Seoul

That one's for you, Ana.

I love domestic flights. If all of my travel experiences were like my domestic flight from Jeju to Seoul, I wouldn't have such a hate on for airports. I woke up at 5:30, arrived at the airport at 6:00, and by 6:20, I was at my gate waiting to board. Piece of cake.

We landed in Seoul at 8:00, and the first thing I did was head over to the Gangnam Express Bus Terminal to make damn sure that I had a bus ticket home that night. Once I bought my ticket, I had a solid 9 hours of exploring ahead of me. I was excited, because it was my first venture into Seoul in the time I've been here. I really didn't know what to expect, and I only had a vague idea of what I wanted to do that day.

I knew I wanted to check out the Cheonggye Plaza and the peaceful little stream that flows from it, so I made my way there first. Aside from that and the Museum of Art, I didn't really have anything planned out for the day.

These greeted me when I came out of the subway station.

During the Josean Dynasty (1392-1910), the river was a central site for daily life; housewives would gather by the stream to do laundry, while their children played together. Then from 1900 until after the Korean War, those who left their homes to find jobs and a better life in the city built homes for themselves along the river until the area became a shantytown. For two decades, starting in 1958, work was done to cover the stream with concrete in an attempt to improve the aesthetic appeal of the area. An elevated highway was eventually built over it in 1976.

A few decades later, there was once again concern about the ugly look of the city. Bringing together the goals of improving aesthetic appeal, improving safety, and caring for the environment, work was started to restore the peaceful stream. Restoration was completed in 2005. 

May those young souls rest in peace.

This seemed to be some sort of art project in which children were given cameras and told to capture the world through their eyes. At least I think that's what it was.

I love that this is what a stroll through the city looks like.

In 1795, King Jeongjo visited his father's tomb with his mother to commemmorate his father's 60th birthday. Once he returned to Seoul, the King ordered the completion of a collection of sketches commemorating his progress to Suwon with all 1, 779 of his peeps and 779 of his horses. I would've hated to come across these guys in traffic if they were trying to cross the road.

There's more...

and more...

and there's bossman himself.

A woodblock map of Seoul in 1825.

D'awww.....

What a view...

Is that a boobie on the left?

I couldn't take my eyes off of this thing for a good minute and a half. I still have no words.

Outside of Texas Bar.

Looks like Elvis burned his hand too.

The stream starts right at the foot of the cone.

Although my plans were wide open, I did know that somewhere near the plaza, or somewhere along the stream, there was a Wall of Hope, which is some sort of wall that consists of pictures from people who hope to one day see South and North Korea come together so that they can be reunited with their loved ones. Unfortunately, I wasn't sure how long the stream went for, and so after a while, I finally gave up; I was afraid I'd end up walking along this thing all day and find myself on the other side of the city. While I did see some nice sites along the way, I eventually turned back and headed towards the plaza.

When I arrived back at the main street, I noticed a big gate down in the distance; it seemed like an important landmark, so I made my way over. I asked a nearby police officer, and he said it was Gyeongbokgung.

Gyeongbokgung! Of course! I thought to myself. We read about the damn thing in the textbook!

There went any hopes of visiting the museum. There's always next time, Seoul.

(Sidenote: There were a ridiculous amount of police officers around. There didn't seem to be a special occasion of any sort going on that day, so I can only assume that that's the norm for any given day in that part of the city. Maybe it's just because of the proximity to Gyeongbokgung, a national landmark, and it's cultural significance, but man, it was like they were preparing for riots or something. And they weren't even standing on guard or anything; they were just standing around, talking and laughing, scratching their balls--typical police officer stuff.)

As I made my way towards the gate, I let my eyes get distracted by whatever shiny or pretty little thing I came across:

Meet King Sejong. He did some pretty cool stuff in his time, liiiiike....

 1) He decreed that if a poor man cannot afford to wed his wife, his family will help him pay for the wedding. If that is not an option, then the local government was responsible for making the "I do's" happen.
2) When his royal secretariat advised him that seniors of low birth should be banned from banquets for the "cooler" seniors, he told that douchebag to respect the authoritah of his elders and decreed that all seniors were welcome.
3) He decreed that Bondwomen (slaves) who were pregnant and belonged to government agencies were to be given the month prior to their delivery date off, as well as 100 days of maternity leave following their child's birth. Four years later, men were also given a one-month paternity leave following their child's birth.
4) The guy invented a form of musical notation so that traditional Korean songs could be written down and handed down through generations.

Eventually, I made my way to the gate's entrance, and this fellow was waiting there to greet me.

He looks pretty friendly...

I'd like to see who could stand still longer...one of these guys, or a member of the British Royal Guard.

