Cu Chi -Home of the Viet Cong- Vietnam

A secret entrance to a Viet Cong Tunnel.
Cu Chi, Vietnam.

The next day I signed up for a tour.  Ordinarily I don’t go for too many tours when I travel for the simple reason that I usually travel alone and end up being the guy sitting on the bus who never says anything.  This tour however promised to be an interesting trip to experience a place that was close to Hell for U.S. Soldiers during the war.

After a fresh baguette (with nothing on or in it, though still delicious) I was picked up by a small tour bus.

I sat in a window seat, my legs folded up by my chest courtesy of a protruding wheel well thankful for air conditioning and nice view of the streets of Saigon.  At least I was in little danger of getting run over by 50,000 motorbikes inside of a bus.

For 30 minutes the bus drove about bustling streets, turning here and there, to pick up the other groups that had signed up for the tour.  By the time everyone had boarded and the attendance sheet was passed around I found myself thrown together with 20 or so Australians and a Chinese family. 

Our destination was 2 hours outside of Saigon.  The trip, cramped though it was, was worth the $10 I had paid for it.  We left the frantic streets of downtown, crossed a river and soon found ourselves in the somewhat decaying sprawl of the outer limits of Saigon. 

Everywhere people sought shelter from the heat and the sun in shaded hammocks.  People sat on tiny plastic chairs at the ever-present food stands eating cheap food and drinking Vietnamese ice-coffee. 

Soon, the city gave way to rice patties and the shacks of farming communities.  Even motorbikes became less and less common, replaced with the occasional water buffalo wandering on the side of the road. 

The roads deteriorated quickly.  Pavement ceased after a time and the rock covered road filled with potholes and other bumps.  More than once I found myself flying off my seat.  If this had been an airplane ride I would have been praying. 

Finally we came to our destination.

Cu Chi.

Cu Chi is a district of Saigon.  It was once farmland housing villages of rural Vietnamese.  It still has the appearance of rural farmland and is in fact surrounded by many farms, many of them passed on the way. 

The place is relaxing and at first glance looks like nothing more than a small swatch of forested park.  It looks like any campground in New England sans tents and with staggering temperatures.  This, I suppose, is what makes Cu Chi so contradictory.  It is a place that projects the peacefulness of nature but its reality is one of unimaginable violence and terror. 

Beneath the dirt, grass, gnarled roots, and trees is a series of tunnels, sleeping quarters, strategy rooms, and traps.  Cu Chi is the land of the Viet Cong.  From Cu Chi the Tet Offensive was planned.  From Cu Chi the Viet Cong brought guerilla warfare to an invading army. 

My first inclination that Cu Chi might have been an odd pick for an American was the documentary we were shown in a large canopy with a thatched roof.  The footage was grainy and the audio was horrible.  The only things I could really make out was something about “trained murderers,” “evil,” “barbaric,” Americans.

The forest and vegetation in Cu Chi and the surrounding areas was thicker at one point, but American bombing and carpet bombing campaigns has left the area with permanent scars.  In fact, strewn about the trails of Cu Chi are bomb craters filled in with trees growing at odd angles from the crater walls. 

Cu Chi is protected by the government and has been turned into a kind of open-air museum except that most of it is underground. 

The displays, some authentic and some recreated, generally relate to hiding from or killing American soldiers. 

Trap doors line the area and are so well hidden that when the guides hop down to demonstrate their effectiveness and then close the door above them, they are completely invisible. 

Pits full of sharpened and poisoned stakes are cordoned off. 

There is an entire building dedicated to spiked booby traps designed to maim the unfortunate to such a degree that it is impossible to free one’s self from cris-crossing spikes without removing all of the skin from the bone. 

There is a door that if opened will send barbed spikes swinging crotch level.  Behind each display is a painting of what an American soldier might look like if he was the victim of such devices.

Termite mounds provided air to the subterranean maze and many of these things still exist in Cu Chi. 

What struck me most about this place was that along side with tacky exhibits of poorly made animatronic mannequins demonstrating such things as how to turn an unexploded bomb into a mine was this air of genuineness.  The place is a tourist attraction but the place is also authentic.

Bad things happened in Cu Chi to everybody involved.  People died in this place.  I have been to Gettysburg and I have seen musket ball craters on graves in the Boston Common but it is hard to relate to things that happened so long ago and have been so well ground into us in history classes. 

People died in Cu Chi and it wasn’t so long ago. 

I found myself thinking about the numerous other foreigners I had seen who seemed to be the right age to have been a veteran of this war.  I thought about the men I saw drinking beer in melancholy air in the cheap restaurants.  And further I thought of how many Vietnamese I passed in the street who were also veterans of this war.  For those people who were here during such a violent time, Cu Chi is still a fresh wound.

A destroyed U.S. tank.
Cu Chi, Vietnam.

Towards the end we came to a U.S. tank.  It sat at the edge of an alcove of trees.  Kids climbed over it like it was a jungle gym and people posed for photos at the top.  I don’t know the story of the artillery at the War Remnants Museum but the story of this tank was included in the tour. 

This tank was a casualty of war.  It was the real deal.  It had been occupied and driving along when it hit the trigger of an improvised mine likely made from an American bomb.  The back of the tank is blown out.  Jagged metal protrudes where the explosion hit.  Paint is chipped and faded and bullet holes dimple much of the body.

People died here. 

