Namhansanseong Take 2: Living on the edge

Back in early November, we met up with some of the other Gwangju foreigners with the intention of hiking around the Namhansanseong (an old mountain fortress just outside Gwangju - the name literally means "south of the Han (river) mountain fortress") and admiring the Autumn leaves before it got too late in the year. Unfortunately, one of our number (he shall remain nameless) was late so we didn't get going until mid afternoon which meant we only had an hour or two explore the Namhansanseong before it got dark but we still tried to make the best of it. We all jumped in a couple of taxis and made the slightly longer than expected journey up to the old wall and fortress. Rowan and I have been there before, back in September I think, when the sun was still shining and it was warm enough to go out in t-shirts (see http://bloodriceandnoodles.blogspot.com/2010/10/between-acts.html).

Our intrepid group finally reaches the tourist village just next to the Namhansanseong after a lot of waiting around.

Beautiful Autumn colours on the walk to the Namhansanseong walls.

More Autumn colours, this time in red. Yes, Korea really does have it all.

The entry gate to the path along the fortress walls. Little did I know that this would be the entrance into my own personal hiking hell.

We had hoped to walk along the whole length of the fortress wall this time but as we'd made a late start we ended up covering pretty much the same ground as we had done the first time. However, this time we covered it in a much more exciting (read terrifying) way. Instead of walking along the broad paths and up the many steps that make up that path, our group decided it was a better idea to walk on the other side of the old wall on a narrow trail. This was fine at first but as we walked further the path got narrower and the drop from the side of the trail got steeper as the hill (mountain?) fell away to a hollow far below not to mention the fact that the earth was very crumbly in places. Being a complete wimp when it comes to climbing on mountains, I could feel my panic rising. What if I fall? What if it gets dark and we can't get off the trail? What if we run out of beer? Questions, questions. The problem was that we were walking on the other side of the big, old wall and there didn't appear to be any way back through it unless we walked to the next gate and we had no idea how far it was to the next one. The wall there is really high and wide and I didn't really fancy having to scale it, especially with a fairly steep drop behind me. I hasten to add that no-one else seemed anywhere near as bothered by all this as I was. I suppose it's just my Norfolk blood - we don't have hills in Norfolk, well we do but there are so few of them they have their own individual names and were probably worshipped as gods back in the Stone Age by the local lowland tribes.

At this point the trail was still quite wide and it was easy going.

Fighting our way through the 'beautiful' undergrowth as the trail becomes more difficult. Note the height of the wall by this point.

Taking a break from the hiking. Rowan appears to be holding a bottle of soju in his hand - how very Korean of him (Koreans seem to associate hiking with drinking booze and you'll often see people selling Makgeolli, Korean rice wine, at the top of a mountain, presumably to help you roll down it again without breaking too many bones.)

This is one of the last pictures I took when the trail was still not too difficult. After this point, my hands became too slippery with cold panic sweat to operate the camera. I remember looking at those cheerful idiots on the other side of the wall with huge envy shortly after taking this photo.

I could feel the panic getting worse and we had fallen behind the others thanks to my nervously slow pace so we tried asking some passing Koreans where the next entrance through the wall was and how long it would take us to get there. They were proper Korean hiking types, fully decked out in hiking boots, bright coloured hiking jackets, hats and gloves and carrying hiking poles - in other words the standard uniform of Korea's army of hikers. I think there must have been a bit of a communication breakdown though as they told us that the next gate was very, very far away (in Korean) and advised us to turn back to use the gate we'd originally come through. There was no way we would be able to that before it got dark so in the end Rowan and I decided to leg it over the monstrously high wall. Rowan, gentleman that he is, went first and worked out how to get over the damn thing. I think he was pleasantly surprised at how well I managed the climb given my terror on the hike so far. Actually it wasn't too bad and we both rolled over the top of the wall without too much hassle. We were enjoying a well earnt swig of beer when we suddenly heard one of the other guys from our group calling to us. He was on the right side of the wall just like us! In fact, so was everybody else from the group and no, they hadn't all scaled the fortress wall. They had used the hidden passage that went under the wall and we could have used it too if we had carried on just a little further. I was cursing those Korean hikers for their lies! They probably thought we were looking for the next gate though rather than any entrance that would get us on the right side of the wall - communication breakdown. Oh well, at least the others got a good laugh from the mental picture of us scrambling over the wall.

Rowan stands, beer bottle in hand having just thrown himself over the wall, wondering who's calling out to us.

Despite the fear and communication problems it was a good hike. The scenery was beautiful and the Autumn leaves were turning gorgeous colours. It was a really misty day which lent the Namhansanseong an air of eerie mystery (and dampness). Will I go again? Definitely. Will I walk on the wrong side of the wall? Maybe not.

