11 Days, 1 shower, 2 Frenchies, 1 van, 3 wheels, Infinite space and time.

To describe Mongolia I would 3 words: Big, Beautiful and Boring. That was my experience. Please don't take these as any sort of fact, they are just the opinion expressed by one tourist on a 2 week vacation. Which I think is why I was bored. I came from a place, Busan, South Korea, where I was going out almost every night, going to the beach and to bars and baseball games. Going hiking, riding my bike, playing volleyball. Sitting out in the street drinking cheap beer and eating cheap, tasty BBQ. I was having a great time when I left, and getting to Mongolia and traveling the country was a big change. If I did this trip 1 year ago I would have been in heaven...like a pig in shit. Then I was in the groove of traveling independently to out of the way places and seeking solitude. But now I am used to companionship and having a full social plate.

So yes, I did think Mongolia was beautiful and it is a country that still retains much of it's cultural identity. Just out in the countryside, be prepared to entertain yourself a bit, or get used to talking to the yaks.




Part of the reason I was so enthralled with Mongolia was the clouds. I'd see these photos of clouds that look like they are just lined up in the sky for you to jump from cloud to cloud. And they go on infinitely towards the horizon. Every sunny day looked like that in Mongolia. I'd just look out the window of our van towards the sky as we bumped along the bouncy road and say, "that's awesome."


Part of the little tour I joined was a 1 hour free camel ride. Yippee!! I've ridden 1 humped camels before for 3 days in India. That was not comfortable. But 2 humps wasn't too bad. You just plop down in between the humps and off you go. But as you'll notice, my camels humps were lacking. They just sagged over to one side and weren't very graceful.


Another exciting part of the tour I joined is that it came with 2 french people! Emily and Jeremy were their names. They are on a 10 month tour of Asia. In order to make a trip in Mongolia, you pretty much have to join a tour. I showed up on Sunday afternoon, met Jeremy and Emily on Sunday evening at the UB Guesthouse. I convinced them the Gobi desert was too hot and boring, they should take a tour of northern Mongolia with me. And they did. We left Tuesday morning with our van, guide, driver, meals and lodging, all for 42$ a day...not too bad I think.

They were nice enough and we talked about some of the same places we both traveled too. But they...or I should say Emily asked a lot of questions to the guide. Questions such as: "When can we make zee horse?" "Is it possible to make zee horse here." "We really want to make zee horse, we can make zee horse tomorrow, no?" They really wanted to GO ON A HORSEBACK RIDE as we say in UuuuMerca. We eventually did "make zee horse" a few days later and it brought one of them to tears.


Rounding out our Motley Crew was the guide and driver, Our drivers name was Auggie and our guides name is...I forget, that's how memorable she was. I won't mince words here. she was pretty crappy at her job after about day 3. And I know a thing or two about being a crappy trip leader, I used to be one. She gave us lots of good info the first few days and answered all the Frenchies questions politely, but after a few days it seemed she had to point out all the nice things she was doing for us and her tone of voice just seemed like anytime she spoke she was trying her hardest to be nice. It's hard to describe, but it was obvious she wasn't really digging us. I stayed cool till about the last 2 days. But by then her tone and attitude were getting pretty tough to handle. We figured any question we asked could be the one to send her over the handle bars into full meltdown. The Frenchies lost patience with her a few days earlier.



Every night we slept in a ger, the the traditional nomadic home of the Mongolian family, dating back to the days of Genghis Khan. They are very spacious inside, with room for 6 beds or so, a table and a stove. A more traditional ger that is actually lived in has more of a kitchen, and tables. For sleeping you roll your mattress on the ground. Now a days most gers have solar panels and satellite tv. and sometimes you can even get cell phone service if your ger is in the right spot.


Part of being a tourist was having one of our hosts come into our ger in the morning and make a fire. We were very thankful for that, since it would get down to freezing some of the nights. They would also make a fire in the evening. Most of our nights were spent in the ger, the 2 Frenchies and I, reading, playing cards, drinking vodka, drying our wet clothes, napping and staring at the ceiling.


Traditional robes, like the ones these gentleman are sporting are still very common in rural Mongolia. They are made of silk and called "deels."


Some of the traffic passing through a rural city at lunch time. It was heavier than normal this day. people from nearby villages had come to town for some traditional wrestling and horse racing. Unfortunately were on the tour and couldn't stick around for the festivities.


