More Backpacks than Blue Jeans -- Korea: Triptitaka Koreana and a Random Day

So this weekend started normally. Friday was Tom's last night so we went to the WaBar to say bye. Everyone was there and it was a good night -- and I left pretty early 1ish.

Today (Saturday) started normally as well. I had made plans with Becky and Sam to go to Deagu and then to see the Triptitaka Koreana -- an important set of Buddhist wood block carvings. We caught the bus no problem and headed to Deagu. When we arrived in Daegu things started to get weird. We had to take another bus to get into the city from the station. When it arrived the bus driver got out and started yelling at an old lady waiting to get on -- very strange, we just stood back and waited to see what was going to happen. About 5 minutes later he let everyone (including the old woman) onto the bus. Now although I have been to Daegu several times I have rarely gone straight from Osan, so I am not used to looking for where to get off the bus, therefore we ended up getting off a couple of stops early. This turned out to be a good thing, 'cause there was a nice looking church there, so we went to take a look around. It was really pretty and huge -- in comparison to the usually small churches that are EVERYWHERE. The common ones are normal buildings with glowing red crosses, but this church was more traditional in looks, and very large.

From there we headed in the direction of the downtown. We ended up in the shopping area by Daegu station, and wandered down many random streets. At the beginning of the shopping area we came across the Boobie bus ... No joke!

Near the boobie bus was what appeared to be an anti-Bush petition signing, with great movie posters that had Bush photoshopped into them.

Next we went down a side street selling blood sausage (normal) and steamed pig liver -- a little odd even for Korea.

Next it was on to an info booth to figure out what to do, and get a recommendation and note for a jimjilbong to stay at. We also asked about the local cuisine, as every city in Korea is known for a different kind of food. It was now about 5 so we decided to wander a bit more. As we headed back through the shopping district we came across a group of dancers, some wearing rain coats with x's on masks over their mouths (very odd) -- That's all I can say as we never figured out what the significance was.

Then we found the herbal medicine street (Daegu is a major shopping city). It smelled great, but we didn't know what anything was. We turned down another street full of beautiful tea shops. There we met a crazy man who wanted to be my 'good friend' after finding out Becky was married -- so it was time to move on.

It was now time to find food which was a ways away. We decided to keep walking, it had been good for us so far. So we did, and at one point we had to take an underpass, which lead into a mall. As we walked through the mall looking for a way out we came across a body building contest -- very funny. Most of the guys looked like they has known about the contest and had been preparing. They were oiled and tanned and wearing speedos, but one guy was as light skinned as Koreans come and was wearing shorts, with them tucked up around the edges, very funny.

From that point on the walk to the restaurant was less interesting, although we did magically end up coming across a number of monuments and such, which was cool.

For dinner we had galbi jjim (we have recently learned that jjim means cooked in a double boiler). We went into the most crowded restaurant on the street figuring it was the best -- and it was good. The meal had more garlic in it than I usually eat in a week -- and I like garlic -- yummy!

From there we went to a DVD room to watch a move -- Swing Girls it is Japanese -- and quite funny. Then ice cream and finally we got in a cab to go to the jimjilbong that the info woman had told us about. At this point things got funny again. The woman said the place was only a ew minutes walk from Daegu station, but we seemed to be driving far. We went further and further we realized that we were not heading where we had planned on going -- we had no idea where we were. We did end up at 'a' jimjilbong, but none of the outside signs said that and inside, there were machines with tickets, no person -- all very complex. It is a very basic sauna, but a large jimjilbong area, with a space that looks like it is an outdoor pool in the summer. That is where I am writing this from. It turns out we are very close to where we need to be tomorrow morning so all is good :)

The next morning we relaxed as we didn't fall asleep very early. We stayed in the strangest jimjilbong ever, and on top of that there was a huge group of teenaged boys there with no supervision making noise 'till about 3 or 4 am! The sleeping platform was made of metal (with wood on top) so every time the boys came up and walked around they made tons of noise -- uugh! Oh well they finally went to sleep and so did we, but that explains not getting up until 9.

We took a cab straight to the bus terminal for Heiansa, where the Triptitaka is. The Triptitaka is a collection of 800 year old Buddhist woodblock carvings. There are thousands of the blocks stored at the one temple. It is a World Cultural Heritage site because of the significance of the blocks. Going to see the Triptitaka has been on my list of things to do since I arrived back in January (after Christmas). And I wasn't disappointed. The blocks were amazing to see. Stacked on 6 shelves, each stacked 2 high in long rooms full of shelves.

You cannot touch them, but they do have one on display to see, and another that you can get a copy of the print (I didn't 'cause I was too big to go in my scrapbook, and otherwise I wouldn't know what to do with it).

It is just amazing to think about the amount of time that went into making them. Also their ability to create the buildings that hold them is fascinating.

In the last 10 years (or so) the Korean government tried to build modern buildings to hold the blocks, but when they were moved they started to grow mold, so they moved them back into the original buildings, built more than 800 years ago.

The bus took us almost all of the way to the temple which was nice it was only a short climb from the road. The temple itself was very nice as most of the buildings were very old. The buildings that hold the triptitaka have amazingly escaped both Japanese occupations, and an accidental fire. Making them some of the oldest temples in Korea.