Let's go up to the mountains. . .

During a grueling four hour long rehearsal for the DYB Song, which we might not even have a chance to perform, Nate received a welcomed phone call from Joseph letting us know that he was up for skiing on Sunday. While he mentioned the possibility of going early last week, he asserted that no final decision could be made until Saturday night. . .we can only assume that the eventual choice was contingent on how much he was planning to drink after finishing a six day work week!

Excited by the opportunity to get out of Seoul for the day we agreed that it would be best to get to bed early, seeing as how Joseph set our departure time at 9:00am. Even so, Saturday is one of our only chances to get out of Junggye in the evening and thus eat somewhere other than a gimbapchongook. . .I know, you think it's disgustingly repetitive, so do I, but you find somewhere else to it Junggye at eleven o'clock at night, okay!?

Not having been out with us in a while, Cleo decided to tag along and managed to talk Miran in to joining us on a quick trip to grab a bite in, well, obviously, Itaewon. With so many international choices and so little time left in Seoul (no, I'm not planning on being fired, I'm just optimistically hopeful that I'll find a good enough reason to bail soon) I've decided that I'd be depriving myself of vast cultural opportunities if I were to begin frequenting the same restaurants. So, each time we go to this world hub we try to eat somewhere new. There are of course two exceptions to this rule. The first are street doners, which, in fact are served up by a variety of different nationalities and cannot possibly be passed up. The second exception, as the most astute of readers might have surmised, is fish 'n chips at the Wolfhound; on Tuesdays of course!

It didn't take much of an argument to talk Miran and Cleo into trying out a Greek restaurant, Santorini, that we had eyed a couple weeks back. With little problem we managed to find the small second floor eatery in no time, immediately behind the Hamilton Hotel. Hoping for something in between Lou 'n Harry's and Greektown (in the big-D of course), Santorini managed to just barely make the cut. While lamb chops made the menu, apparently sheep are scarce enough in Korea to warrant gyros being made with a substitute meat. . .oh well, the tzatziki that came with made up for any complaints I could throw out there.

Though the 'girls' found their saganaki to be too salty, Nate and I both agreed, after a taste, that fried cheese is fried cheese. . .and not to ever be condemned! Again they found the fried calamari a bit too greasy though my problem would have been with the blatant presence of tentacles on the plate over the grease. . . again, the tzatziki made everything at the table taste equally wonderful. Although I was at first worried about not being able to eat my fill, probably due to my last experience at the Bulgarian restaurant, I left Santorini quite satisfied. On top of it all, the best part of the meal was probably the little three bite salad that I had before anything else. It's been ages since I've had a legit salad and even longer since my last helping of real Greek dressing. . . again, oh how I miss Lou 'n Harry's.

Anyways, after dinner we made a quick stop by Woodstock to, luckily, catch the last of 'the Trio's' set. . .while they're not quite George, Johnny and June these three little Koreans rip up a mighty tight storm! As the following act took the stage we took sanctuary outside, far away from the piercing noise! Back home and to bed by one in order to be ready for the day of riding ahead!

On to Saturday. . . sorry for the delay. . . I woke up a little after eight having agreed to meet Nate for breakfast as twenty after. We strode across the street to McDonalds to catch the elusive MickyD Breakfast and put to use the 2 for 1 coupons we snagged out of the bag of this, and every, month's Groove magazine. After painfully trying to order an egg mcmuffin set with and orange juice and a coffee, I eventually relinquished my request for both as I was continually informed that 'set comes with one drink.' Thus, as soon as I had paid for my set, with coffee, I immediately ordered an orange juice.

Assuming that my actions would have made clear my initial intentions, Nate followed suit ordering two drinks, not before being cut by two Korean women who literally pushed past him, the only other customer in line, to order first. Unfortunately, by the time Nate got around to ordering, the cashier must have forgotten that the waygookin ordering two drinks fully intended to pay for both and was not trying to scam Ronald MD out of a free drink. . .alas, it was no use and Nate had to order a single drink set, then return to order his OJ. . . silly Kowea.

Running a bit late, we headed back towards Doota, ready to go, just a few minutes before nine, our departure time set by the driver, Joseph. Unfortunately, just then, Nate received a message from Joseph saying that he'll see us at ten. . . uh, 'no, now,' Nate suggestively replied. It was no use. A little after ten Nate called Joseph and, apparently, woke him up. Of course having dragged myself out of bed and forced a coffee down the hatch I was unable to get anymore rest, instead spending the previous hour (which would turn out to be longer) sitting, staring at my computer screen wishing I was asleep or on a mountain.

I called Nate soon after he spoke with sleepy Joseph and learned that our departure was again pushed back. I in turn spent the next half hour continuing to stare at my computer screen as meaningless images and words passed by. Around 10:45 Nate called me insisting that I put pressure on Joseph. I obliged and was subsequently informed that Joseph was on his way and would be at Doota in less than ten. I quickly packed up and headed over to Nate's place to share the good news. Fifteen minutes later I got a call from Joseph impatiently demanding to know where I was and why I wasn't out back waiting. . .oh, I'm sorry, I was there at nine, two hours ago, when we were supposed to leave. . .sometime since then I decided that I should be able to rest upstairs on the comfort of a couch. . . silly me!

Finally, a little after eleven we were on our way! Well, almost, we had to swing by S-Oil to fuel up and 7-11 to, well, fuel up. About 80 km into our 155 km drive towards Hoengseong we pulled off to a rest stop to grab some lunch and unload some weight. After a piping hot bowl of dok (chewy rice cake) ramyeon we were back on the road. Around 1:30pm we stopped at a rental shop on what appeared to be the outskirts of a small mountain town.

