Sunday, May 19 • Travel Day
Hi! I’m writing this entry from a hotel in Seoul. It’s not exactly where I had planned to be at this time, but it worked out this way and I’m not upset about it. You know me, I go with the flow! Alright, so I’ll just start right at the beginning of my journey here, which started on the morning of Saturday, May 18.
J-P, my boyfriend, wanted to see me off at the airport, so he had stayed over at my apartment. We got up at ~04:30 so we could be ready when the Uber driver I had scheduled in advance showed up at 05:15. My flight was scheduled for 09:15, so I wanted to be at DCA around 06:00, which meant we had to leave my apartment VERY early. Everything went well with the Uber ride, and J-P and I walked to the security line together. He even took pictures of me while we were waiting in line. I already had my boarding pass and wasn’t checking my bag, so that made things easy.
J-P stayed in line with me right up until I was close to the TSA workers, which was nice. All of that went smoothly and quickly as well. Everything went so quickly that I ended up at my gate 2 hours before the boarding time. I was pretty hungry, but luckily the cafe next to my gate was open so I was able to enjoy some hella overpriced avocado toast and fruit.
The whole time I was sitting there eating, it was raining. I honestly expected my flight to be delayed or even canceled because my weather app said there would be thunderstorms. I wasn’t super anxious about that though because I knew that if my flight to Toronto was delayed to the point where I missed my connection to Seoul, 1) my host would understand, and 2) I would be able to call on my extended family in Toronto to help me.
Well, miracle of miracles, none of that needed to happen because it stopped raining shortly before my plane started boarding! Bless up. The only thing I didn’t like was the fact that I was forced to check my carry-on because the plane was too small to hold it. I hadn’t wanted to check a bag because I didn’t want to have to wait too long to get down to Gurye—the town where my host lives—right after my arrival. Oh, well. Luckily, they checked it for free.
The flight went super smoothly and I slept pretty much the whole way. Cool. The Toronto airport is so big (in my opinion), so it took me a while to find the gate for my connecting flight. Even when I did, though, I still had like 2 hours before boarding, so I walked around a little bit while talking on the phone to my parents and J-P. While I was talking to J-P, I suddenly stumbled upon something that literally made my entire morning: vegan gummy candy!!! Coincidentally, I had recently been looking (to no avail) for good candy like that because I used to love gummies before I went vegetarian, but traditional gummies use gelatin, which is made of crushed-up animal parts ☹️🤢. Seeing the Katjes gummies out of the blue made me so happy and I bought them immediately. I told J-P that on my way back through Toronto I would buy him some too. They are so good! They taste just like regular gummies! I didn’t finish the whole bag so I put the rest in my backpack.
I was getting hungry again, but I knew I would get a lot of airplane food on the 15-hour flight to Korea, so I just bought a slice of pizza and some fruit from places in the airport. I also bought some travel-sized sunscreen when I realized I hadn’t brought my own. It was gonna be really sunny in my area of Korea for most of the trip, according to my weather app.
Then, I realized I didn’t have a gift to give my host upon arrival! I decided to buy some Canadian maple syrup, which I will also buy for myself when I come back through. The cashier wrapped it up really nicely for me.
J-P called me again before I boarded and we talked all the way up until I sat down in my nice window seat. I fell asleep again almost immediately, and when I woke up, the flight attendants were already giving out the first meal! I was grateful to the woman next to me who had opened my tray table and put my food in front of me while I was asleep.
I decided to watch the movie The Book of Clarence on my seat’s TV screen, but it took me a very long time to get through it because I would fall asleep, wake up while the movie was still playing, pause it so I could go back to sleep, wake back up thinking I had the energy to keep watching it, then fall asleep again! I think it took me 7 hours to actually finish the movie. Verdict: it was okay. I didn’t really get the point of it, but the acting was good. I also watched the first episode of the 3rd season of A Black Lady Sketch Show, but I wasn’t into it enough to keep watching and I fell asleep again.
I didn’t realize we would get 2 more meals on the flight but I absolutely was not complaining. My favorite was my frittata and breakfast potatoes. I liked my spicy cheese and red pepper sandwich, too, but it was a bit too much food so I packed it in my backpack along with one of the cookies they gave me (vegan s’mores), a muffin, and Biscoff cookies. I still plan on eating those.
In between naps, I checked the cool animated flight map and looked out the window a lot. What was really cool was that the sun stayed in the sky the entire flight. It never set for the whole 15 hours, and it stayed in pretty much the same spot from where I could see it outside my widow. It was an interesting phenomenon.
I started to read Dixon, Descending (which my godmother, Karen Outen, wrote) towards the last hour of the trip. I couldn’t sleep anymore because I was so excited to finally land in South Korea! When we landed at around 16:40 local time, I couldn’t stop smiling. I was finally in an Asian country for the first time in my life! But there was still a lot to do before I got to my final destination.
