What and where is Korea?

people seem to think that since a lot of photos on my blog are me doing stuff that means I'm doing stuff all the time and my life is great.

This picture depicts how I spend at least 50% of my time.
sad isn't it.

I mean, I only work 24 hours a week and those hours run in the middle of the day. The rest of the time between Monday and Friday is spent at this desk or biking to the climbing gym.

The next set of photos is from this weekend when I went to Songoon Mountain. Took a long ass time to get there but it was worth it. The best sport climbing in Korea, beautiful mountain ridges, Many peaks, buddhist sculptures in caves, temples, great mountain vegetable bibimbap (veggies picked from the mountain and then cooked up and mixed with rice - a speciality of the province), views of the ocean, and finally a crap load of rain.

Graves.

Once past the lake I follow a path through a japanese maple forest along a river. Not a person in sight, a rarity among Korean mountains.

If those spots are a disease it is the prettiest disease I've ever seen.
Unless it was on my face.

Always obvious when arriving at the ridge by the look of the pine trees: Small and curvy.

the far corner of the lake is where I started the mindful-walk after I ascended from the campground aka the picnic table I slept on with a thin blanket while dark clouds dumped rain drumming a plastic covering/roof and I used beer as medicine to fall asleep.

To my left of the ridge are beautiful rock formations and trees churping within the japanese maple and pine trees. To my right are rice patties.

AHHHH ASIA!

One of the characteristic Grande lines is "ahhh life!!" with a strong exhaul. I say this when I really feelin' life and it is overwhelming with pleasure or with pain. I don't really say that in Korea for some reason. I usually say "AHH ASIA."

Buddhist rock stacking

wha.. oh the ocean. I haven't seen you for a while. What a pleasent suprise! Hey, lets meet again real soon but next time lets make it more intimate. So intimate that I want you to embrace my body.

buddhist temple.
in middle of forest


smells nice.
I almost bought a wind chim

So this Buddha sculpture is the largest of its kind in Korea. The sign said it dates to the Gejopa period or something. You see the sign makers are obviously not very Buddhist because they are all hot and heavy over the fact that people don't know their Korean history so they don't actually put dates on any of the signs at all the parks in Korea. They just put the period so I just gotta assume everything is really old.

I think it said he is 6meters tall.

this tree has a huge ego.. if it had an ego since Eastern philosophy doesn't believe in an ego and since this tree is Asian I can't give it shit for always checking itself out in the water although I love to criticize others and other things to inflate my ego.

yo girl. check out the custom pimped out multi-angled front wheel support. you like what you see? how about you jump on the back and i show you my world

Now that my stay is coming to end I want to say something important about my blog and my expressed opinions and views of Korea.

I live in the sticks and the sticks is different from living in the city.

Imagine growing up in Seoul and being hip to the jive and knowing the scene and feeling urban and worldly.
Then you move to a small-town-USA 1.5 hours from a major city and the only food is american food and everyone is ignorant and whitetrash. You would get pretty sick of it real fast and have some different opinions of USA right?

Okay that's important to consider when reading my blog. At least take it with a grain of salt because many of the things I talk about do occur in Seoul as well. Even so if I was living in Seoul I would probably have had much more fun and spent thousands of dollars more as well. But that's not why I came here. I didn't come to Korea to just have a good time.

However, I must remember and understand that although I look forward to all the items on my list (seen below) none of them will bring me true internal peace and bliss that knows no time limit. Yes visiting Fort Ward park on Southern Bainbridge Island or smoking a fat bowl with my friends will bring me happiness, even intense happiness and bliss, yet those events and stimulates will fade like the morning dew and the evening clouds.
They will even bring me sadness after the fact for I will long for the return of incredible happiness. This unfortunate mindset is caused by my misunderstandings of change and adhesions with worldly illusionary desires.

True happiness will not be found on that list but within myself. I already have it, we all do, but we have not realized who we are.

I stayed a day in a buddhist temple near my apartment. It was a nice cheap vacation! For breakfast (6am), lunch and dinner I ate veggies and rice. I spent most my time walking the gardens, breathing in fresh aromic air, reading buddhist texts, and meditating. I had three teachings with a monk: two while drinking tea and one in the court yard where he taught me some Tai Chi.

This is a picture of the room I stayed in. You can see the medtation pillow and the window looks out into the court yard.

