BUSAN BLITZ

Goodbye montage. Footage found on the bottom of my shoe. Nikon d5000.

towers, asphalt and sky- A Busan time-lapse- Music by DJ Lennart

A little project I’ve been tweaking. Wanted to see how it looked online, still needs some work. Thanks to Lennart Borst for creating the haunting audio.

Beomeosa in black and white

Took a Sunday stroll up Guemjeong and witnessed evening rites; visiting bhikkus from Thailand were led around in their orange robes and the abbot of Beomeosa passed everyone a gift of his calligraphy (us too). The temple was muffled in dribbly evening haze. Five people quietly watched the monks exit the hall single file and chant the heart sutra into the mountains like a hoarse fight song; an ode to awakening. Metaphysical mercenaries. Many were quite young. I was surprised. Drums and bells echoed and reverberated, tinkling and bouncing through the evening air as white mist mushroomed off the southern peaks.  It was a long weekend, and a bleary eyed Sunday, also the first day of monsoon season, and the scene, my mind swamped in stale smoke and alcohol,made me wonder why I don’t go up there more often.

spring sprung

Spring is here and alive in all its varied guises. The cherry blossoms bloomed and I choked on yellow dust and sniveled a sinusy sigh of relief for the warmer weather. The streets, laden with pollen, sprung fresh greenery, lanterns hang near temples and kids are running ape-shit in the streets. Lauren planted a few tubs full of lettuce and strawberries on the roof of the apartment and I went up there and coughed at all the fresh air. This morning a mist hung over the mountain, looking slightly tropical. Anyway, things are back in a warmer degree. I started volunteering for a local UNESCO organization, doing cultural courses at local high schools: blabbing about creole culture, Coltrane, wigwams and skateboarding, trying an unconventional tack.

Anyway, here are some spring artifacts from the past few weeks:

Beomeosa Afternoon

Canon hv30
24p
premiere cs3
Some shots from a directionless Saturday exploring the temple grounds at Beomeosa. I threw my camera in a bag and nabbed a few candid shots. The audio was from a group of women singing pansori folk songs at the top of the hiking trail, near the north gate. After hiking a few hours we were approached by some older Korean hikers curious about foreigners. They coerced us into drinking soju, afterward we all stumbled down the hill and they took us for dinner. I wanted to incorporate the footage but sadly my trial neoscene pull-down tool ended half way through converting. Hopefully I can incorporate them into something soon.

Below are some accompanying photographs, courtesy of LW

PNU GRAFFITI

So, every once and a while when the weather is nice, I get off my ass and walk along the little riverbed down to PNU- where I eat something ridiculous from a street vendor and check for new graffiti in the tunnels under the subway. Last Sunday was glorious, cherry blossoms beginning to peek out, so Lauren and I grabbed the camera and headed for a stroll. I was disappointed that my favorite piece was missing, the one showing the famous SK student demonstration/riot scene, only with a windows pop-up obscuring the faces (maybe painted over?). I nabbed a couple shots, and am deciding to post them here before the river ‘re-nourishment’ project covers them all up.

A trip to Jalgachi

I somehow ended up waddling through Jalgachi two days in a row over Lunar New Year. I decided to bring along my camera and indulge in my delusions of myself as a lonely planet guidebook writer. The attempt at narration was a pure experiment, so please excuse the monotone rambling. Busanites: I know everyone is probably sick to death of hearing (seeing) things they already ‘know all about.’ But this is more a letter home, so don’t fret.

Snack of the Week #1- Pajeon

Ahh, the pajeon- the delectable griddle cake of green onion and miscellaneous seafood that nationalistic Koreans tell me inspired Italians (via Marco Polo) to create the much more international food of pizza. Whether or not true, the pajeon is still nominated for “favorite new food” alongside triangle gimbap and weird sausage pastry from Paris baguette. I’d been meaning to post of my love of the paj’ (as I like to endearingly refer to it) for a while, but due to laziness, and the seeming triviality of writing about food (I fucking love food, though), I haven’t gotten around to it.

But really not too much to say is there? The pajeon is kind of like a pizza and kind of like a pancake but at the same time is like neither. It is usually more doughy than crunchy, but the toughness of the squid keeps it from being too mushy. It is dipped in a red-pepper soy sauce, and served with a potent rice wine called makoli which is infamous for dehabiliting hangovers.
(It is served out of a bowl with a ladle and goes down a little too easy)

In the months I’ve been here I’ve eaten the paj’ everywhere from sitting at fancy gourmet restaurants to standing at 3a.m street stalls, and I actually prefer the later. It is a fun food to pick apart with chopsticks on a street corner. Sometimes the long strands of green onion (i always wondered why they just wouldn’t chop ’em) can make the endeavor a little difficult.. But like eating crabs, it’s a culinary inconvenience I can learn to love.
I’ve wondered for a while what the paj’ consists of. Lauren bought a mix from the Homeplus but the Hangeul ingredient list was of little help in unlocking the Korean pancake mystery.
When in doubt I turned to the all knowing wikipedia, which as always in the past provided me with answers to life’s difficult questions. Turns out pajeon is pretty simple (eggs,flour,veggies,etc). But unbeknownst to me Busan and the paj’ have been tight for quite some time. Read the article and learn (in brief) about the famous Dongnae pajeon.

