This is a building at the Secret Garden. It was where a concubine lived. There is some sad story behind it (sorry, I forgot!) and so the building was not painted. People actually lived in it until the 80's. I think they were descendants of the throne. Wild.
We were on a bus heading to the southern reaches of the peninsula. It's kind of hilly down there and the road gets really windy. Match this with those really funky, floating suspensions on those tour buses and it's really easy to imagine people getting ill. So there's this middle aged guy who is a real dork with greasy hair. He talks loudly and spent a lot of time talking to a British guy about everything including how he is getting his act together now that he - get this - "knows the affection of a woman". OH gag! Turns out the woman is in her twenties and Korean. Poor woman. Anyway. It gets hilly late in the afternoon and the road starts winding. The man, in the back of the bus, says quickly to a woman across the aisle: "You gotta bag?" She responds slowly 'cause she thinks he needs it for trash or something. But when he says, "Aww I was just asking because I think I'm gonna be sick," she starts rooting around for something. As soon as he gets the thing in his hands, he starts ralphing. Hahahaha! I couldn't believe how disgusting it sounded - and it just kept coming!! I kept thinking, "My God, what did this man eat?" Pretty soon he says, " You got another bag? This one's getting full and it's got a little hole in the bottom and stuff's getting out." We're all startin' to feel a little ill now. So he gets the next bag and starts puking into that! When his supply ran out, he just started dry heaving. That was nice to listen to.The ride back to Seoul took nearly 8 hours with more than half of that time spent in stop-and-go traffic. It almost felt like it’s not worth leaving the city on the weekend because it’s hell coming back into town with millions of other folks returning from their country trips too. Mary, Dave and I started getting delirious from being couped up and began playing silly car games like "twenty questions." I guess us Westerners got the whole thing wrong: Tour buses packed with Koreans would pass us and the windows would be all steamed up, but you could still see inside to witness people (liquor filled cups in hand) dancing in the aisles to the song currently wailed out by whomever was karoake-ing at the time. Meanwhile, our speakers remained silent and most people read or slept. We're so boring. Day 8 Slept in. Really needed it. Took Mary to Myong-dong for a mandu lunch, which she genuinely enjoyed. Then off to Insa-dong where we indulged in the Seoul art scene. Too many shops, and too little money. Two things were on my mind - no three: Korean traditional wrapping cloths, handmade paper, and a funky overpriced lamp. Mary fell in love with the pottery. My love affair with it is ongoing and I’m in the process of narrowing down suitable objects for ownership. So difficult. Had flower tea in a traditional tea house. It’s served in big bowls with no handles. The flowers in the tea re-hydrate so that they look like flowers floating in a pond. I love it. We trekked back to Myong-dong and chowed on some pizza at Jessica’s Kitchen. Excellent salad; a hard thing to find in Seoul. It started raining so we caught a cab to the Hyatt hotel where we sat by a window and ate cake. Perched on Namsan, the Hyatt has a view of all the southern half of city. We watched dozens of huge TV screens mounted on buildings flicker and animate the night. The neon lights on every building nearly puts Las Vegas to shame and we could not take our eyes off of the movement. Nature chipped in and provided an amazing lightning storm for us to observe as it floated across the city. It was raining too hard to wait for a bus when we finally left the hotel at 10pm, and so we took a cab all the way home. Day 9 Had to sleep in again because we were too tired. Managed to make it to my class at Ewha by 2pm. This class is smaller than the one I took last spring, and the other students seem more scholarly than the last batch as well. I’m really excited about this as I expect the discussion to be enlightening. Being there and listening to Dr. Chang speak about women brought me back to a place that reminds me who I am, what I need to do in my life, what makes me feel alive. I need this class to help keep me grounded in my life’s direction, my life’s work. It is too easy while I’m on hiatus from my career to forget how much it feeds my soul and to ignore how empty I feel when I’m not feeling passionate about something. I’m really looking forward to spending my Tuesday’s at Ewha. After class, I showed Mary a taste of home: Seattle Espresso. It’s a little espresso café complete with a manhole cover from the Emerald City. I beam every time I go there and I’m sure the women behind the counter wonder what’s up with me. I wish I could meet the owner so I could lavish praise upon him and proclaim my indebtedness. Day 10 Mary had to bop into the tailor’s in Itaewon for her first fitting. I was totally miffed at the guy ‘cause we got there and he said he didn’t even have the fabric Mary had chosen and so he’d just basted together some stuff so she could try something on but he’d still have to make the whole thing. It’s like, the guy had, like, a whole week to call us or something, but he didn’t. Instead, he wants to run it down to the wire. What the hell? He agreed to have the suit ready on Friday for a fitting. We ran a couple of errands after that in Namdaemun market, and then had lunch at Jessica’s again. Just can’t shake that craving for good salad. Stupid logistical nightmare number 157 in Seoul: Two palaces adjacent to one another with only one measly little wall separating them, yet the entrance to each is separated by approximately two miles. There is no way to cross the wall between the palaces. This is not a cool thing. Paid for a cab to cart us between the two. Went to the one called the Secret Garden, but we had just missed the tour. Tours are mandatory at this one, so we had to think of something else. This is where we decided to take a cab to the palace next door. It was cool - same buildings as other palaces. Mary was more taken with the wedding couples having their pictures taken than with the ancient architecture. We returned to the Secret Garden in time for the next tour and, I’ll tell ya, it was totally worth it. Whenever someone comes into town in the future, I’m just gonna skip all the other palaces and head for the Secret Garden. Access to it is strictly controlled, so it’s not crowded with people, and the tour guide explains everything. We were tired after hoofing it around downtown and the two palaces so we came home early.
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