헐

람보3

나: 새해 복 많이 받으세요!

철봉: 새해 복 많이 받아라! 어젯밤에 TV를 보면서 필립 생각 났어.

나: 그래?

철봉: 응. 뭐더라? 람본가?

나: 람보라구?

철봉: 응. 필림 씨는 우리 반 람보다!

헐.

晩秋에

The weekend of my graduation, November 13-16.

반친구

졸업 연설

Yuka’s Wedding

Insadong

번짐

번짐,
목련꽃은 번져 사라지고
여름이 되고
너는 내게로
번져 어느덧 내가 되고
나는 다시 네게로 번진다
번짐,
번져야 살지
꽃은 번져 열매가 되고
여름은 번져 가을이 된다
번짐,
음악은 번져 그림이 되고
삶은 번져 죽음이 된다
죽음은 그러므로 번져서
이 삶을 다 환히 밝힌다
또 한 번 저녁은 번져 밤이 된다
번짐,
번져야 사랑이지
산기슭의 오두막 한 채 번져서
봄 나비 한 마리 날아온다

[수묵정원9-번짐, 장석남]

하늘공원

 

억새

여원 손

내가 잠든 뒤에도
빨래는
어둠을 지킨다.

늘어진 운명의 줄을
붙잡는 여윈 손.

그는 스스로
절대의 허무 앞에 던져지기 위하여
체온을 버린다.

밤의 적막은
바람들의 세상이지만
깨어 있는 우주의 창밖에서

빨래는
어둠의 공간에
하나의 밧줄을 던진다.

스스로 육신을 포기하는 자의
저 완벽한 연기.

[여원 손, 오세영]

 

百潭寺

달밤의 백담사

어둠의 공간에 하나의 밧줄을 던진다

My friend at the Korea Tourism Organization invited me to apply for a temple stay trip to Seoraksan’s Baekdamsa (백담사百潭寺). Our group — diplomats from Nepal, scientists from Spain and Mexico, photographers and teachers from Canada, and the assortment of officials and journalists that coordinate these trips — met up on a chilly Saturday morning in front of the KTO office near Cheonggyecheon.

Our first stop was Baekdamsa’s Manhae Village. Manhae Han Young-un (만해 한용운 萬海 韓龍雲) is most famous for his “The Silence of Love” (님의 침묵), and the Manhae Foundation constucted a center for research and writing on Manhae’s poetry and philosophy, as well as an annual festival, poetry performances, and youth education. The architecture is stunning, and the Seoweonbojeon (서원보전誓願寶殿) is unlike anything I’ve seen before.

We got to know eat other a little better over lunch and tea in the Village cafeteria, then headed to Baekdamsa to start the temple stay program. Baekdamsa is located in inner Seoraksan, and while we were slightly early for the change in the maple leaves that makes these mountains so beautiful in October, the mountain behind the temple had a stream of maple fire beginning to trickle down its slope and along the forests to the riverbed. The stream bed, filled with small stone towers, wound into the foggy distance. The trip was billed as “Discover Yourself”, which I had assumed was a bit of an overstatement marketing our temple stay. I’ve been on a few temple stays already, and the last time, at Jikjisa, my peers even talked our guide into letting them out of the morning meditation.

But this was something else. Our first day was pretty relaxed, with a short tour of the grounds, the usual bumbling and fumbling over eating temple food on time and washing the dishes outside, and this remarkable green tea meditation (차 훈증 명상) — a spa treatment by any other name. We made tea in large specially-made bowls, placed our chin and foreheads on the rims, covered our heads with towels, and meditated. It might have been difficult to concentrate on the meditation, but perhaps the clearest surprise was popping up to see everyone’s slightly disheveled hair and fresh, dewy faces.

Baekdamsa is also famous for the moon as seen under its pines and for being home to the disgraced dictator Chun Doo Hwan (전두환全斗煥) from 1988.11.23-1990.12.30. So after our meditation, we sat out under the eaves, ate ddeok, and watched the moon slip in and out of the clouds.

[While I was looking for these dates, I stumbled across this article about the irony of 'Ilhae' (일해日海) Chun Doo Hwan moving to Manhae Han Yong-un's temple.]

The weather cleared up before morning, and we woke up long before dawn for the morning yebul (예불禮佛). I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to that exhilaration at swimming through the night sounds of the samul (사물四物) or of slipping into the gold and pink light of the beobdang (법당法堂), but I hope I don’t.

[사물(四物)은 법고·운판·목어(木魚)·대종(大鐘)의 네 가지 법구의 뜻하다. At Baekdamsa, samul means the four temple treasures: dharma drum, cloud-shaped gong, wooden fish, and temple bell.]

