Squid : Pumpkins as Batman : Robin

Dodong Sunset

The boat jumps in the surf like a fish and lands like a rock. Someone in the front of the ship heaves wetly. A shared groan rises from the rows of chairs. The cabin is a miasma of stale air and the smell of sick.

Rough going in the East Sea.

I'm sitting in the back of the ferry trying to remind myself that I've never been seasick before (and until last weekend, I hadn't been). Next to me an elderly Korean man holds his stomach with one hand and an opaque, black ziplock in the other. He's staring at the floor while a young woman in a ferry uniform rubs his back.

The ship lifts and slams. People rock in their seats. A girl from Germany takes exaggerated stagger steps on her way to the aft bathroom, just trying not to fall down.

"Try chewing gum," the Korean ferrymaid says to me politely (and in perfect English), still trying to comfort the old man. "I'm worried about you." I guess I don't look so hot.

The old man turns in my direction and vomits into his bag. Loudly. Sweat beads on my brow while my mouth fills up with watery, thin saliva. "There," the woman points to the concession booth nearby. Another ferry worker brings the old man a wetnap.

I push my back against the rolling wall of the ship and slide up to my feet.

"Gum? Ju-say-oh? (means 'please', or thereabout)" The man behind the counter is dressed in a black vest over a short-sleeved white button-up and wearing a hat that makes his outfit look unmistakably professional-bowlerish. He stares at me blankly, then smiles. "Gum?" I chomp my teeth a few times on imaginary, magic gum that keeps you from getting seasick.

The man points to a bag of chips. I don't see any gum behind the counter. Damn. I wave my hand. "Ah-neo (No), gam-sah-ham-ni-dah (thanks anyway, compadre)"

"Sweet Baby Jesus be with you," he replies.

I swear, he said this.

I meet his eye, a little shocked at the Ricky-Bobby-ism given the circumstances, then rip a black ziplock from my jacket pocket and heave up 14,000 Korean Won of fried chicken and squid.

And those are the highlights from the ride back.

The trip to the island was much smoother. Strange to think that our voyage on The Seastar was over the same sea lane, but I'm told the current direction matters a lot. Sure seemed to.

After the teacher appreciation dinner our school threw at a BBQ joint (worthy of its own blog), an hour on the subway, and five hours on a bus -- we were finally ready to get on a boat and get out to the island. Korea is a relatively small country (or rather, the US is a relatively huge one), but Ulleungdo is still a good long way away. Maybe another 3.5 hours by ferry from the east coast.

That's a long boat ride

The ferry we were originally slated to take lost an engine, so we were pushed to another several hours later. The group we were traveling with (Adventure Korea) made up for this by taking us to a couple beaches to chill at along the way. We saw the sunrise over a beach that's allegedly the set of the Korean version of the OC, although it was bitter cold on the beach in the pre-dawn. Still, a beach is a beach and the travel planner was making lemonade, I know.

Adventure Korea was sweet. It's one of several companies here that plan these big trips. They're all geared towards English speakers. You pay a flat rate, and the company handles everything. Most of your meals, all of your lodging, all the transportation; it's all pre-arranged and prepaid, so once you cough up the $400 you can pretty much just chill. We were hesitant to pay that much for a 4.5 day vacation, but when we started looking at setting up all of the moving parts ourselves, we found we weren't saving enough money to make it worth the time or trouble.

At the ferry station our tour guide/planner handed out tickets. We were pretty beat, having not really slept on the way. My ticket had my name misspelled, so I was corralled into a special group of misfit toys. This turned out to be a good thing. Prior to this trip, Maria and I hadn't really talked to anyone outside of our coworkers and each other, and that had been about 2.5 months now. So when we joined up with a group of 118 westerners, many of who came in large groups of friends, I know I was feeling a little out of my element. Like I had forgotten how to talk to new people.

