Catching a taxi here is about a billion times easier than in the states. In the US, unless you live in NYC or a big city you usually have to call ahead, in Korea they have a wonderful post called a “Taxi Stand”… Yes, right next to the bus stop is the taxi stand… where you stand, and then a taxi will drive up to meet you. You do have to remember to avoid the Black taxis though, because they are the luxury ones and will cost quite a bit more, but the simple boring yellow and white taxis come around more often anyway.
We boarded our first yellow taxi from said taxi stand and said Okpo ( which is really pronounced Og-po…which Joseph knew! Thanks to his Hangul self teaching!) But the driver knew where we wanted to go, and in perfect English said… OK!
Not ten minutes and about 8 dollars later we arrived at said destination. We told him to drop us off at the Admiral Hotel since we knew from the map that was a place that was central and close to the International School. He dropped us off and we said our thank you!
We then headed down a long driveway hill and right in front of us, not ten feet across one street was a mini-mart labeled World Mart. Success!!!!! (we had found out that Okpo is a very big international port of Geoje, so we figured if there was anywhere on this Island that would have some home comforts this would be the place!) We walked around the very mini mini-mart, but didn’t see much except for some British stuff and some Indian stuff… it was cool but we just purchased some “throat candy” aka cough drops. Since I am still coughing a bit and then heading out back to the street…. One block down there was a another place called “foreigners mart”… thinking it was the same thing we almost passed by without a care, but something in the window caught my eye… “ Joseph Look it is the Quaker Oats Guy!!!!”… ahh that beloved childhood icon saved the day… Not only did this store contain Real Cheerios, brands we had heard of and instant oatmeal, it also had some Fiber One bars… Joseph’s Granola bar of choice. And they were fairly cheap!
I am pretty sure he would have bought every last one in the store if I had let him, but we still had tons of Okpo to see and only so much allotted money for our “spendage” and I was not going to leave at 12:30 because Joseph wanted to go home and eat himself into a granola bar induced coma! ( But I can’t blame him as he used to eat one every day in the states and here it is over three weeks later that we finally find a small supply of them) It was a small victory, but a victory none the less!Okpo for some reason feels very different from Jeong Pyeong ( Our side of Geoje City) it felt bigger, maybe because in three weeks we have walked most of the streets and have seen most of the sights in our neighborhood, but to again feel that lost sensation brought back many feelings from our first few days here, although now we were equipped with knowledge of Hangul and some idea of how to interact with people. It was invigorating… not scary this time.
We spent most of the afternoon just seeing the sights. Okpo is famous for the International School, which we passed, and it is much more foreigner friendly than our tiny neighborhood. Almost immediately we stumbled upon a Quiznos! I had not seen one of those since I worked for the Board of Law Examiners (we had one downstairs, so convenient when you just wanted some hot soup on a rainy day!) But seeing it now in Korea after not seeing a real American restaurant ( because Baskin Robbins and Dunkin Doughnuts don’t count as restaurants…. Really) it was almost like it was too easy. There were tons of foreigner bars too, and Lounges and places that had signs saying “ Foreigners only”… which made me feel not superior but almost embarrassed!
Let me clarify, I know had we been placed in Okpo the first day, it would have been a huge relief, a bit of a “light at the end of the Korean speaking tunnel”, but seeing it now, it seemed so out of place… like it didn’t belong in the tiny fishing village ten minutes up the street. I mean, I thought embracing the culture of Korea was the entire reason for coming to Korea… if I only wanted to see White people or just drink a Budweiser, I would have gone to Ireland or England, or just stayed home! ( the much cheaper option). A nice surprise, but Joseph and I didn’t want to take advantage of those Foreigner Only places… It is meant to build camaraderie between the “foreigners” but really I feel like it may create a void in the relations with Korea. It seems a waste to spend time in Korea in only “Non-korean areas”…. maybe once we have been here 8 months and have a hard week teaching, we will change our tune, but for now, I will savor my Korean time, and try to fully appreciate the beauty in the Okpo Traditional Open Air Fish Market.
It was located at the top of a hill and the market (It was covered) worked it’s way down the hill, to the bottom holding all sorts of homegrown vegetables, choice cuts of meat and fish, live eels swimming in plastic bowls with salt water, immaculately created rice cakes and all sorts of crafts and dishes… it was a bustling place and full of new possibilities at each shop. In fact it was the tiny ajumma lady who smiled at me that made me feel most at home while we inspected her beautiful collection of beans, rice and lentals.