Passport check and customs were uneventful, but the baggage claim that I had wanted to avoid took like 30 minutes. Also at baggage claim, I realized that I didn’t have the maple syrup I had bought in Canada :(. It had fallen out of my pocket while I was on the plane. I knew my host would understand, though.
Once I retrieved my suitcase, I got some won from an ATM and bought a bus ticket to Seoul. I’ve mentioned this before, but y’all. We are so blessed to know English. Every sign had an English translation on it. It was absolutely zero trouble getting my money and bus ticket and getting on the bus. While waiting in line for the bus, I ended up talking to a woman whom I had briefly spoken to in line for the bathroom on the airplane. I told her I was visiting a host family all the way down south in Gurye, but I didn’t give all the details about farming and stuff. Apparently, I had been pronouncing Gurye wrong the whole time. I had been saying GOO-ree-yay, but it’s actually more like GOO-ray. I’m glad she corrected me lol. The woman was with her husband and they were visiting family for 2 weeks in Korea and then going on a 1-week vacation in Japan. I told them I have never been to Japan (or Asia at all before now), and they said they have never been to Japan either, so they are excited. One interesting coincidence is that they live in Fairfax, VA, right outside of D.C.! I told them I work in D.C. and the husband told me that their daughter works in D.C. for the government! Cool!
We all got on the bus together but they were going to the end of the line whereas I got off at Seoul Station. The ride was 1 hour, but it just felt really long to me. I’d done so much sitting and traveling already and I still wasn’t close to being done.
When I got to my stop, I saw that the actual station was across about 4 streets of traffic from where the bus dropped me off. Okay, whatever.
Oh, one thing I forgot to mention was that once we got into the center of Seoul, I saw the HYBE building. HYBE is one of the companies that produces K-pop stars. Nice!
Anyway, I made my way over to the station carefully. If I were in the U.S., I would’ve jaywalked and zoomed across the lanes so fast, but I didn’t want to call attention to myself so I waited patiently for my turn to cross. Lol.
When I got to the station, I used the website Rome2Rio to help me understand exactly how I could get to where I needed to go. My host also has instructions for how to get to Gurye from Seoul on his WWOOF website profile, so that was helpful too.
My first option was to try and take a train straight from Seoul to Gurye station. Unfortunately, the electric ticket kiosk informed me that train tickets to Gurye station were sold out for the day. Boo. Oh, well. The other option was to take a bus from Nambu City Bus Terminal. I looked up how to get there from Seoul station and I ended up having to take the subway there. I had to go from the 4 line and transfer to the 3. Okay, I could do that.
I went to the subway ticket machine and I had to select exactly what station I was getting off at before it charged me. Okay, that’s something I don’t have to do in D.C. I tried to pay with cash, but the machine wasn’t taking all the money I was giving it, seemingly because my denominations were too big. I figured I’d just go ask one of the shops around the station to give me some smaller denominations. Before I rushed off to do that, though, a man at the kiosk next to me started loudly complaining, in English, about how he was just ₩1,000 short of the money he needed to get where he was trying to go, and he asked me if I could give him one of my ₩1,000 bills in exchange for some USD he had. He only had Chinese yuan and USD in his wallet and had apparently had trouble getting the ATM in the station to accept his card to get more cash. I was like, dude, I’m also trying to get the right amount of money for myself. I told him I was American, too (I had assumed he was because of his accent), but I didn’t need USD right now. He said, “I’m actually Canadian.” Whoops. Well, we’re both North American!
Anyway, he said that since we were both looking for cash, we could go together on our search. Alright, whatever.
The first 2 shops we went into couldn’t help with either of our requests, but a cashier at the second one told us to try the station’s convenience store. That one ended up being the store that gave me smaller denominations! Yay! But my Canadian partner did not have the same luck. He could not exchange his USD or yuan at the convenience store. All of a sudden, I was just like, wait. ₩1,000 is such a small amount of money, and I have more than enough to get myself where I need to go. I finally decided to just give the guy ₩1,000 from my own wallet and we were good to go. He was so grateful, and in exchange, he gave me 5 bucks. I wasn’t sure exactly what that was equal to in won, but I was just like, ok dude, thanks. (I looked it up later and found out that ₩1,000 is equal to 72¢. I guess I made a pretty good return on my nice deed!)
We went back to our kiosks and he was quickly able to get his ticket. he thanked me profusely and said, “Good things will happen to you.” I thought that was such a nice thing to say.
After that, I realized that without the ₩1,000 I had just given away, I didn’t have exact change for my own metro card anymore. Oof, lol. I went back to the convenience store and asked the guy at the register if he could change my ₩10,000 bill for 10 ₩1,000 bills. He, unfortunately, did not have that much cash in the register. Dang. For some reason, I just decided to go back to the kiosk and try again with my largest denomination, which was ₩50,000. Now, tell me why that worked perfectly, lmao. But, oh! I almost forgot to mention that when I was about to go to the convenience store the second time, some random guy started sneaking up behind me and tried to snatch my ₩1,000 bill from the kiosk! Bro?! Luckily, I got my money before he did. Like, chill, dude.
