The city by the sea

I've been in South Korea now for about two months, maybe a tad more. Ever since getting here one of my priorities has been to try and hook up with a friend of mine from Canada that I haven't seen in over a year. With two aborted attempts behind me, the third time was a charm as I finally made my way to Busan for my long awaited visit with my friend.

Luckily enough I was given a four day weekend through various school holidays and so spent a lazy Friday getting everything in place for an early Saturday departure.

Up at 5:50am, in the cab at 6:30am and on the bus for Busan at 7am. It was an early start but it would place me in Busan around 10am leaving me a full day for sightseeing general frivolities.

This was the absolute worst part of the trip and simultaneously the worst bus trip I've ever been on. As I was going away for three days I had two bags with me, so I chose a seat at the very back of the bus that afforded me greater leg room ang subsequently more room for my bags. Leaving Suncheon was no problem and we quickly made our way to Gwangyang to pick up a few more travelers. There were two or three people that got onboard, one of which was an older gentleman. Given that the bus was half empty I didn't forsee any problems with seating. Well that gentleman proved me wrong.

After a couple of aborted attempts at choosing a regular seat he decided to sit in one of the four empty seats that lined the back of the bus beside me. At first he sat a seat away from me and I thought nothing of it as I listened to my audio book. After a few minutes though he shifted over to the seat beside me. Okay, still nothing major but in my opinion highly unnecessary. Then he rubs my arm. I'm thinking, okay, no big deal. I've had plenty of Koreans rub my arm looking at the hair on my arm. Then he rubs my leg. Getting a little creaped out at this point, but in trying to be polite I gave him the opportunity to prove that it was simple curiosity that would quickly fade. Nope.

After rubbing my other leg for a second he puts his left hand between our legs an then starts to rub the underside of my right leg. Okay, now I just want to knock the guy out. I push his arm away and say "Anio!" (Korean for no). He gives me a strange look and then starts to say something in Korean that I don't understand. But his hand stays away so I go back to my audio book and the passing scenery, hoping that that was the end of it. Nope.

A few minutes later he starts at it again. Again I tell him no and push his arm away. He gives me another strange look and then pulls out his cell phone and gives it to me. I interpret this as his wanting me to give him my phone number, so in an effort to appease the guy I type in my phone number from Canada, hoping that he will leave it at that. Nope.

About every fifteen minutes I'm forced to tell this guy to stop rubbing my leg. I really did just want to give the old man a shot in the head. Well, actually I wanted to give him repeated shots in the head, but I didn't.

As we are coming into the bus station in Busan he motions for me to go to eat with him. I tell him no, several times. When the bus comes to a stop, he tries dragging me off the bus with him, but I don't go. I wait a couple of minutes hoping that he will wonder off. When I finally do get off the bus I quickly look around and not seeing him think that the coast is clear. So I set about looking over the subway map and making a quick call to my friend. Sure enough the old man comes back trying to drag me off with him again. I tell him no, turn my back to him and continue with my phone call. He simply stands a few feet away looking at me.

When I see him head over to a newspaper stand, I bolt into the terminal up an escalator and back towards the area to buy tickets. I wait there for about fifteen minutes hoping that I had finally lost the old guy. Success!

With that unpleasantness behind me I managed to get ahold of my friend and arrange to meet up in the subway system.

Waiting in the Busan subway

Once we were together we decided to make our way to the Haeundae Beach district, get a motel for the night and start our day off with a quick lunch at Bennigans. After lunch we made our way across the street to the beach and the Busan Aquarium.

One of the many Haeundae markers in the sidewalks

A view of the beach looking east

The Aquarium was pretty good. I couldn't remember if I had ever been to an aquarium before. The shark tank was pretty cool and I liked being able to see a couple of Green Sea Turtles.

A young girl playing with a penguin

One of the many sharks

A Green Sea Turtle

After the aquarium we made our way downtown to one of the open market shopping areas and a temple park. In the park was a observation tower that offered tremendous views of the Busan harbour area.

Looking east towards the docks

The Busan harbour

After the temple area we decided to check out the Texas street shopping area. This is what Lonely Planet has to say about Texas St.:

Dangers and Annoyances

It's best to avoid Texas St. - a small commercial district opposite Busan Station that's home for shifty people, Russians, hostess bars and the occasional street hold up - at night.

I must admit that this was the first time that someone immediately thought I was Russian simply because I was white. That combined with the propositions from 'madams' in Russian set the atmosphere quite nicely. Unfortunately the shops that we wanted to go to were closed by this time in the evening so we left and made a point of going back on Sunday.

On Sunday we went back to Texas St. and found the shirt shop that we had been looking for and as a bonus found a shop that provided me with my most satisfying purchase.

The entrance to Texas St.

One of the many Russian bars

My new Darren McFadden jersey!

After leaving Texas St. on Saturday night we made our way back to the beach area to meet up with a friend of my friend as there was to be a fireworks display at Gwangalli Beach. When we made up to street level from the subway we could already hear the fireworks exploding in the distance. We quickly stopped at a corner store, bought a beer and began to make our way to the beach.

The area was simply one huge mass of people pushing towards the beach trying to gain a better view of the pyrotechnics. I had never been pushed around so much at one time in my life. It made the busses seem spacious by comparison. Through a little luck, determination and the odd well placed elbow I made my to the boardwalk and managed to get a video of the display.

A view of the bridge and the crowd

Me with a few kids were busy making mountains

After the fireworks were over we hung out on the beach for a while. I took some pictures of the bridge as it is supposed to be somewhat famous. Two of my co-teachers commented on it when I told them I was going to Busan. After meeting up with two more people, we made our way back the Haeundae Beach area for a quick dinner at a Lotteria and off to the U2 foreigner bar.

The beer was expensive ($7 for a bottle of Stella Artois), the dj was blaring techno dance music in a bar in which everyone was huddled in booths or around tables trying to talk. The music was a real hinderance in trying to talk with this one particulary nice young Korean woman that I was carrying on a conversation with.

Sunday arrived and three of us made our way to the United Nations Memoria Cemetery to commemorate the allied forces that participated in the Korean War. It was a very peaceful place guarded by two solemn Korean soldiers. It was a sprawling display of monuments, flags, grave markers and flowers. It was definitely worth seeing.

The monument at the entrance to the park

The Canadian monument

A view of the memorial wall

After the cemetery we made our way back to Texas St. (as I said earlier) and then tried to make our way to Democracy Park. We were given directions at Busan Station and with them in hand we boarded the designated bus and got a cheap tour of Busan, but no Democracy Park. We cirled around it a few times, we could see it off the distance in the fading light, but just couldn't quite get there. But we did get to meet a nice Korean woman who was rather pleased to meet us. She had lived for about a year and a half in Sydney, Nova Scotia.

After returning to Busan Station we decided to make our way back to Haeundae and to see about a train for my friend's friend. Now down to the two of we headed off to freshen up at the hotel and then off to dinner, a nice walk along the beach and then a patio for some beers. The patio even came with a floor show when to Korean's decided that they had had enough of stroking one anothers hands and hair and got into a scrap that sent tables and chairs flying.

Monday morning came and with it my journey back to Suncheon that was thankfully uneventful. After an hour on the subway to the bus terminal it was a three hour ride to Suncheon and half hour on the city bus to my apartment. Four and half hours after leaving my seaside hotel room I was back home uploading pictures and putting together my video.

It was a great weekend and I look forward to my next trip to Busan.

It was a good capper to a great weekend.