Last week, I caught my two supervisors looking uncharacteristically tired. Concerned, I asked them, what was up? Jenny just groaned. Alice explained. “Me and Jenny Teacher stayed out until 3 AM yesterday.” It was a Wednesday and these are women who are typically asleep by 10:30. I was very confused. “Party, party?” I asked, palms up like a lecherous old man at a nightclub. Because what other kind of party is there, really? “No, no!” she insisted, “Mr. Yoon asked us to join him for one drink so we went. But he really didn’t want to stop drinking. He kept having more soju but we didn’t want to.” “So you drank with him till 3am!?” “Of course not!” Jenny Teacher chimed in. “We just had cola after the first drink but we couldn’t leave him early because, ah, it would be so rude.” This coming from Korean people, I immediately understood but, at the same time, was entirely baffled. Mr. Yoon is essentially the custodian of our private academy. He’s a hunched-over, string-bean of an old man who regularly creeps around the building, scaring the children and teachers alike with his grouchy, temperamental demeanor. In contrast, my two Korean supervisors are young, energetic people who behave in a friendly and socially acceptable manner, as far as I know. So why in the name of King Sejong would they subject themselves to more than four hours in Mr. Kim’s drunken company on a Tuesday night? Let me introduce you to a unique cultural nuance birthed straight from the bowels of Korean collectivism: In social settings, Koreans are extremely reluctant to be the first person to leave a gathering regardless of how tired, bored, or uncomfortable they might be. The trouble is, Korean gatherings can go on for hours. Broken up into “rounds”, a single night can see you travelling to a coffee shop, dinner, bowling, noraebang, second dinner, a dessert cafe , a pool hall, and finally, to wind it all down, another coffee shop. People will physically drop like flies during one of these 10 hour endeavours, falling asleep on cafe couches or doubled over drunk in the darkness of the singing rooms. Despite all of this, each exhausted member finds the willpower to trudge through the night and make it to the sunrise to disperse with everyone else. There are several reasons why this is a thing. First, in social settings, it’s considered a slight to the host or the person who organized a gathering if you don’t stick around the entire time. Leaving early suggests that you think the events or the present company aren’t fun enough or that you might not be having THE BEST TIME EVER. Second, it’s a work-related outing and the boss is picking up the tab. I’d say it’s also expected in Western companies that you will stay the entire time if a boss or authority figure treats their employees to a dinner or night out. The difference is that it can be taken to the extremes here because of the work hard, play harder culture. If boss man wants to finish a bottle of soju every 10 minutes, prepare to go shot for shot. If he also wants to stay out in Seoul until the trains start up again at 5 AM, you’d better stick around too. Last, social pariah-phobia. This one definitely had a strong influence on my poor supervisors and the situation they found themselves in. Mr. Yoon holds no power really at all in the school hierarchy, but he’s a drinking buddy of the school director. So that apparently gives him a high enough status that demands recognition. If they left and hurt his pride enough that he would mention it to their boss or anyone else at school, there could have been major social and professional repercussions. No irreversible harm came to my supervisors because of their forced night out, mostly just sleepy eyes and an increased need for coffee. But that’s not always the case. South Korea recently made international news because of two high-profile crimes committed against women. The first was a random murder of a young woman in the upscale Gangnam district of Seoul. The suspect claimed he did it because women never paid any attention to him. Aww, male entitlement is really cute right? Especially when it’s lethal. The second involved a young teacher who was gang raped by three men, two of whom were fathers of her students. Nice, huh? An article from the South China Morning Post explained how many teachers in smaller, more remote areas, like the island where this teacher was located, rely heavily on parent support and assistance to run their schools. This makes it harder for them “to refuse when asked to attend dinners, invariably accompanied by drinks” with those parents. In the gang-rape case, the victim was having dinner on her own, planning on an early night so she could have energy to explore the village the next day. The three men joined her and insisted that she drink with them, despite her refusals. When they had gotten her sufficiently inebriated for their needs, they “volunteered” to drive her home and then took turns raping her (The Korea Herald). What happened to this woman was in no way her fault and the guilty parties should probably be castrated - or just locked up for a long time, since medieval punishments aren’t acceptable anymore, even for rapists. However, when I