This is an example of a Mongolian toilet. it's hard to have plumbing when there's not much running water. They just dig a whole, put some boards over it and call it a squatter.


By now the tour has taken us up to it's northern terminus, before it returns back to UB. We are at Khosval Lake, a massive body of water, north of 50 degrees latitude and near the Russian border and Lake Baikal.

Up on the lake shore I came across these 4 men collecting downed wood. It was a very old school operation. They would drag the log near the truck, then cut it into smaller pieces with something they call a chainsaw, though it looked like nothing I'd ever seen. Then 3 guys would roll the log up 2 other diagonal logs used as a ramp. They filled their truck twice this way. I took a few photos, but the older fella started saying something in Mongolian, something like, "look at this punk foreigner with his camera. We're out here working our ass off and all he wants to do is take a picture." So I put down the camera and helped then load some logs for a few minutes. I was tired very quickly.





As I said earlier, we finally did, "make zee horse." and it was a memorable experience. We decided to make a 2 day trip up through the mountains and along the shoreline of Lake Khosval. in order to do this trip he had to hire a horse guide, as well as pack horse. Though the cost was minimal. The first day was pretty standard. We trotted and walked with our horses until we reached a nice ger camp on the lake. We hungout there and explored the lake front, relaxed and enjoyed the nice weather.

The return trip back was much more adventurous. We awoke to very threatening skies. It probably would have been a good idea to get an early start avoid as much of the rain as possible. But in Mongolia time as we know it doesn't really exist. There are no clocks and watches. People just go somewhere or do something when they feel the time is right. And for our guide the time wasn't right, or he wasn't drunk enough, I'm not sure. he spent the morning drinking Korean beer and fermented horse milk, called airag. By the time we departed at 11am there was a solid drizzle that would persist for the next 5 hours. 5 hours that we would spend on the back of a horse trekking up and down the hills that skirt the edge of Lake Khosval. By the 4th hour Emily was in tears. Her and Jeremy's fake North Face jackets from Nepal and China just weren't keeping them warm. She no longer wanted to "make zee horse." She wanted to be in her ger with a warm fire crackling, which was understandable. It wasn't a very fun ride. Our guide kept himself energized with an endless supply of Korean beer that he would pull out of his robe. I went into some sort of meditative haze where I wasn't cold, but I wasn't warm. i just told myself I wasn't uncomfortable, I wasn't tired and I wasn't hungry...and I wasn't French.


Mongolians are damn good basketball players. I see them playing all the time. They are better than Indians and Nepali's atleast, but not as skilled s the Chinese. Koreans are pretty good too lots of passing and teamwork, and no one is tall. Anyways, I hopped in and played 2 on 2 with these guys. The tall guy had moves like Hakeem Olajuwon. The rim was made of re-bar and tended to be a little bouncy. The court had a few pieces of yak dung on it that could mess up a bounce pass. But that didn't matter, they were still smiling and playing hard, and I had a great time playing with them. Basketball is still basketball, and we still had to put the round ball through the round hoop.


At the top of most hills you'll see Buddhist markings like this. They are religious. But they are also used in the old days as navigational points, before Russian jeeps and motorcycles. All the blue ribbons represent the sky. There were also a few bottles of vodka and horse skulls placed on the monument.


The next few photos are just a selection, or a basic representation of all the wide open beautiful landscapes that graced these eyes for 11 days. For days we drove through some of the longest, greenest most untouched lands I've ever seen. And the great thing is, that the majority of the time the land belongs to the people, the nomadic herder, the guy with a ger and few hundred goats and sheep. Rarely would we see a fence, and it was probably there to keep the animals out of their small little yard.

The best analogy I could come up with was this: Mongolia reminds me of Montana 150 years ago. (Not that I was ever there.) When the native people still roamed the land and chose what to do with it. It was a time before the USFS, NPS, BLM, DNR, WWF, EPA, barbed wire, and fashionable ranches for Billionaires. Mongolia is millions of acres of open land and sky. Free for people to roam and make a living off.







Mongolia is mainly Buddhist country, though it was banned when it was a communist country under the wing of the USSR. There were still temples and landmarks around the country from previous centuries. One of those temples was the Amarbayasgalant Monastery. (I won't be typing that word again.) It was built in the early 1700's. And it recently received an infusion of cash-probably from Richard Gere, as they are building new dormitories, a golden Buddha full of rice and a large white stupa. This large white stupa looks exactly like the Buddnhath Stupa in Kathmandu, by the way. This stupa, in Mongolia is up on a hill with an amazing view of the monastery and valley.