Anyway, I finally found my way to the proper metro stop and made my way to Nambu Bus Terminal. It took like 30 minutes with the transfer. The metro was very quiet. People weren’t talking on their phones and there was certainly nobody blasting music from speakers and dancing in the aisle as is often the case in D.C. and New York. Mostly, people were glued to their phones scrolling or watching videos.
I got to the bus station at around 20:00, and I had a feeling it was kinda late for a bus going 3 hours away to a rural town. Well, I was right. No more buses were going to Gurye that night, and the next one wasn’t going to leave until 06:40 the next morning. Ugh. I texted my host and told him I would get a hotel for the night and try to get on the earliest bus in the morning. He understood. By the way, he only texts me in Korean so I only text him back in Korean, too. Yay for Google Translate. I had tried to study some Korean before coming on the trip, and though I learned a few phrases, nothing has been more helpful than the internet. Oh, and of course the abundance of English on signs. 🙃
I called my mom (duh) and talked to her about the situation. I really wasn’t stressed or anything. I just did what I needed to do. I was very fortunate to see on Apple Maps that there was a hotel a 7-minute walk from the station. All I had to do was walk over there and tell the receptionist I needed to stay for one night, and I was immediately set up! I paid the ₩70,000 (~$51) in cash and went up to my room. I stopped to grab some free candies from the lobby first, though, lol. The outside and the lobby of the hotel are very unassuming. No kitchen for breakfast or anything, just a table for free coffee and candies, and one woman at the reception desk. She also showed me a closet where I could grab extra towels and water bottles for free. Nice!
My room is very nice. A big TV came on right as I entered and turned on the lights, there’s a desktop computer, and the bathroom has both a shower and a bathtub. Love it. I put the food from the airplane in the fridge and set a reminder to take it out in the morning. Oh, before I forget, the receptionist gave me a little bag before I went up to my room. When I opened it, I found 2 toothbrushes, a small razor, 2 tiny toothpaste packets, a hair tie (which I actually needed, so that was cool), and, quite unexpectedly, 2 condoms. Never had that happen before, lol. Good on them for promoting safety, I guess. I kept the toothpaste, razor, and hair ties.
Then, I called my mom again and talked to her while I settled in. My parents and I talked about our day, and then we hung up around 21:00 and I took a shower. I was so sweaty and gross from going around in my sweatsuit for as long as I did, so it felt good to take a shower.
After that, I video-chatted with J-P. I told him everything and he was so happy for me that I figured out everything while being here alone and he was excited to be talking to me from the other side of the world. He also said that it was probably for the best that I got to stay in a hotel for a night because it served as a break in between all the traveling I had already done. We stopped talking at about 23:00 because I told him I wanted to write in my journal before going to sleep. Even though the bus ride tomorrow will be 3 hours, I am prone to motion sickness and didn’t want to rely on that time to write in the journal. Okay, I’m finally finishing up, and guess what time it is? 01:22! And I set my alarm for 05:15! I will sleep so hard on that bus, lol. Good night! Talk to you tomorrow after I finally get to the farm!
Monday, May 20
Hey, folks! Today was my first day at the farm. I’m writing this entry at 21:14 while listening to music. It’s my brother’s birthday. I sent him a text and a virtual card via Punchbowl. I just showered and put my retainer in. Unfortunately, I completely forgot to ask for anything shower-related (towel, soap, etc.), and everyone is in their separate rooms and I don’t have Wi-Fi in my room to text anyone and ask for stuff. Oof. All I could do was rinse off and use paper towels to dry myself off. Yeah, I know. Much sadness :(. It’s better than nothing, though. Showering at night is essential on a farm frfr.
Right now, I’m sitting on my bed next to a lamp! Yes, there’s electricity in my room! I’m even charging my phone in a full outlet. I bought an adapter like 2 years ago before I went to Curaçao, and luckily it has worked everywhere I’ve gone since then! This one adapter works in places like Morocco, Spain, and Korea, and yet the U.S.A one works almost nowhere else. Oh, U.S.A., lol.
I’m swatting away lots of different bugs as I write this, which is kind of annoying, but I put on pajamas that cover my whole legs and arms and I’ll just make sure to wrap myself tightly in my blanket. NBD.
So, anyway, let’s go back to the beginning of the day when I woke up at 05:15 at the hotel in Seoul. Everything went smoothly packing up and getting out. I called my mom when I woke up because it was evening there, but she couldn’t talk because she was out shopping with her friend. So, I called my dad next, and he was at home. He talked to me until I left the hotel around 06:00 and lost the Wi-Fi.