Beautiful red leaved trees shrouded in the mist at the side of the trail.

It started to get really misty by the time we had made it back to the right side of the wall.

Another beautiful Autumnal view over the mountains. The Namhansanseong wall is just visible in the distance.

For a more amusing take on the Namhansanseong with some bizarre Korean musical accompaniment check out this video- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1cDlRKK7y4 It even has pictures of the temples that are apparently contained somewhere within the walls. We've never made it to see them as we always end up getting there too late to go very far. It's mainly the music that I love this video for though - I think it might be an example of Korean Trot music, a type of old school pop music beloved by Korean grandmas (ajummas) with a pounding disco beat and wailing Korean vocals. Might have to write a post about it someday. Watch this space.

School Festival 2010

The second of the two days of fun (and no work!) at my school was the School Festival. This was even more exciting than the sports day which had been day one of my school's extravaganza. It was a day of singing, dancing, silly games and even a Chinese acrobatic show that showcased the talents of our school's students and some of the teachers too. The festival opened with a performance of traditional Korean samul nori drumming by some of the students followed by the usual round of speeches by the Principal and other school worthies.

Students giving a samul nori performance at the opening of the school festival.

The school principal addresses the crowd.

With the opening niceties dispensed with, we moved onto the first entertainment of the day - the O and X game. This was basically an elimination game that was played outside on the school playing field and involved the competing students being asked true or false questions. They had to decide if they thought it was true (O) or false (X) and move to the appropriate side of the field for their answer. The last person left after the various rounds won some kind of prize. I actually had a part in this competition as on e of the rounds was a special English quiz. I has to get up on stage and ask them 3 true or false questions though I don't think they were hard enough as everyone went the right way for all 3! Oh well, never mind, perhaps being a quizmaster isn't my calling in life after all.

My 5 mins of infamy. I was actually quite nervous, worried perhaps that they wouldn't understand a word I said and I would look like a total fool.

Students playing the O and X game on the dirt playing field in front of the school. Teachers held up ropes after a set amount of time and if you were in the wrong box you were out.

These were the prizes on offer to the winners of the pop song contest and the other competitive events at the festival.

After I had done my 5 mins of work for the day I went for a wander around the school playing field to have a look at the stalls that had been set up all round the edges. Some stalls were being run by parents but most were run by students. A few of them were selling food and drinks whilst the majority were game stalls reminiscent of the kind of thing you might see at a village fête but with a distinctly Korean twist. You were supposed to buy tokens to play the games but I didn't realise and didn't have any money on me. Luckily, the novelty of having a Foreign English teacher play your games seemed to be enough for me to get quite a few freebies!

This was a hot food stall run by parents. It was selling curled fish paste on sticks (not my favourite!), Korean "pizza" (pancakes) and tteokbokki (spicy rice cake stew). They gave me some for free which was great as I was freezing and it was tasty and hot!

A student run food stall selling weird but strangely delicious rectangular shaped hot dog sausages.

These girls had made a lucky wheel game for their stall and they let me have a free go. I won a pair of small pink socks which was cool!

One stall I visited was selling anything - they just wanted you to try their "special" biscuits. The biscuits had wasabi as well as custard cream in the middle and were pretty damn hot but as I love wasabi I happily munched my way through a couple, all the while exclaiming about how delicious they were much to the disbelief of the students!

A student run face painting stall. Their face painting skills were a little hit and miss but that just added to the fun.

This lad wasn't selling anything. All he wanted was a hug! That's what he charged me for this photo - 1 hug! I'm sure teachers would never be able to that in the UK.

They're playing Chinese chess? This seemed to be a popular spectator sport too which isn't surprising given that there appears to be a whole TV channel dedicated to the board game Go on Korean TV.

This was by far my favourite game stall at the festival. It's basically a human sized version of the whack a mole game with students instead of moles and inflatable rubber rings instead of holes. Genius!

This game was so funny I had to stick an extra picture on here of it. This is a closer view of the hammer action. Th students were really going for it with the mallets but the "moles" weren't put off, and kept sticking their heads up through the rings for my punishment.

At this stall you got to throw water balloons at a few brave (and very cold) students. Note the towels stuffed under their chins in an attempt to stop them getting too wet.

This was probably the most dangerous stall at the festival. The object of the game was to burst the balloon in the open locker. Players were offered the choice of using sharp stones, scissors or screwdrivers which they then had to throw at the lockers in the hope of popping that balloon. Ricochets were scarily common!

A student takes aim with a pair of scissors. There are small sharp stones and other scary implements on the chair in front of him in case he finds that the scissors aren't cutting it.

