.
We exit the market after a half an hour or so and go back out into the sunlight. Here is what greets our return to the world where photosynthesis is able to occur:
At first, we're surprised because it looks so strange. Then we stop and remember "yeah, this is Korea where there are little character guys on EVERYTHING. It's cool. In fact, I bet 20,000 won that if I turn around ..."
And we are correct. Turning exactly 180 geometric degrees around we see this:
The strangeness is oddly comforting here in Korea. If normal things started happening, we would panic. It's like in New York City ... when you see some random halfnaked homeless guy wearing a chainmail helmet, clutching all of his worldly possessions and saying "Ants! Ants! They're everywhere!", it's normal. But you take that same guy and drop him in front of a movie theater and watch him say "Ants! Ants! Um ... one for Spiderman, please. I'm a big fan," and you've got yourself a story.
So we pick a random street and walk down it. It is random for two reasons. One is that they all look the same. The other is that it doesn't have a name, so any name that you give it is good enough. Here is what you see:
Notice the ajummas staring at us. Get used to it if you're going to leave the main areas of Seoul. Looking up, all the buildings kind of look like this:
Just when you start to get depressed by the crushing similarity of everything, we come across this gem of a door:
When you think about it, most of Korea outside of Pusan was leveled by 1953. Seoul was taken by the North Koreans and retaken by MacArthur in his famous amphibious landing at Incheon (which is where all international flights arrive and depart from). The Koreans rebuilt their country almost from scratch, so that helps explain why things tend to look VERY similar within each neighborhood.
As we near the end of Random Street, we come across this place, which is inexplicably closed even though it is 7:30pm and the sign on the door CLEARLY says that it is open EVERY day from 5:30pm to 1am.
We resolve to come back to this place, so that we can say that we went to Valhalla and had a beer.
Interestingly, when we reach the end of Random Street, we come to our workplace, which is a 5 minute walk from where we live. So, all of these things that we saw today are within about a 20-25 minute walk from our apartment.
**************************************************
So, so long Mokdong. It's been interesting ...