A quick little tangent, This valley was amazing. I set off on a little jog, towards the setting sun. I found a nice jeep/horse track that rolled along a river and took me deeper into the trees and meadows. I ended up running for 90 minutes and returning after sunset. The endorphins I felt made up for the sticky dirty feeling I had after not showering for 10 days.


Sometimes when a horse dies and it's a strong or special horse, the owner will cut off its head and leave on a hill top. There, the vultures and scavengers will pick its skull clean. This is called a sky burial and it is done only for the best horses.


Earlier in the tour we visited the Karakorum, (which means black rock in Mongolian and in Urdu, some how.) It is the former capitol of Mongol dynasty in the 13th century and of and on it's also been home to the Erdene Zuu Tibetan Monastary. Many meetings and battles have taken place in this area since the time of Gengis Khan. Between Mongols, Uigers, Chinese and smaller bands of ethnicities.

Now it's a tourist attraction with a few monks taking up residence as well. You can find them in the monastery spinning their prayer beads and chanting in Tibetan as they read the Kangyur, or Tibetan prayer book.



I hope you've enjoyed reading about my little journey. Mongolia is an amazing place, so large and vast. I didn't even get down to the Gobi Desert, or over to the high mountains in the west, or over to the rarely traveled to east.
If you want to see more pictures. I have some on my Flickr page, which you can get to at the top of this page.

Catching Up

Sorry It's been so long since I've updated the blog. I had plans on writing last week, but I wasn't in possession of the right photographs. Due to the fact that I made a fatal error forgetting my camera at home, then not returning to my home for 50 hours. So I had to beg, steal, and pilfer a few photos from my friends. I could have written something about how much fun last weekend was, but without photos it would be lacking the visual element. For instance, the above photo of sea urchin. A little story about eating raw sea urchin just needs a photo. And here it is. I was cruising Haeundae Beach on Friday night with a friend. We saw a man and women dining in a little orange seafood tent that are so plentiful around Busan. We asked them what they were eating. The man, in perfect English asked us to join him and give it a try. So we did, and it was quite delicious, especially when it's mixed with soy sauce and wasabi. He also talked us into eating some raw jumbo prawns, that ran 5 bucks each. By now our bill was getting a little steep, but we thought it was OK because it was a new experience and the guy was really cool to talk to. What made him even cooler was when we got up to leave and pay, he offered to pay for our whole meal. Which probably cost 40 dollars. So thanks, Sang Moon Chang, the lawyer from Seoul for the free, delicious, raw seafood, It was awesome.

To cap off the night of freebies, my friend and I were going to listen to some dance music at a club, though the cover was a little steep, 20,000\, which is 17$. We were walking along the promenade paralleling the beach, when a young fella offered us free passes to the club we were planning on going to. We triple checked that this would indeed get us in the door and he guaranteed it. And he was right. We ended up dancing are faces off until 3 am and didn't feel guilty about the 7 dollar Jack and Cokes.



A few friends of mine went to check out Texas street, which is one of the seedier parts of town. it's right across from Busan Station, the main train station. As you walk down the carless street lined by Russian restaurants, you hear women speaking quietly at you saying, "You, come in, sex, sex." our response would be, "actually we're looking for some borscht." As we were just there for some Russian food and a bottle of vodka. We ended up finding a nice Uzbek place that served Russian food and had a Russian waitress who was quite easy on the eyes and much younger than we all thought. All the guys debated and we guessed she was 21-24. Actually she was 17. Woops.



These are some of the peoples I've been hanging out with the past few months. They are super fun, and fun fact here, if you add up their ages, they are slightly older than my dad.



As always this blog is going in about 12 different directions. Last week my Co-teacher said we were going out to lunch after summer camp. It was me, her, her daughter and her daughters two friends. I didn't know where were going, I though it was going to be more still live octopus and raw fish. But I was way off. We ended up dining at The Very Important Person's Society, otherwise known as VIP'S. A place I thought I'd never get to visit, purely because I'm cheap. The lunch buffet without a steak runs 19,000\. We ordered 2 steaks and split them. Then at the end my co-teacher footed the bill, though I think she used school funds, Which I'm completely fine with.