Meeting Basia (pronounced Basha) helped a lot. Truthfully, we wouldn't have found the bus pickup in Seoul without her. In the messed-up-ticket group I met a fisherman from the states and some Swedes. The fisherman was definitely my favorite. He's been teaching here for 17 months, and spends his free time flying around the country and Southeast Asia on fishing trips. Six feet tall and made an inch or too taller by big hiking boots. An eccentric dude, he was wearing the neon hiking gear normally favored by old Korean men and had three collapsable fishing poles strapped to his back. Like Goofy meets Bear Grylls. "This is me with a catfish in Vietnam. 77 kilos." He's flashing his phone around to all the guys in the ticket circle. I know he was born in 1985, because he was shouting across the tarmac ferry landing that his ticket read 9185. He was fun to talk to.

On the ferry, I sat next to a woman named Kim, who I just call "the artist". We get to talking about teaching and traveling and hobbies and jobs, and before long she's got her cell phone out showing me metal crafted scrap art (really amazing stuff) that she's sold and donated. She was great too. Says she hiked about South Africa when she graduated high school, and has been going to school and traveling ever since. One those folk who you can smell the sense on. Smart lady.

And of course, there was Donovan. I was talking to a French exchange student while we waited on the ferry, and found out there were people from North Carolina in his group. Turns out that Donovan wasn't just from North Carolina, but graduated from West Meck High, where I very nearly worked in Charlotte. And here he is. In line for a ferry in South Korea. Small world.

Like I said, the ferry ride to the island was easy. As we near the shore the talking and mingling on the boat stops. Everyone is staring out of the windows. Cameras come out. This place is incredible. I snagged the pictures I posted on Facebook before we went from Google, but the real deal looks just as amazing, if not more so. Towering rock spires jut out of the sea next to island-proper. Black/grey rocks, sheers cliffs, and dark green foliage. I've never been to Hawaii, never seen a true volcanic island in person. They look raw. I mean fresh. Like they were born yesterday. I used to teach about igneous rocks (formed directly from magma/lava) in my earth science class, now I can see the pores in the rock where the air escaped in the cooling process. Now I can see flows of basalt. Incredible.

We dock on the island, and everyone piles out. My throat starts to itch as we're marshaled to the bus that will take us into town, and I realize it's because I haven't closed my mouth since we landed.

The bus ride to Dodong (the largest village on the island) isn't long. From there we trek through the narrow streets to our hotel. 118 of us stand out in front of the steps to the place, tired but excited. It's maybe 5 PM. "Ok, everyone," our travel planner says over the crowd. He's using the exact same voice as every summer camp counselor you've every had. "This is our hotel. The itinerary for our trip will be posted on the wall there. Get in to groups of four or five, and I'll give you your room key." And just like that we went from being 118 people on the precipice of a sweet vacation to 118 middle schoolers on the precipice of a kickball game. Everyone's grouped up in twos and threes, looking around to see who they'll be sharing their room with. Trying not to make eye contact with people they don't want to sleep next to.

Dodong

Basia, Maria, and I are standing in a group looking for a group of two or so. That's when we see Jerry and Emily doing the same. We join up, having not spoken to them before (though I think I stood next to Jerry at some point), and get assigned to a room on the roof of the hotel, which would prove fortuitous.

Slumber party

Our room was pretty small. Just a square room with a bathroom. A stack of blankets sat in the corner that we were able to make pallet beds out of. It was all very open. The shower didn't even have a curtain -- it was that kind of open. When everything was all set up, it looked like a slumber party, and I guess it was. Just a bunch of people piled into a room full of pillows and blankets. It was a good time.

You always bond fast with people in situations like this, when you're traveling or in programs or camps. I don't know why it happens, but it does. I was only in Greece for six weeks my Sophomore year, but when I got back I felt like I had known the people I was traveling with for months. It went something like that here as well. People pack up (like wolves, I mean). Must be all the "other" around you in situations like that. Not a lot of English outside of the group -- that's a strong bonder. Everyone's is experiencing a lot of new, and it's always more fun to share that with someone. Whatever the reason, the five of us became fast friends (as I write this, I'm actually getting ready to meet them all in Seoul tonight for a firework festival).

Five minutes after we set our stuff down in the room, all 118 of us (or thereabout) were to be back down in front of the hotel and moving in a herd for the water. My crew missed the meeting and walked the backtrail, following the sounds of English and laughter. The village is situated in a valley and slopes down to the ocean. There's a fish market there, and a bridge that connects to a thin path. The path is made of small bridges in some places or just cut from the side of the mountain/island (on a volcanic island, mountain and island are pretty much synonymous). We follow the path until we find the rest of our group amassed around a bridge. Everyone's stripped down to their bathing suits and is jumping off.

