In Da (Mountain) Club, Yo

originally posted on 2/23/07

After nearly 5 months in Seoul and just under two months a stone's throw from Korea's most popular national park, I finally made the trip to the mountains. By subway, a cool 3 stops, as my current location dictates. It literally takes longer to walk from my house to the subway than the subway trip to the mountains takes. I know, I know, lame I haven't been yet, but I'm pretty damn lazy. You knew that.

So, equipped with a sturdy backpack jammed with necessary vittals like gorp and lakes of water, a solid pair of hiking boots, and a detailed, English-language map of the mountain, I set off for my hike at 9 a.m. And by this, of course, I mean a haggard backpack filled with books and a pocket Yahtzee game, a ½ liter bottle of water, no food, no map, and setting off at 3 p.m after a long night of drinking. Yeah, that sounds more like it. Also, crappy shoes, because I didn't want to get my adidas too dirty. Tomato potato.

I walked down, or rather up, a rather easy trail complete with stairs, which of course was near heart attack inducing level for me. I was out of water before I'd even finished the first cigarette of the hike. After awhile, as it got dark, I realized I needed to find a spot on the trail where I could declare the hike a victory and head home. I finally reached a large rocky bluff with a great view of the city and decided that this was the point of return.

A group of Korean hikers; each wearing boots, hiking pants, fleece jackets, Goretex, and sporting quality backpacks and walking sticks (basically, like everybody else on the mountain but me) were in front of me, working their way down a trail. The trail was a different one than the simple one I had taken to that point, but who wants to take the same way twice? No adventure in that. I decided this was the trail for me. I noticed a sign written in Korean and English (I could only read the English part of course, but I could sound out the words on the Korean part - big step) saying "Dangerous Trail." Dangerous? Perfect. I'd clearly been dominating the easy, stairs-built-in (I think it may have had a wheelchair ramp too) trail I took to this point, I needed a new challenge.

Most of the Koreans were now down the dangerous "trail," and two insisted they stay on top of the ridge until I descended the "trail." See, the "trail," (that's annoying, I know) was basically a 30 to 50 foot sheer, near vertical rock face, with a few random cracks that one could use for hand holds and foot holds. Which means it required me to, at certain points, hang off the side of a mountain like Stallone in one of his lesser, non-cold war-ending rolls. Maybe not that dramatic, but it seemed that way from my angle. And of course, due to my brilliant choice in footwear, I had all the traction of an 80 year-old Stalingrad whore.

I didn't realize what a bad idea descending this trail was until I was already far enough down that climbing back up was unthinkable. Good thing the Korean climbers were there. They would yell at me in Korean to move in a certain direction, but that only lead me to twist around into some sort of Mission Impossible 2 like formation (stupid reference, I know, but it's on TV here all the time). One guy who had already reached the bottom came back up to where I was, and would grab my foot and move it to the next foothold, and would also generally run around this precipitous rock face as if it were flat. Plus, keep in mind, this dude was at least 50 and maybe 110 pounds.

Finally, I made it down to the bottom of the ridge, and the two guys who had stayed at the top to lend me a hand and yell Korean instructions scaled down after me, in about 3 seconds. Then, all of them pointed at my shoes, and made fun of them in Korean, and rightfully so really. I attempted to explain why I was a dumbass, but this would prove difficult even if I was fluent in the language.

The rest of the trail back to the base was easy. I walked back with them, and they seemed determined to ensure that I was never in the front of the group or in the back, until we reached the base and the tourist village at the entrance to the national park.

There was a large map painted on a large signboard at the entrance to the park, which I attempted to go look at to determine how far I had actually hiked, thinking how I would love nothing more than to buy these people a beer before heading home to order a pizza. One of the 10 climbers, the only one who spoke English beyond "hello," "goodbye," and "my name is," (by the way, I still don't know "my name is" in Korean, which I'm sure really impresses the girls at the bar) invited me to come with them to dinner. Pizza be damned.

We went to a restaurant in the tourist village, and had a nice two hour dinner. We ate tons of food, the centerpiece a seafood stew with baby octopus tentacles (yes, I said tentacles, jackass) and tiny shrimp complete with shells and heads – and it was tasty as hell. Needless to say in such circumstances, countless toasts were given and countless shots of soju were downed. Turns out this group is a mountain climbing club, and they meet to climb a different mountain every week.

When it came time to pay the bill, my hosts refused to allow me to contribute a single won to the bill, despite my many offers to do so. Then, as we split up near the train station, Mr. Ahn, the head of the club, bought a big bag of oranges from a street vendor and insisted I take two with me.

So, to recap, these strangers that I met by random chance saved my ass on the rock face, got me pretty well hammered, bought me dinner, and sent me on my way full, drunk, and with a couple of oranges for the road. How often do you think that happens in, say, Aspen?