After being taught some Tai Chi by a buddhist monk who is a master of Tai Chi, I moved to the top of the temple grounds to practice the move. Interestly I had already learned the move during my short study of Tai Chi at WWU. The difference is this time I learned the martial art application for the move, or what the move actually means-its hidden truth. Tai Chi is not orginally simply pretty movements that are relaxing but a deadly martial art. I knew this but few in the West know its true applications.

I enjoyed my walks in the woods between meditation. It acts as a meditation of its own. I especially enjoyed taking a long look at all the botanic diversity not found in the Seattle area.

Looks like what is in my nipple.

uhhhhh. well i guess monks have sense of humor. the big letters read chul keo oon which sounds like a korean name so maybe a monk at the temple. the message on the right I don't know what it means.. The first part is "We" and the rest I don't know....

BUT JUST THE PICTURE I MEAN COME ON!!!! HAHAHHA

Today I flaked on my climbing buddies for reasons out of my control and went to the local temple. Ended up having a tea session with a buddhist monk that I have pictures of before. Awesome dude. He's been around the world, he's driven a car from Boston to Miami, serves tea in 300 old cups from China (he said to be careful), speaks fluent English. True Buddhist in that no meat and no sex.

Sunday night after I finish climbing boulders in Insubong I'll be doing a temple stay for 2 nights from Sunday to Tuesday morning. No school Monday because it is Teachers' Day and my school is awesome and not open!

Vance Pryor ( http://www.myspace.com/anandam)
visited me in Korea from Thailand. Man has he changed. jesus.. traveling sure does weather the body. But he still has his great smile!

In 1 month, 3 weeks, and 5 days I'll be home. But things are going well here. My I CAN'T FUCKING WAIT TO GET HOME!! isn't strong anymore. Weather here is awesome, I'm eating what I love to eat since the new megastore opened down the street from my house, I am climbing so much with people I really like, and I have some great friends here - quality over quantity, and my job has become completely natural and the students really like me... maybe too much sometimes.

but anyway here is a list of things I will eat, smoke, drink, and do, as well as places I'll go when I return home in 1 month, 3 weeks, and 5 days.

Drink:
1. Kumbucha
2. New Castle beer
3. Pike Ale - IPA
4. Rasputin Stout
5. Boundary Bay Ale - scotch ale
6. Cheap organic wine

Smoke:
1. Weed

Eat:
1. burritos
wraps
veggy burgers
annies dressing
couscous
chinese buns
Vietnamese sandwich
thai food
veggy dogs

Go to:
bloudel reserve
baltic room
siagon deli
bellingham coop
madison market
warroom
the globe
jesse's dad's house
toad lake
sehome hill
chuckanut beaches
the Fin
point no point
zietgiest
lighthouse cafe
peppy's house
fort ward
vancouver
squamish
stone gardens
kissaten
casa que pasa
black cat
emmy's
asian veggy market
triple door
pike ale house
boundary bay (reggae night)
nature reserve beach (hansville)
lost lake
the locks
cafe flora
broadway
zion's gate
respect records
gorditos
maharaja (that indian restaurant on pike)
top deck of ferry
Blakely elementary school
secret beach deck near battle point
Bellingham food bank
atlas clothing
zebra club
central market in Pousbo
stumbling monk

To do:
smell fresh seattle air (not that Korea doesn't have sweet pine tree air sometimes)
dance with friends
ride my cannondale road bike
drive my mom's car
climb rocks with friends
climb rocks alone
hug friends and family
swim
inhale herbal smoke
DJ and listen to my vinyl
listen to my party speakers
listen to my studio monitor speakers
play jazz with jonah
inspect my new crash pad
cook
air hockey with alicia
huge french press of mate with Skyler
Sauna with friends at jesse's dad's house - thanks Ken :)
Play with Cisco and run through grand forest with Cisco
Play with my mom's dogs
Show off my korean language skillzzz
sleep in my feather bed
camping
beach fires
visit old WWU professors
read many books from the library on political issues
register for classes
resole my la sportiva climbing shoes
take jesse and mac to dinner for loaning me a bunch of money last winter
read old college notebooks
review powerpoint
walk

Many many buildering going on in this country. Although we must recognize I'm the only one participating in the sport.

So we go to the "white ghetto" also know as Itaewon. This is where the USA military base is. There are many knifings, rapings, and human trafficing going on in this area. FUN!

But they got some bombass middle-eastern food where you can puff on some apple.. WORD.

YA DAN. YOU CELEBRATE BUDDHA'S BIRTHDAY WITH THAT NAP CHAMPA INCENSE. YOU JUMP IN THE AIR LIKE A FLOATING BUDDHA CHILD!