I consider myself somewhat off a buffet connoisseur, from all my time taking tours through Las Vegas. I would rank the VIP'S Below The Rio or The Wynn, but quite a few notches above Sizzler or The Golden Corral. Though I love the Korean food. It's always nice to taste some foreign foods. Like guacamole, salmon, ribs, pizza, blueberries, and a variety of salads.




I've been riding my bike all over town recently. To the baseball stadium, to the beach, to the shopping, to the bars, Though I once thought it to be dangerous. Now I see it as a complete joy. The buses rarely bother me, the taxis seem to get out of my way, and because of their total disregard for traffic laws, I somehow feel safe running red lights, riding on the side walk, and being part of the rhythm of the road.
The funny thing about Korea is the places that you think would be safe to ride and riding would be encouraged are actually closed to bikes. For example, I rode out to Taejangdae. Which is a park jetting out into the East Sea. In the park there is a 2 lane road that is closed to cars. To visit the park you can walk on the wide sidewalk, or buy a ticket ride on a green version of Thomas the Train. What you can't do is take your bike on the rolling road that winds through the park and overlooks the sea. I was told...buy I guy in a car, that I couldn't have my bike in the park. As you would expect, I took this really well. I believe I yelled something about how Korea should encourage bike riding in places like this, as an option for kids instead of playing computer games 10 hours a day.




The next few photos are from Amnan Park, which is about 3 miles from my house. It's another park that juts out into the East Sea, giving spectacular vistas. We went there to do some climbing on the sea cliffs. Usually this place is deserted, but today it was full of Korean climbers. They came prepared with shade, food, BBQ's and drinks.
Though I'm new to climbing, I think this must be one of the more ideal climbing locations. It's right on the beach, you can climb, swim, repeat.








Checkout the difference between how Russian enjoy their Sunday picnic and how the Korean women enjoy theirs. I think the only thing they have in common was their love for soju.



Here's a fisherman/woman on the rocks at Amnan Park, looking back towards Busan and Youngdo Island. Such a beautiful place.



A young Russian Ship worker taking enjoying the sun and water on Sunday afternoon. I tried to say hi to the guy. I gave him a smile and a nod. But he just stared at me, probably thinking, "should I kick this guys ass before or after he takes my picture?"




If I didn't have enough hippy hobbies, here's another, slacklining. Which pretty much means walking across a moving piece of rope. I'm not very good though. 5 steps and I'm on the ground.



On the other hand, there's my buddy Mack. You'd think he'd been raised in the traveling circus. He could dance, juggle, read a book, and do a back flip. Not really, but he's better than me.



Unfortunately, in this entry there are no attractive Korean girls. I'm sorry to every one who only checks this blog for that reason. But I can offer you a picture of flier's. Which are strewn through out Seomyeon with reckless abandon by students and old ladies alike. It's there way of advertising, through garbage.
I was hollered at many times last weekend because I was picking the flier's off the ground and throwing them in the air and yelling, "Make it Rain!"

Sweat Monster

It's really hot and sweaty right now in Korea. I took this photo this morning at 7:50 after I returned from my run. here is complete sweat coverage of my T-shirt. It's something I'm proud of and I always feel like I've accomplished something when I can attain full coverage. Ideally I would take my shirt off, or not even start with it on, but, this Korea, where showing such skin would be considered highly offensive. I'd get stared at like I was Mel Gibson walking down Hollywood Boulevard.

I'm guessing it was around 80 degrees when i departed at 6:45 this morning, with the dew point pretty high as well. In some ways not being able to leave my school right now is a blessing. All I'd do is sweat, or stay in my apartment with the A/C on. Instead I plan on taking a little nap and planning my vacation..and gazing out the window at the beautiful blue sky.

"Worst comes to worst, we'll get some prostitutes and call it a night."

That was the quote of the weekend overheard at Mudfest this past weekend, out on the west coast of the Korean peninsula. I'm fairly sure it was said by some US military guys I passed by them at around 2 AM. And it summed up the weekend pretty nicely.

