This time, when I talk about "We," I mean my dad's best friend's family (the mom, dad, and two daughters aged 23 and 26). We grew up together sharing Christmases and holidays which were all recorded on home videos which we watched endlessly while I visited them. Their family ended up moving back to Korea, and, it's interesting to see how the girls I used to play with grew up so different from me, leading the life I could have lead if my parents had moved back to Korea too. I have to say, it's been so much fun hanging out with them/girls/young people again. We may have gone on extremely different paths, but, we picked up right where we left off.
On the day we left, we took a KTX train from Seoul to Mokpo, a city on the southern most tip of Korea, where we boarded a ferry for a 2.5 hour ride to Hongdo (Korean for "Red Island").
Gorgeous. Absolutely gorgeous. Almost uninhabited by people due to the designation of the majority of the island as a nature reserve, the island combined the things I love most.
After Hongdo, it was off to Hooksando (black mountain island), another island (10x larger, and with a whopping population of 4,000 people).
We chose to leave right in the middle of Olympic fever time, when all the events Koreans are good at were playing on tv. As a result, no matter where we went, Koreamania took over and people were crying, yelling, and hugging on the ferry and in restuarants. God love nationalism, even if it's not exactly my nation! If you know what event is happening at what time, you can literally tell the result by listening for the cheers or moans of agony that penetrate through the apartment walls or permeate from the streets below. Loves it!
Pictures:
The general reigning over his land at Mokpo.
Mokpo: the rock that was covered with white powder to give the appearance of a large pile of rice to intimidate the Japanese that were going to invade on ships. The Japanese were intimidated by the "cornucopia", and instead of attacking, fled for home.
On the ferry riding to Hongdo! I heard once that Korea is the only place in the world with overlapping mountains and weather that makes for these types of black and grey scenes... probably not true (Japan for one), but, so pretty nonetheless. The sticks are the borders of fish farms.
Arrival at Hongdo!
Hongdo: I look like a tool, but, this is the only pic I have of Hongdo's forests.
One of Hongdo's green green hills (the only one you can walk up)
A closer look at the stairs leading up the hill. I just realized that the colors seem to be off on my camera... either that or the light was really different at different times of day
The little village of Hongdo, nestled inbetween the hills.
Mini praying mantis
That pier is the one where I want to get married someday. Maybe. Probably?
View of the sunset from the restaurant where we had fish we saw swimming not 10 minutes before.
Then it started raining, but, nothing could dampen our spirits (or our backpacks) on the pier
View from the ferry at Hooksando. That rock happens to look EXACTLY like Korea! Everyday the basic tv channels "take a break" from 4-6, but, when tv resumes at 6am, they play the national anthem with a slideshow of great images of Korea. We saw a handful of those images while at Hongdo and Hooksando, and, these rocks comprise one of them
Cloud forest at Hooksando
Ji Hae and I made a surprise birthday dinner for her mom's bday! I will miss that family tons.
It for now; leaving in 1 week, can you believe it??
Sara
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