Damyang Bamboo Festival!

A/N: As astute readers may notice, this blog entry is dated May 7. It is currently August. Having been appallingly remiss in posting, I shall now post a new entry each day, spanning the time from May to present day, until we are all caught up. Huzzah!

May 7, 2011

Despite my attempts to get up early and get to Damyang at a reasonable hour, my wake up time progressed from 9:30 to 10:30 to 11:00. By the time I'd packed my overnight bag and finished my shower? 12:30. Siiigh. Bear in mind here that it takes 5 hours to get to Damyang.

A lesser traveller would have given up, but I persevered! You see, this weekend in Damyang is the annual bamboo festival – the only bamboo festival in Korea. It would just be foolish to give up now.

After a warm and bumpy bus ride, I proceeded to AK plaza. My online instructions indicated that I had to go up to Yongsan to catch a train, but I decided to give Pyeongtaek a fighting chance. Sure enough, the 2:57 train to Gwangju was available!

With 90~ minutes to kill, I proceeded into the DAISO/dollar store to acquire a notepad and pen. I had originally planned to keep myself amused with a fantastic fantasy novel called “The Warded Man”, but I finished it yesterday after reading it for five hours more-or-less straight. Instead, I brought “Memoirs of a Geisha” and my ipod, but decided on some extra entertainment, just in case. Now that I think about it, I easily could have brought along my Sudoku book. Ah well. Such is the fate of those with poor planning skills.

I then went to the food court, at which point I was accosted by a Jehovah's Witness. They love Pyeongtaek station – I've run into them three times now. It's interesting to discuss religion with them, because no matter what blasphemous things you say, they are unfailingly polite and understanding. It's actually really impressive. For example, I told her I thought the Bible stories were about as plausible as Greek mythology (not to say that the 12 labours of Herakles didn't happen, because they totally did), and she just smiled, said, “Read this,” and handed me a pamphlet.

But enough about my brushes with religion. Following my Jehovah's Witness encounter, I proceeded into the food court, where I purchased and consumed bibimbap. This is my third or fourth time eating it, and I have to tell you, I'm not the biggest fan. Without hot sauce, it just tastes like bland rice and vegetables, and with hot sauce it's just spicy. Perhaps one day I shall find a happy medium.

During my 4 hour train ride, while looking out the window, I remembered something Ashley Drakos told me. In Korea, there are super cheap hotels called “Love Motels”. You can probably imagine the reason behind the name. And to keep the affairs of their clientele secrete, the motels often put up a line of wide, fabric strips across the driveway/parking lot, so passersby on the street can't look in and see which distinguished businessmen are emerging from cars with their mistresses for a night of passion. Brilliant!

Upon arriving at Gwangju station, (Gwangju, incidentally, is one of the largest cities in Korea – possibly 6^th?) I asked the nice ladies at the ticket booth how to get to the Damyang bus. After some mis-communications, they directed me up to the third floor, over an impressively long overpass that spanned the train tracks, and down to a bus stop.

I waited for #311, and after double-checking that this was in fact the correct bus, I boarded and took a cushy seat. The ride was about 25 minutes, and featured the fastest on-ramp curve I've ever experienced. It would have actually put my father to shame, and if you've driven with him, you know what I'm talking about.

Upon arriving in Damyang, which is a smallish town near Gwangju and the bamboo capital of Korea, I discovered that people here are ridiculously helpful. I went to look at the big map at the bus station to get my bearings, and two different people tried to point me in the right direction.

My first stop was acquiring a hotel, which I managed by approaching a merchant and saying “Hotel?” in a confused manner until he gave me directions via arm gestures. The motel is actually right beside the bus station, and pretty decent accommodations for only 40,000 won a night.

After dropping off my stuff, it was about 7:15, so I proceeded across the street and asked directions to Jongnukwon, the bamboo forest. They sent me right, and I continued to walk this way for about ten minutes until I heard the sweet sound of a brass band!

It turned out to be a concert in the park, and it was a good 2 hours of fun. First the brass band played a bit, then an older woman (and later, an older man) came out to sing what I assume to be Korean classics.

Then the sound of drums filled the air, and I turned around to discover a parade! Admittedly it was small, and lasted all of 5 minutes, but there were some memorable moments. The Korean soldier who saw me taking pictures and waved me over to shake his hand. The soldiers throwing cellphone charms, and the resulting rush of people that I narrowly avoided being crushed by. The nice man in the float who, seeing the only foreigner, waved me over and gave me a cellphone charm – and, of course, the nice lady who tried to explain what it was by putting her hand to her ear and saying, “Handphone, handphone!”