What Mudfest is, is a gathering of Koreans and mainly foreigners in a small town on the coast. It is centerd around the healing and health properties of the areas mud. But what it actually is a poormans spring break, where Korea meets the Jersey Shore. It's a place where thousands of Military and teachers descend for a weekend of drinking and debauchery. For a weekend of losing their minds and catching up with friends from around the country. I have a few pictures of this weekend. But due to the environmental condidtions and my proclivity to lose things and or damage them I only have a small collection of photos. The rest of the time I was in the ocean, on the beach, in the mud, in the rain or trying to give myself alcohol poisoning. All of which don't mix with a 500 dollar camera

On Saturday night, the festival put on a fireworks show, then afterwords our buddy Rufus put on a fire show of his own. Previously on Saturday Rufus lost his glasses in the ocean and needed to borrow mine in order see. He said the biggest disappointment of his afternoon without sight was not being able to check out the ladies. Poor guy.

Here's a list of other things lost at Mudfest:
1. An Ipod (not mine...I lost mine a year ago and refuse to buy another piece of technology I will loose eventually.)
2. A drybag with money, ID card and 3 bank cards (which we found out were turned into the police and nothing was taken.)
3. Rufus' glasses
4. Dignity
5. Braincells.

It wouldn't be a Ben Koss blog with out a couple pictures of some of the local ladies. On Sunday afternoon the skies cleared up and the Mudfest organizers were kind enough to grace us with the presence of some random girl group which are so prevalent and popular in South Korea.



It's called Mudfest for a reason. There's mudpainting, mud slides of various sizes, mud wresting, mud prison, mud slinging, mud swimming, mud obstacle courses.


The place was packed. Not only with foreigners, but with Koreans, especially on Sunday. Koreans really like to play in the ocean and wear lots of clothes, since the sun is the devil. They also like to stay as close to each other possible. On any popular Korean beach you aren't allowed to swim out more that 40 feet, or you're headed back into the shallows, like a Japanese dolphin.

What I don't have pictures of is the day before when there were solid waves that were perfect for body surfing. Saturdays activities went like this: Drink, mud, swim, drink, mud swim. Until you were too cold or too drunk to function anymore and needed a hot shower and some food in your stomach to make you feel human again.


There were dozens of Korean Paparazzi around. I'm not sure if they were media or just hobbiests. But there were dozens of them. all with cameras worth thousands of dollars. My theory is they are Korean secret service and are being paid by the government to spy on foreigners.

Random girls exiting the obstacle course.

If you think I'm the only one with this photo, think again. There were about 15 people with a camera in this girls face. It was like seeing a Bear in Yellowstone....or seeing Brittney Spears get out of a car.
A couple of my favorite ladies on the beach. Koreans really don't like the sun, and they don't sweat either. These were a couple of secret service/photographers I befriended while they were cruising the beach looking people to photograph. Or they were bee keepers, I'm really not sure.

But all in all, it was a great weekend spent with some great friends. It was a great experience that I'm glad only comes around once a year. Right now my liver needs a break, I could use a some fruits and vegetables, and maybe a night or two in a temple to clean up my mind and body.

In other news I'm currently warming my desk like a pro. it's summer camp time in Korea. I teach from 9-12, then I'm required to stay at the school, even though there are no students or teachers. (This is the part where I should should bitch and moan about Korea, and I may dedicate a brief blog entry to this later this week...Lord knows I have the free time. ) This will go on for 3 weeks. Then I' off to Mongolia for 2 weeks of vacation. Then 3 weeks of teaching normal classes, then 1 week in Japan. I guess I have to take the good with the bad.

Birthdays, Tangents and Dong envy.

Finally, an update of this blog. There are three reasons why I haven't done so more frequently. One, I haven't taken many photos lately. Two, I haven't been doing a ton of interesting things. And 3, overall apathy towards doing things, writing and taking photos.

But I guess, on the other hand I've been busy. I had a 30th birthday. There was the 4th of July which required celebrating. The World Cup has kept me up to all hours of the night. Either to watch Korea or America play in the conveniently timed 3:30 AM Korean time kickoff. I also have this thing called a job, where I have to show up, be polite, smile and be an ambassador of the English language.

Here's the first of a couple tangents. watching the USA-Algeria game was just as exciting as being in the US. We all had the same reaction as I saw in some of the videos being passed around the Internet. A build up as they charged down the field in the 91st minute. Then a yell as the first shot was blocked, then a 2 second silent pause as the ball floated in the Goalie box, then pure mayhem and pandemonium as Donavon pounded it into the back of the net. Tangent Alert: This was followed by one of the US fans getting "Iced." Where you get on one knee and shotgun a Smirnoff Ice. I missed the boat on getting "Iced." But once in a while I see someone doing it in a picture on Facebook. (Cousin Matt, I'm talking to you.) I know it's all in good fun, but I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything by not doing it.