first read about it, my gut reaction was, why didn’t she just not drink? I couldn’t imagine ever being comfortable enough to drink heavily around my students’ parents. Additionally, as a 24-year-old woman, my own society’s broken standards have forced me to accept that until both sexes are educated equally about rape, I will have to protect myself from men. Then I had that conversation with my supervisor and I understood more about how that teacher could have ended up in such a terrible situation. Koreans are very trusting. More so than most other groups of people that I’ve met. A friend of mine left his wallet on a KTX train at 1:30 in the morning. He was able to retrieve it after the train traveled three stations away and back. His bank cards, ID and cash were all still there. That’s very common here. I can see how that trust, so lovely and special most of the time, combined with the social pressure I mentioned before, could override a young woman’s sense of personal safety. Those same things could give a group of men the idea that they are innocent of wrongdoing - even, they would argue, that getting to have sex with this woman was justified, given how much they do for her and her school. Gender equality in Korea is just as screwed up as it is in the U.S. Maybe even more so because of the social pressures that are unique to an eastern society. This country is very safe, despite what you hear about our Northern neighbor and his flirtations with nuclear power. Unfortunately, as it is so for many other countries, half of the population is not as safe as the other. As gender rights progress here, the challenge will be even more difficult for young women and men to change the perspective because they will have to uproot deeply conditioned behaviors that are not only social, but cultural as well. My hope is that my Korean friends will discuss this issue and work towards changing it within their own social circles. I also hope that they continue to party like crazy people into the early morning hours. But if someone wants to leave early, I hope that person will not be embarrassed to go home, especially if their safety is in question.
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I went on a trip to the Seorak mountains with a group of my coworkers a few weeks ago. The first day there, we did a three hour hike up to Ulsan Bawi rock. The first two-thirds were great but the last leg was an enormous set of steep, metal stairs that zig-zagged up the face of the mountain with frighteningly large gaps between each step. Fast forward five flights up: I'm crouched over the railing, regretting every day I've ever skipped a work-out in my life and swearing off hiking as a stupid activity - I mean really? All of this to see some rock and a view you can enjoy better with a glass of wine and a baggie of pretzels from an airplane window? I did eventually make it to the top...and after my lungs re-expanded I was able to sit and enjoy squinting through the pollution haze out to the Pacific Ocean. Suffice to say, by the time our group made it (painstakingly) back down the mountain, we were all very sore and in need of a little R&R.
Earlier in the day our guide recommended the “hot springs” at the top of the hill near our guest house. The seven of us were sharing a single bedroom with a single bathroom and a single shower so we eagerly went on a hunt for these hot springs once we arrived, hoping to find some showers as well. I don’t know about you, but when I think about “hot springs” I picture bubbly, outdoor stone baths full of people soaking in their bathing suits. It turns out that the promised hot spring was actually your regular, old Korean jimjibang. A quick definition for you: a jimjibang is a uniquely Korean spa where, for a small fee, you can chill out in a bunch of different baths and saunas. Everyone is segregated by gender because, you guessed it, being completely nude is a requirement. Me and my fellow female coworkers were about to get reaaaall close. Nothing like seeing each other’s lady bits to form a lifelong bond. We bid adieu to our male compatriots, and strode into the woman’s locker room to strip down and stash all of our clothing. We grabbed one of the tiny towels they give you and headed into the main spa. None of us were really sure what to do with the towels or where to put them so naturally, we draped them over our crotches all casual-like to give the appearance that we didn’t care that much. The four of us women shuffled into the huge, balmy room, tried not to stare at each other’s tits, and immediately split for the nearest shower. Korean women have a very specific washing ritual before they hop into any of the baths which requires roughly scrubbing off your first layer of skin so none of your personal nasties get to anyone else. Generally, I’m more of a casual scrubber but I did my best to mimic the women around me. The first bath I checked out was a warm, green tea bath. The color was a little green but, other than that, there wasn’t much to indicate that there was actually any tea ingredients in it. Regardless, it was lovely, and after I had nicely submerged (hidden) my body, I started to relax and really enjoy