It's getting dark, but we've been travelling for 20 hours since we left Seoul, and we didn't come to this island to not jump into the ocean. I peel off my shirt and hop the bride alongside Jerry and the two Swedes from the misfit-ticket circle.

The water feels good. Really good. It's salty like the Mediterranean was. So salty that you barely have to tread water to stay afloat. I swim around for a bit watching people jump and smiling like an idiot until the sun really goes down, then everybody walks back to the hotel for dinner (we may have stopped for beer and ice-cream on the way).

The Chuseok harvest moon is the biggest of the year.

The hotel provides dinner. Kimchi, rice, and greens (I say greens because I have no idea what it really was). Of course, the fisherman joined our table. He says he's going to spend all of Monday fishing (It's Saturday night). Tomorrow, we're slated to go on a bus tour of the island (the whole island), and then hit a pretty gnarly hike. Tuesday we've got a cable car ride planned, but Monday is all free time.

After dinner, we walk back up to our room and share a few drinks and stories. Basia is from Hawaii and has been in-country for a year and a half, Jerry is from Toronto, and Emily is from Florida. A small party kicks up on the roof outside or our room, and we explore it a little, meeting people from all over. It's a blast to talk to such a mixed group of people. The Netherlands, Sweden, England, Germany, France, Canada, Peru, California -- it's a wild mix. Seems like I could have counted on my fingers how many people I knew from out of state when I was in college, and now this. Is this how people in Europe feel all the time?

Everyone's pretty tired, and tomorrow's going to be a doozy, so we hit the hay pretty early (maybe around 1 AM).

The next day we eat breakfast (kimchi, rice, and greens), and load up into three buses for a tour of the island. You can see from the map below that the island has a good many villages. There's a road that traces the island, and one off shoot that snakes up to the village in the volcano's crater, but other than that there don't seem to be too many roads. It's too mountainous. That means that our bus tour (five hours) was spent driving along the coast. Mountains and jungle on our right, and the wide sea to our left.

Ulleungdo

I wasn't too keen on sitting on a bus for five hours, but it was the best, and only, way to see the whole island. I figured that once we saw it all like this, we could take a cab wherever we wanted to go on Monday. There are a lot of small rock vigil islands just off of Ulleungdo. You can see most of them on the map. Our guide sat in the front of the bus calling out their names on a microphone as we passed them. "To your left is Dragon Rock." "Look! Penis Rock!" "Ahead is Baby Bear. The story goes that Mama Bear fell in to the ocean, and Baby Bear is still waiting for her. See how he looks out over the cliff?" "Ah, look! Bigger Penis Rock!" I wasn't able to confirm with village elders if "Baby Bear" is legitimate, so I can't prove that for our five hour tour this guy was just making up rock names and giggling out phallic jokes -- but I know what I would do.

Racks on racks of squid

The bus stops to let us out in several places. The island's biggest export is squid (which you can see drying on racks EVERYWHERE), and after that it's pumpkin. That may sound like a strange combo to you, but on Ulleungdo squid and pumpkins are like Batman and Robin. One of the places we stopped was a pumpkin farm where the farmers made bread and candy from their crop of gourds. That's pretty cool, but it get's better. This is a volcanic island. The edge of a volcanic island. Space is at a premium, and arable land is negligible. The farmers' pumpkin patch is spread out over a series of terraces that they get to via a mini roller coaster. That's right, when the pumpkin farmers aren't making candy in their oceanfront home/business, they're riding their personal roller coaster down a mountain. I know the grass is always greener, but gosh -- that sounds pretty objectively green.

Don't know which phallic rock that is

Next, we eat lunch in the crater of the volcano. I'm told that this is the only village in the world where people are living in a volcano. Don't know about that, but the lunch was amazing -- a bowl of rice and greens with a side of kimchi. Outside, the crater village has several field of herbs planted. The ground is totally level and all around us the walls of the caldera rise up to form the broken rim of the extinct volcano. Pretty amazing. Our hike will leave from this village, the guide tells us. It's slated to be a four hour ordeal, and the route will take us across the crater, up over the rim, and then back down to Dodong. We'll be climbing around 1,400 ft, which isn't terrible, but isn't anything to sneeze at.

