no rest for the sleepless

Jetlag continues... but as much as I can't sleep at night, my days seem to fill themselves up. Yesterday we went into Gwangju, the nearest big city of about 1.3 million people, with the other english teachers from our school. Nobody knew what we were going to be doing, besides that we were going to get a chance to wear traditional Korean clothing. I did not expect what the next 12 hours would bring.

We took a bus and then the subway into the city and got off at a stop called the 'Provincial Office'. There was a stage set up there and people were rehearsing for a festival that would gear up later. We made our way into a building and up to a room where a few other english teachers had come for whatever it is that we would be doing. Once ready, we followed someone down to the street and into a van, where we were told that we were to visit a famous graveyard. After a long drive into the country, we finally came to a huge memorial site that we would come to know as the National May 18 Cemetery for the Gwangju Democratic Uprising of 1980.

I did not expect the impact that this place was to have on me. This monument was built over a decade after the massacre of hundreds of people, mostly university and high school students, that gathered to demand the democratization of Korea's government after the assassination of it's dictator in 1980. The place they had made their last stand was the 'Provincial Office' where I had gotten off the subway. The people's struggle against the authoritarian regime that ruled over them finally succeeded in establishing a democratic government a decade later. In 1994, the government started working to recover the bodies of the victims from desecrated and unmarked grave sites in the surrounding areas. After the protesters had been dispersed, imprisoned or killed by the military, the government worked for years to erase the event from history through misinformation and suppression of free speech. When this regime finally fell, its leaders were put on trial and convicted for life, but were quietly released months later and those responsible for the massacre were never disclosed. The day of May 18 was chosen as a national holiday to remember this event and what it stands for.

There was something heinously real about this whole experience that struck me more deeply than any commemorated occasion from my own history. It was not a bitter or depressing experience, but a hopeful one. May 18 was not the day that the new government took power from the old, or the day that the forces of good triumphed over those of evil. It was a movement led by people with a conviction that their government should protect them, not hinder or suppress them. It was a movement that was quelled and its participants disgraced. But as the movement died, its purpose gestated in the hearts and minds of Koreans until almost a decade later when its purpose was finally achieved. Throughout the country, the people demanded that those who fought in the days around May 18, 1980 be honored for their role in establishing a government that would truly represent the South Korean people.

Anyways. We were told that there was going to be a concert at this site, and so sat down with several hundred other people to watch a Korean boy-band and a magic show. It was then that we were asked if we would be willing to go on stage and say a little bit about ourselves and our experience in Korea. I still had not slept much at this point, but I felt that I should participate in an experience that had otherwise been without any cost. Leta didn't want to, but I went up with a few other english and japanese speaking people to say "Hello, my name is Adam Smith. I am from America. I just arrived in Korea two days ago. It is an honor to stand at such an important site for the Korean peoples struggle for freedom. I look forward to enjoying more of your beautiful country." Then, they set up microphone stands for all of us and we were told to sing along with a song that none of us had heard before. So I stood there looking like a dufus and before long we left the stage. After us was another band (with more musical talent than the boy-band) that included an electric violinist. I'd never seen one of those before.

So, it was at this point that were finally invited to try on some traditional Korean clothing. Mine was pink. We had our picture taken in this clothing in front of the big monument and put it into a guestbook. Then, we were driven back into the city and dropped off at the Provincial Hall. At this point, the "6th Bienniele Gwangju Festival 2006" was in full swing, and there was a dance-off between two teams of five breakdancers on the main stage. We all decided to go eat dinner and so we plunged into the masses of people that filled the downtown streets to the brim. We ate at an Italian (themed) restaurant that had some pretty fantastic pizza and pasta and stuff, where I ate my first Korean-style communal meal. They threw a bunch of different pizzas, pastas, salads, cakes, etc in front of us until we were stuffed.. and in the end it cost as much as a value meal from A&W.

After we were finished, we plunged back into the crowds. We stopped for awhile at a soju bar and for the other teachers to shop for make-up and engrish clothes. The streets only got more and more crowded as the night went on and of the million-odd people I saw that night, I was the tallest. Normally, I hate shopping malls full of people milling around... but walking through the packed streets with cars pushing through the crowds at a snails pace was invigorating. It's hard not to understate how exhilirating the whole experience was, as I tried to piece together the day that had been so full of unique experiences. The trip home seemed long, and once there Leta was relieved to find that she HAD actually locked our apartment door and that all the worry had been for nothing. Then I fell asleep.

I want to mention a few more things that have struck me as strange about Korea. First, Koreans count their age different than what I thought was the standard way of doing so. Their age includes time spent in the womb, so once they are born they are almost a year old. Also, everyones age changes on the lunar new year. This way, I suppose, it is easier for people to be friends only with people their own age as is customary here. Second, in Korea there are often dozens of buildings in clusters that are identical. My apartment is one of 16+ identical dozen-story buildings in the same complex. On our trip down from the airport, I saw what seemed to be hundreds of identical buildings in such complexes. You can tell these buildings apart only from the gigantic numbers inscripted on the sides. The reason for this is that construction, like other industries in Korea, is a very corporate business. Companies like LG and Samsung are producers of all types (yes, all) of goods and when they implement a building project, they do so in mass. Third, there are multiple channels on television here devoted entirely to 'gaming'. At any time of day, you can watch people compete in any number of games... the most popular of which is Starcraft (which has got to be at least a decade old by now). Players sit in front of big bulky monitors on two sides of a stage in front of a live audience, and as the players rush each other with their armies, there are often smoke and light effects that crowd the stage. There are also announcers that get really excited when one player manages to kill a strategically important unit. I don't need to understand what anyone is saying to be thoroughly amused by these channels.

Now I've got to prepare for my lessons.