Max's Visit - Friday, Saturday, and Sunday

As most of you know, my brother Max came to visit me this past week to, in the words of Will Ferrell in Step Brothers, "f*** s*** up." It was good timing as Brenda was heading back to Snohomish/Seattle for a week so living arrangements would be less cramped. His flight arrived Friday night so Brenda and I hopped the KTX immediately after work and met him at our usual hotel in Itaewon. Being that we arrived late, the only thing we had a chance to see was Itaewon's selection of foreigner bars, kebab shops, and drunken white people.

The next morning we woke up determined to do something cultural. So, we headed to Gyeongbokgung Palace, the grandest palace in Seoul (admission priced at a very reasonable 3,000 won). At the main gate a number of guys were dressed in traditional Korean garb, doing something I didn't understand but I would guess is vaguely Korean. The interior consisted of a number of open courtyards. In fact, I was somewhat confused as to what made this a "palace" as I didn't really see any places that people could live. Admission included a free visit to the Korean Folk Museum, which like all museums in Korea was interesting and very well-organized.

(Palace Pictures)

At that point Max broke off to visit the National Museum, while I escorted Brenda to the airport. Word of advice: don't take the airport "limousine" (more accurately described as "bus"). It took significantly longer to arrive than advertised, largely because the driver seemed to be circling certain areas hoping extra fares would hop on. We showed up at the airport with 30 minutes to spare before Brenda's flight. We raced to the Standby counter, where the Korean Airlines attendant asked merely "Late?" Indeed. Brenda checked in at record pace and flew towards security, which mercifully is more efficient and less absurd than American security by a significant margin. I hopped back onto the "limousine" for Itaewon. All in all, it was a 4.5 hour round-trip. Max was tired and we had plans for the next day so we grabbed a couple of beers and called it an early night.

Our plans were to attend "Mudfest," AKA The Boryeong Mud Festival, a yearly event in which tons of mud are dumped in the seaside town and Koreans and foreigners alike do their best impressions of hippy burnouts at Woodstock. We had heard rave reviews from my friends who attended on Saturday so we decided to board a free bus my school provided on Sunday. After checking out of the hotel bright and early, however, we were greeted by a torrential downpour which soaked us to the skin in seconds. Undeterred, we rode the subway for 45 minutes to reach the meeting point for the bus. The majority of Seoul teachers were not as hardy as us. 70 people RSVP'd for the two buses, and maybe 15 showed up. The trip was cancelled accordingly, and Max and I trudged back to the subway en route to Seoul Station and then Daejeon. It was for the best really, as the downpour killed pretty much all activity at Mudfest and my friends left early Sunday, and there were persistent rumors of swine flu and a nasty rash going around.

Additionally, the cancellation of the Mudfest trip afforded us the chance to attend a Daejeon Citizen game with regular soccer buddies Lon and Lisa. By then the rain had subsided and I bought Max a replica DCFC keeper jersey to remember his trip by. He appreciated the jersey, and the fact that you can carry unlimited amounts of beer and soju into the stadium. The game started badly, going 2-0 down at half time, but Daejeon pulled it back to 2-2. Afterwards, we headed to Eunhangdong to seek out our favorite bar, Omega, only to find it closed. So we grabbed a beer elsewhere and headed home in preparation for the week ahead.