Korea - Land of the Morning Calm

I’m back in Korea. South Korea. Seoul, South Korea, to be precise. Yongsan Army Base, Seoul, South Korea, to be perfectly precise and exact.

If you can’t tell, I’ve been reading Kenny Mayne’s book, “An Incomplete & Inaccurate History of Sport*.” That was probably supposed to be italicized, not in quotes. I should know better with my publishing background. But at least I put the period INSIDE the quotes, where it belongs. Kenny really throws us a curve by putting that asterisk in there. Thanks Kenny. I barely know how to spell asterisk let alone how to combine it with a period and quotes at the end of a title of a book.

Anyways, continuing with Mr. Mayne’s format, I will now go backwards in time.

I came back from Japan on the C-40 with the Republic of Korea (ROK) Navy officers where were there with me. C-40 is the fancy military term for a Boeing 737. All I can say is that’s it’s a lot nicer than a C-130. For one thing, there’s a pressurized cabin. And comfortable seats. We flew over Mt. Fuji, so I finally got to see something of mountain I climbed halfway up the previous weekend. On the flight I finally showed some of my ROK Navy buddies what I used to do at nossaTV. They are pretty tech savvy and thought it was cool.

Got to the airport in Gimhae, which is also spelled Jimhae sometimes, but the ICAO identifier is PUS as its really the airport for Busan. Not confusing in the least. We confused the people waiting for us even more by pulling into a different part of the base. The CNFK Detachment in Chinhae sent a ROK driver to come pick me up. Once we connected at the Base Ops office where the plane parked, I said my good-byes to the ROK Navy guys and headed over to the main terminal, where I still had to go through customs. It was all on my own honor to go do that. I thought that was funny. “Hello, yes, I just flew into your country on a military jet and thought I would voluntarily stop by to let you know I have nothing to declare, thank you!”

The ROK driver, you could almost say chauffeur, brought me to the KTX station in Busan (for the record, the ROK’s now call it Busan, but the old translation was Pusan). I bought my ticket then waited three trains until it was my turn. It’s a very efficient system, but since it was a Friday afternoon the first two trains were sold out.

First weekend back I just reacquainted myself with the base here. As I said, its called Yongsan Army Garrison. Maybe I called it ‘base’ before. In reality, everyone calls it ‘post’ in the Army. There are two sides, Main Post where everyone works and where the Exchange is, and South Post where everyone lives and containing the Commissary, the movie theater, and the Dragon Hill Lodge. Which is apparently a 5-star hotel. It’s just down the path from my unaccompanied officers’ berthing. I go there to use the wireless Internet. I’ve also made use of its restaurants, pubs, mini-exchange (chips and soda, Ben & Jerry’s), café (white chocolate mocha), cleaners, and phones. There’s also a Galaga game. I went to play it once, but it takes FOUR quarters now, and I only had two. What has the world come to? At least I don't have to pay for gas over here.

Anyways, if you want to know more about the base, or post, or garrison, you can go to the links I posted earlier. If you go to www.cnfk.navy.mil/mission you can download a very large PowerPoint brief and pretend like you are in the Navy and thinking about coming to Korea on orders. Somewhere on the USFK site, which is probably www.usfk.mil or www.usfk.army.mil (since its pretty much an Army command) there’s probably a link where you can download the Seoul Survivor. That’s a book you can get here on Post/Garrison/Base, but its really for Army people who are thinking about coming here, or more likely ARE coming here on orders. So it would make sense for it to be online somewhere. I told Katie to look for it so she can brush up on her Korean. And find a place to run. ‘Cause you know Katie likes to run, and this base isn’t too big. And I don’t want her running on the streets. You’ll see why when I get to the GMAT story.

Anyways (I like saying that when returning from a tangent), I spent the first weekend kind of getting settled into my “hooch.” The guys brought me here Friday night and gave me the keys, some sheets, and towels. The rest was up to me. There’s a kitchen with a microwave, but no pots or pans or utensils. And there’s a refrigerator. And two AC units. I use the one in the sitting room, where I’m sitting and typing this right now. Though it helps to turn the AC off when you’re in the room. That’s something we learned in Hartford. Too much noise if you’re trying to sleep.

The first week back was short because the 4th of July was on Friday. I went to work, and crammed like crazy for the GMAT. But I also spent a considerable amount of time trying to convince the GMAC and the testing center here to even let me TAKE the exam without my passport as identification. You see, we don’t travel on our passports in the military. You should probably have one, but you don’t need it. Except to take the GMAT. So apparently this had “never happened before” and was “extremely unusual.” Of course I was caught in the whole IT nightmare of no civilian e-mail at work (blocked), no working .mil e-mail at work, no way to call the Asian office for GMAC (I could only call the U.S. with my calling card), and it was always middle of the night in the States when I had time to call them. Somehow we got everything all sorted out via e-mail eventually.

