DMZ and JSA

Friday

We took the KTX to Seoul, which takes just under 3 hours.  Nick lent me a fascinating book on Scientology (Inside Scientology by Janet Reitnam), which made the time fly by.  That Church is thoroughly fucked up.

Anyway, we got to Seoul and went to our hostel.  Nick booked us a hostel in a phenomenal location, just 15 minutes by foot from the train station and 20 minutes to where our tour left.  The hostel was really well-reviewed, but unfortunately our room had cockroaches L (thank goodness they were of the small, baby variety.  I’m genuinely terrified of the big ones.  The fact that they can survive the radiation of a nuclear bomb is terrifying).  So neither of us slept too well.

Saturday

We had an early rise at about 6:20 to give us time for a shower and breakfast before the tour.  We stopped for a filling breakfast at the nearest MacDoozers (Bacon Egg McMuffins are delish) and then went to our tour pickup.  The tour left from the Lotte hotel, which was one of the ritziest hotels I’ve seen in quite some time.  The lobby features impressive statues and restaurants.  Nick and I, initially disappointed to find our hostel without sufficient toilet paper (we both needed to make a poopie), were treated to a couple of absolutely luxurious thrones in the lobby bathroom.  I’m talking full baday and everything.  Hadn’t had been treated to a warm water rinse where the sun don’t shine since Japan.  I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t nice.

At 8:00 on the button we headed out on our tour.  The first stop was the DMZ (De-Militarized Zone, ironic because, despite a mutual agreement for zero military personnel, it is the most militarized place in the world), which was mostly cool but had some fluff.  The biggest highlight was probably the 3^rd tunnel, which is a tunnel North Korea had built to try to secretly invade Seoul, but, thankfully, was discovered by the South.  The scary part is that military experts believe North Korea has probably built 50-100 tunnels.  South Korea has found 4. 

Some other cool stops included Freedom Bridge, which was used to exchange POWs during the Korean War.  The bridge had thousands of ribbons attached to the walls, which our guide told us were put by South Koreans for separated family members stuck in the North.  I also like the Dora Observatory, mainly because I took pictures I wasn’t supposed into North Korea.  And I got to see some North Koreans working in a farm via binoculars. 

The most useless thing was visited was Dorasan Station, which is the northern most train station in South Korea.  The train tracks actually go into the North, but trains obviously don’t run there.  The only reason it is part of the tour is because apparently Bush visited in 2002.  Hilariously, we read the speech he gave there in 2002 and from the beginning Nick predicted “I’ll be he mentions 9/11.”  Just as we were starting to lose hope, we saw it in the 3^rd to last paragraph.  Classic Dub-ya.

After a spectacular lunch of bulgogi, we headed to the JSA (Joint Security Area).  In the DMZ we just toured the border of the DMZ, whereas during the JSA part of the tour we entered the DMZ and went all the way to the North Korean border.

Our first stop was Camp Bonifas, where we had to sign a waiver that North Koreans may kill us on the tour.  We also watched a brief presentation about the history of the JSA, most notably about the ceasefire signed in 1953 (note that it’s a ceasefire and not a treaty, thus the two countries technically remain at war), the Axe Murder Incident in 1976 (during which two US soldiers doing tree-trimming (the trees blocked visibility into the Northern side) were decapitated by North Korean soldiers wielding axes, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Axe_Murder_Incident), and the Soviet Defector Incident in 1984 (during which a Soviet citizen ran across the border demarcation line while on a North Korean tour.  North Korean soldiers chased him while firing, and South Koreans fired back to protect him.  The Soviet survived, but fighting left one South Korean dead and one wounded.  On the Northern side, three were killed, five wounded, and eight captured.  Shots were heard from the North 20 minutes after the firefight, which reports state was the execution of the tour group's commander and one of his key subordinates).  After the presentation, we boarded a military bus and headed to the JSA.

On the way, we passed some rice fields, which belong to residents of Daesong-dong, the South Korean village in the DMZ.  Also known as Freedom Village, the village boasts a 100m high South Korean flag.  The village is under UN control, and as such, residents don’t need to pay taxes.  And that’s no small potatoes, because our guide said the average family pulls in a cool USD $80,000 annually.  But they’re under constant threat of being kidnapped by the North and have a curfew, so it isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. 

We also saw Kijong-dong, the North Korean village just south of the boarder.  Not to be outdone, Kijong-dong has a 160m tall flagpole, the 3^rd tallest in the world.  The village is also known as Propaganda Village, as it entirely uninhabited and, apparently, never was.  It was simply built for show.

When we got to the JSA, we saw the Freedom House and Peace House, South Korea’s two buildings within the JSA.  I’m not quite sure what they are used for; our guide said they were for “talks,” but there is a shared conference room whose midsection lies along the border, and apparently that is where talks are held.  Anyway, the Freedom House was pretty and impressive (this is the building which has one side facing the North Korean boarder), whereas the Peace House was just a building.

