이것저것

이것저것 means "this and that", as in 최근에는 많은게 있는데 제가 이 블로그에서 이것저것 쓰고 있어요. Recently a lot of stuff's been happening, so I'm writing about this and that in this blog (post).

Fulbright ETAs who participated in the Hwacheon Peace Forum, posing in front of our hanok, or traditional Korean house. I mean, it was traditional, but the rooms still had fridges and televisions, so it wasn't that traditional. Photo taken by the talented Neal Singleton.

Today was the last meeting of the special English class I've been teaching to a small group of school principals and regional supervisors. We went out to eat hanwoo, or Korean beef, and it was delicious, and they made me drink a lot, and they all said they loved the class and wished that they could take more classes with me, and this was a bunch of middle-aged Korean men who presumably had little to no prior interest in English eight weeks ago, so that made me feel pretty happy.

In other news, taekgyeon training is definitely helping me become stronger and fitter, but in the meantime it is also destroying my feet. My left big toe has been sprained for the better part of a month now, and it's all purple from a particularly nasty bruise I got two days ago. Every weekend, I give my feet a rest, and they're fine until Monday, when I kick with bad form or get kicked myself, and then I know nothing but pain. My first competition is in four weeks, and I am going to be utterly helpless.

In other other news, I have bought all of my plane tickets for summer travel: Seoul to Taipei to San Francisco to Rapid City to San Francisco to Seoul. Six weeks until vacation! A part of my brain is, I must confess, already on vacation, and that's the part that successfully convinced me to binge-watch season four of Arrested Development, which turned out to be no less fantastic or hilarious than I wanted it to be, over the past few days. I haven't been sleeping much.

In other other other news, France has legalized same-sex marriage, the Boy Scouts are allowing openly gay members, and this weekend in Seoul, I'm going to my first Pride! Cool stuff.

세계평화의 종 - The World Peace Bell

Let's break that down:

세계 (se-geh) means "world".

평화 (pyoung-hwa) means "peace".

의 (eh) is a possessive particle.

종 (jong) means "bell".

Fulbrighters and Hwacheon Peace Forum campers at the World Peace Bell. (taken by Ammy)

The World Peace Bell, located in its namesake park in Hwacheon, was cast in 2005 for the 60th anniversary of Liberation Day (August 15th, 1945 -- the end of Japanese colonial rule). The metal in this 37.5-ton Buddhist-style bell was recycled from empty ammunition cartridges from the Korean war and various conflict-ridden regions of the world. This gives the bell a certain special significance in its symbolism of world peace.

Making wishes. Btw, this bell is huge.

During the Hwacheon Peace Forum, we visited the World Peace Bell Park and learned about the bell, the nearby Hwacheon Peace Dam, and a little bit about the hopes of those who created this park. The dream, of course, is peace, but then there's also Reunification (통일/tongil). The top of the World Peace Bell is decorated with pigeons (비둘기, which represent peace, just like doves do; it's worth mentioning that pigeons and doves are in the same bird family). However, one of the pigeons is missing half of one of its wings. The missing piece is being kept with the promise that when North and South Korea are finally reunified, it will be reattached, thus finally completing the bell.

In the style of Buddhist bells, this one is rung by being struck on the outside by a large wooden beam (a battering ram?) The beam is very heavy, and it takes many people to swing it. All of the campers got a chance to strike the bell. The sound it made was very deep and powerful. As soon as it was struck, we were supposed to gather around the bell and place our hands or backs on it to feel the resonance, as well as to make a wish. I rested the back of my head on the bell after I had rung it, and it felt like a nice massage. While I did feel to an extent that the symbolism was a bit tacky, I did learn later that it actually costs about fifty cents for tourists to ring the bell, and each year, all of that money goes toward a full scholarship for one Ethiopian university student to study abroad in Korea, as thanks toward Ethiopia for fighting alongside Korea during the Korean war. I feel much better about that.

HL and SY with an otter (수달), which I believe is Hwacheon County's mascot.

After visiting the bell and watching a short video about the Peace Dam (평화의댐), the camp participants had some time to discuss what we had learned over the past two days and share our thoughts about peace and Korean Reunification. My two student partners, HL and SY, were two bright girls who, despite being good friends, plainly disagreed on whether Reunification would be good or not.

HL, whose father is in the army, was against 통일 because she knew the risks were great: Korea would be plunged into an economic and humanitarian crisis if it suddenly had to take care of millions of refugees from the North. SY, on the other hand, was more idealistic and remained convinced that North Koreans are "our family" and that the current separation was neither tenable nor the desire of most South Koreans. We didn't have enough time to elaborate on these thoughts, but I could tell that both of them had actually thought through their positions, and I appreciated that.

Both did agree, during our discussion, that the conversation about 통일 was likely more often had in Hwacheon than in other parts of the country, due to the county's proximity to the De-Militarized Zone between the North and the South. It seems like the farther away you get from the border, the less people tend to think about the issue. I know it hardly comes up in my life, way down here in Changwon, but it's not hard to see why people who live a mere thirty kilometers away from an enemy state would be more attuned to this dialogue. So, it was no wonder that the students of the Hwacheon Peace Forum, some of whom have participated in the camp several years in a row, were capable of expressing themselves so well about a matter very important to them. I was both impressed and inspired.

That said, I don't have any grand, sweeping conclusions to make about world peace or Korean Reunification. Not yet, at least. I've learned a great deal about this issue over the past few months, and I'd like to get all my thoughts down in writing at some point, so stay tuned.

인절미

A large blob of rice cake in the making.

인절미 (injeolmi) is a traditional Korean snack. (When I say it, it kind of sounds like "Enjoy me!") It is a variety of 떡 (ddeok), or rice cake, that is first pounded into a sticky, glutinous blob before being coated with bean flour and sugar. I've eaten 인절미 often, since rice cakes of all kinds are a common gift for teachers, but there's definitely nothing like eating a fresh batch that you yourself have helped make!

This past weekend, I went up to Hwacheon (화천) to attend the annual Hwacheon Peace Forum, a twenty-four-hour camp that combines an excursion to locations around the DMZ (De-Militarized Zone between North and South Korea) with a language and cultural exchange between Korean students and Americans. On the evening of the first day of the camp, we visited a hanok (한옥) village, a collection of dwellings built in the traditional Korean style that often serve as host to these sorts of camps. The first thing we did there was get the lowdown on how to pound our own 떡.

My student partner HL and me pounding at the 떡. (taken by SY)

Delicious 인절미!

It's not too difficult, really. You grab a giant wooden mallet and swing it down onto the blob of rice. Accuracy and strength are key, but it was a little bit tricky to engage both at the same time. I had a good time pounding away at the 떡-to-be, even though I wasn't doing it very well, but I also realized that our efforts were minimal compared to how much work must have been put into creating the blob in the first place.

Anyway, everyone who wanted to work out their aggression via giant wooden mallet got a chance to do so, and then we coated our rice cakes in the sweet bean powder and started nomming.

Afterward, we had a nice outdoor barbecue dinner and I got to hang out with all of the Korean students and get to know them much better. It was neat how quickly we all became close. All it takes is a few enthusiastic circle/icebreaker games and food, and suddenly you've got tons of new friends. I introduced everyone to Ninja, a favorite from college, and also got really into many rounds of Mafia later in the evening. I'll elaborate on what this Peace Forum was actually about in the next post. To come: the non-touristy DMZ, the World Peace Bell, and otters!

Korean students and American teachers having some fun before dinner.