How I Spent my Lunar New Year

Not having the scheduling-ahead abilities of some of my family (eg. aunt Karen), I'm stuck in Korea for the holiday. For the Lunar New Year, Seoul empties itself of a huge section of its population, so plane ticket prices skyrocket, ferries become overbooked, and basically, if you don't plan ahead, you can't go anywhere. On Wednesday the roads were completely congested. Thursday morning (the actual New Year Day), the eight-lane road that goes by my apartment had about twelve cars go by in twenty minutes.

Seoul is known for its crowded subways. So here's a station on New Year day:


Another station shot:


And waiting for the #2 train, the busiest line in the city in the middle of the afternoon, when normally you can't move for the crowds:


The reason I was on the subway, if you're curious, is that I was on my way out of Seoul to Namyangju, the home base of Matthew, a fellow former CDI trainee from the American South. I figured since I couldn't go away for the holiday, I might as well do something fun - and he lives a four thousand won cab ride away from a ski resort.

The last time I went skiing I believe I was still in elementary school, but it's amazing how quickly things come back to you. And it's a surprising happy feeling to rediscover that you enjoy doing things you used to enjoy doing. After two spills, I was weaving down the hills like I never took a twelve-year break from skiing.

It was a tremendously fun experience, but was marred slightly by the bloody idiots flooding the slopes that night. I guess during the holiday is when people decide to try skiing for the first time, or maybe it's just a coincidence that the majority of people who came to the resort that night were jerks, but all down the hills, scattered randomly, were people sitting and taking a break or standing around even smoking, while people going down had to veer and fly off jumps and into fences trying to avoid them. Amazing.

Still, it was fun. And today, although we didn't get to see Sweeney Todd as we'd planned (sold out), I got myself an mp3/video player at a steep discount and bootleg DVDs of my favourite television shows. I'm pleased with myself.

Of course, I'm completely exhausted now, having only just gotten home at about 8:00 pm. Tonight I think I'll just watch a couple of episodes of Doctor Who, sleep, and try to do something interesting tomorrow.

Happy Year of the Rat, all.