All this talk of wikipidia and pancakes reminds me of the theory by Richard Foreman that modern technology makes us all informed idiots. This post (blogs period) being a perfect example with the links and two second research.

“But today, I see within us all (myself included) the replacement of complex inner density with a new kind of self-evolving under the pressure of information overload and the technology of the “instantly available”. A new self that needs to contain less and less of an inner repertory of dense cultural inheritance—as we all become “pancake people“—spread wide and thin as we connect with that vast network of information accessed by the mere touch of a button.”

Holidays abroad

Christmas Dinner:

Noraebang riot:

NEW YEAR’S

Surfing Busan

Even with the wreck of noise and flickery lights in the city one can still manage to get away into something more pristine. Morning hikes are nice, trips to the beach better, especially when the fickle sea knocks up a bit of surf like it did last week when I stumbled upon the SongJeong surf club, a 45-minute bus ride from my front door. There is a large cove with rock outcroppings and a long sandy beach, still littered with gaudy hotels, but less intense than Hauendae. I spent the day shivering through 2 foot closeouts with the glee of a child. I didn’t expect it. I was given some website info and swapped waves with a few locals until dark. I rode the bus back salty with my wetsuit wrapped in a towel. The ajummas eyed the soggy bulge suspiciously.

The club is housed out of a ramshackle beach hut crammed full of boards, wetsuits, and beach paraphernalia. The members, who pay annual dues to stash their equipment and use the club showers, mill around on the porch in their matching purple club sweatshirts after sessions. It seems a genuine, non-commercial surf scene, maybe something akin to the early days of surfing in the US and Australia. The surf in itself was better than I had expected, small but clean, zippy peelers racing into the sand. I ended up in the water for over seven hours, coming in for coffees at the beach hut cafes, dripping wet.


There were lefts funneling down the beach, light off shores holding them up before the inevitable closeout section. Climb and drop, race the tiny lines into the sand. On the other side of the cove was a right hand point break. I surfed it with a few others, dodging rocks and crap traps, scurrying outside for the occasional chest-high set. Some of the locals said the point broke better in the summer when the swell direction suited it. As my ice cubed toes and limp shoulders thawed out on the ratchety bus ride back through the gray city I felt consoled that only 45 minutes from the din of Busan I could be floating in a peaceful bay. If anyone else is interested in surfing here- holla.


I am still trying to discover a reliable surf report, so if anyone knows about surfing in Busan drop me a line. I would love to meet a group who wanted to explore the surf possibilities around here.
Here is the club site, although I can’t seem to get the webcam to work. Get in touch with me if anyone can decipher a surf report.

Hanguk Christmas

‘Tis the Christmas season in the land of the morning squid, and although far from home we are traipsing through the Yuletide best we can. Armed with paper snow flakes a mock mini pine tree atop the fridge, I am more decorated in the far East than ever at home. Honestly, I am a bit of a scrooge. I usually don’t privy the frosty excitement that seems to perk up in the more seasonal minded. That said, the comparatively sparse decorations do add a touch of hominess, especially in a land where Christmas means one day of work (Thursday at that) and the kids think chocolate cake and pizza are traditional Christmas foods.

On Christmas eve we are having a celebration at work, but I am not sure exactly how traditional it will be. Fusion Christmas. Something like a shrimburger kimchi set with sweet potato fries and a chilsung at the Lotteria. What makes me question the integrity is the odd query from our boss that we dress up in ridiculous costumes (preferably as the opposite sex) with lots of make-up and do synchronized dance moves to a Korean pop song. With the twisted South Korean marketing logic that seems to see dancing and ridiculous outfits as the magnum opus of promotional ploys, boss man thinks this will surely win over new students. Maybe upon seeing the goofy waygookans floundering around making fools of themselves these poor overworked little students will see some beacon of hope for their after school monotony, and subsequently chide their parents into enrolling them, but I still think it sounds more like Halloween. The fact is it’s a total sham, being as we have instituted a new curriculum which has the kids either buried in books, testing, or doing dictations in every free second(we literally outlawed games). He confided his secret strategy with us afterwards: “you see, we trick them with fun and dance, make them think that this is what class is like (sinister giggle), and then we have them.” I mean honestly it’s  damn hilarious. Education is a fucking industry here. But again, an unconventional Christmas. Almost makes me glad we have a tree.

Also, this is our new apartment, which is a few feet bigger than our last place. Here is one last picture for the full panorama.

GoBaMa-RaMa!

Watched it go down in the lounge. Co-workers smiled. “Bush a little stupid, right?” “You don’t like.”