It's a tradition here to drink a special pumpkin wine-drink at the top of the mountain. Mackalay, I think it's called, but I was calling it all kinds of things at the time. Mack-a-laid. Macklejon. Pumpkin wine, would serve. Just when the group was starting to leave for the hike I ran back in to the restaurant we ate lunch at to buy some. The elderly woman behind the counter didn't speak any English, but I gave her 10,000 KRW (a little less than 10 bucks) and said "Mack-a-laid, please", just the same. She pocketed the money and walked back in to the kitchen. I waited. Three minutes or so pass. The group is starting to leave. I'm thinking that there's no way I'm going to be able to explain to this woman what I want, and even if I could, where is she. Looks like I just donated 10 bucks to the island retirement fund.

I'm thinking of just leaving when the woman comes back with a a clear plastic liter bottle of what I'm assuming is mackalay (looks like a cloudy white liquid), a bag of greens (imagine green beans in some kind of sauce), and a few pairs of chopsticks. I thank her profusely (no change was given, so I guess she just gave me 10 bucks worth of stuff), and hustle back to catch the group.

The hike is a long one. It's beautiful, but it's a no joke hike. After we cross the crater basin, which looks like one wide meadow, we reach a trail that snakes through some woods and ends at a long wooden stairway. Up, and up, the stairs go beyond count. I've never hiked in a group so large, and it's really the opposite of what I go for when I'm trying to get away from it all, but it wasn't bad. The big group stratified pretty fast. The folk that had come in jeans fell to the back and the spryer crowd moved to the front. The stairs gave way to mountain paths and switchbacks. We stopped for a while at a natural spring where the islanders had made a rock pool to catch the water. They even left plastic ladles for drinking.

Some hours later we reached the top. The summit of the mountain marked the highest point on the island, but it was wreathed in clouds, so the views weren't stellar (aside from the clouds drifting between the green mountains). We popped the mack-a-laid, and it was pretty sweet stuff. The woman at the restaurant gave me 6 cups, so we passed around those and then passed the bottle. The police force for the island was out on a training exercise and had also made the climb. They produced several mack-a-laid bottles (I saw now that the ten-dollar bottle the woman had given me was much larger than the normal ones), and had lunch. I bartered the tailend of our mack-a-laid for some of their tofu, and passed a few words with those that spoke English -- it seems like most young people here do.

The hike down went fast. We reached Dodong in maybe 40 minutes. It was so steep coming down that many of us took to walking backwards to save our knees. I'll credit Jerry for starting that.

A group congregated in front of a convenience store, and we stopped to eat some fruit. Basia and I sliced up a couple Korean pears. After that, we made for the water. Seemed like a good time to jump off a bridge. But wouldn't you know it, the island 5-0 was there waiting. Some cop was standing on the bridge scolding the lot of us, telling us not to swim here. Of course we looked like belligerent spring breakers, most of us naked to the waist and streaked with mud from the hike. Koreans handle partial nudity very differently than westerners. When I went to the beach a month or so ago, Maria and I were the only people I saw in bathing suits. It's a modesty thing here.

Knowing that, I guess it makes a little sense that when 35 or so sweaty foreigners start pulling off their clothes and jumping off bridges along a scenic waterfront path (and in view of a little restaurant), the local authorities get a little uppity. That being said, we didn't travel all this way to not swim in the crystal cobalt ocean, so Maria, Emily and I walked a ways down the path and jumped in there. And it was nice. Really nice. There aren't many beaches here, not sandy ones anyway. The rocks are young and sharp, but man, the water. Just on the edge of cold, and depending on the sunlight, it goes from a light aqua to a deep blue-green. And clear. Clear in the way the only rocky places can be. No sand. No mud. You can see straight down in the water until the light gives out and it all fades to blue. So, you see, we had to jump in. It was out of our hands.

