Mood: Cheery again
Music: More of the singing from the lobby with the out of tune piano...
I actually managed to make breakfast today! Hurrah... I was given a menu and picked the 'beef and leaf thick soup' which turned out to be very nice, if a little spicy. That much chili for breakfast isn't most people's idea of a good start to the day, but it seemed to wake me up and clear my nose at the same time!
We set out on the drive across town to the Mt. Namsam park area. This has a set of paths leading up through pine woods to the ridge along the peak of hill. The park has 57 temples, over a hundred tombs and many statues and carvings of Buddha made from its granite rock. Several of the status were destroyed/beheaded in the Confusianist period of Korean history. Several also remain with their heads put back in their original places.
The walk was a few kilometers up hill, passing several sites of interest on the way. We also passed many locals walking up and down the hill. The thing that stands out about this is the way that many of the ladies wear sun hats and also masks which cover most of their faces. This is, according to my guide, to avoid getting tanned at all. That is because beauty is seen in those with lighter skin in these parts of the world. Whereas when the sun comes out in the UK everyone clamors to expose every last inch of skin to get a tan... here they all cover up to avoid getting one.
After we reached the top we had a bit of a look around and then headed back down by a different route. At the bottom we stopped for lunch in a place that specialises in hand made noodles. These were served with some of the normal condiments but also some green chili peppers. I was initially quite wary of these until Trueman took one and bit in after dipping it in the bean paste sauce. It turned out that the chilies were incredibly mild, just above a bell pepper and rather tasty. After asking were these not hot my guide suggested we could get some hot chili too... Most people know that I'm not one to turn down a challenge that involves chilies (so I've lost a few in my time but I have taken part). I bit into the chili and chewed it for a while in the side of my mouth and thought not much of it until I started to swallow. From that point forward anything other than water that I put in my mouth released more of the burning hot chili onto my taste buds!
Most of the rest of the meal tasted of chili alone, but it was nice both before and after this. Being a creamy sauce over noodles, eaten with chopsticks, things did not end too well for the black jumper I was wearing. I really need to practice eating noodles using chopsticks without spraying blobs of sauce everywhere!
In the afternoon we visited a number of other sites, both around the other side of Mt. Namsan and further afield, including one which is apparently on many of the Korean tourist guides. The photo in the guide books is taken in the middle of the summer when the Lotus flowers are all blossoming in the middle of the pond.
Later on we visited the Seoguram Grotto, which I had failed to visit yesterday. It contains the most spectacular stone sitting Buddha that was hidden for hundreds of years and only found again during the Japanese occupation almost 100 years ago. The grotto dates from ~800AD and also houses several large statues guarding the doors around the main Buddha.
After seeing this I was dropped off back at my hotel for the evening.
Tomorrow I say goodbye to Trueman and fly to the island of Jeju for a couple of days before returning to Seoul.
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