it. Trying not to be creepy about it, I started to look around at the other people. I mean, how often do you get to compare your body to one that doesn’t belong to a celebrity or model? I read an article awhile back about how women in the west have more painful childbirth because they are extremely self-conscious of their vaginas. We tense up from fear and embarrassment which makes labor much more difficult. I couldn’t help but think about this as I looked around at the Korean women who had grown up going to jimjibangs. Maybe to them, the naked female body is not so strange and forbidden? I had a discussion recently with a friend about when we first realized that our “private parts” were something shameful that was meant to be hidden. We couldn’t exactly pinpoint a time but whenever it was, it is something that has stuck with us. This has major repercussions as you grow up and your body matures, especially for girls and young women. From self-image and self worth to how you feel about sex and sexuality, it’s a real challenge to overcome the idea that exposing your body is wrong. I wondered how things would be different if I had grown up going to a jimjibang or an American cultural equivalent. It sounds strange, but there was something so empowering and therapeutic about hanging out with a bunch of naked strangers. For me, whenever I’m in a bathing suit or even just form fitting clothing, i’m constantly sucking my tummy in or pulling at my shirt hem so my little love handles don’t peek out over my waistband. In the jimjibang, in a place free from the male gaze and female-to-female competition, everyone can just let their belly bulge out. Sweating off the mountain grime in that green tea pool, I found that I really liked the feeling of not hiding or feeling ashamed of my body. When it was time to switch to the next bath I rose from the water and didn’t try to hide anything with my towel. Instead, I strolled confidently to the sauna, smiling at my fellow women folk and thinking “Hello sister, your body is beautiful, my body is beautiful, we are all beautiful.” Confidence brimming, I plunged into the next bath without a care in the world. Sadly, it turned out to be an ice cold bath and I emerged from the water screaming loudly and breaking the serene silence. Oh well, just like a naked body, you can’t have beautiful without a little awkward too, right? Trip to Kyoto and Osaka Last Friday, as I made my way onto the tiny plane bound for Osaka, Japan, I was delighted and surprised to feel something I had never felt before: a complete lack of fear and anxiety at the thought of traveling to a country where I am totally unfamiliar with the language, food, customs...pretty much everything! I credit this to the fact that after living in Korea for 7 months, Danny and I have dispelled the “scary Asia” myth for ourselves and now, hopefully, after the adventures we had with our two friends, Kelsey and Ryan, we’ve dispelled it a little for them too! Day 1 We arrived around 4 pm in Kyoto right around the same time that Kelsey and Ryan got in after leaving Mt. Fuji - lucky kids. It took a little searching but eventually we found our Air BnB which was located in the historically famous (or infamous, depending how you look at it) “pleasure district” of Kyoto. As I’m sure you can infer, this was the area of the city swarming with geishas and still is today - in a more contemporary form. The BnB was so cute and charming. To get to it you have to walk through a sliding wooden door that lets out on to the street, walk down a wood paneled alleyway and then turn a corner spotted with bikes, plants, a moped and little buddhist shrine at the end. Inside there are more sliding doors, some with frosted glass, and of course, tons of fun Japanese features. My personal favorite was the super cool toilet that was everything anyone has ever said about Japanese toilets. Bidets for days, music to play to cover up a stray toot, warm seat...let’s just say I really looked forward to peeing or doing that other thing that ladies don’t do since we, you know, poop rainbows and what not. Anyways, the house was lovely but we only took a short rest after arriving and then set out to explore the area. Our first stop was a tiny little noodle shop where we munched (and slurped) on delicious udon noodles. The restaurant was located on the Shijo Dori road, an area full of shops with tons of cute little trinkets and sweets of all varieties. I tried a soft-serve green tea and vanilla swirl cone and it was absolutely magical. We explored a little but suppressed our shopping desires for the moment, determined not to blow all our recently exchanged Yen in the first few hours. I’m a grandma so after some down-time and a short nap, for me, we headed to the Yasaka Shrine and checked out the gardens and night-market around it. I tried Takoyaki - a ball-shaped Japanese snack made of a wheat flour that’s filled with octopus. A little funky at first but once you get past the tentacle texture it’s really tasty! Day 2 We headed out early and grabbed a bus bound for Arashiyama, a beautiful, mountainous area a short ride from the main city. This place was absolutely stunning, completely overrun