A lot of people died from both sides.

My guide spoke with pride of the resistance of the Viet Cong.  It really is incredible.  They were farmers drawn into battle, living in horrible conditions fighting a horrible war.  He spoke with pride about how many Americans they killed and the ingenious simple but fatal traps they used to kill them, to kill us. 

It is fascinating to hear the other side of a story but that doesn’t mean that it can’t be difficult too sometimes. 

I thought again of the veterans who make the trip back to Vietnam.  Why do they do it?  Closure?  To see that the place really isn’t the hell that it was during that time?  What must it be like for them to come to Cu Chi and see all of this? 

My guide motions to me and tells me that he will take my picture if I want to hop onto the tank and pose.  An Australian is sitting atop pretending that he is operating the gun.  I decline.  It just feels, I don’t know, wrong for me to do that.

One attraction of Cu Chi is the option to shoot a number of weapons that were used in the war.  It is phenomenally expensive so I didn’t partake, but it adds to the atmosphere of Cu Chi.  The jungle is thick, the heat is oppressive and always there is the sporadic burst of automatic rifle fire and the quick whiff of gun powder. 

There was one thing I was determined to participate in.  The government has maintained some of the Cu Chi tunnels so that they are safe enough for visitors to pass through them.  The path from start to finish is obvious with optional exits every 10 meters or so.  Traps have been removed or cordoned off. 

In Cu Chi you can wander the tunnels and into the rooms where the Viet Cong lived, died, killed, and planned during the Vietnam War.

It is billed as a simple way to get a little closer to history.

The tunnels at Cu Chi are a nightmare.  Some have been widened a touch to make way for western visitors but they are still overwhelmingly claustrophobic.  Their curved ceilings are too low to do anything but stoop and waddle, knees level with your belly.  The air is still, thick with humidity and hot as hell. 

I got the impression that these tunnels would be well lit and a breeze.  I was wrong.  There were low powered bulbs where the tunnel turned 90 degrees but the light was overcome by darkness a few feet later.  To walk in the tunnels is to walk in darkness.

Viet Cong tunnel.
Cu Chi, Vietnam.

Claustrophobia set in pretty instantly.  By the time I bowed over to get into the tunnel I wished that I hadn’t but already there was a line of people behind me.  You can’t turn back in the tunnels.  You can’t go forward either if the line of people in front of you have stopped for god knows why.  So I sat there in pitch black, oppressive heat, unable to fully extend my arms even if my elbows were folded. 

We waddled along a few steps and then stopped again.  This continued until we came to a turn and then a drop into a tunnel further still under ground.  We came to a larger room, something only obvious with the change in the echos and people bunching up and bumping into each other.  It was a nightmare. 

You could hear voices ahead and behind but often you couldn’t see anything in front of you.  Closing your eyes made no difference in visibility.

The tunnels are panic inducing.  Illogical as it was, I developed this nagging fear that some moron at the head had taken a wrong turn and was leading us to hell or some other humid and black tomb.  Certainly we were underground for a hell of a lot longer than I expected and the turns had disoriented us. 

When at last we felt a breeze (still almost 100 degrees, mind you) I had had my fill of the Viet Cong.  When I could finally stand in sunlight I was covered in sweat and dirt.  My knees were scraped from the tunnel floors.  My legs hurt.

An Australian behind me muttered the sentiments of everybody when invited to enter another tunnel.

“Fuck this.”

  The next day I hopped a bus to Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

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Vietnam: Museums and Amputees

Ben Tahn Market.
Saigon, Vietnam.

The man who split his time equally between standing behind the desk at the Giang Linh Hotel changing my U.S. dollars to Vietnamese dong, and sitting on a sofa watching TV and smoking told me that the War Remnants Museum was 1. Not very far, and 2. Cheap.  It basically met the minimum requirements for the sort of activity I was looking for.

I had spent a couple of days wandering around Saigon trying half-assed not to get lost.  I got lost routinely, but that is the point sometimes.  I would set out before noon or whenever I woke up, and return to my hotel for a couple of hours after eating lunch in one of the identical alcove restaurants to avoid the heat.  I would then head out again and find a market or some other place to walk around, take photographs, or just eat.  I was looking for some sort or tourist activity and the War Remnants Museum seemed to be the answer.

I walked as far as the Ben Than market, which has existed in one form or another since the early 1500’s, before succumbing to the heat and hopping into an official looking cab that did not screw me.  Fifteen minutes of snarled traffic and dilapidated buildings covered in grime and foliage later I was walking onto the War Remnants Museum compound.

Ben Tahn Market, outside.
Saigon, Vietnam.

The museum has one tall cinderblock structure that looks something like a parking garage (admittedly a pretty nice parking garage) that is surrounded by various vehicles and devices of the American war machine.  It seems to be the most heavily guarded parking garage in history.

Everything on display in the perimeter seems to be from the American military.  Amongst the landing craft, fighter jets, tanks, and attack helicopters are piles of unexploded ordinance.  Families take turns posing for photos next to giant machine-gun turrets. 

Off to the side is the recreation of a South Vietnamese political prison.  It is a hard thing to take in.  There is a guillotine that has seen heavy use.  The cages, regardless of being recreations, induce a feeling of intense claustrophobia when mixed with thick, hot air.  Every here and there are tools of torture on display next to photos of their results. 

Through the sights.  War Remnants
Museum.  Saigon, Vietnam.