Luckily, because the bus station was so close by, I remembered exactly how I came and didn’t have to use my maps. I stopped at an ATM because I wanted to get more cash to cover the unexpected expense of the hotel, but it wasn’t taking my card. Maybe something similar occurred with the Canadian guy yesterday. Anyway, I knew I had enough for the bus ticket, so I just moved on.
I got to the bus station at around 06:10 and bought a ticket for the 06:40 bus to Gurye. I still had the airplane food so I ate the rest of the cheese and pepper sandwich and just a small piece of the cookie because I wanted to taste it. It was alright. Maybe it would taste better warmed up a bit.
As I ate, I called J-P. He was chilling at the Wharf after attending the running of the Chihuahuas event. I’m glad he got to go to that by himself because I would not have been interested, lol. We talked until I had to board my bus. I sat towards the back in a single seat. It was nice like the bus I took from the airport. Comfy leather seats with a lot of space. I took a couple pictures on the ride, but not too many. I also slept. About 2 hours in, we stopped at a rest stop, which was fun. I saw a shop selling clothes and I looked at some skirts, but I didn’t want to buy them. I still have time to get my Korea outfit. I looked around some more and saw 2 women selling fruit I did not recognize. It looked good and I wanted to buy some as a replacement gift for my host. A pack of 6 was ₩10,000. I told the women I would come back because I wanted to see if I could find another ATM and get more cash. And whaddya know, I did find an ATM and it took my card. Woohoo!
I went back and bought the fruit and felt happy. I was done with what I wanted to do and the break was only 15 minutes, so I just went back to the bus after that. There were a few buses at the rest stop and I had a brief moment where I was like, wait, where’s my bus? But I eventually found it, haha. I recognized how I had left the window curtain and some of the faces of other passengers.
Anyway, I hadn’t bought any food for myself at the reststop because I didn’t want to spend too much money. I was a bit hungry, though. Luckily, I had a muffin in my backpack that was also from the airplane. This stuff has lasted a while and served me well!
I didn’t sleep too much more because my mom called me and my host also called me to check in on my ETA. It’s great that the bus had Wi-Fi. I checked my Maps app and saw that we were still about an hour out from Gurye. I also texted him what I was wearing (my “Send Noods” shirt and black camo leggings) and the color of my suitcase so he could recognize me when I got there.
We arrived at the station at about 10:15 and it didn’t take long for the man who I thought was my host to find me. Turns out, it wasn’t my host, it was one of the other WWOOFers. His name is Ikje and he is in his 50’s. He told me that there are 4 of us WWOOFers, and that I would meet the other 2 when we got to the farm. He told me that although everyone eats lunch and dinner together, we eat breakfast separately, so I would have to buy my own groceries. Good thing I had gotten the extra cash! He took me to a nearby grocery store where I bought eggs, yogurt, and some more of the fruit I had gotten for my host. By the way, my host’s name is Sang Jik. Ikje also took me to a bakery because I wanted bread, too. I didn’t think about the price of it all at the time, but I looked it up later and realized I had paid over $20 for 16 cups of yogurt, 15 eggs, a bag of small fruit (which Ikje told me is called chamoe (pronounced kind of like cham-way)) and the bread. Yikes. With the amount of food I got, though, I don’t think I will need to buy any more.
Then, we finally drove about 15 minutes to the farm. Yay! Ikje told me that Sang Jik was busy, which is why he couldn’t pick me up, and I wouldn’t see him until dinner at 18:00.
Then, Ikje showed me my big room with a small bed and desk. It also has the kitchen where everyone meets for meals and before work. I guess that just means I won’t have to walk far too meet everyone in the morning, haha. Also, work is only from 07:00 to 11:00, and then we have lunch and free time. Wow!
It was about 11:00 when I got to the farm, and the other 2 WWOOFers came in from work shortly after I arrived. I met Lilli, a 19-year-old woman from Germany, and Eunsaem, a 27-year-old woman from Seoul. Oh, Ikje is also from Korea, by the way, and he is from a small town about a 4-hour drive north of here.
One thing I should mention is how awkward my first interaction with Lilli and Eunsaem was. I was so nervous about making a good impression that I ended up just making myself seem really awkward. When Lilli said she was from Germany, I was like, “Oh, cool, Guten Tag!” And she giggled and said, “You don’t have to do that.” 🙃 Then, when I asked Eunsaem where she was from, she played a joke on me and said she was from Japan. Before I tell you what I did next, I will reiterate that I was VERY nervous. I said, “Ni hao!” and immediately I covered my mouth and was like, “Oh shit that’s China!” and then I said, “I’m so sorry! I meant ‘Konnichiwa!’” And then she laughed and revealed to me that she is, in fact, Korean. 🤦🏾♀️
Anyway. Everyone is actually really nice, welcoming, and friendly. There was a guitar beside my bed when I got in and Ikje said it was his. He even played a little tune for me. I told him I would love to learn a Korean song and sing it with him sometime.