with tourists since we did go during peak season, but still an amazing place to check out. We were all really excited to visit the bamboo forest so we headed there first. You see this place pop up on Pinterest on the reg so it was definitely one of those expectation vs. reality moments since the path was swarming with selfie-stick wielding tourists. It was all ok, we joined the frey, snapped our future profile pics and then actually put our phones down and appreciated our beautiful surroundings. After the bamboo forest - which is really more of a bamboo path - we were all feeling a little hangry so we checked out a buffet place that served everything from tofu to miso. There was also this delicious caramel custard that I could have eaten until I became as fat as a sumo wrestler but, you know, summer is coming so...only one small piece for body-conscious Casey. Our next destination was a short hike up to the monkey grove which, as it sounds, has actual monkeys living there! It was so cute but also a little scary because though the monkeys are comfortable with people, they are still wild. Multiple signs warned us not to touch the monkeys, get too close or put our cameras in their faces - makes sense. Unfortunately, we humans can be much less intelligent than our primate counterparts, especially when we blatantly ignore warnings meant to keep us safe from harm. Case in point: as we’re standing in a group of people looking at this little monkey family with three adorable babies, this young American guy crouches down and creeps closer and closer, trying to get a perfect shot of the playing monkeys. Papa monkey notices, get super pissed and charges at the unprepared photographer. The guy lets out a shriek, runs away, leaving the monkey with no one to attack so it grabs the shirt of the poor girl who was standing behind him. She reacted less dramatically and the monkey quickly lost interest, opting instead to run around beating his chest and swinging from trees to prove his dominance to we big, silly creatures. A little alarming, but mostly funny. We ended our day in Arashiyama with some green tea ice cream by the river. It was such a stunning place and I would absolutely return if we make it back to Kyoto. For dinner that night the boys and girls split to different restaurants since the boys are uncultured buffoons who get squeamish about seafood. Kelsey and I ended up at one of those fun revolving sushi restaurants while the boys hunted down some meat and Saki. Kelsey, feeling over-confident in her spice tolerance, tried wasabi rolls and ended up gulping down water and holding back tears as the restaurant staff laughed at us. It was cute and now we can check “have sushi in Japan” off the bucket list. Day 3 Sunday was our last day all together and we were all really enjoying Kyoto so we decided to spend the day exploring a few more places before parting. We got on a very crowded bus and were joined by a group of very, let’s say, energetic high schoolers from Australia and their less-than enthusiastic chaperone. The whole ride I couldn’t help but wonder, was this poor guy forced into his job? Or did he really think leading a group of 15 teenage boys around Japan would be a breeze? Crammed into the aisle of the bus, these boys thought it was hilarious to continually push and shove each other, regularly stumbling and putting their whole weight onto their angry chaperone. Though annoying, it was also very entertaining to hear this poor man shout things like “Ay! You blokes, knock it off or you're in big traable!” Lol. Aussies. We soon escaped the crowded bus and made our way up to the Golden Pavilion, a buddhist temple famous because, as the name suggests, it is covered in pure gold leaf. We snapped our photos, checked out the enormous coy fish, and oooed and ahhed at the pretty gold, it was all very lovely and touristy. My favorite part, however, was visiting a little pagoda just past the pavilion where we enjoyed some stinky, albeit delicious, green tea and cute little cakes. It was sweet and peaceful, Danny really got into the tea drinking part. After the pavilion we hopped on a train for the Inari shrine. A quick thought on Japanese trains, they are so cute and vintage! It may only be in the historical and touristy areas but it was really fun to take them to the different places we visited. They are also super comfortable and significantly less crowded than the trains we use in Korea. So we took one of these cool trains to the Inari shrine. This place is pretty iconic because of the striking orange arches that often show up in photographs on travel sites. This was probably my favorite place of all that we visited in Kyoto. There was something really moving and special about visiting the many shrines and walking through the endless arches that led through the forest. We learned how to pray at one of the shrines and also observed a monk leading prayer in one of the temples right in the center of all the crazy tourist hubbub. Danny and I were both having a little bit of the homesick feels because the woods smelled a lot like the woods we like to hike back home in Virginia, but the more we wandered through the shrines and trees, the more