The museum itself is largely dedicated to the reality of war in the eyes of the Vietnamese who suffered through it.  Walls are dedicated to the My Lai Massacre and in remembrance of the innocents of unknown villages who died at the hands of the “murderous, savage American aggressors.” 

It is a hard place to take in as an American.  While it is now called the War Remnants Museum it has had a few other names that were less subtle, for instance: The War Crimes Museum, The Museum of American War Crimes, and The House for Displaying War Crimes of American Imperialism and the Puppet Government.  The name has been changed to its current as part of Vietnam’s “normalization of relations with the United States.” 

Other exhibits include an extensive look at the results of Agent Orange, napalm, and unexploded ordinance.  Haunting black-and-whites depict children born with extreme mental and physical defects.  They are almost all wide-eyed and smiling, seemingly unaware at the horrible predicament they were born into; victims of a war long over. 

Another exhibit displays the photographs of the many photographers who died in Vietnam from dozens of countries. 

Outside, before I leave to get screwed over for the final time by a taxi driver, a man calls to me.  I see him first out of the corner of my eye.  As I turn I am taken back, shocked for a moment and then embarrassed that the man might have seen my surprise.  The man is a double amputee.

The Guillotine.  War Remnants Museum.
Saigon, Vietnam.

He tells me in quiet, fast, broken English that he had the misfortune of stepping on a leftover landmine.  His arms are cut to thin nubs of purple and bulbous scar-tissue just below his elbows. 

I notice them for the first time as he pulls out a book that he is trying to sell me.  The book is about the legacy of unexploded ordinance and mines that remain in Vietnam.  I look to his face and am again shocked, sickened, and then embarrassed.  His face is scarred to hell.  Purple lines and tears run from his chin through his lips to the rimmed hat that he is wearing.  His right eye is cloudy, faded, distorted, and dead.

I feel that I should buy his book but it is expensive.  He is persistent and becomes irritated when I tell him as polite as possible that I won’t be buying anything from him.  He takes the book from me and puts it back into an old saddle bag with his forearms.  He asks me where I am from and I tell him I am from Canada.

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Food and People in Saigon

An empty Street in the Backpacker
District.  Saigon, Vietnam.

The food in Saigon is cheap and everywhere.  I spent much of my time in Saigon just wandering around with my camera or trying to cross the street and I found that I was never more than a few meters away from food.  Pho stands seem to dot the overcrowded pavement in front of every other door.  Under foggy glass a collection of fresh vegetables and questionably fresh meat sat gathering a collection of flies.  In a minute you could have a bowl of pho for much less than a dollar. 

About these stands was an array of multi-colored plastic chairs and tables that were probably meant for little kids but were perpetually full of people enjoying their meals under the beating sun.

Courtesy of its history as a colony of France, fresh baguettes can be bought anywhere for next to nothing. 

The restaurants I frequented were largely across the street in the backpacker district.  Roads full of cheap restaurants, guesthouses, laundry, and booking services ran parallel to each other, forming this village of travelers, beggars, and more than a few dirty hippie drifters. 

The smells were intoxicating.  Lime and basil accented the smoke of burning meat.  Alcohol hung in the air as though the place were a giant open-air bar, which it basically was.  This place, the backpacker district was a little place of comfort for travelers without the luxury of a nice hotel or cloth napkins. 

Each restaurant had someone outside asking everyone who passed by if they were hungry, trying to drag in business as though they were fishing.  This is necessary because every restaurant there is almost identical: a long open room like a long garage, filled with tables and plastic chairs and cheap table cloths if there is one at all.  They lack ambiance but they deliver in quality food at low cost and the ability to watch as the night wears down. 

An Alcove Restaurant.
Saigon, Vietnam.

I sat towards the back of the alcove restaurant beneath a fan and still sweating.  Outside people laughed or shouted as twilight deepened.  The waiters and waitresses dropped all manner of dishes, pho and pineapple fried rice to burgers and meatloaf, in front of patrons from who knows why. 

Every now and again as I waited for my bowl of pho and pulled swigs of my warming Tiger beer a merchandise peddler would come in.  They usually had a tray of knock-off sunglasses or fans and they were usually visibly pissed off when you refused to buy anything. 

An American guy flirted with my waitress.  He is some sort of writer he said.  I blame him for my growling stomach. 

People walk in front of the entrance with loads of laundry or with backpacks that weigh more than half that of their owners.  So many dreadlocks. 

It is interesting to see who comes to these places.  For most people I do that thing where I try and figure their story out.  Do they live here?  Are they here for work?  Are they just passing through? 

The thing with Vietnam is that it has this weird mix of people.  The backpacker district is a good example of this.  Nobody here belongs but they don’t look entirely out of place.  Here and there are people in nice clothing wearing nice shoes and cargo shorts, but most people, including myself, have a layer of grime to them.  There are wild eyes in Vietnam and a sense of community. 

Then there is another population. I was eating lunch one day and they came in.  There were four or five of them.  Americans.  They wore Harley cutoff shirts or some cheap Saigon shirt that exposed black tattoos that had faded to a dull green.  They drank beer and talked and ate beneath a fan in the shade away from the sun. 

They were in their 50’s and 60’s I could guess and they were somber.  They laughed now and again but it was never the gut busting laughter that came from younger people who frequented these restaurants. 