Tangent of a tangent Alert: What's wrong with drinking Smirnoff Ice in the first place fellas? It comes in a wide variety of flavors. It has a solid alcohol content, plus lots of sugar so it gives you a nice, quick buzz. And it tastes better than cheap beers like Coors or Miller Lite. I say drink up and enjoy the Smirnoff. There shouldn't be any silly marketing gimmicks involved. Any confident man can pull it off.

Returning to the above picture. I thought it summed up my 30th birthday quite nicely: A little blurry and out of focus. I had a nice gathering at one of the bars in one of my favorite "dong's." And had a few of my favorite shots: whiskey.


This blog is a little scattered today. But I figure all my scattered blog posts should have an attractive Korean girl or two. Last weekend we were cruising through one of the college areas in Busan. We came upon a crosswalk at a busy intersection. My buddy Jake said, "check that out." And pointed to the wall of 10 girls waiting to cross the street. We just stood there as they all passed in front of us. I felt like Brett Michaels on the first day of "Rock of Love." Minus the heart attack.

I thought I'd throw in a few more photos of my area, otherwise known as Goejeong-dong. This is the street that passes in front of my home, taken at night with a 4 second shutter speed. My home is located directly under the first white street light on the right hand side of the street. Yes, it's noisy. But I've gotten used to my bed shaking at night as the semi trucks rumble buy, and the constant honking during rush hours.


This is the view from my school of the scrap yard. The harbor is called Gamcheon Harbor and it's used for ship building and fish processing. As well as steel making. There are plenty of Russians around, as I've mentioned before. There are few scrapyards in my area. Sometimes I do a run where I pass 4 or 5 of them. I call it the scrap yard shuffle.



The weather has certainly changed in the past few weeks. Gone are the crisp, sunny evenings where I could see all the way to Haeundae Beach from the mountain above my "Dong." it's now the rainy season. (Though only on the weekends.) The rest of the time it's cloudy and humid. I think the humidity ranges from 75% to about 400%. Which is a real treat for running. I now try to run before 7 AM or after 7 PM.

These two photos above are a good example of the haziness. They were taken from the same vantage point and of nearly the same place; the downtown Busan harbor. The second one is in sepia. Yep, there's not a hole hell of a lot to look at.


Here's another photo of one of the neighborhoods...I mean "dong's" surrounding my home. When I think of a Korean home,I don't think of home like this. I think of massive apartment buildings which tower over Busan's never ending skyline. All looking the same, off white, small windows, numbers on the side, 203, 301, etc.

If I showed you this picture and gave you a multiple choice test. What would you choose:
A. India
B.Mexico
C. Ecuador
D. Korea
E. Italy

I guarantee you wouldn't choose South Korea. I would pick India. With bright colored homes, narrow streets barely wide enough for a car...or cow and blue water tanks on the roof, it brings be back to traveling around Rajastan.
In some ways I like living in a neighborhood like this. It's real, authentic and genuine. The streets ans sidewalks are narrow and crooked, and blocked by rubbish and motorcycles. Sometimes it would be convenient to live in a more westernized neighborhood where I can get a philly cheese steak and a Dr. Pepper just around the corner. But I like the rough edges of my "dong."


One big difference from living in the states is where the nice houses are. As you travel away from the city and into the hills, you don't find mansions and estates with security fences and Land Rovers. All those people live in the city, in an anonymous Lotte tower. Up in the hills are the working class, the farmer, the slums almost. One of my favorite places to run though is a little section of town above Gudeok-dong, where this photo was taken. This little shack of scrap metal is above a little plot of farmland. In the distance I can hear dogs barking, most likely being raised to be eaten. They do have great views though of the Nakdong River.

Finally, the 4th of July was on Sunday. It capped off another great weekend of free drinks at a casino, night clubbing, hiking, temples, World Cup and going to the beach. In America it's customary to cook some meet and drink some beer for this holiday. In Korea that's called going on to dinner. It always nice to end Sundays with Korean BBQ and hanging with some friends. Unfortunately for me, this tasty dinner was followed by a 1 hour bus ride across town, back to crooked sidewalks and rough edges of Goejeong-dong.