Lilli and Eunsaem (who also goes by Saemi) live in a different house from mine and Ikje lives right next to the house that Sang Jik and his wife live in. Eunsaem and Ikje are long-term WWOOFers who have been here for months! Lilli has been WWOOFing in different places in Japan and Korea while traveling during her gap year between high school and college. It’s a popular thing among WWOOFers to go during gap years. She said she didn’t have too great of an experience in Japan, which is a bummer. She has had a lovely time in SK, though!
We had to eat lunch basically right as Ikje and I came in because Eunsaem had to leave soon for her job as a barista at a nearby cafe, where she works a few times a week.
By the way, one thing I wanted to mention was that Lilli and Ikje are fluent in English, whereas Saemi is good but still learning. Ikje speaks and reads so many languages, including Latin, Ancient Greek, and Hebrew! Wow! He’s also quite a well-traveled man, but he hasn’t been to the U.S. (yet). He was low-key talking shit about America on our way to the farm from the bus station, mostly related to the bad things Trump has done. I didn’t agree with everything he said about the U.S. in general, but obviously we found common ground in complaining about Trump, lol. He also said that the president of Korea is “dumb and stupid.” Oop.
Also, over lunch, I asked Saemi if she liked K-pop, and she said that while it’s not her favorite type of music, she’s happy that a part of Korean culture has become so famous worldwide. Nice.
After we ate a yummy lunch of rice, beans, kimchi, nori, and a vegetable that comes from a vine that I did not recognize, we had some of the chamoe for dessert. There were 2 rice cookers on the shelf next to us, and Ikje told me I could boil eggs in one of them. I hope he will show me how to do that soon so I can eat the eggs I bought.
Then, Ikje told me I could rest for a while until Sang Jik came back. First, though, he drove me to his and Sang Jik’s area of the farm where there was Wi-Fi so I could let my family and J-P know I was here.
The drive was like 1 minute long, so I just walked back by myself, which took like 5 minutes. Also, a book just randomly fell off a shelf just now. I have no idea why. I hope to God it’s not a mouse. I didn’t see one, though, so I’m just gonna put that out of my mind.
Oh, speaking of God, when I said grace over my meal at lunch, Ikje asked if I was Catholic. I said yes, and he told me that there aren’t that many Catholics in Korea, but there are many Christians.
Okay, so after I got back to my room from texting my parents and J-P, I slept for like 4 hours. Sang Jik ended up waking me up at 16:30 and he told me that dinner would be at 18:00. Cool. He is a very nice man who speaks less English than Eunsaem, but he is also learning.
At 18:00, all 5 of us had dinner together. Sang Jik’s wife makes the lunch and dinner that we eat, but she doesn’t eat with us for some reason. I just saw her briefly and said hi, but I don’t know her name. For dinner, we had the same food that we had for lunch, but with kimchi cucumbers and a leafy green that I don’t know the name of. We wrapped the other food in the leafy green and it was really good.
After dinner, Lilli took me with her down a trail to feed the chickens. Sang Jik’s property is huge! And the chickens are so cute! But they didn’t want to go back inside the cage after Lilli gave them their food and water. We tried our best to lead them back, even by picking them up, but they just would not stay in there. Lilli said she would go back in 1-2 hours and try to get them in later. She assured me that they wouldn’t go too far or get lost. Well, okay then.
Also, while we were walking together, we talked about my nervous energy. I told her that I was really self-conscious about getting things wrong or not following the proper rules of South Korean culture. She told me that I didn’t need to worry about any of that, especially not with the folks on the farm. Everything is really casual, and even if there is something wrong, somebody will just tell me and not get mad or yell or anything. Okay. I trusted her.
After all that, Lilli showed me where the toilet is. I have a shower in the house where I stay, but the toilet is in a whole other small house, in a basement where no one is staying. Good thing I brought my headlamp in case I have to go out there at night like I did in Spain! It’s an actual toilet with indoor plumbing and everything, not an outhouse, which is great!
After that, Lilli and I went back to the kitchen where Ikje and Eunsaem were speaking in Korean over tea and these little walnut and bean paste snacks. I took some of the snacks but I didn’t want any tea. The water from the kitchen sink is clean, so I filled my water bottle with that.
We all sat and talked for a while about things I will write about tomorrow. Sometime after 20:00, Lilli and Eunsaem left and I went back to Sang Jik’s house to get Wi-Fi and another convo in with the ‘rents. I guess I’ll go over there maybe twice a day while I’m here. We’ll see.
Okay, I’m finally done with all that I want to write about tonight. It’s now 22:48. Good night!