As the meal wore on they became quiet.  Maybe they were tired and hot but they spent a long time drinking beer in silence staring out into the street.

Obviously what I am getting at here is that it is my assumption that some of these guys have been to Vietnam before under less than happy circumstances.  I wonder what it is like for the veterans of the war to return to a place that was so violent and horrible for them.  I wonder what brings them back.

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Saigon Traffic



The rotary. Saigon, Vietnam.



Saigon is set up in districts. District 1 is the main drag of the city and where the bulk of accommodations for visitors are located. The place is full of stores, sites, and people of every level of poverty and affluence. It was a dynamic and mad place and I am happy to have spent my time in Vietnam there.



Saigon, regardless of district, is controlled chaos, organized entropy. The mindset of Saigon is realized through the total shit show that is rush hour traffic. In District 1 there is a major rotary. In the center is a sculpture of a man who I assume is probably Ho Chi Minh. Five or six different roads pool into this rotary so that it looks like a nightmare to negotiate under normal circumstances.



In Saigon, like the rest of the world, rush hour is the plague of the day. The thing is rush hour seems to last most of the day here. Also, there are not too many cars. If there is some hidden population of four-wheeled transport then they know well enough to avoid this rotary.

Ajummas: not caring who is behind them internationally.
Saigon, Vietnam.

Instead of cars there are scooters and motorbikes. Thousands of them. When the traffic is bad, which is always, scooters clog the roads like blood pumping through excited veins. They ride as many abreast as possible and sometimes more than the road can hold. In effect, the street becomes a river raging in a flood, spilling rapids over its banks.

I made several trips to this artery. Firstly, because the spectacle of this traffic and the ragtag businesses that spring up about it (air-compressors, petrol in liter bottles of cola) is fascinating. Further, on the other side of the street is the backpacker district, full of cheap lodging, laundry, food and other logistic vendors. It is the place to be.

To get to the other side of the road, especially at the peak, is a lethal Why-did-the-chicken-cross-the-road joke. It seems impossible. There are not many pedestrian crossing signals and if there are they are usually inoperable or universally ignored by drivers and pedestrians alike.

To cross the street is a test of faith and steadfast nerves. The trick is this. Find an opening and start walking. Do NOT change your speed. It might even be helpful to look forward and pretend that there are not 800 scooters whizzing by you. Reach the other side and thank god that you made it. The other option is to wait for a local to cross and hope that they soften the blow when that hit comes.

Scooters.  Saigon, Vietnam.

There is a constant peal of anxious horns. Drivers on these roads seem to beep not so much as a warning or threat so much as an acknowledgement that they are entering into your space. Given that the roads are total gridlock (very fast moving gridlock to be true) the sound of whiny horns is constant.

Every so often a man in a pedal operated tuk-tuk or a salvager pulling a car stacked impossibly high with junk will come on and mess everyone up.

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Saigon Part One

Well, I have been home for a few days now.  It feels very bizarre.  It has taken me a while to get internet in my room (but not so long to buy a giant ass TV and spent a bunch of money) so this is all really late.  I tried really hard to take a lot of notes on my way through SE Asia.  Here it is.  Part one of "What the Crap Was I Thinking?"

Vietnam was my Vietnam. 

Hours earlier I had woken up in familiarity at a little hotel in Seoul.  The sun had risen to what looked to be a nice day on the peninsula.  Now, my plane is bouncing around a runway at night.  Trees that look like palms are silhouetted by the lights of run down and abandoned buildings with a distinctively French architecture that dot the area around the airport. 

I walk off the plane and am blitzkrieged by the heat and humidity of Saigon.  My skin becomes moist and my jeans suffocating.  As I stand on the bus that will take us to the arrival terminal of the airport I am pressed against the window Publish Postby the crowd of people piling in.  It isn’t so bad really.  There is air-conditioning and it I am in little danger of falling given that I can’t move.  And the view is good, so my eyes dart around as my cheek squishes against the window.  Behind a green fence are a couple of old bombers.  Their windows are smashed and the war-green paint is dinged up in a few areas.  Their identifying numbers are barely visible, but they are there.  They look like movie props from every Vietnam flick ever made but they are probably the real deal. 

Welcome to Saigon.

It is a strange transition between Korea and Vietnam.  I think it must be a strange transition for anybody to go from East Asia to Southeast Asia, or the opposite.  My first experience in Saigon, now officially Ho Chi Minh City (but Saigon sounds oh so much cooler), was a pretty good example.

I had become soft in Korea; too trusting.  You could probably leave your wallet in any bar and stand a pretty good chance of it being returned with nothing missing.  I rarely locked my apartment door (until my students started to come around towards the end).  I never thought twice about getting into a cab because they are all the same, and they are all cheap.

I hoped that the airport in Saigon would have a kiosk where you could arrange pick-up to a cheap hotel.  That was my plan after I had my visa processed.  Incheon Airport in Korea has said kiosks every thirty feet.  Saigon had zero. 

It was late.  Everything was closed and besides there wasn’t much to the airport in Saigon.  Just a long corridor with a few little rooms, most of which were abandoned.  I changed some of my Korean Won into Vietnamese Dong and walked out again into the heat.

There was nobody in the airport because everybody was outside.  Hundreds of people were mulling around waiting for arrivals. 

