It’s the weekend and I have two days with nothing to do and no-one to see. Time to explore. First my flat.
The previous occupant was Peter, a young American, who was also the native language teacher at the school where I will be working. It’s surprising how much you can learn about a person even from the little bits and pieces left behind. I clear the left over toiletries from the bathroom cupboard. The after-shave and the Dr Chuk prescription lotion is discarded, but the Old Spice deodorant may be useful in an emergency. The shaving foam is welcome, as is the bottle of Aloe and Snake Gall cleansing milk. The bathroom itself is a small windowless room with a toilet, a shower head, two taps and a mirror. No shower cubicle, no sink. A pair of plastic shower shoes have been left – essential for trip to the toilet when the floor is wet, which it usually is.
In the other room I make up the bed with the thin quilt that serves as a sheet and the slightly thicker quilt on top. I hang my clothes in the wardrobe, check out the fridge. It needs a good clean, but I’ll do that later. In the freezer I find some fish and a bag of dimsum, the contents of which I can’t decipher from the Korean packaging, so I leave them for now too. Peter has left the remnants of a jar of coffee and some tea which I find undrinkable. Much as I would like to, I cannot savour the flavour of green tea. There is a glass, a plate, a frying pan, a sauce pan and not much else. I won’t need much more as the kitchen consists of a sink and a two-ring gas hob in the corner of the room.
With the contents of my suitcase almost cleared, I open the drawers of the TV cupboard to stash the remaining bits and pieces. Peter has left books, films, a course in Korean. ‘Oh good,’ I think, until I look more closely. The Korean language course is on tape and against my better judgement I left my cassette Walkman back in England. The books and the films all have one theme: God. ‘King of Kings’, ‘Glory Revival’ and ‘St. John in Exile’ to name but a few. Even in my most desperate moments I doubt I will turn to the Lord to relieve my boredom. St. John’s exile continues in the shoe cupboard by my front door.
Peter did leave one thing I desperately needed for my further enlightment; a tourist map – ‘Treasure Island Namhae County’. Even though I don’t know which part of Korea I’m in, at least I know now that I am, as I suspected, on an island. Namhae is really two islands – Namhae and Changseon - joined by a bridge, with each island connected to the mainland by its own bridge. I know from Sun-mi that the nearest city is Jinju, about an hour by bus, and Busan, Korea’s second biggest city (after Seoul) is two hours away. This means, from my recollection of the map of Korea I saw on the internet before I left, that I am somewhere on the south coast.
I’m in Namhae-eup, or Namhae City, and the building behind mine is Namhae College, which I find on the map. I find the bus terminal where I arrived also on the map, but I still have no sense of size of either the island or population. It is clearly a tourist destination; landmarks include ‘Garlic Land of Treasure’, several fishing villages and ‘Raw Fish Towns’, half a dozen temples, beaches and the Hilton Namhae Golf and Spa Resort.
I venture out to explore. I’m carrying a stack of Korean notes big enough to make a pre-Euro Italian feel comfortable (I’ve worked out that a 10,000 Won note is about £5) and a list of ‘must-buy’ items. It’s not hard to find my way into town – through the yard past the stray cats that hang out round the bins….
and I’m in the centre of town.
Grocery shopping remains a mystery. Apart from instant noodles, I don’t know what else to buy. Almost everything is either an alien vegetable with no clue to their preparation or flavour, or bizarre items wrapped in indecipherable packaging I buy the obvious: coffee, soya milk, tofu, eggs, rice, noodles and plan to invent a meal from them later. I can always survive a weekend on omelettes and boiled rice. I find a bakery and after observing other customers I figure that purchases are placed with tongs onto a tray and taken to the counter for payment and packaging, I leave with a few items that look vaguely familiar and will serve as a breakfast surprise.
Once my groceries are stored at home, I set out again, this time, just for the hell of it and with the intention of getting lost and so learn my way around town. I walk for an hour or two taking any turn that attracts my curiosity. The smell of fresh fish draws me and I find myself in a covered market. Women sit on the floor behind their low stalls laden with all varieties of fish and shellfish. Some are prising mussels, apparently raw, from their shells, others are peeling prawns of various sizes. In the baskets on the floors, heaps of fish wriggle and writhe in their death throes, waiting to be sold to a hungry customer. All stalls seem to sell some kind of crucified dry fish, its insides gaping as its flesh is held apart by wooden stakes. Most of the women smile and talk to me in Korean, offering their goods, picking up handfuls of wet shellfish innards and offering them to me. They laugh as I walk on by and I hope they are simply amused by me and not being mean.
I walk the whole length of the fish hall and circle round the back to take another look at the edges of the market again. I’m tempted to buy something, but what? What do you do with live tiger prawns? Or with long silver slippery fish still intact and flipping?
By now it’s around one in the afternoon and it’s hot. I can feel my skin burning and itching, but I don’t know how to get home and out of the heat. I try to find a few landmarks – the FamilyMart, the ZZYYXXZZ bar, the big pink Christian church (no doubt Peter’s favourite hang-out). Finally after a few false turns and circling my street closely without realising it, and eventually finding the best back alleys to take,
The previous occupant was Peter, a young American, who was also the native language teacher at the school where I will be working. It’s surprising how much you can learn about a person even from the little bits and pieces left behind. I clear the left over toiletries from the bathroom cupboard. The after-shave and the Dr Chuk prescription lotion is discarded, but the Old Spice deodorant may be useful in an emergency. The shaving foam is welcome, as is the bottle of Aloe and Snake Gall cleansing milk. The bathroom itself is a small windowless room with a toilet, a shower head, two taps and a mirror. No shower cubicle, no sink. A pair of plastic shower shoes have been left – essential for trip to the toilet when the floor is wet, which it usually is.
