Greg's Visit

JULY 14TH, 2009 (Note to reader: Entry was started on July 14th but completed at a later date)

Tonight marks the first night that I will not be in the company of my good friend Greg Jablonski. As I write this entry he will either be enjoying a nightcap somewhere on his last night in Seoul or in a dimly lit dungeon, a mile underground and in the unforgiving grips of Kim Jong-Il’s blindly loyal military regime. Though his flight out of Seoul is scheduled for tomorrow I recently discovered that the plans he made with a new acquaintance from Canada that we met in my last night there to tour the DMZ today came to fruition. This brash decision to explore the most highly militarized border on the planet is a testament to his adventurous spirit and I’m glad he was able to do it, but my fingers are crossed for his safe return. For those of you at home, if a stout and scruffy gentleman, answering primarily to the name “Ox” should come across your path please be sure to bring him home- his friends and family will be worried.

Greg’s arrival brought an inauspicious start to his journey across the globe. Still without a cell phone and more than three months into my contract here, the demand for sharp action and precise planning was necessary to ensure a smooth transfer from the Gwangju bus terminal to my humble abode. Unfortunately, despite our best efforts, a great failure to meet at the appointed time occurred. While I arrived early and rushed to the point that I expected him to come through he somehow managed to elude my vigilant eyes. The consequence was a lot of waiting around and Greg’s eventual decision to stay the night at the Ramada that happened to be just down the street from my school. By then I’m sure he had just about thrown in the towel for meeting me that night but his last ditch effort to use the internet in the lobby of the hotel proved successful. While my concern for Greg and the assumption that he had been waylaid in Seoul entered my mind I too took a chance by paying a few won to log onto one of the bus terminal’s public computers. Fortunately, both of our decisions were made at roughly the same time and live contact was established. Though on slightly grumpy and exhausted terms, we were able to meet in the lobby of the Ramada sometime around the 2 o’clock hour. I had the pleasure of showing him the ridiculous proximity of my school to his lodgings as well as to his first Korean meal at a nice restaurant on the corner called McDonalds.

Before parting ways on that first night, we made plans to meet up for lunch outside of my school and from there he would be able to come in and observe my newly acquired Korean teaching methods. We did lunch with some of co-workers at a nearby “kimbap nara”, allowing him to actually taste some real Korean food. While no effort is spent on ambience or service at these kimbap shops, the price for the quantity and value along with the authentic Korean experience that it provides makes a place like this an extremely worthwhile visit.

After lunch, I was able to introduce him to my kindergarten class as we tackled the “science “part of our
curriculum. On that day, our undertaking was to demonstrate the reflective principle of a camera. As is the case with most of the sciences we deal with, the concept being dealt with was beyond the understanding of my kids and the work need to assemble everything was also impractical for them to complete alone. It was actually extremely lucky that Greg was there that day because I wasted no time putting him to work helping the students and were it not for that I don’t think we would have finished in time. The results of the camera science were interesting, although mixed, as some of the kids’ lenses showed upside down images of the world while others revealed little more than a dim light through an opaque film. The greatest success of the day was a noted sense of endearment that developed between my kids and “Grape” teacher of which I think we were both happy about.

For my first afternoon class, I took advantage of the fact that I was ahead of the workload with my class and let Greg take the reins. It was the idea of my Korean teacher to have the kids use their English to ask the Greg questions about him. At first, the questions were weak and scarce but as they grew more comfortable and confident the give and take between the two parties became more fluid and the English flowed more freely, if not inaccurately in many cases. For my later class, I think it was enjoyable for Greg to see how well they could actually speak and how easy it was to interact with them but, at the same time, it is a class where a lot of work is done and I gave him the nod to head upstairs to the office and take a break. After all, he had been flying for a day and half and jet lag was very real ailment at the time.

Perhaps the greatest thing about leaving on Wednesday in America and flying 18 hours to Korea is the fact that when you get there it’s already the weekend. By the time I was done with work at 7:20 and met back up with Greg upstairs, we were both ready to take on Friday night in Gwangju. Set on showing him some of the cornerstones of Korean nightlife right off the bat, I took him to dinner at the nearby corner Korean barbecue where we ordered the usual, supplemented with some local Korean beer and the country’s national liquor, soju. Delighted by a delicious dinner and the first real chance to catch up, we stuck around until our cheeks were a little bit redder than they started and set our sights on downtown Gwangju. The night brought us to a number of our local haunts, introducing Greg to the Korean bar that brews its own German-style beer and another one where we could play some pool and darts, varying from a largely foreign clientele to a mixed Korean/foreign crowd. While the memory of everything may vary in accuracy, the culmination of the evening actually occurred well into the morning hours when we were randomly invited to sit with a few Korean guys sitting at an outside bar on our way to take a cab home. Just as we though the night was over we found ourselves engulfed in a torrent of volleyed Korean and English. Essentially unable to understand each other from words alone, the need for charades and big gestures increased as we drank and the hilarity was palpable.