I walked away from the crowd to stand for a moment and formulate a game plan.  This was something I should have probably done before arriving in Vietnam but I was not yet worried.  I had a 3 week jaunt through Southeast Asia and not a single plan.  Immediately I was approached by this rotund guy who spoke pretty decent English. 

While Korea made me soft it did not make me stupid.  In defense of what happened I have to point out that I was exhausted.  I was pulling two big pieces of luggage.  I was wearing jeans and sweating profusely and had taken a decent amount of xanax for the plane ride.

The mind is quick to accept a way out of duress, even if that way is something you would not have gone for under normal circumstances.

The round man was a taxi driver.  He spoke with me for a while and I spoke back.  He seemed to be a genuinely nice guy; a little pushy but nice.  He spoke of Saigon with a lot of pride.  He asked about the handkerchief I had attached to my camera bag and he seemed interested when I told him it had come from Seoraksan in Korea.  Eventually one of his buddies, a thin and loud sort of jerk came over and began chatting too. 

The thin guy grabbed my arm and started running his fingers over the tattoo on my arm and asking me questions, particularly if I was traveling alone and why. 

At this point the first guy started to grab my luggage and walk towards his car.  Given that I had yet to agree to a ride this should have been my key to bail and find an official taxi company as opposed to a couple of goons in the shadows.

I grabbed my bag and asked him where he was going.  He told me he would take me to a cheap hotel near downtown.  I thought on it and decided, against my gut, that I might as well ride with tubby.  I had to get to a hotel and this guy didn’t seem all bad.  Or maybe he did, I didn’t know.  I was exhausted.

I got into his car.  It had no taxi markings on it.  It bothered me a little but not enough to send any sort of alarm. 

I closed the door and the thin guy jumped into the passenger seat up front and said something real quick.  For a moment I thought I was about to get robbed.  I became very self-conscious of having an absurd amount of cash on me.

The thin guy spoke again and then told me I had to pay a fee to him because he was the boss.  I gave him money and he told me that he would keep my change as a present.  He then smiled, jumped out of the car and ran away. 

Shortly after this the cabbie hit me up for the cost of the exit toll (this is pretty standard).  He then took me to a hotel that cost $80 a night in the middle of a colony of homeless families.  The taxi cost almost as much as the hotel.  I didn’t pick up on this until I looked up the exchange rate. 

The next day, after paying for water I drank from the mini-bar and becoming extremely depressed over a rocky start to my trip and losing quite a bit of enthusiasm for the entire thing, I took a reasonably priced cab back to the airport to try again.  My debit card was sitting somewhere in my old apartment in Cheongju so my wad of cash was all I had for the duration. 

$80 hotels were not in my budget. 

The second cab driver looked like a 90 year old mole.  He spoke in this high-pitched whine that reminded me of the old man in the Adam Sandler Chanukah cartoon.  He led me to his car (totally thread bare, by the way), charged me the exit toll, and brought me at last to a cheapish hotel.  He told me he had gotten me a deal because I had been good to him and that he thought I was nice.  I thanked him for finding what looked to be (and actually was) a safe and legit hotel.  He then made a valid effort to scam me out of a lot of money (and was successful to a certain extent) before he drove off.

I was then led upstairs to my tiny $20 a night room.  I moved my luggage into a corner and relaxed for the first time since leaving Korea.    

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Guangzhou, China

I am writing this from somewhere in China.  I could put down the name of the city but it is currently in my bag full of random computer wires and electronics charges (when combined with the appearance of my external hard drive and alarm clock look something like a bomb in the airport x-ray machine, if you were wondering).  There’s not much point in naming the city though because I am in an airport so the city and even country are really irrelevant. 
There is a wall of windows to the left where planes take off about every 5 minutes.  I like watching the take-off despite my own inability to not sweat profusely when I am directly involved.  I left Seoul at 9:40am, and arrived here 4 hours later (but we went back in time for an hour during the flight). 
The flight was mostly ok.  The plane itself was the least impressive plane I’ve ever been on.  The tiny tv screens would raise and lower randomly through out the flight.  I wasn’t feeling very good about being boxed in with NO legroom but I lucked out and the guy who should have sat in the middle of the trio of seats never showed. 
I popped a xanax and felt pretty okay for most of the flight, but it didn’t alleviate anxiety enough for me to say that I actually enjoyed it.  I was tired and started to doze towards the end, and that’s when I tend to freak out: jerking awake and remembering I am in a plane. 
There was an interesting 10 minutes when the plane suddenly dropped more than I had ever felt before.  It then bounced to one side and the other.  The intercom went off amidst the creaks and thumps of shifting luggage and people.  Her voice was tonal and her words were fast.  She was talking about turbulance and there was a dash to clip seatbelts in a hurry.  I buckle mine as soon as I sit down and I never unbuckle it because I do not get up for anything- I didn’t pee once on the 13 hour flight to Korea. 
The turbulance went on and it got pretty bad for a few moments.  Over the years I have developed this weird way of dealing with turbulance: I shift around in my seat.  If I am moving myself up and down the drops and bumps don’t seem so intense.  They left as fast as they came and the guy next to me didn’t notice regardless because he managed to sleep through the entire damn scenario.
He slept through the whole flight.  I envy people who can do that.  I can’t even sleep in a car.  I am also really happy he slept through it because anytime the plane bounced or turned I looked like I was severely constipated with both arms linked under the arm rests and my mouth sealed shut.
I have also developed these weird habits on planes that seem to help with flying anxiety.  I don’t really even notice doing these things.  I will pinch or scratch myself if I am tired.  Sometimes I will pull out a hair.  These were tips on some website I read before I came here.  A little pain to bring you back to reality.  Some people wear rubber bands so they can snap them on their wrists if they start freaking out.  I also hate being hot so I almost always end up with my jeans rolled up to my knees to alleviate that hot, itchy feeling you sometimes get.
So, by the time I land I basically look like a moron wearing high cut black socks, nice black shoes, capris pants, and missing a bunch of hair on my arm.
I am exhausted.  I am starving.  I am thirsty.
This section of the airport is fairly bland.  After misunderstanding the immigration official as to where I should stand as an international transfer traveler and looking like a moron standing in the middle of a room for 10 minutes, I made my way to the international departure floor. 
I’m not impressed. 
It is one long hall with the sort of ugly grey rug with swirls of blue and brown that remind me of cheap clothing stores I went to as a kid.  There is only a scattering of a half dozen stores selling nothing I currently want (food, drink, a secret money belt).  Further, there is no money exchange here so even if there was a store selling, I don’t know, maybe a triangle kimbap, or candy, or chips, or a soggy pre-made sandwich at this point, I wouldn’t be able to eat.
There are no ajjumas here.  Everybody looks pissed off.  The entire place smells like stale cigarettes because the “smoking room” is actually just an area on the floor with no walls and little vacuums that fail to suck in much smoke at all. 
In each of these smoking areas is a machine that dispenses water.  My mouth was dry and stagnant so it was a welcome sight but it took me a bit to figure out how to use it- there were a surprising number of buttons and levers.  A woman tried to help me and I thanked her in Korean without even thinking about it.  I suppose there are a lot of habits I have picked up over the past year.
I opted for the cold water.  I filled my Seoul thermos and headed back to my seat / bed.  It was about 90 degrees.  There is one man sitting directly across from me.  He is picking his nose with enthusiasm.  He is also wearing white pants and is pretty obviously not wearing underwear.
Only another 6 hours to go and I will be on my way to Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam.

