4th of July!

I'm at an internet cafe, without my camera to post any pictures. I can't believe this trip is coming to a close. I just wanted to say hello, and I'll post again after I'm back in the U.S. tomorrow evening. I'll have several more pictures and stories to share then. Until then, M

Korean War memorial

Here is a famous statue at the Korean War Memorial. A South Korean soldier embraces a North Korean soldier (depicted as smaller and weaker) as brothers, while the land splits beneath them, depicting the split between N. and S. Korea.



So yes, this morning I went to the Korean War Memorial in Seoul. It made a big impression on me - I found myself incredibly moved by the experience. We've been talking a lot about the danger of forgetting about atrocities in our world by future generations. For example, some of the older participants on this trip were worrying about when the WWII generation dies, will younger generations make similar mistakes? Well, this museum is a big step in the direction of not forgetting past wars. It really pays homage to the gravity, trauma, and sacrifice of wars while uplifting peaceful relations as the answer.

The first thing you see upon entering are these sculptures. Two are sculptures of Korean soldiers, and behind them all the people they are protecting (young children, invalids, everyday folk). There is this sense of momentum in these statues, like they are playing tug of war. They are quite emotional to look at.






Then, in the center is this huge pillar, which is split down the middle. I think it represents North and South Korea. On the sides of these pillars is a carving of "the masses" raising their arms, in protest of injustice and/or in solidarity for South Korea.





Behind these statues, the entrance to the memorial looks like this, with all of the United Nations flags flying out front, and a huge plaza of concrete.



There was a display of children's artwork about war in Korea and the split between North and South Korea. I really enjoyed this exhibit. Do you recognize the two soldiers from the first picture?



The water from the vase at the grave transforms into a vision of a city (?). I still think it is pretty:



I like how the soldiers are coming out of a lotus flower here, though I'm not sure what it means. Is it about reunification?

national treasures

Another temple site... This one is called Mireuksaji. It is the largest scale Buddhist temple built during the Samguk Age. One of the pagodas here is designated National Treasure No.11. One thing that I thought was great was how the Koreans designate and number "National Treasures," "National Relics" and "National Human Cultural Assets". The last of these -- the human cultural assets -- are people!!! (People who know a lot about a particular aspect of Korean history, philosophy, craft, or tradition). I think we should designate human cultural assets in our country!

village with lotus flowers

Looking down from a mountain side onto the Andong Hahoe Village, which has preserved the housing architecture and the village structure of the Joseon Dynasty. It is a reconstruction, but there are people who actually live there (in the reconstructions) today.






Pictures of rice fields, which I've never seen in the U.S.



Pictures of fields of lotus flowers, rising from the mud:

Shilla Dynasty temple

This is the location of the Sinin-sa Temple of the Shilla Dynasty. Remains of wooden structures are on the large rocks at the south and pieces of stone pagodas are scattered here and there. The Buddhist statue to the south was the principal image of worship and a temple facing south was managed there. Several Buddhist statues were portrayed pictorially in the large square rocks as well.



Shown in the picture are the Buddhist triad and then there's a separate Bodhisattva image on the southern face of the rock.

Seokguram Grotto

Here is a pictures of the Seokguram Grotto. There was a huge statue of Buddha (that we couldn't take pictures of). It was incredibly beautiful here...

Korean home from the 1400's

We visited a traditional Korean home from the 1400's while we were in the Gyeongju Region. Here are some pictures. There were the husband's quarters in the front, a large courtyard, and then the wife's and children's quarters in the back.






Here's what it would have looked like from inside the wife's quarters out onto the courtyard and the street:




Here are the kimchi pots!

Gyeongju Mountains, moveable type, Haeinsa Temple and the Tripitaka!

We are now in the province of Gyeongju, which is in the eastern/southern part of Korea. It is a very mountainous region, and almost reminds me of the Green Mountains in VT or the foothills of the White Mountains in NH. We have visited several Buddhist temples, grottos, and a few museums. We have been eating pretty much exclusively Korean food, but today we did go to Pizza Hut. Blech!

On the way to the Haiensa Temple, and once we got there:















The Haiensa Temple is where the Tripitaka Koreana resides. The Tripitaka is the Buddhist canon of scriptures. They are written on 81,258 wooden printing blocks, that had been soaked in the river and dried by the wind. They have survived there since 1398.



