“The journey of 1,000 meters,” a sage once said, “begins with a hangover.”

And so it was this Saturday morning, at the ungodly hour of 6 am, as I waited at exit 1 of Noksapyeong Station to meet my new friend Sanjay, and an Arirang television crew.

Our journey?  To head down to old Gyeongju and film ourselves gallivanting about various tourist sites, including some loosely related to literature, particularly the Kim Dong-ri and Park Mog-wol Literary museums, and Girim-sa, a temple about which Kim had written in his famous work “Shaman Sorceress”.

As the latest schedule had been sent to me in Korean, I couldn’t possibly read it, which was OK, I guess, since it had also been sent to me in .hwp (Hangul Word Processing) format, which I couldn’t even open. This also will represent no problem because having traveled with Arirang before, I know the schedule will be robustly ignored.

A cup of coffee at home, a sandwich-ette at the convenience store, and then it was down to the station, to wait very briefly for Sanjay, then just a bit more for the van full of Korean television technicians and a driver.

Sanjay is a 29 year old Indian, who is in Korea studying the language, coincidentally at Dongguk University where I work. His Korean, after 9 months of intensive courses, is rather awesome, and so I hate him.^^

We pottered about Seoul for a while, and then hit the highway at about 6:40 or so. About 1.5 hours later we stopped for breakfast, then hit the highway again. Both Sanjay and I were able to get a slight nap during this travel.

2 hours later we stopped again for a bathroom break. For those who haven’t been to Korea, the highways have rest-stops with full services: Gas, food, banking, clothing, and in this case a batting cage. Taking advantage of that, Sanjay and I each hit a round of balls, a task at which he was substantially better than I was; and so I hate him.

We landed first at Silla Millenium Park, fairly named I think, even though the Silla empire came a few decades short

of a millennium. Here we wandered about randomly whilst waiting for the Hwarang show. The Hwarang is a Silla empire thing, the character of which depends on who is talking. At some times it has been slang for something like ‘girlie-goy’ and at other times it has been synonymous with patriot. The Wikipedia sums it:

The Hwarang, or “Flower Boys”, were an elite group of male youth in Silla, an ancient Korean kingdom that lasted until the 10th century. There were educational institutions as well as social clubs where members gathered for all aspects of study, originally for arts and culture, and stemming mainly from Buddhism. Chinese sources referred only to the physical beauty of the “Flower Boys”.

In this case it was a mixture of cowboy, Indian, and sword-fighter, all of which we found pretty cool. Then it was off for a bibimbap lunch and an afternoon stop at the archery range where I dominated Sanjay, who had never held a bow before; so I hated him a bit less.

One super entertaining but super-cheesy live sea/swordfight/fireworks/water fountain show and we limped out of

dodge to Anapji Pond. Anapji Pond is the classic case of “it is what it is, which isn’t really much, “  a thought that was cemented firmly in our minds when our lovely guide began the tour with, “there isn’t that much to see!” This is because only 3 of the original 17 buildings have been restored, and the rest are marked only by stone footings of long gond columns.  At any rate, it turns out our lovely went to school at Dongguk University in Daegu, so we were, for a brief moment, three Dongukkians on a lark. And to be fair, the pond

Then, I sat in the van, typing this, as the photographer waited for night to fall on Anapji. When the lights turn on it is quite beautiful, and he needed that shot. On the way out of Anapji I noticed that the map listed Bunhwangsa, a temple that is notable in Kim Dong-ri’s Shaman Sorceress as it is a place of spiritual refuge, specifically for a particularly nasty grandmother/witch who kills a young boy.  Alas, we were not

going to get close enough to visit the temple, so this quick snapshot of the map is all I got.

Finally, it was off to a restaurant for the third (3rd!) bibimbap of the day, though this one was a bit different as instead of using gochujang (red-pepper-paste) for a condiment it used dwenchang, which resulted in a bibimbap with much subtler flavors, and in which you could really taste the namul (vegetables).

A short drive to the hotel, and we await the fully literary section of our journey, at the Kim Dong-ri and Park Mog-wol Literary museum, in the morning.

The hotel is rather awesome, with rooms the size of the Hwarang Jang, so sleep will come easy.

Two bonus pics, first one of the crew slamming down their Bibimbap after a 12-hour day, and one of the rather weird urinal system (and outdoors at that!) at the Silla Millenium Park.