Going To The War Zone

May has been a whirlwind of activities and adventures and this past weekend we completed our last weekend trip of the month. We are now planning on spending the next two weekends in Seoul until we trek to the southern part of the country for our deep sea fishing adventure.

On Sunday the 17 CIS had their version of gym day. CIS hired a company to run it, rented out a gym, and invited all the kindergartners and their families. I

had one girl show up with 9 guests! It was a really long day for the staff (we had to be there an hour and a half earlier than we would normally report to work and stayed almost as late as a normal day) but lots of fun! There were various activities and games throughout the day that everyone got to participate in. Moms took on moms, dads took on dads, and the western staff squared off for a couple of battles as well. It was fun to meet some of the parents and see the kids in a different environment. One of my favorite parts was having a picnic lunch with the families. They all brought food to share and then we sat in a circle on the gym floor eating gimbop, soup, and fresh fruit.

Last week Meg and I also had an exciting night when we went ahead and officially booked our plane tickets for our July vacation to Thailand! We managed to find a really good deal on flights from multiple cities. On July 25 we fly from Seoul into Bangkok, where we will stay until the 28. Then we will head over to Chiang Mai until August 1. We are starting to plan out some fun activities but haven't decided on anything concrete yet. More details to follow as we began to nail down our plans!

We are also now the proud owners of a microwave/oven combo! One of my co-workers was getting ready to leave the country, and in true Korean style, invited everyone from work over to claim anything they wanted. Meg and I snagged the oven and lots of good cooking items (such as the ingredients for cookies, pancake mix, and maple syrup)and half a bottle of North Korean soju which is apparently different from South Korean soju. We have yet to use the oven part of our new appliance due to complications in figuring out the Korean on it (we even called in our neighborhood Korean friend to help but he was also at a loss) but the microwave part works great!

On Saturday, we left for our DMZ trip. Meg and I were really excited for this particular trip because it is an experience that you can't have anywhere else in the world. Since the end of the Korean war in 1953, the North and South have remained in a state of war although there hasn't been any fighting since then. The DMZ is located on the 38th parallel, is 155 miles long, and about 2.5 miles wide. It is also the most heavily militarized boarder in the world. Our trip took us to one of the less visited areas of the DMZ, Odaemi village in Cheorwon, which is located in the north-eastern part of the country. We were able to get a fair number of pictures on our trip, which is actually uncommon. For obvious reasons, there are many areas along the DMZ where the Korean government does not allow photos to be taken.

The first spot we visited was the second tunnel, which was discovered in 1975 by the South Korean army. The North Koreans dug 4 tunnels along the DMZ in order to invade the south, and this particular one is 2.1 miles long, sits about 160-520 feet below the surface, and can hold about 30,000 people. It was really cramped to walk through and very low at spots (even I hit my head a few times) but was a really cool experience. From here we went to the Cheorwon Peace Observatory, where you can get a view of North Korea. This observatory overlooks the Iron Triangle Battlefield and this area had the highest number of causalities during the Korean War. It was a little hazy and cloudy that day, but we were able to see the north off in the distance. Next we stopped at Woljeongri Station where we were able to view the remains of a bombed train that used to run to North Korea. The fiercest battle of the war was held here and the train marks the partition line of the Korean peninsula. Lastly, we stopped at the Labor Party Building, which was used as the house of the Labor Party until the war started. Many people were tortured and killed here when the North Koreans owned it. South Korea eventually bombed the building and then claimed the land as their own, so it is now considered part of South Korea.

From here we went to the village where we would be spending the night, literally on the edge of the DMZ. The whole village is a rice growing village, so it was very different from the city. It was very quiet and we were shocked at how dark it got at night! Much to our surprise, we learned that we would be staying with an adjema (grandmother) who lives in the village. One of the tour leaders brought 5 of us to her house, opened the door and showed us the two rooms where we could stay. It was a little weird since NO ONE WAS HOME. We literally just walked into a stranger's house and dumped our backpacks. Meg and I took the smaller room, leaving the other 3 girls the bigger one. Our room was basically a closet, Meg could reach wall to wall with her arms extended and our two sleeping mats filled basically the entire floor. We rounded out the evening by riding a tandem bike, having a traditional Korean dinner cooked by the locals and have a huge bonfire. At about 10 pm we went on a "bravery" walk with the group. This consisted of us walking up a 100 meter hill that had no lights and large bushes lining the path. We were also warned that land mines are still around the area (we are still unsure on if this is true or not...) so to make sure we stay on the path. We did this one-by-one and of course, some of the other tour guide leaders jumped out of the bushes trying to scare us. However, at the top we were able to see the lights of the North Korean bunkers.

The next morning we went back to the memorial so that we could see it in daylight. The memorial sits at the place where the White Horse Battle was fought, in which over 20,000 soldiers died. A South Korean soldier gave us a brief history of the area and was kind enough to pose for some pictures. We then got to try our hand at finding land mines (fake ones of course). Meg and I failed miserably, good thing we aren't in the army. From here, we went to plant rice in a field right next to the DMZ. We were both unaware that rice is planted in literally a flooded field of mud. We pulled on boots and rolled up our pants and jumped right into the knee deep mud. Planting rice is a tedious process, thankfully we only did about 4 rows. We had squares of baby rice stalks, which we had to pull apart so we had about 4 stalks together. We then stuck these stalks into the mud. About 30 of us were lined up across the field and we were each responsible for about 2 or 3 feet around us. After everyone filled their space, we took 2 steps back and did it again. Our field looked pretty ragged at the end, I feel kind of bad for the poor person who ends up eating our rice!

From here, we went on to the last part of the trip. Bungee jumping. This was the part I was both looking forward to and dreading. There was no question that Meg was going to jump and she had been working on me since we signed up for the trip to convince me to jump. I had told her that I would, figuring that if I can eat ox blood I could surely jump off a bridge. We paid for our jumps quickly so I couldn't back out and then began the tedious process of waiting for our turns. Meg had decided to jump by her ankles and I decided to go by my waist. I was doing pretty well until we got to the top of the bridge, 177 feet up, and waited for a good 30-40 minutes. By the time Meg got ready to go, I was freaking out. Meg did an AWESOME swan dive off the bridge and got some pretty good distance on some of her rebound swings. Then it was my turn. Meg was racing up the hill to try to get a good view of my jump, I was praying she hurried because I didn't know if I could stand at the edge very long to wait for her, and then the guy was nudging me to the edge and starting his countdown. I ended up pretty much just throwing myself off the edge and I am so glad I did! It was a really weird sensation but so much fun! It felt like I was falling forever, but then I couldn't feel when I was going back up. All of a sudden I was just flipping over and falling down again. At the end my toes and fingers were shaking because of the huge adrenaline rush! Meg and I both had a blast and it pretty hard to describe. As someone who was really freaking out before hand, I highly recommend trying it! Meg's camera died right before she jumped, so luckily the person who was going to record our jumps for us used her camera to record them. You can watch the videos here COMING SOON.

Overall it was a fabulous weekend and one that won't be forgotten! However, come Monday it was back to reality as I got to school, only to be told by the principal that the foreign staff wasn't allowed into the school until we went across the street to get tested for swine flu due to an outbreak in some newly arrived foreign teachers. More details on this in the next post!


More pictures on webshots of this weekend HERE