GMAT day. The night before I decided to take a study break and go watch a movie down at the theater. Not too far away. As I was walking down the road one of the CNFK officers and his family were on their way to the Navy Club for Mongolian BBQ night. They invited me along. So I hopped in the car and enjoyed Mongolian for my study break. Just about everyone at CNFK was there that night. This place is like a small town. Plus everyone else on the base loves the Navy Club. Great food, and they’ve had a history of great entertainment there as well.

Anyways (there I go again), GMAT day I had to get up early and take the subway a few stops over to the test center. Then I had to find the test center. The directions were something like “get off the subway, exit #4, go forward past the media center building, turn right and look for the red building.” Luckily, those directions were actually adequate. It helps that everything over here is labeled in English. Kind of like how everything in the U.S. is subtitled in Spanish now. In Korea, it’s mostly because of the 1988 Olympics.

So to start the day, I’m walking outside the base to the nearest subway stop and I come upon a horrible accident. Keep in mind its Friday, July 4th, but it’s Korea, so they are all going to work like normal. They actually work Saturdays here, too. For some reason they don’t celebrate our independence. They have gatherings about our delicious beef, though. Rallies even.

This accident was unreal. All that was left was one car, but it was completely wrapped around a telephone pole. It must have been hit by a truck at like 60 mph. The telephone pole was where the driver’s seat was. It may have been a U.S. driver, since there were some Army cops watching over it. They had the whole sidewalk taped off, but that didn’t stop Koreans (and myself) from politely and gingerly ducking the “Police Line – Do Not Cross” tape they had blocking the sidewalk.

Koreans drive a little crazy over here, needless to say. One of the ROK Navy guys explained the stop signs here. They are really just yield signs, even at a four-way stop. You’re supposed to know which street is bigger, or primary, and yield to that one. Kind of like a round-about. And stop LIGHTS are sometimes treated as stop SIGNS. Especially by motorcycles and mopeds, which there are a lot of. And then the mopeds just drive on the sidewalks half the time to really avoid the traffic and any semblance of rules. Crazy!

So I take the GMAT, get a 690, which is 88th percentile, and then just kind of relax the rest of the weekend. I think I went out to dinner in Itaewon Sunday night. Otherwise just got caught up on my own stuff. Got all my UConn application stuff done. Even got my recommendation letters arranged. Followed up on some civilian job opportunities. The nuclear power industry is starting to hire again, might be some promise there. I was fortunate to network quite a bit in Japan with the other Reservists there.

We had Monday of last week off, too, so that made for a long weekend. On Sunday I went and checked out the War Memorial Museum next to Yongsan. It’s right next door, and only $3 to get in. I ran out of time before we went out to dinner, so I went back on Monday to walk around the outside.

Tuesday of last week LT Dave and myself went down to visit the Navy Base we have down in Chinhae. It’s really easy to get to via train. We have a driver take us to the KTX station then just ride the train right to the city or town of Chinhae. Then it’s just a short walk to the base. The U.S. base is adjacent to the ROK Navy base, which is apparently their largest. We met the guys down about business, and Dave showed me around. He was there for a few weeks in the fall for another planning effort. We will all be down there in August for the big exercise. Almost my entire reserve unit will be coming out, as well. A couple are going to other locations, but nearby, also in the south.

Link to album of Chinhae photos on Photobucket
Slideshow

There was a “Hail and Farewell” on Tuesday night, so when we got back I diligently walked next door to the Burke Towers where it was being held. I remember hating those events so much during my time on the Shiloh. But this was much more relaxing. Probably because I didn’t hate the people I work with. I haven’t worked there long enough yet! Or maybe because I’m only one or two ranks away from everyone now. But seriously, the Admiral is pretty cool, and so are the O-6 Navy Captains at the command. Helps that they aren’t all SWOs.

The party was in someone’s apartment up on the third floor, and these towers are already up on a pretty substantial hill with a great view of the city. And it just happened to be the first clear night since I’d been back. Beautiful view of the skyline. So I went back and grabbed my camera and tried to take some photos, half drunk and without a tripod. Oh well, it was beautiful in person.

Link to album of Seoul Skyline photos on Photobucket.
Slideshow

Needless to say, last week was a little short. Things are a little hectic in the Plans shop and my boss is going on leave this week. So I’m getting thrust into the limelight. This weekend I’m getting started on my last course from Naval Postgraduate School. Hopefully I’ll have this done before I check outta here at the end of August. That will be a nice feeling. Kind of like finishing the GMAT.

Once again, I’ll try to write more often. And share some pictures, one way or another. Check out the article (below) where Katie was quoted. We talked for like two hours today. Or more like chatted, and she got to overhear a Korean-American ESL lesson going on at the next table over. One adult and about 4 kids. Well, you win some you lose some.

At least we talked about of bunch of vacation ideas. I think we’ll stick close to home here in Seoul. Just go and see the sights here, go out to dinner every night. Go running 8 miles every morning, read our blogs, and watch lots of ESPN ☺

Cheers,
Mike