The only drawback of our evening’s prolonged festivities was, quite naturally, the next day. While a late start was far from the worst thing to happen to a visitor who needed his rest on a day when much of the activity was spent preparing for the Fourth of July celebration that night, it became necessary for much more time to be reserved for recovery than that. Chalked up, based on my extensive knowledge on these kinds of medical maladies, to a combination jetlag/ exhaustion, very authentic Korean food and a long night out, when Greg woke up that morning, he was a far cry from the floor-stomping, 100-meter dash record breaking Ox that many of us know so well. Some of us like to say that it was the soju that really did it, so that we can act like pseudo-natives who brag about being able to drink their home brews but either way, even as the morning and day got ready to turn into evening, our fallen comrade was not yet ready for it. To give my guest some well-deserved credit he did manage to make an appearance at our rooftop gala long enough to nurse a cheeseburger and meet some of my friends that he had yet to encounter up to this point. Tragically, his timing being what it was, he managed to miss the short visit made by a fellow son of Vernon, Matt Marion. Not having met him before, there was an odd familiarity that existed when I saw him simply through the knowledge that we shared common origins. It was just too bad we couldn’t have the trifecta sharing a beer and a burger beneath the setting sun of the Orient.

On my end, the night was yet another one that was very well spent. We decked out our rooftop with chairs, grills and music and while we only had a small handful of expected guests our popularity proved to be more far-reaching than we had initially realized. As the sun hovered above the not so distant mountains, we sat or stood talking about America, Korea and just about anything under the aforementioned ball of fire and gas. Perhaps the only real flaw to the whole plan was leaving yours truly in command of the grill for evening but even then, I think I managed an adequate performance. On the pro side, fireworks can be bought just about anywhere here without difficulty and they pretty much were. Even after a thorough display of roman candles, bottle rockets and a multitude of other incendiaries there still remain an assortment of fireworks sitting in random spots in my now overfilled apartment, compliments of the vast array of items that were conveniently stashed temporarily in my nearby abode.

The next day, Sunday, was my first opportunity to introduce Greg to Korea in the daylight. Unfortunately for me, Greg was going on a full day and night’s rest and ready to see this new world while I was still shedding the weight of the previous night from my eyelids. We managed to get ourselves our of the door sometime around noon or so and, after a quick lunch at Kimbap Nara, set forth towards downtown- a place he had been previously, but under much different pretexts. We spent some time looking for the Bermuda Triangle of bars that we had patronized in the dawning hours of Saturday but to no avail. Though Greg claims he saw one of the guys that we drank with on a later visit with one of my friends I am convinced that our experience was somewhat of a mix between Alice and Wonderland and The Twilight Zone. The obvious conclusion that I’ve come to is that this bar only exists when it is the one thing you want the most, otherwise it rests somewhere in limbo, awaiting the next party of dreamers to stumble upon it. Beside that, we just wandered through downtown where I showed him the market that sells anything from VERY fresh produce and seafood to knock-off Louis Vuitton (don’t worry, I google checked it for spelling accuracy) bags and furniture.

By the time we made it back from downtown it was somewhere around dinner time so I took him to my local favorite, California Sushi and Roll. It has reached the point that he trio of Terry, Chris and Liam have managed to acquire our own distinct “go-to” restaurants in our neighborhood- Terry has Kimbap Nara for his spicy and bubbling hot soup, Kimchi Jjigae, Chris has O.So where he can some get some Korean barbecued beef and I have my sushi place. The thing is, they never seem willing to go to my favorite spot so it was essential to bring my hometown pal to some of the best rolls he’s ever had. While red soup and raw cow meat may have an allure of their own, there is nothing like a roll of sushi shaped like a dragon with edible fire emanating from its mouth- trust me, Greg agrees. After that, we finished off his first weekend in Korea with a few pints and a few friends at our favorite local watering hole.

During the week, much of Greg’s activity that is worthy of retelling occurred while I was at work. While I could attempt to piecemeal a story together with what he told me about his adventures in Gwangju, I don’t believe myself up to the challenge and would be too afraid of delivering it in a way that is unbefitting this Quester of the Orient. Much of the story involved getting intentionally lost in the city and taking a journey to the outskirts for a leisurely hike in the mountains. Also, much of what was in his plans, which are ever wont to go awry, were bogged down by the advent of the Korean rainy season. He managed to arrive just as it began to get into full swing and it kept him pretty well grounded for the week. We did, however, have a few good nights out and one which was probably the most memorable of our the nights that didn’t fall on a weekend.