Feeling a bit hungry we stopped at a bakery called Paris Baguette, ( So much westernization!) we bought a small cheesecake with strawberry, A chocolate cream horn thing, a small mini-pizza and a carton of milk. It was so good! Very fresh and tasty, just enough carbo loading to keep us moving for the rest of the afternoon. ( our early breakfast didn’t stick to our ribs as well as the purchased one at the bakery!
After the fish market we just followed the tiny crowded streets, we saw fishing shops, tiny restaurants, mangy dogs running around, Kids walking from school… (Some poor darlings go to school on Saturdays here…not our school thankfully!) We found much to our excitement, A BOOKSTORE…
… unfortunately even though the name of the store was in English it failed to have adequate English books for purchase… In fact I can count on one hand the amount of books for sale that were written in English… yep folks… Five whole books in English for sale… I would have bought one if I had not read all of them already… and what five books was it? You ask…. Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone, Twilight, Phantom of the Opera, To Kill and Mocking Bird and Dead Poets Society… All of them movies, so I am sure when filling out their purchasing order the thought process went something like….”Ohh and they can watch the movie with Korean subtitles!”. Oh well, I heard there was an awesome bookstore in Seoul so maybe when we get up enough nerve to travel there we can pick up a few good reads, and the book Julie & Julia that I bought in the Atlanta Borders is almost finished… ( I have really been enjoying reading a book about a woman who cooks and writes a blog! Maybe I will try something like that when I get back to the states, I like Blogging!)
We also came across what looks to be an interior design store... this is what most of them look like and having a friend in the buisness, I wanted to take a picture to show Amanda what she would have the possiblity of working in, should she for some odd reason ever be transfered to Korea for a while! (probably not... but it would be funny)
And Joseph and I decided we wanted to tell our Director we needed this Bling Sink and toilet combo to bringthing things up in the bathroom! Wonder if it will work?
Next we decided it was too early to eat dinner but our feet were killing us, so we took a short hour break at the PC café we found. It was Atlantis themed! Joseph Approved. I answered a few e-mails to very important people ( Aka Moms! Both mine and Joseph’s!) While Joseph indulged in some Warcraft! After our coupons expired we were both hungry after walking what we figured was probably two or three miles…so we walked back to the main street and decided to chow at the Quiznos. ( It didn’t say foreigners only, and it smelled so good and not spicy) We got a bread bowl with some Country Chicken soup with Cheddar cheese and a Turkey Ranch Guacamole sandwich, we split both…
Delicious Bread Bowl above and Awesome sandwich below!
and much to our surprise what do we see they have to drink… DR. PEPPER… which we have not seen since we got here. I am fine with Pepsi and Coke, but Joseph missed Dr. Pepper, so he bought a few more to take home! ( it was very exciting…trust me)
We decided we still had not had our foreigner friendly fill so on our way to get ice cream I had to stop and get my picture taken with the giant inflateable beer mug in front of one western bar!
Next we went to Baskin Robbins and split a banana split… it was delicious. The Baskin Robbins was very hip, and they sat us down in the window with our dessert. Upon leaving the place one thing we noticed was the freezer next to the exit had a huge variety of ice cream cakes for sale. These were quite possibly the cutest ice cream cakes to ever exist. We didn’t buy one tonight but we decided for our birthdays we might indulge in one. But even if we did I have no idea how to eat something that looks like it just popped up out of a anime television show!
They are so darn cute! not that it would really stop me from eating one... I might feel bad for a minute though!
We then went to a camping store called Redface ( Like Northface stuff actually) that is fairly reasonably priced (unlike Northface) and bought a new backpack, since mine broke, and Joseph’s is two threads away from breaking. When we travel it is nice to be able to bring extra things like jackets and not have to wear them since it can be really hot during the day, but once the sun sets about 5:30 it gets really windy and cold. We figure it will be good so I won’t have to carry a purse, and we can fit more in it anyway. ( And since Joseph looks stupid carrying my purse, now we will be able to trade off)Feeling sufficiently full and having spent all of our “spendage” ( of course that occured after one quick stop in the World Beer/wine/liquer store...They had one bottle of Malibu so we had to bring it home) we decided we had had enough fun so we hailed a taxi at the wonderful taxi stop and speeded home to Jeong Pyeong. Our driver dropped us off at the Home Plus, and we happily carried our spoils back up the short road to our apartment complex.
Our Spoils!!!Now we sit here together listening to Billy Joel songs and talking about how much fun we had, and thinking about our future travel plans…We figured we had been here over three weeks. It is hard to believe. But we want to take advantage of our time here, and plan to see all we can see. We only have 11 more months here, which seems like forever now, but I can already feel how fast time can slip though our fingers.
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