For only 15,000 won I rented a 160 board (super awesome yellow flower pattern) and size 285 boots! Not a bad deal at all! On top of it, we got 30% of our lift tickets for renting wherever we did. . . or at least Joseph claims that we did! I'm really not sure how any of the transaction went down but apparently our lift tickets were delivered to us once we made it to the resort by a rep for the rental shop. . .not sure what was really happening but it got us up the mountain!

After a bit of locker trouble we were on the gondola headed to the top of Hyundai Sungwoo Resort! I don't care, or know how really, to delve into 'ski writing' so I'll keep it short (ha, you say, watch this. . .).

While Sungwoo had a bit on Boyne it was a far cry from Breckenridge! With a little more than 1000 feet of vertical we could go from top to bottom in less than about two minutes. . .gunning it that is! We gave every lift, except the 'Family Chair,' a fair shot but continued to return to the same curving run that went off the backside. A long groomer this trail provided us with the best mixture of stupid little jumps (which there are very few off), decent (though man made) snow, and of course a grade that perfectly allowed for point and shoot racing! Though it would have been nice to cover a bit more terrain, only about half of the runs were open as a number of them were almost entirely bare. Oh well, it was still a blast!

What I'd like to discuss ad nauseum but simply don't know how, and really don't want to (believe me, it's as boring for me to write this as it is for you to read. . .I swear one day I'll figure out how to say what I want to in a manageable number of words. . .gimmie a deadline and a word count and I'll be on) is the plain spectacle of a Korean ski resort. From the brightly colored snow suits (which are really inexplicably absurd and my pictures do not do justice to what can only be described as neo-modern retro) to the furry animal hats the whole thing looks like a bad joke. Not to mention billboards, giant TVs and terrible Korean pop music stimulating your every sense as you try and relax in the peacefulness of nature.

We caught a two hour break from 4:30 to 6:30 while they cats groomed up for night skiing and then hit the mountain hard (aside from Joseph's numerous calls for rest) until 9:30pm when we decided to take off. Here the real fun started!

I imagined that going home would take long due to the traffic. I never imagined that Joseph would intentionally lengthen the trip due to absurdity! After getting out of our wet clothes and out to the car. Joseph insisted on waiting for a good fifteen minutes before moving. First, he had to brush off the windows. . .okay, understandable, a half inch of snow could ice over by the time you start driving. But, even after the windows were cleared and ready to go, he insisted that we not move until the car warmed up. Now, I've always been one to drive a cold car hard in order to warm it up quicker. . .but apparently that's not how it's done over here!

A few minutes down the road we hopped out to quickly and painless drop off my rental. . .at this point Joseph called in our 51,000 won payment for the lift ticket. . .apparently, he had not even purchased them earlier but was simply given them expectant that we would later return with the equipment I rented, deposit free, to pay 153,000 for the tickets. Trusting, or stupid!?

Another couple minutes down the road we stopped in 'town' for a dinner of seolleongtang. A couple spicy, like, really, really, spicy, peppers, and some 'bachelor kimchi' later, we were on the road again. . . or, at least outside in the snow. It took Joseph another ten minutes to wipe down the dusting of snow that had accumulated on the windshield before he would even consider getting in the car! Before deciding to finally get going Joseph noted that we would have to drive much slower because we didn't have any chains to put on the tires. . . .at this point there was perhaps three quarters of an inch of snow on the ground. . . and less on the roads!

A few seconds up the road we again had to stop at a convenience store to get snacks for the ride back. Luckily it didn't snow enough while we were inside to warrant yet another exhaustive wipe down, though we did have to wait a minute to make sure the car was still warm. Finally out of town and on the highway I thought we'd be on our way home once and for all. Again, silly me.

Pulling out onto the highway the car's windshield was immediately splashed with slush from passing cars. Having been using his wiper fluid liberally the whole way up the mountain, it was no surprise when nothing came out on the way back down. Unwilling to drive with a smudgy windshield, probably rightly so, we pulled off at the next gas station to fill up with washer fluid. The nice part about gas stations here is that you don't have to get out for anything meaning that there was no time for the snow to build up warranting another brush off.

Pulling out of the gas station, well, we didn't actually get all the way out. Joseph pulled forward a few meters and again stopped, jumped out and grabbed a can of something out of something out of his trunk. Apparently he had purchased some spray on rain shield for just this purpose. The only problem was that it required the windshield to be wet to apply and he had just drank the last of his water. . .which he had me search for for a few minutes in the back of the car.

He pondered spraying it on then decided that following the instructions was a better idea. Thus we hit the road and pulled over at the next rest stop to grab some water. Outside the car Joseph sloshed water on the windshield then quickly wiped it down. I had to remind him that the purpose of getting the water was not for him to clean his window but to apply the rain repellent or whatever it was. . . Oh yeah!

After spraying down the windows we of course had to wait until the chemical dried and fulled filled the car with fumes. Finally we hit the road, reassured by Joseph that he would try not to fall asleep. We eventually made it home a little after one, more than three hours after setting out. The absurdity of the trip was not how long it took but the pure reason why it took so long!

Sorry it's a rather anticlimactic ending. . .I don't even know how this got drawn out this long. . .believe me, I would rather have not spent this much time telling you all about nothing! Oh well. . .so that's what it's like to go skiing in Korea. . .or with Joseph at least! We do have another adventure planned over our Lunar New Year holiday where we're supposed to meet up with a random group of about 16 people and spend two days up at Phoenix Park Resort. . .perhaps going with other waygookin will be a different experience. . . though that's not necessarily a good thing.

Good Night. . .