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Wandering Downtown

Cherry Blossoms.

A year minus a day or two I said my extended "so longs" to my girlfriend (at a train station), my sobbing mother (in my predawn livingroom), my less sobby sister (same room), and my dry-eyed father (amid exhaust and noise at the departure drop-off at Logan Airport). In a few days I say goodbyes that are likely to be permanent to all of my Korean friends.

I haven't thought too much about the real end of this Korea thing. Most of the time it seemed to be so far off that giving it too much thought wasn't worth it. Then, before I knew it, I didn't want to think about it because I knew it was right around the corner. Now that I have less than a week left in Cheongju; in this one room apartment with warped floors and no attached plumbing on the sink, I have no other choice.

I now realize that I basically have no departure plan. With preoccupations (the lost passport) and money issues with my school (with a dash of extreme procrastination thrown in) I have failed to book any hotels, looked into any activities or things to do on my trip. Hell, I haven't even booked my final ticket home yet.

The plan:

Leave Seoul on 4/25 and arrive at some point in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam.

The next ticket I have booked leaves Bangkok, Thailand a couple of weeks later, give or take.

In the mean time I am spending a few days in Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, and MAYBE a brief trip in Malaysia.

I then fly to Barcelona, Spain to see my friend Jordi with whom I used to wait tables and be taken apart by customers routinely.

Then, I fly to Logan whenever I get a ticket and complete this around-the-world loop.

The River.

As for what I’ve been up to recently: nothing very productive. The cherry blossoms have come and have basically left. The days have been really nice in Cheongju, a couple I would dare say hot, so I have made time enough to walk along the river even though I usually end up in Home Plus just the same.

The Yellow Dust also came. It blows in from the industrial towns in eastern China as an off colored haze full of mercury and lead. Between that, the radioactive rain from the disasters in Japan, the over-reactive minds of Koreans when it comes to health, the news would have you believing Korea was one toxic heap at the moment. But, it isn’t. I don’t think. I will make a note to see if I have super strength before I leave.

I’ve seen some pretty cool things recently while walking around the river. While meandering around with my camera (soon to be upgraded!) I followed what sounded like drumming. The beats led me to the track near Downtown (or Uptown like I used to call it) where everyone skates or ride all sorts of inane, ass-backwards bikes.

Members of the Ajumma Army.

It was here that I saw a dozen or so ajummas marching around in circles, drumming in formation. There were some older guys and college students mixed in, all led by a young guy in some sort of fancy pants. I don’t know what they were doing but I guess they were practicing for some sort of traditional performance. Either that or the guy in fancy pants now has well disciplined army of ajummas.

Last Friday / Saturday and Saturday / Sunday I spent a lot of time at the bars with my friends here. We saw a band that played Oasis covers and they made me prematurely nostalgic for Korea. It is hard to imagine a Friday or Saturday that doesn’t involve the same four bars and my Cheongju friends. Heck, I still expect to see my friends who have left walk in.

On Sunday, after realizing that I was way too hungover to deal with the hell that is Home Plus on a Sunday, I walked a but further down the river than I had before. Where as traditional drumming led me to the Ajumma Army, old-school bob brought me to some festival at a Buddhist temple that I never noticed until that day.