Or maybe a staring contest.

Or a thumb war.

Welcome to Gyeongbokgung!

The ceiling on the first gate.

Old timey toys.

Korean version of a dreidel, I guess. You have to whip it...whip it good! to keep it spinning.

Just managed to catch the tail end of the changing of the guard routine.

Several hours later, I found myself walking down the street that stretched alongside the Palace, and I stumbled upon a slew of museums. Within three blocks, there were five or six art museums/galleries! Let's do this, I thought to myself.

There was one painting at the Museum of Modern Contemporary Art that I could have stared at all day. It was done in a comic book style, and it was of a scene on a crowded subway riding through a poor neighbourhood in the city. There was so much detail in every little square of inch of the painting that I found myself staring at it as I once stared at several Where's Waldo books.

There they were, all these characters that we've all met time and time again while riding the subway home on a sweaty Tuesday afternoon. There's the guy with a completely glazed over look on his face; the guy grooving to some tunes; the crazy guy standing in the middle of the subway and screaming out at nobody in particular about the end of the world; the cranky lady who unfortunately chose the wrong seat and is stabbing the crazy guy multiple times with her eyes; the guy who just let one rip, and the girl with the overly sensitive nose; the overly exhausted woman who just wants to get home so she can remember who she is again after suffering through another long shift at her thankless customer service job.

Every face, every wrinkle, every crinkle, every goddamn hair out of place told a life story. Just outside of the subway, there are nothing but slums for as far as the eye can see. These people are nobodies, living on the fringe of society. Yet on that subway, those nameless, faceless people are works of art; they're stories begging to be told. They are poetry in motion.

Another highlight was the gallery consisting of the works of exiled Iranian filmmaker Shirin Neshat. Her work explores the political and social conditions of Iranian and Muslim culture through themes of gender, power, and displacement. Ultimately, her work leads viewers to question their own definition of identity and humanity by looking at the compatibility of Islamic tradition and Western ideals of individuality and liberty.

One such video featured two screens facing each other. The video was about the ban on female singers onstage--a ban, mind you, that has been lifted several times over the years by incoming new governments, only to be reapplied once power changed hands yet again. On one screen, there was a crowded room listening to a man singing a beautiful traditional hymn; on the other, stood a woman with her back to the camera, standing in front of an empty room. Once the man finished his performance, the woman started singing a wordless hymn of her own. The man onstage, along with everybody else in the room, stared at the woman in the opposing screen completely speechless. It was hard to tell if they were in shock out of disgust at her audacity or awe at her divine voice.

Other favourites looked at the significance of death--one of the few things that binds us all together as human beings--and the passionate and almost animalistic pursuit of happiness and belonging that drives our every action.

The final surprise at the MMCA was the Art of Nonfiction series. This was a string of documentaries that the museum had been showcasing for almost two months. I just happened to catch the very last screening of the very last documentary before the series closed down. The documentary in question was called The Ghosts in Our Machine by director Liz Marshall. It follows photographer Jo-Anne MacArthur in her attempt to bring animal cruelty to the forefront of society; she grabs your head and forces you to look at the crimes we willfully turn a blind eye to on a daily basis. She shows the farms where foxes are kept in captivity in tiny cages in Cambodia before being shipped off to Laos or Vietnam, and eventually purchased by China for use as test subjects in labs. They go mad in their cages, and some are missing ears or look close to death. She shows the tiny cage that can barely fit an expecting mother pig carrying sixteen little piglets inside her, who was needlessly beaten and stunned repeatedly with a cattle prod before she passed out and half of her babies died inside of her. While the foxes aren't as lucky, the sow is at least rescued and taken to a sanctuary.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Throughout the doc, you meet several other beautiful creatures, from a rescued beagle that looked so damn much like little Sammy back home that I almost had to turn away from the screen, to an injured cow that was almost put down. You learn that cows used for dairy production are put down after only four years "in service," if you will, because they are then deemed useless. You learn the truth about organic farms. And in the end, you're left feeling like a piece of shit, because you realize "animals are hidden int he shadows of our mechanized world." You realize you're a part of the problem; you buy the medicine the animals are tested on, you visit the zoos and aquariums, you eat the meat and consume the dairy. We enable all of this cruelty to happen. We allow it to happen.

The element of the documentary that really brought the message home was the protagonist herself. Her warm personality and her ardent love for all sentient beings and desire for them to have their rights recognized is so contagious. She even says that after all of her years of traveling and capturing pictures of animals in terrible condition, she had developed PTSD and had significant trouble sleeping every night. She loves animals with all of her heart, and only wishes the rest of the world could understand why. The documentary helps her with that; I mean, the way she digs her face into a cow's side as she embraces her dirty and smelly friend, or lovingly pets an even smellier and dirtier pig like it's a newborn puppy, it all makes you love those creatures more, simply by association. Through Jo-Anne, you see the personalities of these creatures, you see their capability to love, and you grow to love them in return.

