Jeju Fun

Jeju Island gets sold to new foreigners here as the Hawaii of Korea and seeing as I have been to Apgujeong in Seoul (aka, the Hollywood of Korea) I have been very, very leery going there. I put off multiple invites and long weekend trips to Jeju but when Joone got free lodging at a luxury resort Saejin, Tony and I all jumped at the chance to check it out.


It was a last minute plan and so we had to take whatever flight we could get and that meant a 6:30am departure. This ultimately meant an earlier check-in and with it being a single hour leap to the island we arrived too early to get into our room. This was the perfect reason to change into our trunks and hit one of the resorts two pools. We chose the one with beer.






The outside grounds were gorgeous with palm trees and real grass. Ask a Korean and palm trees are considered local to Jeju but if you look around the only place the trees grow only along roads next to the resorts. Hmmm, really? Now obviously palms can survive here but I know they live here on the far edge of the region palms can grow but either way it did give the island a tropical feel (in the resort area). I will take stunted palms but the pines and lava rocks found everywhere else were beautiful and worthy of being shown off as rural Korea.


Our place was a two room apartment with it's own kitchenette. One bedroom had a bed and it's own private bathroom and the second room was empty where you set down a sleeping pad on floor the way many older Koreans sleep.


We finally hit one of the beaches near the hotel just before sunset and the water had already retreated. The sand was nice and next to lava rocks it gave the beach a completely different feel from any I had ever been to (next stop Hawaii.)


Dinner on the first night was fish. I play up my hatred of fish to my kids as a joke and when I first came to Korea fish did bother me. The smells and looks of the things hit the gag reflects' faster than a shot of tequila but over time (dinners with Korean friends) I can now handle the raw stuff. We went out a little late for sup and so Saejin and June used their Korean skills for a discount to great use. We were all bagged by the early morning flight and hit the sack soon after our fresh meal.






Refreshed from an early night we woke early and hired a taxi for the day to hit some of the sights of the island. First stop was a Jeonbangpokpo just on the edge of Seogwipo city. The pictures speak for themselves.


More of the sights around Jeonbangpokpo which is a five minute walk from the parking lot.


We were in tourist mode but didn't hit all that Seogwipo had to offer, instead we climbed Hallasan the smart way by taxi. Hallasan is a dead volcano and I believe the highest (possibly second )point in South Korea.


The altitude obviously got to Tony (a proper University professor teaching marketing) and June (a banker running his own investment company) as they started doing ridiculous walks hoping none of their students or clients were spying on them.


After a nice (more fucking seafood) lunch in Jeju City we hit the Manjanggul Caves which are lava tubes that were cold, damp and as expected...dark.


The caves were our last spot of the day and thinking Jeju was just a tiny island we scofted at the idea we would need six hours to a simple three spots. Six hours later we took back any ignorant ideas we made on the flight over.


We finally had a land mammal for dinner when the Koreans accepted my choice of pork for dinner.


After dinner we hit the resorts neighbouring hotel for some classy drinks of wine before hitting the minimart for beers outside on the lawn. This lead to more fun and intruducing skinny dipping to the "conservative" Koreans (pictures not included.)


We had a long lay in and after trying out some western food at the resort we walked over to the folk village just across the parking lot. The park is set up to show three diffrent regions of traditional Korean life.


Fun times.



Jeju is famous of dungdaeji (translstes into shit pigs) these black skinned pigs live/lived off of people excrements. June was the only one willing to pose for the much begged picture. While there are still some pigs that still value tradition it's difficult to find restaurants that do serve authentic shit pork.


We had a great long weekend and I have finally crossed over to the Jeju is a must see for anyone coming over to Korea team.

Fun Website

I sometimes read, A Geek in Korea and he found a great little website that is fun to play around on. If you go to www.wordle.net you paste in some text and it will display the words you use most frequently. (Stop squinting and click on it to see it bigger.) Holiday mode is clear and present from my last five posts along with weekends playing a big role, August has been amazing.

Long Weekend

Three days off made for a lazy weekend which did have some unplanned fun involved on Thursday night. Saejin and I had vowed on sticking in the whole holiday but once a dinner invite was given to him he decided we should head out. I didn't feel like more raw fish (in Jeju we ate raw fish daily) so I met up with him and Joone at bar Bliss. We weren't there long before Joel, Tony and Don made their way in for a guilt free Thursday night of drinking.

It was all peaceful and fun until Joone brought up the singing contest we never had in Jeju (that post will come). The plan had been for Tony and I to take on the Koreans in a sing off. In Jeju, the Nore Bang closed early and we missed the chance to see the challenge out. Fast forward back to Thursday night and with Bliss being all but empty we made four teams and put bottles of wine up for the losers to pay for and started up the Karaoke machine. Tony and I did amazing and never once had to pay for losing and hopefully forever shutting up Saejin and Joone forever.

Back to Work

I was back to work this week and although I did wake up early-ish (9:00) on holiday,6:30 came mighty early Monday morning. I was fully expecting rowdy kids who forgot how to behave but all the classes this week went surprisingly well. Luckily I'm only working half days and tomorrow is a public holiday making the whole week easily glow.

My lame excuse for not posting should fall on laziness but I won't do that and instead just lamely say the weather. It's horribly hot, mingle in thunder showers and the resulting unbelievably abusive humidity and Seoul Sucks in August. Normally, I take my holiday abroad but because of high airfare costs I chose to bill the school for the cost of my flight home so I could keep the dough.

All is good and with a three day weekend and no going away parties, mini holidays or having to meet friends this weekend planned I will post several pictures sometime soon. Next week I also work four half days but on Friday and Saturday I volunteered to help out another school somewhere South of here for a mini camp. I have to stay overnight but the Korean teacher going with me is from the school we went rafting with and it should be alright. Not sure what's all involved and have nothing planned as of yet but it's all good and the overtime I'm due it makes it worth it. Picture updates soon.

End of Term Trip

School finished on the 23rd of July for summer holidays and after quickly sending the kids out our school, along with another small bumpkin school nearby, got together on a Karaoke tour bus and headed out for a couple of days of fun.



We started out driving three hours away to do some white water rafting. There wasn't much of the white water but it was a great time under perfect weather conditions.


By going mid week we luckily beat out any crowds.


The pension we stayed at was tucked away in the mountains nearby. It had everything drunken Koreans need, an outdoor karaoke machine, a ping pong table, food already cooked for the guests and the smallest rooms to cram nine drunk old men into. Koreans drunk on soju make for a chorus of snorers. Snoring is my pet peeve and come four AM after zero hours of sleep I put on my MP3 player and waited until the morning. I had maybe a total of one hour sleep but seeing as I was on holiday I tried my best not to be grumpy come our six AM wake up call.


The next day we set off to Sorak city to check out the beach.


We were supposed to climb Sorak Mountain but I don't think I was the only one lacking in sleep so instead the plan was changed to check out a nearby temple. This temple is call the 100 pond temple and you have to be shuttled up to it by local bus. After seeing one temple in Korea you have seen the all but this one was so far removed and next to the cleanest river I've seen that I fell in love with the place. The whole two day trip was a great time.