they were replaced by the spiritual feels. I snapped a few photos here but I also found myself walking through the arches and just absorbing everything. I found it to be a really inspiring place and I think I will go explore eastern religions a bit more at some of temples and shrines in Korea. We headed back to Kyoto Station and said goodbye to Kelsey and Ryan who would fly back to the U.S. in the morning. We had a crazy fun few days together and it was nice to feel like they brought us a bit of home all the way to this side of the world! Danny and I grabbed a train bound for Osaka. We had booked another Air BnB in the city close to Kansai Airport. Now this place was cheap, like 40 USD a night cheap, so neither of us were expecting a palace. It did have good reviews so I was fairly certain we weren’t going to walk into a serial killer’s lair. The host, an American guy named Stacey, was super nice and met us at the metro stop to walk us to where we were staying. Stacey is “that guy." You know the type? He’s someone who you meet and immediately feel like he should be a character in a book or movie. A little untethered, drops his whole life story on you in the first few minutes, knows all the people you pass by and they also seem to know him. A little odd but really, a nice guy. “That guy.” So Stacey leads us from the station and into this old, old neighborhood. Like old, vintage Japan neighborhood. The streets are tight and the house is situated down a half-covered market street dotted with shops, mostly-shut down, with their sliding metal doors securely locked. The way he explained it, the neighborhood used to be run by the shopkeepers but most have grown old, passed away and none of their children want to inherit the shop business. Hence the sad but sweet and nostalgic street that remains. The house was super simple and small but totally functional and comfortable for a two night stay. The walls were paper-thin but we’re used to that from living in our Korean apartment. We were both a little hungry so we checked out this little bistro that Stacey pointed out on our way over. Neither of us really knew what we were ordering so we just went with it and ended up having a really fun time just trying lots of random Japanese food. We actually ordered something listed as “steak”....yes, in quotation marks. Still not totally sure what it was but we think it was some kind of potato-like veggie with a mix of meat seasoning. It was actually very yummy. I also tried Japanese plum wine which was so, so good - and a little dangerous, as Danny can attest, I swayed and giggled my way back to our house after our weird and fun meal. Day 4 We had one day to spend in Osaka so we headed out early and grabbed some breakfast at this cute diner next to the train station. Breakfast places are not really a thing in Korea so we were excited to find a place that served waffles, eggs and pancakes. They also brewed drip coffee in this really cool upside down contraption. Our waiter was this nice, older gentleman who was very patient and not judgemental of our poor Japanese skills. We spent the morning visiting Osaka Castle. The castle was really interesting but I was impressed by the enormous outer walls and moat. The grounds and gardens around the castle were also really special and we took some silly pictures with one of the castle’s “warriors.” There was lots of food for sale so we paused for a tasty ramen lunch before we went into the castle to check out the museum. Interesting history fact, Osaka Castle was built by Toyotomi Hideyoshi, a man who was born to a peasant and rose to become Imperial Regent of Japan in a very Game of Thrones-esque fashion. It’s definitely worth a look at this guy’s Wikipedia page if you’re into Japanese history. As we exited the castle we ran into a man who tried to sell us some pamphlets and tell us that Japan’s prison system is worse than North Korea’s, so that was weird, but we were trying to get to the Osaka Aquarium so ain’t nobody got time for that. The Osaka Aquarium is listed as one of the top tourist sites in Japan so we were curious if it would live up to the hype. OH MY GOD IT DID. We saw so many cute, fat seals and sea lions, got to touch some sea critters and...seriously, WHALE SHARKS ARE THE COOLEST! I want to write a song about how cool whale sharks are! In the center of the aquarium there is this enormous tank that you can look at as you walk down several floors and they had not one, not two, but THREE whale sharks. I could seriously watch them swim all day, they are just amazing. Danny was more about the otters and the fat seals but I’m a whale shark girl through and through, if there is such a thing. We got some cute aquatic accessories on our way out and left feeling refreshed and giddy from our visit under the sea. To celebrate our last night in Japan we went for dinner at a fun little place tucked away from one of the main shopping areas. We ordered a bunch of different dishes, Japanese tapas style, and drank more plum wine and saki. We headed home for an early night in preparation for a very early flight and fell asleep feeling well-traveled and happy. |
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