The documentary reminded me of this video a friend had recently posted on Facebook. As I left that auditorium, I can honestly say that it was the first time I've ever genuinely considered going vegan--not just for the sake of the animals, but for my own health as well. It definitely won't happen in Korea, but I might give it a try down the road once I'm back home for good. (Allysia and Mike, if you're reading this, I'll be looking to you guys for some major help.)

(Sidenote: Did you know that when McDonalds says their burgers "are made with 100% beef," what they actually mean is that the company they get their beef from is called "100% beef"?! They're actually just 40% beef!)

The other galleries I visited were just small galleries consisting of a couple rooms, but they all had some interesting items to share. For starters, the artist showcased at Gallery O was into some kinky circus stuff. There was the ballerina balancing on three stacked pigs; the victorious boxer, with his arm lifted in the air, and his porn star breasts smiling at the world; and perhaps my favourite, the pair of acrobats wearing Mickey and Minny Mouse masks as they flub tossing a baby between them in mid air. I feel like that last one is a metaphor for most of our childhoods.

Next stop was the first of two Gallery Hyundai buildings. This one was exhibiting works by a French artist named Bernar Venet, who I feel was inspired by his 7-month old niece or nephew. His entire series was literally nothing but scribbles. Seriously, Google this guy right now. I'll wait.

See!

This is the bullshit the pamphlet tried to pitch me: "The current exhibition consists of Bernar Venet's scultpural reliefs, drawings, and paintings through which you can glimpse into his distinctive "self-referential vocabulary that manifests his entire oeuvre."

What?! It's scribbles, man! If I'd written the pamphlet, I would've written this: "Venet sculpted 8-foot scribbles out of wood; they look awesome. They shine a light on the beauty of the spontaneity that comes with childhood innocence. In other words, he just stole his nephew's drawings and used them as his own."

Upstairs, there were also framed scribbles drawn in charcoal. There were kind of cool because the edges were smudged on purpose, almost making the scribbles look like they were pulsating.

The second Hyundai gallery showcased works by Jung Jae-ho, a Korean painter who, through his work, was recalling the period of vast cultural modernization in Korea from the 1960's-80's. The exhibit was called "Days of Dust" because looking at the paintings, you feel like you're in a museum rather than an art gallery. There's the typewriter with a burning piece of paper set in it; the pair of rotary phones that look like they're hugging, because the receivers are switched; the trio of casually dressed gentlemen standing on the moon wearing space helmets, one of the guys scratching his ass; the old bus and yard of streetcars. Everything is painted in a delectably vintage tone as well.

The fifth art gallery, which focused on African art, was unfortunately closed, so with that, I started to make my way back to the subway station. Along the way, though, I came across the elegant architectural beauty known as the Ilmin Museum of Art, which was running some sort of video exhibition titled "Total Recall." I bit at the name and wandered in.

Knowing I didn't have much time, I sat down in front of a random video and hoped for the best. It turned out to be a fascinating two-man performance, starring two guys seated in an empty room, save for a table and their chairs. The man on the right was a drama instructor/actor, while the man on the left was on trial for some sort of crime. (I came in part-way through.) Essentially, the actor was trying to teach the accused that his best defence was to take on a character's role and believe with all of his being that he was innocent. The conversation was completely fluid, weaving from discussion of body language, motivation, and intent in our communication to sexual frustration.

I had to leave before it was finished, but I enjoyed what I saw. I suppose the video was commenting on how we all wear masks of some sort or put on a performance in our everyday lives...maybe?...I dunno.

All in all, I felt pretty f*@#ing cultured by the end of the day. The Gwanghwamun district is itself a work of art. It's where sleek modernity, revered history, serenity, and culture come together for one hell of a sexy party.

Not sure what exactly was going on here. The lady with the shades seemed to be her agent or representative or something, and the only thing I could guess is that this chick was some sort of fortune teller...she had a Facebook ID, but when I looked her up, nothing came up. I guess I'll never know...

Maybe she's just a really big Packers fan, and that's her attempt at making a Cheesehead hat.

A final thought: Toronto, this is what a subway map for an international city should look like. It's amazingly simple to navigate, and the helpful exit signs tell you which exit to use when leaving the station. There are also sliding doors dividing the edge of the platform from the tracks, which I would imagine keep people from jumping. The doors only slide open once the train has come to a complete stop.

I'll be back, Seoul.