(This picture was not taken with flash!)

I have learned that the Koreans used moveable type made from metal in 1377 to publish the Jikji, a Buddhist document of teachings. This was before Gutenberg publishes the Bible using moveable type in 1452. Very interesting! We never learn about this in the West... Both the East and the West figured out how to create moveable type and mass-produce texts! The Koreans deserve credit, too, just like Gutenberg got!

traditional Korean experiences

Below is a picture of this traditional Korean tea ceremony that we went to. It was beautiful, and made me want to have a "tea" when I get back.





A picture of me trying on a traditional Korean outfit.



A picture of me trying on another traditional Korean outfit. It was kind of strange how they had these "experiences" as a part of our schedule, but also a reminder of how fun and memorable it is for students to experience aspects of the culture they are learning about.



A picture of me learning to write my name in Korean. It was harder than it looked!

Joint Security Area: Panmunjeom

Today we visited the Joint Security Area (JSA) between South Korea and North Korea. It is the DMZ, or the de-militarized zone. There were South Korean officers everywhere, and we got to look over to North Korea. It was a reminder to me of how arbitrary geographical boundaries are, and how the landscape was exactly the same on one "side" as on the other. Very much like the separation between India and Pakistan - both sides of the border look exactly the same, and ethnically, the people come from the same background. Here are several pictures of the area. Below are the United Nations flags - countries who help rule the JSA. Under that is the entry building, where we had to sign a statement that included these rules:

"3. When you arrive at the conference room, DO NOT TOUCH any equipment such as microphones or flags belonging to the communist side

4. DO NOT SPEAK with, make any gesture toward or in any way (including pointing or waving), approach, or respond to personnel from the other side.

5. You can wear casual clothes, but it is prohibited to wear blue jeans, sandals, shorts, short pants, short skirts, sleeveless skirts, shirts without collars, excessively exposing clothes, etc. Shaggy or unkempt hair is not allowed either."

SO WEIRD! I can't believe this is our world...







Below is a picture of the spot where the ax-murder occured in 1976, when a group of United Nations officers attempted to trim a tree with an ax, and North Korean officers attacked and ended up killing two American officers with the ax. I had never heard about this, and found the whole story really shocking. Below that is the train going from South Korea into North Korea, and a picture of postings on the fence of the train tracks with cards and posters welcoming this idea of linking the two parts of Korea.





Below is a picture of a north Korean building, and all of the security (both north and south Korean) outside. Pretty weird experience to be there, all together.



I learned a lot more about North Korea today. All in all, a surreal experience. I kept on thinking of my grandfathers and great uncles, who were the age of the South Korean officers during WWII, traveling to far away places and serving in the military. I also thought of all of the American soldiers in the Middle East right now. I don't think I had ever seen so many military personnel in person before today.

Korean Film

Yesterday we watched a movie called "My Heart" (1999), directed by Bae Chang-ho. I recommend it whole-heartedly. Apparently the title is not a literal translation of the title in Korean, which is "Jeong". It was interesting to hear about the meaning of the word "jeong" because it requires a whole paragraph of explanation. There are many words in Korean that are so embedded with meaning there is not a single English word that matches their meanings. Anyways - "jeong" means this collective sense of togetherness, of belonging to a group, and having both a right and an obligation to step into other people's affairs. It includes love and responsibility and a sense of selfless community. If I understand correctly. I thought this was fascinating! The movie was about the life story of a woman in Korea about 100 years ago, and was beautifully done - she is depicted as resilient and thoughtful, and still a product of her historical context.

We then heard a lecture on Korean film, and the speaker gave several movie recommendations, if you're interested. I'm not sure how easy they are to get on netflicks, but I'm going to try to get them when I get home. They are:

"My Road" by the same director as "My Heart"

"Sopyonje" (1993) by director Im Kwon-taek - this is about traditional Korean singing

"King and the Clown" (2006) by director Lee Joon-Ik

"Three Iron" by director Kim Ki-duk

A Schoolgirl's Diary (this is a north Korean film and may be impossible to get in the U.S.)

All of this reminded me that I really want to see "Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter, and Spring".