<img src=”http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3184/3007014610_8fb3602497.jpg”

Halloweekend (illustrated and annotated)

So the past month has screamed by and yet at the same time this tiny nook of an apartment is beginning to become a home- although a temporary one. I feel a relief maybe akin to some kind of nomad and his tent. A kind of Kublha Khan/yurt thing. We have a pan (can you believe it!) and even a broom (oh, good god!). But in all honesty we went from having only a sheet, pillow, and a squat little refrigerator to having packed cupboards, a Herald Tribune subscription, a coffee pot and wireless Internet. I even have a tupperware full of kimchi which was given to me as a gift when our head teacher found that I liked spicy food. We’ve actually taken to whiling our weeknights away in these confines, cooking dinner at home and reading, something we hadn’t done at all during the first three weeks. Saying that the weekends are still spent on the town, usually complete with a night out and a escapade either to the mountains or some unexplored ‘hood.

Here is this past Halloween weekend illustrated with annotation.

Friday morning I mysteriously awoke in a frog suit. Rousing from a particularly deep sleep I was confused/exhilarated at my stroke of luck. All my coworkers were dressing up and couldn’t believe I didn’t have a costume. I mean, I am from America, right? I felt so lame I headed out that evening in hopes of magically stumbling across some sort of Halloween hint. Somewhere in PNU my wish came true. Frog costumes, along with cat, dog, cow, giraffe, hamster, etc, all lined up along the main avenue. I bought it, stashed it in my bag, and met up with a friend for a few drinks. There is this peculiar thing that seems to happen in Korea when you go out for “a few drinks,” maybe one can blame the bars that never close, or in particular at Moe’s-the great music that never stops, but this odd incidence causes one to stay out way past one’s proper bedtime (and to consume copious amounts of stale beer or soju). So upon returning home early in the morning I crept in to my frog suit and crawled into bed, unbeknown to Lauren. It was a fitting way to wake up Halloween morning, a confused frog in a fog. Luckily we had an all day Halloween party at work.

We had heard we were having a party at school, but clueless to the details we had no idea what to expect. Upon arriving we pretty much found it to be a free day. Our head teacher dressed up as a zombie (Korean ghost, she insisted) and the general level of gore impressed me. I thought I would just be a wholesome frog, but my co-workers insisted on giving me corpse paint and blood running down my chin. Okay, frogula, frog zombie, killer frog, whatever. My head teacher suggested that we run around to the other hagwons scaring children and handing out candy. We busted into one class screaming and scared a kid so bad he hid under his chair and wouldn’t come out, shaking like an epileptic. Afterward Lauren and I ran the drink table as the kids snacked away their afternoon. Later we went on a “parade” which consisted of us being stared at by confused and frightened Koreans. We even went trick or treating at a few of the student’s houses. The kids ended up leaving early and we ordered Chinese food to our office and had a communal dinner.

Later that evening we headed out to PNU for some Halloween occasion. The party was massive, spread out between Crossroads and Moe’s with some kind of function at B-SIDE also. There were near 10 bands total, including some Korean punk and rockabilly groups surprisingly . The costumes were also great, I wish I had gotten more photos.





I’ve also have loads of video that I’ve been too busy to upload off my camera. Mostly footage of the bands and the general pandemonium outside. We stayed until about 2 a.m (relatively early) and then went home so we could salvage our Saturday. Below is a quick clip of the craziness that spilled into the street, hopefully I will have more of the party up soon.

We spent Saturday exploring Semyeon and the seedy “Texas street,” and then hiked Guemjeong on Sunday, ending at the Dongnae hot springs for a serious soak. We are lucky in that their is a trail literally in our backyard that connects to the ridge that runs between Beomeosa and the cable car. The trail is empty to, so you can have a peaceful climb before being bombarded by a sea of trendy hikers. We got a little lost, but were luckily led along by a jovial Korean who chuckled in amusement as we followed him to the main trail.

This is about halfway up the riverbed trail, looking down to Dusil. We weren’t sure where we were going but luckily ended up making our way.

This is up at the East gate on the main trail. It was a nice spot, well manicured and surrounded by those foot volleyball courts which were all packed. They also had a public bulls eye where for a dollar you could shoot a wooden bow and a pile of arrows.

I’ve also got some video of the hike, the gates, and the cable car that I will hopefully put up at some point. We forewent the cable car this time and hiked down a steep set of makeshift stairs that led through several temple court yards, at the bottom we were relieved and visited the public foot bath.

This place is a trip. There are some serious hot springs in Dongnae and they really tap into them. This place is usually full of hikers soaking their toes for hours.

We eventually ended up at the larger hot springs which are a giant indoor deal. Lauren overcame her fear of public nudity and we soaked for hours, meeting downstairs to lie in the saunas and even eat a bowl of bibimbap in our robes. It was quite a time.

Halloween in Busan

Here is a quick clip to prepare you for the onslaught on Halloween photos I should be posting soon. I thought my costume was genius, but being as I bought it off the street and the fact that costumes are pretty hard to come by here I should have realized that I wouldn’t be the only frog at the party. Anyway, the jam was righteous, massive crowd, great costumes, and surprisingly enough- Korean punk bands!

Jalgachi/Pnu

Ahh…here are some fresh clips of a Saturday exploring Busan. Mostly fish guts and booze. Enjoy.