Tuesday, May 21
Hey hey! It’s 06:35. I don’t have much time before the others come in for work, but I’ll write what I can about stuff I missed yesterday until they come and continue writing later. Right now I’m eating some bread. I already ate a cup of yogurt and a couple more of the walnut bean paste snacks. I feel tired because I had some pain in my hip that woke me up in the middle of the night. The pad I’m sleeping on is a bit thin, unfortunately, but I’ll be fine.
Alright, so let’s go back to the first thing I stopped writing about yesterday: The fact that I’m leaving the farm early now! 😮 At lunch, Lilli and Ikje asked when I was leaving SK and I told them I was leaving on June 1. They asked if I was going to Seoul and I said no. I told them that I planned to stay at the farm until June 1 and then go back to the airport and go home. They were shocked and immediately said I shouldn’t do that. I MUST see Seoul. They said I came all this way and spent too much money to go back without seeing such a beautiful city and only staying in the rural area. I thought about how I was able to visit Bilbao, the biggest city in Basque, while I was in Spain, and I was very happy doing that for a day off during my two weeks there, but I guess Gurye doesn’t have a place like that nearby.
Yo. Right after I finished writing that previous sentence and was starting a new one, Ikje and Sang Jik came into the room and I had to get up. We sat down at the table and waited for Lilli and Eunsaem to get there before we all had tea. I’ll tell you more about that later. By the way, the tea is some fancy Chinese tea that doesn’t come in bags. It’s in a box and inside the box is this like circular brick of tea leaves that you break off into chunks with your hands. So, every time we have tea, it’s from a chunk of leaves from the box.
Anyway, it is now 17:17 and I just woke up from a super long nap. Why am I so tired??? I guess I’m still jet-lagged, but I wish I wasn’t. I should be exploring more of this gorgeous place. The sun is shining and burning, though, so it’s probably best if I do that in the evening.
Okay, I still have to finish writing about Monday! I’m sorry I’m so all over the place with the timeline. I want to get as much as possible in while I remember. I will start back up where I left off: my conversation at lunch yesterday with Lilli and Ikje (by that time Eunsaem had left for her barista job) about going to Seoul.
Lilli said I should at least go for one night and leave the farm next Friday. Ikje said it would be ideal to leave on Thursday and spend 2 nights in the city. I was a bit wary of this idea because 1) I didn’t want to spend too much more money than I had already taken out, and 2) I worried that Sang Jik would be upset about me leaving before my originally planned 2 weeks. They assured me he would understand the desire to go to Seoul. Lilli also told me that I can find really cheap hostels, if I was okay with staying in one. I was like, I’m totally cool with that! I had a great experience with the hostel I stayed at in Portugal after my Spain trip back in 2022. Wow, can you believe that trip, my first WWOOFing experience, was almost 2 years ago now?
Anyway, I told them I had spent ₩70,000 at the hotel by the bus station, and they were both shocked. Apparently, that is super expensive for one night. Lilli looked online for me and sent me the info for a nice-looking place in Seoul that serves breakfast and is ₩66,000 for 2 nights! Okay, I can definitely swing that. I was so grateful to Lilli and Ikje for encouraging me to go to Seoul. Now, I’m excited for it! Ikje even explained the whole situation to Sang Jik later during dinner and Sang Jik said he completely understood. Ikje had explained it all in Korean, so there was no language barrier that could have caused any confusion Woohoo!
Another thing I’ll mention about yesterday is the nice chat I had with Lilli. (By the way, it is 17:43 now and Sang Jik just came in to start cooking rice for dinner. I will continue writing for as long as I can.) After Sang Jik left when dinner was over, it was just me, Lilli, Ikje, and Eunsaem at the table. Ikje and Eunsaem spoke to each other in Korean while I got to know Lilli a little better. She said that this is her last farm before she visits some other parts of SK and then returns home to Germany after a year of traveling. She has been here since May 2 and will leave here on June 2, shortly after me. She is still working on her application to start university in the fall. She wants to go to Dresden University in Germany.
I told her that I am about to start law school in the fall at Howard University. I made clear that I do not mean Harvard, lol, and that it is a historically Black school in Washington, D.C. I was also using my G.W. Law water bottle and I told her I was using it even though I was not going there because I got it for free. I said, “Howard didn’t give me a free water bottle, but they gave me a full tuition scholarship!” Lilli was very happy for me because she knows how expensive school is in the U.S. I told her that, yes, the student loan debt situation is kind of a crisis, and I told her that G.W. had expected me to take out $88,00 in loans for 1 year. Her jaw dropped, understandably. We agreed that no school is worth taking on debt that you’ll have for decades and maybe even your whole life. Of course, she is happy that school is free in Germany, as she should be!
Okay, it is dinner time now. TTYL.
Hi! I’m back and it is 20:27 and I am writing while sitting on my bed, swatting away gnats and things again. They only come out at night. Luckily, I didn’t notice any bug bites on me at all when I woke up this morning, so I’m happy about that.