Between the two buildings, though, is a circle of grass with a small statue, and our guide told us that it was the site of the shootout in the Soviet Defector Incident.  That really made me cognizant of the imminent danger we potentially faced, especially if a stranger did something stupid.

We were led from the busses through the Freedom House and into the shared conference room.  In the middle was a table, with three microphones in a line in the middle, a UN flag on the edge, and South Korean soldier standing, at attention, in line with the flag and the microphones.  Our guide explained this line represented the border between the North and South.  Looking out the window, we could see a concrete line marking the border, with concrete on the Southern side and dirt on the North.

It was a thrill to stand in North Korean territory, albeit for only a couple of minutes.  Nick and I got a photo with a guard to remember the experience.  I’m pleased to say I nailed the facial expression (a mixture of “hey this is pretty neat” and “holy shit).  I really wanted to knock on the door leading to the North Korean side, but there was a guard about 10 feet from the door which we weren’t allowed to walk past.  I did get some shots of North Korean land though the window, though.

After seeing the conference room, we stood on the patio outside of the Freedom House and took some pictures of North Korea.  Their main JSA building was maybe 150 yards away, and had a guard looking at us in binoculars.  I wish I had a better zoom on my camera, because even zoomed all the way in (12x) the dude is still a bit small.

Once the other group finished going through the conference room, we headed back to Camp Bonifas via bus.  On the way out we saw the site of the Axe Murder Incident (a memorial, the tree is now gone), and the Bridge of No Return, which Koreans were allowed to cross after the Korean War.  But their decision of which Korea to live in was final; once they crossed they couldn’t cross back.  Hence the Bridge of NO RETURN.

Back at Camp Bonifas I checked out the gift shop, but the selection was disappointing.  I did buy the Old Man some golf balls though, which came with some tees.  The sticker on the bag of tees is hilarious – it has a golf club crossed with an AK47 and says “The Most Dangerous Game” or something silly like that.  Needless to say, that sticker is mine.

After getting back from the tour, we meandered back to our hostel.  On the way we walked through Namdaemun market, which was absolutely packed and had lots of yummy looking food.  We decided we’d head back there later after cleaning up and visiting the N Seoul Tower.

After a shower, short rest, and some coffee at our hostel, we took the cable car up to the N Seoul Tower.  We’d been there months ago during our first visit to Seoul, but the wait to get to the top was over 3 hours so we decided to skip.  This time the wait was about an hour, which was cool with us.  So we grabbed some snacks, a couple of beers, and soaked up the gorgeous evening weather.

An hour later we took the elevator up, which had a super cheesy space video with some music.  Nick and I laughed out loud at it.

The view from the tower was spectacular.  Seoul is sprawling city.  It brought me back to the view I had on Semester at Sea from the Tokyo Tower (though Tokyo is even more sprawling).  There was also a urinal with a window to look out at the cityscape.  Classiest pee I’ve taken in quite some time, and I’m the classiest of urinators.

After the tower we went back to Namdaemun, but it was dead except for some street dining.  So we decided to get some chicken skewers, pajeon, and beer.  The food was quite yummy.  Though the atmosphere was significantly dampened by the fact that a bum was just harassing the very friendly lady who cooked for us.  He came up and asked for food, and she offered him some egg and rice cakes in sauce (very filling) and water.  But he kept yelling and, presumably, asking for meat.  He wouldn’t leave, even when the vendor, who was being exceptionally patient, tried to shove him to get him to leave.  A male patron tried to get him to move on to no avail.  Eventually the police had to be called.

After our late dinner we wandered in search of bar.  Shockingly, as Namdaemun is in the center of the city, we found zilch.  Apparently it just isn’t a bar area.  But we did get a bunch of dudes asking us to go into a “Business Clubs” (not sure if it’s a mistranslation of “Gentleman’s Club” or they are trying to attract business men, either way they are strip clubs), a pimp offering sex, and even an entrepreneurial women in her mid-30s (she approached and asked where we were going.  When we said we were going to our guesthouse she has “Can you bring a female?”).  Despite being unable to find bars, we weren’t too disappointed because we were exhausted.  Though we were disappointed to have to wander around for a half hour after getting lost.

Sunday

I decided to take the slow train home to save $$.  It takes 5 and a half hours, but has bigger seats and is about $25 cheaper.  So I slept, read about 80 pages of Inside Scientology, and looked out the window.  The landscape is really, really beautiful.  And mountainous.  Seriously, almost the entire time I was looking at mountain ranges.

I got home around 5pm.  I did laundry, cleaned up my apartment, watched the documentary Man on Wire, which is about the French wirewalker Philippe Petit who walked between the Twin Towers in 1974, and then went to bed early.