And then there was the drunk old Korean man who decided to invade my personal space and ask me where I was from. After I smiled and repeated “Canada” about 5 times, he was finally satisfied and shook my hand. At that point he attempted to drag me off towards the beer tent, so I removed my hand and retreated into a crowd of amused Koreans who had been watching my plight.

I lasted until a new lady came on – who, I might add, had phenomenally bad hair – and sang English songs off-key and off-tempo, at which point I left. Once I located the Paris Baguette, which meant my motel was near, I stopped in a little diner and had some delicious bulgogi. If there's one Korean food I'm going to miss when I get home, it'll be bulgogi. Oh, and the BBQ!

Tomorrow I will hopefully get up bright and early to go see the festival. I'm not going to mess around with walking – taxis are 90% the way to go in Korea. Have I mentioned how dirt-cheap they are? Comparison: Canada ride = $10. Same distance in Korea: $2.50. I know.

Now it is time for sleep, so I bid you 안영하세요!

May 8^th, 2011

After a less than tranquil night's sleep, I utilized the shockingly hygienic bathroom and got ready. Then I packed up my things, returned the key and set out on my journey.

My initial plan was to locate a taxi and get to the festival that way, but this plan failed when there were no taxis. Instead, I began the trek in the direction of where I suspected the festival was located. Luckily I spotted a taxi along the way, as there were a few more twists and turns than I had suspected.

The festival itself was beautiful – coloured pavilions lining both sides of a river, which actually had stepping stones you could walk across. You could also rent boats to go out on the river, but I prefer ships more along the size of a cruise ship.

I strolled up the bank, watching little kids get their faces painted and shoot at targets with bamboo water guns. Then I crossed the stepping-stone river – getting my shoes wet in the process – and went to a little booth where I wrote a message on some yellow paper and tied it to a tree.

Back on the other side of the river, I happened across a concert stage, where they were performing all sorts of traditional Korean music performances. There was a fan dance, and an old lady singing loudly while a man beat a drum, but my favourite part was the man who played the bamboo flute. That eerie, ethereal sound was haunting and lovely, and its always been a sound I associate with Asia. Beautiful.

Deciding to leave my shopping until after, I proceeded into the bamboo forest, which was just spectacular. Lush, green bamboo forming walls around you... I kept expecting a panda to trundle around the bend at any moment. Unfortunately there are no wild pandas in Korea.

I made it to the top of the hill, then went down to the cultural village, foisting off my pink balloon I'd acquired earlier on a small pink child. Such is the purpose of children. I then wandered about the village, which featured serene ponds, pagodas, weeping willows and, of course, bamboo. I got to strum one of those flat Korean guitars. It's funny, because I've been here for 7 months, but this is the first time I've really felt like I'm in Asia.

After lounging by the lake for a few minutes, I hiked back up the hill and went back through the bamboo forest. Once done my trek, I hit up the bamboo shop, where I acquired a cup, a spoon, and some green tea. Gotta have green tea!

Then I intended to take a taxi back to the bus terminal, but couldn't find one, so I asked a nice police officer for help. He called me a cab, which cost twice as much to return to the terminal as it took to get to the festival, strangely.

At the terminal, my “I'm a helpless foreigner, save me” routine drew two gentlemen, who managed to get me onto the right bus despite the fact that they couldn't speak English, and I couldn't speak Korean. On the bus, I met a nice Korean lady who spoke fluent English, and we chatted about various things. She turned out to be a physics teacher in Damyang headed to Gwangju to meet her boyfriend – a civil engineer – for Parents' Day.

As Parents' Day requires gift giving, she had brought a raw steak in a freezer pack for the occasion. Awesome. She mentioned that she was going to England this summer, so we talked about that for a bit as well. In her honour, and in honour of all the kind people who helped me on my adventure, I name this trip, “Voyage to Friendly Damyang's Bamboo Festival”.

When I arrived at the station, I hit a bit of a snag, as all the trains to Pyeongtaek were sold out. However, there was a seat available as far as Nansan, at which point ticket lady assured me I could pay the conductor in cash for the rest of the journey.

As ticket lady promised, things went smoothly. At Nansan I went into the snack car, where the conductor sold me a new ticket to Pyeongtaek. Not sure why they couldn't just do that at the train station, but whatever works.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed my voyage to “Friendly Damyang”, as I'm now calling it. It was rather far away, true, but the festival was fantastic, and I got to walk through an actual bamboo forest! I would recommend going to Damyang just to do the forest – the festival was just a bonus.