I think I have just a couple more things to write about yesterday, and then I will finally start today’s entry. At this point, I’ll probably have to finish today’s entry tomorrow. I don’t want to have to keep doing that too much, though.
Anyway, one small thing is that I spoke to Ikje about is where in the world he’s traveled to, and it’s a good number of places. Apparently, he studied in England for 4 years. I don’t remember exactly what it is he studied, though. I think Ikje is a very cool guy. He also follows me on Instagram now. Yay!
Guys. That’s finally it. I’m done writing about May 20 and can move on to writing about today. It is now 20:50. I will write until I can write no longer and finish anything else tomorrow.
Okay, let me go back to when people started showing up at my room before work. Eunsaem and Lilli came around 07:00 and all 5 of us sat and had tea for a while. I asked Sang Jik for shower stuff and he said he would get it for me later in the day. Ikje put 5 eggs in the multi-functional rice cooker and showed me how to use it. The eggs did not finish cooking by the time we were done with tea and ready to work, though, so I figured we would just eat them later.
Lilli, Eunsaem, and I went down to feed the chickens together, and Eunsaem told us what Sang Jik told her he wanted us to do. The 3 of us had to go clear weeds from a grassy area by the road. Oh, yes. I remembered how serious I got about clearing weeds in Spain. I could totally get into this.
We grabbed gloves and our tools, which consisted of a handheld hoe, a small saw, and root kill to brush onto the deep roots of the weeds after hacking off as much as we could. Lilli showed me how to do everything, as she and Eunsaem had already done some of this work yesterday. We started clearing where they had left off. It became quite easy to differentiate the specific type of weed we needed to kill from the rest of the plants because of its long, unique stem that sometimes even grew up the trunks of trees like it was choking them. I couldn’t reach all the ones that crept really high, but I showed no mercy to the ones I took out, lol.
I thought I might play some music from my phone while working, but I realized the sound of a small waterfall down the hill was very nice to listen to. Oh, yeah, we were on a hill. A steep hill overgrown with weeds and other plants that you have to be very careful not to slip down, or else you’ll tumble into the water below, and I don’t even know how injured someone would get from a fall like that. So, yeah. Definitely a bit more dangerous than the weeding I did in Spain, but all good. I stayed safe, and so did Lilli and Eunsaem. After only 2 hours of work, it was break time. Nice!
We went back to the kitchen for more tea. We also each had one hard-boiled egg from the cooker with salt as well as chocolate moon pies and chamoe. Yum. For some reason, Sang Jik took Saemi and me from the hill to the kitchen in the back of his truck. We could’ve easily just walked, which is what Lilli did because she stayed outside a little longer, but okay. It was cool to ride in the back of a truck for like 30 seconds, lol.
After our break, we went back and just continued doing the same work. Ikje and Sang Jik were not doing our same work, by the way. At that point, I wasn’t sure where they went.
I kept working and walked further and further down the area parallel to the road until Lilli called to me and said that we had worked on pretty much everything in that area and it wasn’t necessary to keep going as far as I was going. We went to ask Saemi if she knew what else we could do. We saw Saemi’s tools on the grass, but she wasn’t there. Lilli assumed she had gone to the toilet. We (half?) jokingly hoped she hadn’t fallen down the hill. She hadn’t, lol. She came back from her room at the time when we were pretty much supposed to be done, so we packed up our tools and left. Eunsaem said that Sang Jik said we could do the same work tomorrow, but just going the other direction. Okay, we’ll see how that goes.
One thing Lilli and I talked about while waiting for Eunsaem was how grateful we are to have just 4 hours of work because both of us have experienced working at farms for 8 hours a day, which gives you little to no free time. Lilli also told me that before I came, the working hours used to be 08:00 to 12:00, but it just got far too hot by 12:00, so they moved the hours up to 07:00 to 11:00. That makes a lot of sense. The sun was HOT.
Also while we were waiting for Eunsaem, Lilli asked me to take pictures of her working so she could have proof to offer to the WWOOF Korea national organization and get a certificate from them. I didn’t know that was something you could do. She wanted to add the certificate to her university applications so she could show what she was doing during her gap year. Cool! I had also asked Eunsaem earlier to take pictures of me too, just for fun lol.
We got back to the kitchen at around 11:00, but lunch wasn’t until 11:30, so I took a walk down to Sang Jik’s house. I figured it was a good time to talk to the only people I’ve been calling on this trip: my parents and J-P. Eventually, I saw Ikje and Sang Jik come out of a wooded area by the road. Ikje told me later that they had been working on rebuilding a treehouse that they had taken down last year. Dang, I wish I could see that treehouse. I sat in a chair in the shade outside the house and finished up my convos so Sang Jik could drive me back up to the kitchen in his truck. This time I got to sit in the front seat. It wasn’t until we got out that I realized Ikje had been riding in the back!