I walked in and tables lined the courtyard. A few were covered with canopies as those sitting under it served simple Korean foods or made crafts. Across the dirt ground was a cluster of covered tables withh a half dozen families eating. Monks walked here and there. I could see shadows of people bowing in the main temple.

A Buddhist temple in Cheongju.

I lingered for a while there until an older guy, having something to do with the party, came over and talked to me for a while, asking if I wanted to eat something or anything else. I bought a bracelet and left as Louis Armstrong came on over the loudspeaker.

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How to replace your lost passport in Korea

A few days ago I set out to send some money home and go to the pension office to cash ou of the Korean Pension Scheme.  This leads to the only informative thing in this blog. 

What do you do when you lose your passport less than two weeks before leaving Korea?

Here is what you do:

1. Panic.
2. Panic and google "Lost Passport," "Seoul," "Emergency," and various onscenities.
3. Look up how to get to the embassy the next day.  Then freak out when they tell you they do not take walk-ins on Wednesdays.
4. Try to make an appointment at the Embassy in Seoul via their convenient appointment program.
5. Swear when it doesn't work on the school computer.
6. Swear and throw stuff when it doesn't work on your computer at home.
7. Contact Larry and have him do it forward.  He got me into Korea and he can sure as hell get me out.
8. Thank him when he gets you an appointment.
9. Stay up all night watching Modern Family and get on a bus at 6am.
10. Fill out the passport application / list passport (also known as "you dumbass, how could you lose your passport).  
11. Arrive at the embassy and admire that it's in a really beautiful part of Seoul.
12. Stand at the security door awkwardly. 
13. Walk in and hand the man a printed paper indicating an official appointment / hand him a handwritten copy because you don't have a printer.
14. Give the man your bag and kiss your Kindle / phone goodbye (for the duration). 
*** Write down your phone number.  You look like an ass when they figure out you dont have it memorized.
15. Take your badge and cross a parking lot.
16. Walk in and stand at a window until somebody comes.
17. Explain (with a certain amount of shame) that you are, in fact, a dumbass and lost your passport.  Remember that the Embassy is a prominent and reoccurring character on Locked-Up Abroad and feel a little better.
18. Have your number called well before your meeting time.
19. Give them your passport photos.
IF NOT:
- Follow a horrible map to a building that has a photo company who will give you photos. 
- Get lost in a goddamn fire station because the map is crappy.
- Walk to the top floor of the right building (behind the fire station) and ask for the photo service.
- Be told that the photo service was the mall-photo machine you passed in one of the stairwells.
- Pay 8,000W with a 10,000W bill and be told afterwards that no change will be given.
- Take the worst passport photo possible.
- Navigate sizing options as a timer ticks down.  This, it should be noted, is a hell of a lot more stressful under the duress of losing your passport when you are leaving the country in a short amount of time.
- Avoid adding bigger eyes or cute birds as those are both options.
- Laugh and say "WTF Korea."
- Return, passing protests and a line of people at the back entrance looking to get a visa to the States.
20. Give over photos and think about how you will look like a sweaty pedophile in your passport for the next 10 years.
21. Fill out your address on a mailing card and pray to god it works because you can only get a cab to your apartment 50% of the time.
22. Swear an oath.
23. Be given map number 2. 
24. March down to the police station to file a report mostly to avoid identity theft.
25. Turn in report.
26. Leave.
27. Go to Dragon Hill Spa to sleep.
28. Eat Taco Bell in Itaewon to make sure you ruin the rest of the day.
29. Take a bus home with the hope of atleast accomplishing something that isn't a step backwards (like cleaning the apartment you trashed looking for your passport).
30. Be called into school to teach your last class.
31. Fall asleep at your computer.
32. Hope like hell you do not find your passport.

All in all, it wasn't too bad.  I am stressed as hell but the embassy was really helpful.  Shit happens, I guess.  It cost me about $130 for the replacement and it will take a couple weeks.  Casually, the woman told me that I shouldn't worry yet when asked if I should postpone my flight.  She then gave me a card and told me to call it if I didn't ge my passport the day before my flight and they would see what they could do to, which I take to mean an on-the-spot solution.
Also, I made friends with the security because I had to go in and out repeatedly.  Don't lose your passport right before you leave.  It feels horrible.

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Why students should never know where their teacher lives

I spent last weekend fairly determined to do nothing productive or healthy. One of the consequences of traveling around the country to see the friends I hadn't seen in a while is that I was away from Cheongju and my remaining friends here for a few weeks. I got to miss them.


I went out Friday night. It wasn't anything too ridiculous or out of the norm; it was a normal Friday. Amanda and I went to Pearl Jam.

Pearl Jam is the homeliest of the handful of foreigner bars and it also serves the most decent food. This is something I do not know for sure as I have not indulged in any of the food at Buzz or MJ's, but Pearl Jam burritos trump Road King Burritos. These things become important to a guy.

We played Jenga until my burrito arrived. By the time I had finished my food (maybe 45 seconds after the plate was put before me; I was hungry and I had the shakes) we were joined by Gavin, Robyn, et al.

We drank, talked, and joked our way from Pearl Jam to MJ's.

The only thing I really like about MJ's is decent popcorn, and a 2 hour happy hour with 2,000won gin and tonics.

My opinion of the place rises in warm weather after the roof deck is opened and you can hangout in the fresh air above the city. The weather in Korea is warming up but the roof hasn't been cleaned and it still looks like it has been hit by a series of tornados.