Bukhansan National Park

Right now my calves are so tired and my quads are in pain! I will sleep well tonight. I hiked most of the way up the tallest peak in Bukhansan National Park - the peak itself is called Bukhansan (the above is not actually the peak, it is just the only picture I got before my camera ran out of battery). I didn't really know what I was getting into, but I'm glad I went. It was interesting to see a Korean national park. Seoul is surrounded by pretty mountains that look like eruptions of green with stone peaks, and this park encompasses some of these mountains. Unfortunately, my camera ran out of battery after my first couple of pictures, but here's the website for the park:

http://npa.or.kr/bukhan/eng/npa/intro.htm

Two women from my trip were going to do this hike, and I decided to join them. They were thinking it was going to be 3 or 4 hours of trails, and we'd be back by lunch. While the hike was only 4.1 km, it was incredibly steep, and ended up being 6 hours of strenuous hiking. We sweat a lot. It was even more strenuous than hiking Yosemite Falls, which, up until today, was my hardest hike to date. Plus, it had rained last night, so the dirt and granite rocks were kind of slick. I was really careful with every step, remembering how I sprained my ankle a couple of summers ago climbing Mt. Cardigan in NH. I'm glad to have mad eit down without any injuries! It was an exercise in taking it one careful step at a time.

We did have fun, though. You can reach this park by subway from downtown Seoul in 20 minutes! Amazing! As we got closer, more and more people got on the subway with serious hiking gear: hiking boots and wool socks, backpacks, walking sticks! I had a backpack, but my two hiking companions only had purses! We were all in running shoes, not hiking boots. We began to feel under-prepared. Once we were out of the subway, we took a short bus ride to the opening of the park. The bus driver asked a passenger to show us how to get to the start of the trails - very friendly, and kept on telling us how beautiful the mountain was and how much we would like it. We were the only foreigners to be seen the whole day, interestingly enough! Turns out that this park is a big destination for all the hikers of Seoul on the weekends (and there are many of them). Not that many (or any- besides us) westerners seemed to know about it. This man to whom the bus driver had assigned us insisted on walking with us, and he was very nice - showed us pictures of his daughter and wife on his cell phone. He also wanted to keep a fast pace, so eventually, he lost us. As we got closer to the peak, I was not feeling like my shoes had good enough traction, and it was STEEP, so I sat on a rock and waited while my two friends went up a little farther, and came back down when they would have had to scale rocks. While I sat for an hour near the side of the trail, a steady stream of Korean hikers (men, women, and children) hiked on by. All in hiking shoes and proper hiking gear! I ended up hiking with some middle aged women in big fluorescent visors further on the trail until I met my friends again. It was an exhausting hike, but beautiful.

Oh, I forgot to tell you about the food I got at the bottom of the mountain to eat for lunch! I wish I had taken a picture of it. It was called kimpa (sp?) and it is rice and vegetables rolled in seaweed, and then sliced up like sushi rolls. They put it in aluminum foil, and it was very transportable, like having a sandwich. Healthy, and delicious!

a lecture, a strike, and a walk around Seoul

Yesterday morning we heard a 3 hour lecture on the Korean War. It was very interesting and depressing. I knew next to nothing about this war before the lecture, and now I feel like I have a lot more background. I wish I had been a history major in college!

Yesterday also began a strike against the FTA in Seoul. We couldn't get into the palace where we wanted to go (Changdeok-gung), so we walked around and did a little shopping instead. Here are some articles about the strike:

http://www.iht.com/articles/2002/02/28/a_102.php

http://www.forbes.com/business/feeds/afx/2007/06/24/afx3851629.html

Here are some things we saw on our walk. Below is Korea University (not a fantastic picture, but you can see what a well-kept-up and beautiful campus this is.) We attend the lectures at this university.


Here are a couple of pictures of the city streets in Seoul:



We went to this beautiful vegetarian restaurant for lunch. Here's the gorgeous-looking and delicious-tasting food. It was called "Korean Temple Cooking" and we sat on the floor. I really liked the lotus flower lamps.



There was this great fountain in a plaza in downtown Seoul where tons of children gleefully awaited the sprinklers to come on every few minutes.




Here's a mural that shows the Seoul Tower on the top of Namsun Peak as well as the Hangang River. The mural is made up of tiny photographs, as shown below.



Coming up next... My hike at Bukhansan National Park!!!