In the other room I make up the bed with the thin quilt that serves as a sheet and the slightly thicker quilt on top. I hang my clothes in the wardrobe, check out the fridge. It needs a good clean, but I’ll do that later. In the freezer I find some fish and a bag of dimsum, the contents of which I can’t decipher from the Korean packaging, so I leave them for now too. Peter has left the remnants of a jar of coffee and some tea which I find undrinkable. Much as I would like to, I cannot savour the flavour of green tea. There is a glass, a plate, a frying pan, a sauce pan and not much else. I won’t need much more as the kitchen consists of a sink and a two-ring gas hob in the corner of the room.
With the contents of my suitcase almost cleared, I open the drawers of the TV cupboard to stash the remaining bits and pieces. Peter has left books, films, a course in Korean. ‘Oh good,’ I think, until I look more closely. The Korean language course is on tape and against my better judgement I left my cassette Walkman back in England. The books and the films all have one theme: God. ‘King of Kings’, ‘Glory Revival’ and ‘St. John in Exile’ to name but a few. Even in my most desperate moments I doubt I will turn to the Lord to relieve my boredom. St. John’s exile continues in the shoe cupboard by my front door.
Peter did leave one thing I desperately needed for my further enlightment; a tourist map – ‘Treasure Island Namhae County’. Even though I don’t know which part of Korea I’m in, at least I know now that I am, as I suspected, on an island. Namhae is really two islands – Namhae and Changseon - joined by a bridge, with each island connected to the mainland by its own bridge. I know from Sun-mi that the nearest city is Jinju, about an hour by bus, and Busan, Korea’s second biggest city (after Seoul) is two hours away. This means, from my recollection of the map of Korea I saw on the internet before I left, that I am somewhere on the south coast.
I’m in Namhae-eup, or Namhae City, and the building behind mine is Namhae College, which I find on the map. I find the bus terminal where I arrived also on the map, but I still have no sense of size of either the island or population. It is clearly a tourist destination; landmarks include ‘Garlic Land of Treasure’, several fishing villages and ‘Raw Fish Towns’, half a dozen temples, beaches and the Hilton Namhae Golf and Spa Resort.
I venture out to explore. I’m carrying a stack of Korean notes big enough to make a pre-Euro Italian feel comfortable (I’ve worked out that a 10,000 Won note is about £5) and a list of ‘must-buy’ items. It’s not hard to find my way into town – through the yard past the stray cats that hang out round the bins….
turn right onto the side street….
Right again at the agricultural shop on the corner and straight ahead down the street with the huge tree in the middle of the road,
Straight on past some more agricultural shops (if I ever need fishing nets, garden fencing or a spade, I know where to find them), past a few restaurants …
Straight on past some more agricultural shops (if I ever need fishing nets, garden fencing or a spade, I know where to find them), past a few restaurants …
and I’m in the centre of town.
Grocery shopping remains a mystery. Apart from instant noodles, I don’t know what else to buy. Almost everything is either an alien vegetable with no clue to their preparation or flavour, or bizarre items wrapped in indecipherable packaging I buy the obvious: coffee, soya milk, tofu, eggs, rice, noodles and plan to invent a meal from them later. I can always survive a weekend on omelettes and boiled rice. I find a bakery and after observing other customers I figure that purchases are placed with tongs onto a tray and taken to the counter for payment and packaging, I leave with a few items that look vaguely familiar and will serve as a breakfast surprise.
Once my groceries are stored at home, I set out again, this time, just for the hell of it and with the intention of getting lost and so learn my way around town. I walk for an hour or two taking any turn that attracts my curiosity. The smell of fresh fish draws me and I find myself in a covered market. Women sit on the floor behind their low stalls laden with all varieties of fish and shellfish. Some are prising mussels, apparently raw, from their shells, others are peeling prawns of various sizes. In the baskets on the floors, heaps of fish wriggle and writhe in their death throes, waiting to be sold to a hungry customer. All stalls seem to sell some kind of crucified dry fish, its insides gaping as its flesh is held apart by wooden stakes. Most of the women smile and talk to me in Korean, offering their goods, picking up handfuls of wet shellfish innards and offering them to me. They laugh as I walk on by and I hope they are simply amused by me and not being mean.
I walk the whole length of the fish hall and circle round the back to take another look at the edges of the market again. I’m tempted to buy something, but what? What do you do with live tiger prawns? Or with long silver slippery fish still intact and flipping?
By now it’s around one in the afternoon and it’s hot. I can feel my skin burning and itching, but I don’t know how to get home and out of the heat. I try to find a few landmarks – the FamilyMart, the ZZYYXXZZ bar, the big pink Christian church (no doubt Peter’s favourite hang-out). Finally after a few false turns and circling my street closely without realising it, and eventually finding the best back alleys to take,
I get home, have a shower and watch television with a few beers. OCN are showing the entire series of Heroes in one long evening so time passes quickly.
Sunday is pretty much the same. I don’t venture further than my town, finding my way home more easily than yesterday. I check the route to school – a ten minute walk through town. I do my washing then realise I don’t have a rack to hang clothes on. I improvise, clean cupboards, rearrange stuff and have an early night, ready for work tomorrow
Sunday is pretty much the same. I don’t venture further than my town, finding my way home more easily than yesterday. I check the route to school – a ten minute walk through town. I do my washing then realise I don’t have a rack to hang clothes on. I improvise, clean cupboards, rearrange stuff and have an early night, ready for work tomorrow
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