Daegu to Gyeongju

My how the time flies!  Has it really been 2 weeks?  Well, happy Easter to all!  It isn’t until you spend a holiday away that you really realize how much you value the fellowship of holidays. 

Easter day has thus far been the nicest day of any in Daegu.  It’s about 70 degrees and I’m sitting on one of the lovely couches on top of my roof.  It really doesn’t get much better than this… 

The pictures don’t really do justice to what its like up here.  There’s enough of a breeze that you can hardly even hear any traffic below.  There’s nothing but mountains to one side and nothing but city to the other.  I always like to imagine wherever I am, what it would be like without all the buildings.  Its much easier to imagine here because there are random hills and splotches of the city that haven’t been touched.  There’ll be a spot for hiking, then when you get to the other side there’s more apartment buildings.  Its quite interesting the way the city was developed.

Last weekend I took a day trip with Aaron to nearby Gyeongju, which is known for being one of the main historical cities (meaning it has a lot of old stuff).  Getting there takes about $4 and 45 minutes by bus.  

Right when we got there we decided to rent some bikes so we could hit the whole area a little quicker. 

  First we decided to check out the royal tomb complex, which was very neat.  There were 23 very impressive looking hills in this park like area.  Turns out these are the tombs of kings and other important people of the ancient Silla dynasty.  It was very interesting to see!  We were able to go inside one of them, but pictures weren’t allowed.  I did get to see how they were made.  They took the dead person and put them inside of a huge wooden box (think way larger than a coffin), then they piled rocks on them.  A LOT of rocks.  Pretty much the whole hill is rocks.  Then the last few feet they put earth on top.  I just cant even imagine how much work that was hauling all of those rocks.  Doesn’t sound like a fun day to me. 

After that we decided to test our bikes out off road so we went and found a little area where we could go play… pretty fun. 

We ended up biking down to a temple, then down to the lake, where we ate a traditional korean lunch (about 20 dishes...)

its not as bad as it looks...

A lot of the traditional meals involve wrapping meat and assorted vegetables in a leafy green and stuffing it all into your mouth.  Very delicious.

After lunch, since we were that far already, we decided why not just check out the Korean folk village right?  So our map wasn’t very clear on the fact that the road to this village was straight up a mountain.  It took a good half hour of pedaling straight up a hill before we got to the top.  The ride down was worth it though!  The village? Not so much… it was pretty much a bunch of shops that sold pottery and other traditional things… this was the best thing I found there…

So at this point we’re a good distance away from our original destination (8-10 miles judging by my man-compass).  About 3 minutes after we begin our homeward ascent, Aaron’s front tire pops!  He’s a good sport so he managed to get the bike up and down the mountain and back to the lake.  We weighed our options and decided to start walking.  After we realized how miserable that was going to be we gave the bike shop a jingle.  Just as we thought, they didn’t understand English.  We tried explaining our predicament (TIRE!  POP!  WHOOOSH!  BOOM!) They didn’t get it… So luckily we were able to get ahold of our boss after a little while and get her to call the bike shop and tell them our situation and where we were.  After about 45 minutes a guy showed up and picked up the bikes and even gave us a ride back. 

This was our route... the map is deceiving... it was a very far ride...

...tires made with 100% fail

Aaron sorting us out

waiting...

not related... but here's a Korean toilet.

We took that as an omen to end the day... 

All in all, it was a great experience. 

Other than that...

I've joined a Korean language exchange program.  I can read Korean now (that doesn't mean I know what it means).  I'm not sure how far I'm going to take it, but it will be nice to know more phrases ("Hello", "thank you", and "I want to go to ____ please." are getting old).  

I got a guitar... that makes me very happy.  

I saw the hunger games finally (hun-gah gay-muh), which also makes me happy.

This week the cherry blossoms are going to be out in full force, so that's going to be exciting.  I'll be sure to take some good pictures.  

Also, this week is election week.  That means this Wednesday I have no school.  It also means that on every major street corner there are people blaring music and performing choreographed dances 18 hours a day.  It's very funny...  I'll have to get a picture.  If I could vote, I'd vote for number 6.  Why?  They've got great tunes coming out of their booth, and their dances are just a step above the rest of the competition.  You gotta work for my loyalty.

I don't really have much more to say right now.  I have plenty more activities that I could tell you about but that seems a little dull to me right now.  I guess I'd rather share the stories in person!  You should know that I was able to find a couch and two chairs, which was great!  They are very comfy and they were very free.

By now, I've got a firm grasp on the city of Daegu... I can get anywhere pretty much by bus or subway.  That makes it a lot easier to do things!  Next weekend I'm planning a trip to Seoul so you can expect a pretty good update about that in the next 1-2 weeks.  

Again, I hope you all had a great Easter!  

Brad