Inside the school, there was a big display of the student's craft and artwork including a few posters warning of the dangrs of smoking and drink driving.

Yep, smokers really are a pain the neck, aren't they?

The stalls were all cleared away at the end of the morning and the afternoon was given over to the song contest. I must admit that I missed a lot of it as I hid inside where it was warm but I did catch a few bits, including a storming performance by an all teacher rock super-group, a few songs performed by students replete with full on K-Pop style dance moves and the only rap performance of the festival by a couple of students who rapped such charming English lyrics as "I'm a fucking soldier" and "Motherfuckers come on" whilst the Principal watched, nodding his head appreciatively (presumably with no idea what the words meant). The festival closed with a special performance by a Chinese acrobatic troupe who did some amazing tricks.

Some of the students show off their moves in the pop song contest.

Our resident rappers - they're "fuckin' soldiers" apparently - well I'm sure they will be in a few years when they have do to their national service!

The Chinese acrobats were amazing.

This female acrobat could even spring down flights of stairs slinky style without losing her composure thanks to her steel hula hoops.

Mind-bendingly flexible female acrobats.

The acrobat show finale.

It was a really fun couple of days and I was pretty sad when they were over, especially as I had to go back to doing some real work.

School Sports Day

Feverish excitement gripped my school during October in the build up to 2 of the most important days in the school calendar: the school's sports day and the school festival. I don't remember anyone getting particularly excited about school sports day back in England when I was a kid and I'm pretty sure we didn't have a school festival day either so I was curious to say the least about what it would be like.

At break time, classrooms and corridors were filled with the sound of cheerleading as students prepared their chants ready to support their teams on sports day. They even made banners and cards to hold up when their classmates were competing in the different events, sometimes trying to do this surreptitiously during my English lessons in the mistaken belief that I - a) wouldn't notice and b) wouldn't mind - how wrong they were. Yes, this was a long way from the egg and spoon races that I remember from my childhood. It was more like the preparations for a major international sporting event (at least the kids seemed to hold it in a similar regard when I threatened to confiscate their banners if they kept messing around in my class). The build up to the school festival was even more impressive. One of the main components of the day was a pop song contest that was scheduled to make up the afternoon entertainment so for weeks the school rang with the sound of singing, dancing students getting ready for their moment of glory. There were even auditions being held for the honour of being able to perform at the festival which led to some of my students having to leave my class to attend their audition - it must have been a heartbreaking situation for them, having to choose between my English class and following their musical dreams! Unfortunately, in common with the UK, awful, wailing pop ballads are very much in favour here in South Korea, especially among students, so the singing in the corridors was of the ululating, throat vibrating variety which was pretty annoying. On the plus side, most Koreans seem to have really good singing voices - maybe it's all that karaoke they do! Another bonus of all this madness was that classes were cancelled for two whole days at my school - never a bad thing!

The students were all made to line up in the school playing field at the start of the day and salute the Korean flag as the Korean national anthem played on tinny speakers.

The first day was the school sports day. Unfortunately, this was the week when the weather suddenly turned really cold so I, like most of the teachers, spent a lot of time hiding in the library which was the only room that had any heating on at this point. I did manage to catch some of the "soccer" (football to us Brits) matches and a few of the races though. The supporters were out en masse. From what I could work out, each class from the 1st, 2nd and 3rd grades fielded teams and competitors for the different events and the groups of supporters were made up of the rest of the class. It was an interesting sight, as each class had their own specific costume, worn by supporters and competitors alike. Some of the best ones were the class that dressed up in witches hats and cloaks (it was close to Halloween time) and the class that all wore baggy leopard (cheetah?) print leggings with tails coming out the back of them.

The sports day kicked off (sorry) with a few football matches.

Loyal supporters braved the cold with the aid of blankets and banged their baseball “thunder sticks” (inflatable cheering balloons that get their name from the loud noise they make when you beat them together).

My school had it's very own MC for both the sports day and the school festival. The colourful 3rd grade English teacher sported a wacky bandanna and a mic and provided a running commentary for both days.

Competitors line up on their marks ready for a relay race. Note that one of the runners is wearing his class costume of leopard print leggings as are some of the supporters standing at the back.

Most of the kids really went for it in the relay races. There were some funny moments when runners crashed into each other at the changeover point of the race and it ended in a bit pile up of sprawling students and scattered batons.

I think this was class 1-10, clad in their Halloween supporters costumes, giving it their all in support of their relay team.

A photo finish for one of the 2nd grade boys. Note the leopard print leggings worn by supporters in the right hand corner of the picture.

I'm not sure who won the different categories but it was a pretty fun day. The next day was the School Festival, which was even more exciting, but I will write about that in another entry to save this one from getting too massive.