We then assembled for meditation, which is a different experience at each temple. The temple stay system is a great way to get introduced to Korean Buddhist temple culture and a ton of fun for group tours. At participating temples, kind monks spend the weekend with tour groups, explaining the architecture, history, and culture of their unique temples, joking around about the differences in monastic and secular life that arise, and introducing Buddhist philosophy and practice in the context of their own lives. Devotees usually make their own arrangements to stay at temples and meditate or meet with monks and have their own schedules, so it’s not as if participants are completely thrown in to fend for themselves, but it does require participants to keep their eyes and hearts open for a few days in order to learn and experience that temple’s way of life. It is not boring or patronizing, and it is not severe or obscure. It’s just a really well-designed system.

But I did think that “Discover Yourself” was going a little far on KTO’s part. Until 9 or 10 am. Temple stay meditations are usually a short and fun experience probably designed to be fun and educational for participants and funny for monks. At Daeheungsa (대흥사大興寺), we took a walk through the woods with the monk who ran the temple’s famous green tea plantation. At Jikjisa (직지사直指寺), we did stretches, a chain-massage, and then went out to chicken-fight with the monks. But on Sunday morning at Baekdamsa, the green tea steam meditations were over. We had a seated meditation (좌선坐禪), then a 108 bows meditation (108배), then more seated meditation, then a walking meditation (행선行禪), then a blind-folded hiking mediation (자비명성慈悲瞑想), then went out to the stream bed and built small stone towers (돌탑돌塔) while meditating on our singular wish. The whole process lasted something like 5 hours. “Discover Yourself” might be a big claim, but most people learned something during that time. I myself was left with a thought passed on by a monk stopping by during our tower construction. She pointed out that the towers were antennas channeling our wish from the firmament, and invited me to translate that to the group.

 

Learning the Four Temple Treasures

四物

木魚

雲版

四物

Tea Meditation

月

 

[Some notes. Our trip was covered by Cho Seong-ha (조성하), a great travel writer from Dong-A Ilbo, and appeared in the paper on 2008.10.10. I have linked the article and the pictures. For the record, while the paper states that I am an art history major, I'm not. I've also linked another article about temple stay at Baekdamsa. And the title of this post comes from one of my favorite poems by Oh Sae-young  (오세영吳世榮), '여원 손'. The poem is translated in English as 'Withered Hands' in this collection.]

高延戰

Starting school this week was great. The campus is crowded again with Sogang students in the first days of their fall terms and the classroom atmosphere is friendly and fast-paced. In the last days of the summer, I started having dreams in which I was walking along Wall and High Streets on the way to class, and I was wondering if I was going to really miss campus. As a sophomore, on my first night in Trumbull, I looked out at the lights coming on all over Alvarez Court and was stunned to think that at this certain point in August all these people all over the world start gravitating right back to this one spot. Planes arrive, trains arrive, cars arrive, and these people pour out from all over onto campus as if they were made for it. I guess that after 16 years in school, I am made for it.

But those dreams didn’t last too long before Sogang’s campus became a nice place to spend the coming fall.

And to kick off my school year, Bo invited me to Ko-Yon Jeon (고연전), two days of sports competition between Korea and Yonsei Universities and two nights of partying and drinking back in Sinchon and Anam. Since I got back from Busan, the streets in Sinchon have become strung with banners taunting the Korea University “kitties” (Korea’s mascot is the tiger) with puns or just plain insults, and sponsored by the neighborhood businesses. Here is a picture of the games from wikipedia. I made it to the last competition, the soccer match at the Jamsil Olympic Stadium and joined Bo and the Kodae crowd.

I haven’t been to any college bowl games in America, but I imagine that they must be something like this. There was no need to tailgate because students could bring their own food and drink into the stadium, so thousands and thousands of students and alums were dancing, singing, cheering, and jeering as cheerleaders dressed up in these indescribable costumes set off fireworks. It was amazing. The only problem is that every time I go to one of these games I’m on the losing side.

여름이 끝나기 전에

Beach season ends in Busan

Concert season ends in Seoul

The weather is still warm and clear. But as I left Busan, crews were loading the umbrellas onto trucks, and as I pulled into Seoul, the bands outside city hall announced their last numbers. There’s no running from it: back to school.

바닷가에서

Sejin left and Professor Pak came and went. It is late-August, and the skies are clear and big and beautiful and the weather is warm but not wet, yet I was cooped up at home finishing up some projects. A breezy new cafe opened just down that street from me and I’ve been dying to go sit in the sunlight of one of those huge second-story balcony windows and read, but I couldn’t seem to get everything done in the hasuk. I was going stir-crazy.

So when I finally finished at about 9 on Friday morning, I decided that it was time to leave. On a weekend like this, I only want to go to the beach. Going to Busan for the day the other week had taught me just how remarkable a city there is in  south and just how easy it is to get there. I packed my things and headed to the train station, and was back in Busan by noon.

The weather was a little hazy when I got there, so I decided to take my old TA’s tip and postpone the beach. He had told me that the best views in Busan were at a small out-of-the-way school called Kosin University (고신대학교), and to take the 508 bus directly from the train station.

