Life Without Poutine: Jinhae Cherry Blossom Festival

Spring is finally here! And it couldn't have come at a better time, since the seam along the sleeve of my jacket mysteriously tore wide open last week. I didn't even notice until I got home and took the jacket off. "Sonofabitch," I said to absolutely nobody.

Canada, I hope the arrival of April has finally brought an end to the relentless downpour of snow and frigid it-hurts-to-breathe temperatures. Congrats to those who survived the winter apocalypse with all their extremities intact.

Here in Korea, the first week of April has brought an explosion of cherry blossoms. Of course, as with everything else in Korea, this is cause for a festival. Waygooks and Koreans alike packed into buses and cars this weekend and headed out to see the purrty flowers. Gyeongju and Jinhae were some of the big spots around here, so off I went to Jinhae.

While waiting for the bus, I met Tony, a fellow Ontarian. When we got to Jinhae, we were both starving, and he mentioned that his landlord had highly recommended a Chinese restaurant just around the corner from where we got dropped off.

We found the place easily and were eventually led to the crappiest table in the entire establishment, shoved in the corner right next to some furnace-looking contraption. On top of that, the menu was a bit out of our budget, so we quickly skedaddled outta there.

We resorted to street food: a deep fried corn dog. Sadly, this too was a flop, as the corn dog was an abomination. You're probably thinking, "Uri, how does one mess up a corn dog? That's impossible." Wrong. The breaded part was delicious; the 'dog' itself, however, was completely frozen. We threw them out as soon as we found the first garbage can, which as usual in Korea, turned into a bit of a hunt. It wasn't the best start to the day. I just wanted some damn food.

We had no idea where anything was, so Tony and I sort of just meandered about. After a bit, we bumped into Jeremy and his peoples. They seemed to know where they were going, so we tagged along. The group seemed to be in a bit of a rush to get somewhere, though, and they navigated through the ocean of people--young couples taking selfies, families walking at a snail's pace, and just about anybody with a camera or a map in their hands--with remarkable ease. They were on a mission.

Rushing seemed a bit counter-productive to me in this case, though. I mean, we were there to see flowers; they weren't going anywhere, and in fact, they were all around us. If anything, people should have been slowing down to appreciate the scenery around them--the petals fluttering down to the ground and blowing across the streets, the markets and carnival games, and the people. (Who doesn't love a bit of people watching from time to time?)

Jeremy's friend, Adrienne, had the right idea. She was madly scrambling to take pictures of everything around her. The infinite amount of visual stimulation was overwhelming, and she tried her best to capture it all.

Everything.

Needless to say, we lost the group pretty quickly, and Tony, Jeremy, Adrienne, and I were left to our own devices. With nothing else to do, we just wandered through the streets in no particular direction, but hoping to stumble upon some magical bridge we'd heard about.

We found ourselves in the midst of a carnival, so Tony and I decided to try our luck with some carny games. We split on a ring toss and didn't even come close. (I seem to be rusty; in my heyday, I won my fair share of prizes at Wonderland. My one regret is never completing the Animaniacs set; Dot evaded me and she haunts me to this day.) Tony, however, put in a hell of a performance at darts and won himself an Angry Bird. My stomach, meanwhile, was finally rewarded with a desperately needed (and cooked) snack: chicken pops.

Not chicken pops.

The look of concentration.

Making it look so easy.

The rain started coming down in fat juicy drops and we were slowly losing hope that we'd find this damn bridge. Thankfully, we asked a police officer, and he pointed us in the right direction. As luck would have it, we just happened to be walking in the right direction all along. We walked underneath a tunnel, and magically, as soon as we arrived on the other side, the rain stopped, the sun was out, and I even heard a couple birds chirping. It was a good sign of things to come.

Soon enough, we found ourselves at the "Romance Bridge." Unfortunately, there was an insane amount of people gathered around the bridge snapping pictures. I couldn't really tell what the big deal was. In fact, when we first laid eyes on the bridge, I couldn't believe this was what we'd been searching for all this time. Then I climbed the steps and looked across the bridge for myself and I shut up.

If I could whistle, I would.

See what I mean? I pulled out my camera, and joined the crowd. I raised my arms above my head and snapped a couple, hoping for the best.

Now if you've been keeping up with the blog, you've noticed that I somehow have this remarkable talent for screwing up. If I'm not missing my bus, I'm losing my camera or mixing up the times for an event. This week, in the Misadventures of Uri, I forgot my camera's memory card in my laptop. All the lovely pictures I'd been taking all morning vanished as soon as I pulled the trigger. Sonofabitch.

Note: Many pictures (all the pretty ones) in this post come courtesy of the talented Jeremy and Adrienne.

At least I had my phone.

We strolled along the bridge for a while, snapping a thousand and one pictures, before eventually turning around and heading back where we came from in search of a massive flight of stairs.

But not before getting in some more snacks and enjoying the sights.

Ernie and Bert as cigarettes?

He looks pretty alone to me.

What's with the kid yanking on the elephant's tail? Korean graffiti is whack, yo.

Somebody was watching us from the shadows.

Can you spot us?!

Cue the Rocky music:

Many people opted to wait for the monorail that took people up the stairs, but the line looked pretty brutal, so we chose to conquer every single one of the 365 steps ourselves. If the ajimas could do it, then so could we!