We'd been all the way around and over the island that day. Around and back again. Everyone was pretty tired. After dinner at the hotel (a familiar looking arrangement of kimchi, rice, and greens), we made for our room. Another roof party kicked up that night, this one bigger than last night, and we joined in. One thing led to another (and by "one thing" I mean a drink composed of yogurt and soju, and by another I mean "another one or two of those") and we found ourselves at the village noray-bong (karaoke). I can't remember if I've told you about soju yet or not. It's definitely a thing here. Rice liquor, I guess you'd call it. Sort of tastes like a sweet, weak vodka.

Monday came and we slept late. Probably until 11. I won't say it wasn't needed. We missed breakfast, though I bet I can guess what it was.

This was our free day, and we meant to spend it swimming. There was a group going to a place called "Pebble Beach," but we missed their cab. No worries, we'll just catch our own. Maria, Jerry, Emily, and I walked down to the harbor and flagged a taxi. People stared. Openly stared. It's a thing here to be not Korean. In a country where there isn't a substantial base of really different demographics, that's natural I guess. It's not the skin-tone melting/mixing pot that the US is. You get on a subway and everyone is Korean, or at least from Asia usually. I know I'm running the risk of sounding pretty arrogant when I say that, and I'm sure there are a good many demographics of people in Korea (and especially in Seoul) that I just don't know about, but I can tell you without a shadow of doubt that people stare at you if you're from out of town. I watched an old woman eyeball us for 40 yards as she walked down the street, and when she passed us she turned her head 180 degrees like an owl and stared at us for 40 more yards. We're an attraction.

The cab gets there, and we pile in. "Pebble Beach," I said. I guess I hoped it would be that easy. None of us knew how to say "pebble," "beach," or "where's the bathroom," but we hoped it would work out. The guy is looking at me like I have three eyes. "Pebble Beach." I try again. "Swimming," and now I mime out a passable freestyle stroke.

"Swimming!" the cabbie says. Relief blooms across my shoulders.

"Yes, swimming!" I smile, and take a few more imaginary strokes, imagining, I guess, that he was just going to drive us to his personal swimming hole.

"Ah-neo. No swimming," the driver replies, looking confused. Damn. The cabbie is looking around anxiously, like he's thinking about dumping his load of illiterate, swimming mimes.

Jerry ultimately saved the day by getting our trip planner on the phone and then passing the mobile to the cab driver. I hear a quick exchange in Korean over the line. "Ah, Pebble Beach," the cab driver says. I swear, he just said "Pebble Beach" with a Korean accent. Whatever, we're on the way to the beach now and the cabbie is driving his Hyundai Galloper like he stole it.

The beach isn't all that far, and it isn't all that beachy. Mostly pebbles. Ten or so people from our group lounge on the rocks. No one's swimming. Esta no bueno. My crew walks along a path cut into the mountain. It goes over some construction and across a rusty bridge, and before long we find ourselves on another face of the island, perching like sea birds on the cliffs and looking out at the wide pacific. Two guys are snorkling. One climbs up the cliff face a little ways and then leaps off in the ocean. Bingo. This is what we were looking for.

There was even a model there to watch!

The cliff overlooks a small harbor an a few off-shoot islands. The place we were jumping from was around 20 feet from the water. That's not all that high, but it was enough of a rush to warrant spending the better part of the day sunning ourselves on the cliff and jumping off when we felt like it. It was partly cloudy, and it got pretty cold a few times, but the cliff face was warm from the day's sun. I just sort of wedged myself into it and chilled out for an hour or so.

We ran into another group of people that I had spoken with briefly on the hike. A guy with them, Nathan from Chicago, and I struck up a conversation about tattoos and grandfathers. They had a speaker and were cranking out some goodies. Nice folk.

"crappy backflip'

After a few hours hanging out there, and after I worked up the courage to execute what Maria called "a crappy backflip", we walked to a nearby fishing village and caught a cab back to Dongdo.