It’s customary for our directors to take the guests of their employees out to dinner during one of the nights that they are there. As luck would have it, Greg’s time here overlapped with an evening planned by them to take some of the Korean teachers out for some samgyeopsal- a korean barbecue dish of glorified bacon cut in thick slabs and served with a laundry list of sides. It was decided that Greg’s night would be that same night. Well beyond feeling miffed for not getting his own dinner, Greg rose to the occasion and helped make it a particularly socially redeeming night. Tucked in one corner, surrounded by Korean teachers and my bosses and ignoring the stiffness that comes with sitting cross-legged at a foot and a half high table, Greg, Terry, Chris, Charles (a new addition to LCI who hails from the beautiful county of Bergen, New Jersey) and I reveled in the company at hand. We shared glasses of soju and maekju (beer) as we toasted to the hauntingly sweet drinking melody that Greg brought with him from the shores of New Jersey known affectionately as “Drink Your Face Off”. While I admit I was a bit timid to introduce such a dirge myself to the said company in my three months here, after a few precursor toasts there were many who welcomed the refreshingly simple tune. It was a fitting compliment to the array of soju, maekju and “somaek” (a surprisingly pleasant mixture of beer and soju) that was being enjoyed by all. The night took us surprisingly well into the evening and, notwithstanding the mildly rough morning that awaited me the next day, it was a great time.

The following Friday had a typically late start, compliments of Chris and my 7:20 exit from the office and our garrulous ways. As we headed downstairs we made a stop at the main floor where we found Terry who, having the late shift, was still on the clock but without any classes left. To while his time away he was chatting it up with our director Manila. It took very little for us to fall into the trap that can easily extinguish a Friday night before it even starts- small talk. Still dinnerless as the minutes ticked away, the youthful evening began to age into its prime when Manila said she would have offered to buy us a beer if it weren’t for the fact that we still had to eat dinner. Fortunately, we were in a company of like minds who were willing to forego an evening of sustenance for the sake of a friendly invitation and, admittedly, a free beer. However, what emerged from this invitation was a beer that became the first of more. As we sipped on OB Blue and dined some bar food, we listened to Manila explaining how to date Korean girls and how to make sure we find the right one. Though he was only here for a week at that point, Manila had learned Greg’s nickname from home -Ox- and had labeled him with her own -Terminator- and used both interchangeably. We learned that night that Greg was strong-handsome and I, well, was just the regular kind. Still, after such discoveries, our other boss arrived and though I think he was aiming to go home managed to endure our company for awhile longer, for which we were all appreciative. Though unexpected, the first stop of the night that became the actual night was a welcome surprise. I got to boast to Greg about how great my bosses are while he got to boast about how strong and handsome he was. It was win-win.

A relatively quiet and early night on Friday opened the door for a relatively early start on Saturday which, thanks to a favor from Manila, would be the departure date for Greg and I to head to Seoul where I would be permitted to take a day from work and stay until Monday. After a quick meal at the reliable Kimbap Nara and some good-byes between Greg and his new friends, Chris and Terry, we hopped a cab and headed to the bus station. It was around dinnertime when we reached Seoul and settled into our hotel room, where Greg made an incredible entrance by screaming, in a joking tone, at me in the sound-proof revolving doors only for his sound-proofed window to close sometime before he was done with his scream. The first thing we heard from our would-be hosts for the next two nights (four, for him) was to please be quiet, accompanied with some less than friendly looks. In a city that neither of us had been to before and where my depressingly trivial knowledge of the Korean language was our main means of progressing our adventure forward, this wasn’t the start we were looking for. Thankfully, first impressions can sometimes be reconfigured.

Our first night in Seoul was spent relatively close to home-base for the sake of convenience and began at a restaurant that was advertised in our travel book as the Platinum Brewery- featuring a microbrewery of about seven different beers and a dinner buffet. When we arrived, we soon discovered that where the Platinum Brewery should have been was a place known simply as The Beer Factory. Not ones to split hairs, we proceeded downstairs to see what was in store.

The restaurant proved to be what we assumed was the successor of the Platinum Brewery. It looked like a what a place called Platinum brewery would look like minus the name on the door. Either way, it had what we were looking for. There were seven microbrews and a menu of Korean-German dishes. I have, by the way, come to the conclusion that Korea sees German bars in the same way that we see Irish pubs. I have already seen a few and they are the only places where I have seen more than two or three beers on tap and where they actually have their own beers. They probably figure if it’s German it must be good. But, I digress. Dinner with Gregory was enjoyable and the ambience was proper for a couple of old friends getting ready to part ways in a couple of days.