I left in control of my senses at around 2am. Not too late all things considering. I could have gone to bed and woken up to a glorious gray and misty day and done something productive in the morning.

I didn't.

I went back to my apartment and played Xbox with my friends and drank some soju I had in my fridge. I went to sleep at 5am.

Still, not horrible.

What is horrible is being woken up by pounding on the door.

I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and decided to do nothing. The most serious thing at my door at the early hour of 1pm was a repair man or somebody else on official apartment business. The knocking came again. My apartment was a disaster anyway. I had been trying to get rid of things the past week and with the clothing and general clutter I looked like a hoarder.

Most likely scenario was the ever common Jehovah's Witness; a scenario I didn't really feel like dealing with. The worst case scenario would have been ---

"THOMAS TEACHER!"

Oh shit.

It was Ji-Huan.

Hearing his voice startled me, but there was no reason for me to be bothered. He knocked again and shouted my name, with the addition of "teacher" despite my current state of hiding, hungover, in my own filthy apartment waiting for a 10 year old to go away.

He shouted again.  Everytime the boy says my home, including in school, he says it with this manic crescendo at the end.  Usually I think it is funny.

Eventually I heard Ji-Huan begin to turn my door knob.  It was ever so slowly and subtly but it made a distinct sound. 

"That sneaky ... little... ohdeargod."  At this point I realize two things:

1.  I am butt-ass naked.
2.  I forgot to lock my door.

Several scenarios went through my head and none of them ended without one of us being traumatized or in jail.  I stopped breathing for a few seconds.  I might have prayed.  Anyway, in those few seconds I decided my only plan of action was, if he came in, to spring up with my blanket open and in front of me, wrap him up, and push him right back out the door.  With a bit of luck he would think it was part of a game and even if he didn't I was ok with the idea of Ji-Huan being a little confused for a few minutes.

To ruin the story he turned the handle and walked away. 

On Monday he told me that he came by to my apartment to visit and I told him I had no idea what he was talking about.

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Kedros Revisited

These past few weekends have been busy but rewarding for me. As Korea comes to an end I have finally put follow though into my effort to see a couple of people in this country. I have 22 days or so left here and there was really no valid reason for not seeing these people. I wish that I had seen them earlier and that I had seen them more frequently, but I am happy that a year in Korea did not pass without me visiting Sun Young and Dawoon.

Top: Dawoon and I outside the hostel in Kedros.
Below: Dawoon and I outside Motel Tomgi in Seoul.

These two were very much a part of my birth into serious travel as they were present at my first trip abroad. They were already seasoned travelers when I met them outside of the bus in Ioannia, Greece but I was about as naïve and clueless as they come. I often say that I don’t know what the hell is going on in Korea, but I really didn’t know what was going on in Greece.

I’ve retold this Greece story enough times to warrant its absence here, but it had a huge impact on how I thought of things around me, of myself, and the grand scheme of the world. Most importantly I left Greece with an openness to new experiences, new people, and new places that wasn’t entirely present before I left home that first time.

Sometimes I compare this experience to Greece. I was in Greece all of 3 weeks and I will have been away from home for over a year by the time I get back from Cheongju. I realize though that the length of time doesn’t make much difference on the impact an experience can have on you.

Left: Sun Young and I on the road in Kedros.
Right: Sun Young and I at a temple in Busan.

Greece was basically a long vacation from hell. We were freezing the entire time, aching from day 2 until the end, and navigating the awkward situation of a bunch of people from around the world sleeping together on a couple of very wide beds and sharing a dirty bathroom.

When we said goodbye it was as sad as it can be with people you had known only a short while, but in intimate circumstances. Well, not that intimate. Some people did make out once, though. I last saw these two in the Athens airport. We stayed up all night with Jardiel from Mexico as the rest of the group likely did the same in Thessaloniki. We drank cheap wine from Styrofoam cups and toasted to the whole wild experience and told the worst stories from our lives that we could come up with or force ourselves to remember.

I was happy for the company I had. The four of us said goodbyes and hugged and passed on to lost luggage, medical school, magazines, and memory.

That I have seen all 3 of my airport companions since then is incredible to me. We planned reunions but even I, the novice, knew that the nature of these sort of friendships is that they usually end at the airport- at least as far as actually seeing each other in person.

I saw Jardiel a year later in Mexico. My work camp failed to pick me up and I spent the scariest night of my life sitting in a dark corner chain smoking with a homeless man and a feral cat that ate cockroaches as a truck full of heavily armed men drove by. Cabbies I had been cautioned against came closer and closer asking me to get in and me with $2000 of camera equipment wrapped around my leg.

After a week I finally found Jardiel and we spent a night eating and talking about the cold, about the dogs, about the work, about the mountains and the people we met Greece.

So, after a lot of planning I went to Busan to see Sun Young and then to Seoul to see Dawoon. This isn’t to be over dramatic but I barely recognized them. We were all grown up, or something like that. We were wearing proper clothing and we weren’t covered in clay or pine needles, or dressed against winter in the mountains. Everyone had legit jobs.

Still, underneath it all we were basically the same. So we all relived a little of Greece in Korea and laughed at Shibal and the pizza, and talked about the nomad Josef, and the cheese and the hikes. It is reassuring to know that as this thing is ending for me that these friendships don’t really end.

Maybe someday I will see the rest of these mad Kedros people.



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