Sunday, June 15th
Of course Kyle and I woke up too late, and ended up not being able to go hiking. It was an hour by bus to get to the National Park, and we had to catch a train for the farm. We ended up grabbing a quick bite at a fast food type restaurant near the train station after locking our bags up in lockers that were locked using your fingerprint. I had kimbap and ramen, and Kyle ordered bulgogi, which I thought was a mistake, since it was not a very nice restaurant; I compared it to ordering a steak at McDonalds. But these things happen when there isn’t a menu in English, and it is sometimes easier to just order what you know.
We walked around the city and came across a market that was selling all sorts of things. Lots of smelly fish (see photos) while we were walking around Kyle decided that it would be a good idea to get a haircut before we went to the farm to work. 2 years ago when I went to Japan to visit Kyle he got a haircut in the city of Beppu, and it was the best haircut he had ever gotten. He had decided to get as many haircuts in as many of the countries we are going to as he can. He might not have any hair left when we get back!
Down a side street, we gathered our courage and went into a beauty shop. Kyle was worried that they might not do men’s haircuts there, but they did! They seemed excited to be cutting a foreigners hair. They tried to ask us the usual questions. Then they asked if Kyle wanted a shampoo, and he said yes, since he loves to have his head rubbed by just about anyone! They shampooed his hair right in the styling chair. Then took him over to another chair for a rinse. The haircut turned out very well! She really did a great job cleaning up the sides and making the front not look like a little boy’s haircut! And it came to 4000 Won, which is about $4 USD! We couldn’t believe it. Tipping is not usually done in Korean restaurants or taxis, but I thought it would be nice to give her a tip, so I gave her 1000 Won; she kind of giggled but took it with two hands which is customary in Korea when accepting something from someone.
We did a little more shopping and looked desperately for somewhere to sit and have a beer. Finally we found a little coffee shop that served beer. Koreans don’t think it is healthy to drink alcohol without eating something at the same time. I knew this fact but when you are in this situation you tend to forget things like that. Well we tried ordering just beer, but the owner kept asking us something in Korean, and it seemed as if he was not going to let us order any beer. Finally the beer came, and I found in the book what he was trying to say. He kept saying “Anju” which means snack in Korean. So we ordered some food as to not be “unhealthy” and got a chicken salad with too much dressing, but it was still good! Then it was off to the train station to head to Sangju to farm with our “Young Couple”!
The train ride was uneventful, and we made it there in about two hours. Youngmi met us at the train station with Youngin, her 5 month old baby, super cute!! We love the Asian babies. We were relieved to find that Youngmi spoke wonderful English. She took us to her house, showed us around, and then sent us down the road to meet her husband, Insook. He also thankfully spoke English fairly well. He showed us the fields that he works, and described the work we would be doing the next day. The house is in a very rural part of Korea, it is up a little ways into the mountains. The bathroom is very typical of the Korean bathrooms we have seen in hotels, no shower curtain, and not real shower. There is a bathtub but a washing machine is positioned over it, there is a hose and shower head attached to one of the many facets in the bathroom, and several plastic bowls of varying sizes. We are later told that you take one of the smaller bowls and dip it in the big bowl that is filled with water and use that to flush the toilet. This sounded easy but I had trouble getting the technique down, and with the frequency that I have to go I needed to get this skill mastered quickly. There was also not a sink present just the bowls and a drain in the floor. There are a few other houses near the house, and a stream but the fields are a little walk down the road.
After looking at the fields we went up to the house to have dinner. We had rice, which was brown and they had grown it organically last year! We also had kimchi, a cold soup, cucumber (kind of like the cucumber salad I made a ton of last year) I actually made this cucumber salad too, Youngmi let me help. It was amazing to be making my Korean cucumber salad with real Korean cucumbers in a Korean kitchen! I used a bean paste instead of soy sauce and raw dark brown sugar, which Kyle later said looked “amazing”! While cooking I noticed that they did not have an oven just a large toaster oven. But otherwise it looked like an American kitchen. We also had a squid pancake thing that I forgot the Korean name for, but Insook described it as a Korean pizza, I think simple and easy to make, maybe even a little like junk food since it is fried. It kinda freaked me out to see Youngmi preparing the squid, I watched her rinse it and then cut it up, kind of slimy! Dinner was good, and fun. Since Youngmi speaks such good English we were able to ask her all sorts of things about Korea and Korean culture, she also got a kick out of all the things we knew and loved about Korea. Our love for K-dramas has come through so much that she asked us if all American’s loved and watched the K-dramas. We laughed and said that the only people we know who watch K-dramas are foreigners or friends of ours that we have introduced to the shows! After dinner Kyle and I walked outside for a bit. The frogs were so loud, but it was still very peaceful. Kyle pointed out the big dipper, and we discussed whether or not it was actually the big dipper since we were so far from home and our sky, but Kyle just laughed at me and told me it was the big dipper. Then I saw the biggest and brightest shooting star I have ever seen in my life! It almost looked like a firework, but it was too high in the sky. It was incredible, but Kyle missed it but we kissed anyway! Then we went off to sleep on the futons on the floor, another night of sore hips, I ended up having to sleep on my back again.