After realizing that one must flag buses down in Busan rather than to wait for them, I caught that bus and wove through the hillside cliffs with a soft, clear breeze blowing in through the window. The weather got better further from Busan Station, and by the time I reached Kosindae, I was fully in the Mediterranean. I walked up the driveway of the college — as far as Woo had told me about — but decided that since I had no plan and it was nice, that I’d keep climbing. I kept going, getting to the top of the college, and I had my eyes on an exterior staircase leading to a roof when I noticed a small path leading up a sharp incline. I started walking, but then a mangy little puppy came wriggling down the mountain. I bent down to get my camera and it froze, not sure what to do about me. I tried snapping a shot but then the camera ate my batteries. So I paused to reload, and the little furball decided to take its chances and dart past me, its butt wiggling in triumph as it reached the foot of the path and scurried off.

I continued up the mountain, passing some boxed-in mounds and smashed lotus lanterns and a small temple (암자), and running into a hiker who told me that the path led to the summit, and what an 암자 was.

I made my way up the mountain until I reached it’s craggy shoulder, from which Busan came floating down like a shimmery, soft blue dress from the sky and around my head. That is, I could see the ocean and islands and mountains all around me from a series of rocky bluffs, and across the straights of this peninsula I could see the apartment buildings rising from the green hills like bleached-bone cliffs. Behind me, a whole grid of cargo ships sat waiting in the aquamarine, and all around me strong green pines rose from the rock to drink the salt air.

I explored the different viewpoints for awhile, and finally sat down to figure out where I was. The Information Desk at Busan Station had given me a good map, and learned that I had climbed Bongraesan (봉래산) on a peninsula just to the southwest of Busan Station. I headed back down the mountain, lost for awhile, until I tumbled out of the bushes behind a student dorm.  I went back to Busan Station, where I decided to consolodate my luggage. Thus far I had been carrying a couple of paper bags around for lack of a proper duffel bag, so I checked out the underground shopping arcade in front of Busan Station. I found a simple black duffel and baragined it down a few dollars, then took the subway to Haeundae and walked up Dalmaji-kil to Van. While this may be hard to believe, there was another couple, and another magpie.  I had a pumpkin latte — which turned out to be a pureed pumpkin — and had the whole deck to myself for awhile to watch the magpie click across the railing and the setting sun make everything gold, and wrote some letters and read Vershbow’s lame parting reemarks. I headed back down to eat some eel, but it was horrible. I don’t know if there’s an important difference between 장어 and 곰장어, but at this place, I could definately detect it. The 곰장어 was like putrid saltwatery guts, but the owners were really kind and taught me all kinds of saturi (사투리) and told me I was pretty and gave me a beer and let me eat there by myself, so I had to choke it down. I guzzled water and beer and congnamul and doenjang for awhile, but the course wasn’t finished and the owners came over to make a bokkeum of the remaining eel. They made sure I ate every last piece before letting me pay the bill.

I walked awhile in the sand along the beach, then headed to a jjimjilbang near Van to stay the night.

In the morning I got up to watch the sunrise, and then spent some time walking in the park next to the Westin Choson. The park sits right in between Haeundae and Gwangalli beaches and reminds me of a small Golden Gate Park. But I noticed that people had started to look at my bag and move a few steps away. I guess walking around alone clutching a black duffel bag sends the wrong message to people at 6 in the morning.

But I did manage to talk to a few nice people at some of the lookout points. The park has a path along the cliffs and the sea, and bends from Haeundae to Gwangalli and along the marina next to some great condos. At a deck overlooking Gwangalli Bay,  someone even walked up and insisted on taking a picture of me with my camera for me.

From there I headed back, grabbed breakfast, and headed up to Beomeosa (범어사 梵魚寺). It was a gorgeous temple and a good walk, and I made my way back down by about 1. I spent some time looking around for postcards and some time looking around for stamps, and then got to the beach. I stayed until sunset, just sleeping in the sun. People were doing all kinds of funny things, and a Busan teenagers’ festival started up, so I had plenty of cool stuff to watch. Among the acts were a Nanta club and a group of chubby breakdancers crunking to “Ring the Alarm”. It was hard to position myself right to soak up the sun because I had to rent an umbrella. But I finally managed, only to have to watch the beach salesman, a well-built and gregarious guy burnt the color of a coconut, walking around in rolled up shorts terrorizing high school girls by jumping into the gaggles of them yelling “애기씨들! 애기!” and trying to muslce them under his umbrellas. But that aside, it was a nice day at the beach.

After I started driving, I sometimes went to the beach at night. People would be out running and biking, snuggling, or just staring at the waves. Watching the planes circle over the LA basin, I used to marvel at the night’s clear noise, and that I lived at the edge of the country. It’s been over three years since I could do that, and finally, in Busan, I stretched out in the sand for a few minutes to listen to the huge, watery noise of the night. Small fireworks went bouncing through the air and small groups of people were laughing over music and I didn’t feel cooped up at all.

From Bongraesan

Haeundae

Haeundae

At dawn

From Bongraesan

From Dalmaji-kil

Beomeosa

APEC House and Gwangalli