We spent an hour or two at the Beer Factory before we shoved off to see where the night would take us. Interestingly enough, it didn’t take us on all that exotic of a course to start. We trolled the streets for awhile looking for a suitable berth to make anchor but it seemed we that we were still too early and that we weren’t quite in the prime location for Saturday night activity. We decided that it was in our best interest to lay up for a little and hope that a couple of pints would inspire us to our next endeavor. Laughably, we wound up at a WA Bar somewhere on a side street which is a chain bar in Korea that exists, in abundance, in Gwangju. In fact, it was a WA Bar that housed the Friday night discussions the night before. It wasn’t exactly the best way to show off a new city and the house was pretty empty but the company was good and when we asked for a stout the menu said they had we ended up with a pair of Guinnesses in our midst. Not to be discouraged, we took these pints as a sign of things to come. It took some time for anything to happen but eventually a few Korean girls came in and we managed to start a conversation. Before we knew it, we were at a Nae-Rae-Bang or singing room. It would prove to be the second night, since my arrival in Korea, that I would submit others to the once Choral-caliber-gone-terribly-wrong voice of mine. While I apologized profusely in between breaths, the sympathetic encouragement kept me going. Greg did a little bit better than me but I still think we gave those girls something to shudder at for years to come.

The next day took us into the heart of the city, to a place called Insadong. As a recommendation from Manila, I think we were both extremely happy to have been pointed in this direction. Typically, Seoul is considered a much more international and less Korean city than a place like Gwangju but I would say that I, and I think most certainly Greg, got one of the most authentic feels of traditional Korean culture that we’ve had so far. We were able to check out some tea shops with some pretty impressive ceramic creations and got to sit down to a traditional Korean lunch decked out with rose tea and mandu and kimchi soup. Afterward, we were able walk through a market that was built on a large, spiraling ramp that continued a good four or five stories high. From there we could see a good portion of the city and glimpse the ever-present mountains rising up beyond the city limits.

As dusk began to fall and we had our fill of tea and kimchi, we headed into what the kids these days would call a “hipper” part of town. Not too far from a university, Greg and I hoped to send each other off in style. Oddly enough, it became another on of those nights where your first stop is expected to be the first of many but, instead, becomes your venue for the evening. For dinner, we went to a restaurant called The Pub where we, fittingly, got The Pub Pizza (We ate a surprising amount of pizza while Greg was in Korea) and a couple of beers. Happy with the food and the beer, as well as the restaurant itself that had an indoor feel but opened out into the street where we could observe the comings and goings of people passing by, we opted to sit tight for a little while. But anchored only temporarily by our food and beer, our eyes began to wander and contemplate our next move until Greg couldn’t help but notice that the two western-looking girls sitting at the next table over were speaking English at times and French at others. Intrigued, Greg politely asked for an explanation. Sure enough, they were French Canadian- one was in Korea as an English teacher and the other was a teacher back home visiting. To some readers, that coincidence is obvious but for others it becomes necessary for me to explain that Greg is a teacher back home. For those of you who have stumbled on this blog and somehow managed to have only read this paragraph I must also explain that I am an English teacher in Korea. Naturally, conversation erupted and we ended up talking with them for quite awhile. By the time they had left and it was just us two again, we were well situated at The Pub and it became bar the for the night.

The next day was a slow start. With the weather being what it was, an off and on rainfall, and with our plans for the day undecided, we ended up wandering through the streets of Myeongdong, another part of town in Seoul. This was a much more internationalized/Americanized part of the city which, for me was a welcome sight, and it was interesting to see the throngs of people out and about on a Monday afternoon/evening. The main event of the night was an early dinner at a, you guessed it, German-style bar called Bier Halle. Though we were, yet again, impressed by the ambience of the restaurant itself, we picked out two seats near a part of the room that jutted out and over the street with a window for a wall. We found it to be another place to enjoy a pint and some vittles while absorbing the scenes below. From there, Greg accompanied be to the bus station where we had a somewhat hectic time trying to figure out where the bus to Gwangju arrived. When we finally did, we found out the next bus left rather soon and Greg and I parted with a hug and handshake. For me, the next stop would be my place back here in Gwangju and for him, a one way ticket to the DMZ- the most heavily garrisoned border in the world- in the company of our newly-made Canadian friend.

But that story is not mine to tell…


Another post in the near future. This time I promise. Stories from next week’s trip to Japan await.