Top is an oyster. Bottom is unidentified ocean-meat

When we got back we decided to hit up this awesome seafood restaurant that we'd been eyeing since we arrived on the island (the one on the way to the jumping bridge). It didn't have a name that I could see. But why waist time on a name when you're running fresh seafood out of a pirate cove. The place was all outdoors. Really, it was just a partially roofed booth overlooking a bunch of tables next to the sea. How fresh was the seafood? For starters, there's a hose pumping fresh seawater straight out of the pacific and into kiddie pools of oysters, clams, conchs, and various other ocean-meat bearing critters. When we talked up there was some guy in fishermen's boots sitting on the ground and bashing apart conchs with a hammer. It looked like the spot.

I don't know if it counts as haggling, but the guy shouted two or three different prices at us when we asked for a plate of muscles, each lower than the last. What we ended up with was two big beers, a fair-sized bowl of the biggest muscles I've ever seen in my life, and another dish filled with some raw mollusk. I have absolutely no idea what the last dish was. Maybe cut up raw conch. Emily and Maria were guessing sea slug. I could see sea cucumber, maybe. Who knows. It was good though. Really good. All of that for about $10 a person.

On the way home we walked through the fish market, where women in overalls and tall rubber boots hollered at us in Korean over kiddie pools of squid, some small striped fish, and a single, sad-eyed tuna. Emily bought some grilled squid and split it up amongst us. I'm not big on calamari, but this was great! It had some kind of dry rub on it. Tasted like smokey squid jerky.

We went back to the hotel and passed out for around an hour or so. It was the kind of deep, clean nap you take after you swim all day or go to the beach. We woke up feeling refreshed and hungry again, and hit up a spaghetti and pizza place right next to our hotel. We ordered the pumpkin pizza (they also had squid), which was dope. After that we picked up a few more yogurts and sojus from the convenience store (Basia also told us about a drink made from soju and melted Popsicle, so we picked up a few of those as well).

That night the roof party came to us. A rotating cast of six or so Europeans joined our slumber party and helped us celebrate out last night on the island. I spent the better part of the night back down in front of the convenience store with a Californian named Chaz, a Peruvian/German named Patrick, and Jerry (our friendly neighborhood Canadian). We passed around a giant beer and a big bowl of ramen and swapped stories until around 5 AM. It was a really nice night.

The next morning, our last on the island, we took a cable car up to another peak that overlooked the town of Dongdo. I hiked out a little further to a gazebo/observation tower that overlooked the harbor. All of our calves were shredded from Sunday's hike out of the crater, but it was worth it. Pretty stunning views.

Soon after that we rolled through the only souvenir shop on the island. I really, really hate feeling like a tourist. Feeling like I'm being led around by my nose. Suckered, somehow. Feeling like I'm in a tourist trap makes my blood boil. I NEVER got that feeling on this island. It really, really felt like a fishing (squiding?) village in the middle of the ocean that we just happened to be trekking around. That was my favorite part, I think. It felt really honest.

Anyway, you should know that a few hours boat ride from Ulleungdo is an island called Dokdo, and it's ownership is a bit of an issue in these parts. Dokdo is very close to Japan. The Japanese say it's their island, the Korean's say it's theirs. I've been told that if it went in front of an international court (is that a thing?), Japan would win the island, but I wouldn't say that to anyone in Korea. They get pretty serious about it. At the base of the cable car launch there's a "Dokdo Museum", which is pretty much just a few rooms full of "historical evidence" establishing Dokdo as a Korean territory.

In the souvenir shop they were selling shirt that had a picture of the island and the text, "Dokdo: It's our territory!" So you can see that they're pretty convinced -- making t-shirts and all. I wonder if there's a Japanese version. It would be nice to have the set. I picked one up on a whim. Maybe if it ever does go before an international court and the island changes hands, it'll be worth something.

After the museum and the souvenir shop our hodge-podge crew (Nathan, Chaz, Jerry, Maria, Emily, and I) went out for chicken, which was OK at the time. Though, as you already know, I was fated to taste it more than once that day.

What a trip. Thanks to those of you who stuck it out reading all of this. I know it's been a long one, but I know I'll appreciate having a record of this one day. And I certainly appreciate being able to share it with all of you back home. This is a beautiful, amazing country and I'm trying my darnedest to see as much of it as I can. These travel groups seem to be a good way to do that. I'm flirting with the idea of doing a biking trip next weekend in some village to the south. More on that later.

Until next time.