Funny Korean Music Videos

This week I have been extremely busy trying to plan my English Summer Camp. This is the last week of the school term and next Monday is the start of camp which is in fact not a camp at all. It does not involve any tents, sleeping bags or singing songs around a campfire. Neither does it involve actually leaving the school at all. English Summer Camp is basically an extra week or two of English conversation classes at the school in the usual English classroom but with fewer students (just the few who have signed up for it) and more FUN (mandatory)!

Anyway, more about the summer 'camp' another time. The main purpose of this post was to share a couple of funny videos I found today whilst 'preparing' for my camp. The first one is by a popular Korean female pop combo called the Wonder Girls that features the immortal lines

"Why do you keep staring?

Am I really that pretty?

I know it already but all that staring makes me blush."

Yes, the Wonder Girls are not only "so hot" "so pretty" "so fine" and "so attractive" (in their own words) they're modest too. Watch the video for full English translation - it is pretty funny.

The Wonder Girls are wondering why men keep staring at them - could it be the skimpy outfits perhaps?

The second video is an awesome Middle School Camp project put together by an English teacher who is far more creative than me. He has got his class of 1st graders to hold up the words in time to Daft Punk's "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger" - really cool video.

The N/O girl steals the show and it's funny that you don't see the HARD girl until right at the end.

We are thinking of getting our classes to do a similar thing for Bob Dylan's Subterranean Homesick Blues as a bit of an amusing homage to the original video for that song where Bob is chucking cards with some of the words written on over his shoulder.

Fighting for Korea - World Cup 2010

Well the World Cup madness is over for another 4 years for England and for South Korea but we had fun "Fighting" for (supporting) our adopted country while it lasted. The world cup has provided us with plenty of amusement and material for lessons but its not just the action on the pitch that has been amusing.

Take the Korean World Cup advertising campaign for instance. The advertising campaign shows a group of foreigners standing around looking annoyed with their fingers shoved in their ears as they are shouted at by a stadium full of chanting Koreans. The slogan "Shouting for Korea" seemed to be an attempt to encourage the Koreans to shout even more than they usually do to cheer their team on. Presumably, this was in the (mistaken) belief that if they did it enough they might be able to annoy the other teams into losing. There were also loads of funny/irritating World Cup songs including the insanely catchy World Cup Song No.1 by K-Pop boy group 2AM which I played as a prize for my 2nd graders - by the end of that teaching week I was waking up humming that bloody song! And of course who could forget the 'Shouting Dance' by Big Bang.....

Imagine trying to get the English fans to learn that many moves!

About 3 weeks ago we were visiting a Korean friend of ours in Suwon (the provincial capital of Gyeonggi-do) for the weekend and we just happened to be around for South Korea's first big World Cup game against Greece.Our Korean friend lent us South Korea t-shirts for the night and we went down to a sam gyop sal (bacon barbeque) restaurant to cheer on the "Red Devils", stuff our faces and drink plenty of soju (of course).

Sam gyop sal, delicious pieces of pork belly, cooked on a camp stove at your table nom nom nom!

Are you busy? In Korea is polite to wait to have your drink poured for you. The youngest person does the pouring apparently. But if you get bored waiting just ask "Are you busy?"!

We were wearing the old Korea football shirts that said "Be the reds!" (whatever that means). The new ones say "The Shouts of the Reds!" as the Korean team are the reds and "shout" seems to be a popular Englishee buzzword over here at the moment (as if the Koreans need any more encouragement to make loads of noise all the time!).

We were given these inflatable plastic thingys to bash together whilst shouting "Dae Han Min Guk" - they make a hell of a lot of noise

Rowan inflates the plastic things.

There were loads of Koreans there, mainly families with excited young children but also groups of young men hitting the soju hard and young couples too. The atmosphere was fantastic and the crowds were rewarded with an entertaining game and a Korean victory.

Spot the waygook! (foreigner)

We foreigners joined in the cheering too - "Dae Han Min Guk" (I think it means Republic of Korea)!! In fact, the Koreans in the restaurant were so impressed with our "Shouting for Korea" that when the game was won a group of men came over to our Korean friend and gave us a load of money and explained that it was to pay for our meal to thank us for our support! Best football game ever!

A happy Korean fan strikes a pose!

Some crazy Korean fans wanted to celebrate their country's win by having their photo taken with us in Suwon city centre! Say "kimchi"!

We engaged in a bit of celebratory, post-match, deep-fried cheese munching - delicious!

No, that's not a bloodied dismembered finger that Rowan's eating, it's just a deep-fried breaded lump of cheese dipped in ketchup!