Okay, it’s only 21:42, but my hand hurts and I’m tired of writing. Tomorrow, I will write about lunch, dinner, badminton, and going to Saemi and Lilli’s room. Cool. Bye.
Wednesday, May 22
Hi. I’m writing this entry at 11:03. Lilli, Eunsaem and I finished work early so we came back to the kitchen and put away our tools in the shed at around 10:45. I will continue to write about yesterday until everyone comes in for lunch at 11:30.
So, Ikje, Sang Jik, and I came back to the kitchen for lunch via the pick-up truck. Lunch was the same as the day before, except Sang Jik surprised us with tofu! I love tofu! We ate it raw with soy sauce and wrapped it up in another leafy green vegetable. This leafy green was smaller than the first one I had and I was kind of overstuffing it. Ikje said, “I don’t mean to interrupt you, but I think it’s too much.” I was like, yeah, it is, so I got another leaf to double-wrap everything. Easy peasy! When I said “Easy peasy,” Sang Jik and Eunsaem looked at me confused, like, “What the heck does that mean?” Ikje knew, though, and explained to them that it was just a cute, rhyming way to say that something is really easy. He compared it to "okie dokie” and I was like, “Yeah! I say that too!” Later, Eunsaem said “Thank you, thank you,” in the same tone of voice that I use to say “Okie dokie.” That was cute.
By the way, it is now 13:30 and I am writing in the cafe where Saemi works. I will get to that later.
Also at lunch, I showed Ikje pictures of Ashanti and my FSIL, Tiffany, so he could put faces to the names when I talked about them. He said that they are a beautiful couple and that both Ashanti and I have lovely smiles. Aww, that was so nice.
After lunch, we ate some more chamoe. Sang Jik had cut it this time and the peel was still on, whereas when Ikje had cut it the other day, he had taken the peel off. I said, “Can I eat this and not die?” (jokingly, of course!) Ikje said, “You’ll die,” in a kind of monotone voice, lol. Well, I guess he was wrong!
Sang Jik asked what I called the fruit in the U.S. I was like, dude I’ve literally never seen this fruit before coming here. I don’t even know if there is a different name for it in English. Ikje asked me, “If you could name it, what would you call it?” I said, “It tastes very similar to a canteloupe, it’s sweet like honey, and it’s yellow.” I settled on “honey yellow melon.” 🤷🏾♀️ (Actually, it’s better to say “yellow honey melon,” but that’s not what I originally said, lmao.)
Also at that time, Ikje offered me some sweet Korean coffee. I don’t usually drink coffee, but I tried it anyway. It was really good! I think it was good mainly because of how much sugar was in it, though, lol.
After that, it was time for everyone to leave. The rest of the crew were going to an English class that Ikje has been teaching for the past 2 months. Saemi and Sang Jik are learning, and Lilli went to help have conversations with the other students. Ikje said the room was too small to fit both me and Lilli, but maybe I can go to next week’s class. I hope so. As for me, can you guess what I did after lunch? Oh, I already told you, I slept! Ughhhh. I’m done with these naps that take all afternoon. I’m done.
So, I woke up at 17:17, began writing, and then had dinner with everyone at 18:00. Dinner included soup for the first time, as well as Spam. Lilli asked if we could add tofu to the meal since we couldn’t eat the Spam, and Ikje got some for us. We were even able to fry it on a pan using a portable stove. Cool. It was only when we were eating that Sang Jik realized that I was also vegetarian, just like Lilli. We hadn’t had meat at any other meal, so there was no need to mention it. It’s all good, though. He said we can have more tofu at other meals. Lilli and I talked about why we became vegetarian, and she said that she started years ago because her dad and older sister are vegetarian and she wanted to join them. I told her that my primary motivation is to be more environmentally friendly. We also both don’t feel the need to restrict ourselves to veganism, but we cook vegan as much as possible.
After dinner, I emphasized how much I wanted to go on a walk because I felt bad for going straight to sleep after lunch. It helps digestion to move a little bit after a meal, you know. Lilli said we could walk down to the chickens together, which I was cool with.
I, however, never made it to the chickens. Sang Jik stopped me so he could show me so he could show me how to play badminton! While Lilli and Saemi went down to the chickens, I played badminton with Sang Jik. Ikje watched and acted as the referee. I SUCKED at serving. I somehow just kept missing the shuttle! But once we got it in the air, I could handle myself quite well hitting it back and forth with Sang Jik. I played a bit with Ikje, too, and he tried to help me out with the serve, but I was really struggling, lol.
After what felt like quite a long while, Lilli and Eunsaem came back, and Sang Jik beckoned for them to come join the badminton game. With 5 people, though, one of us had to be the referee. Sang Jik looked at me and said, “Joie, your playing skills are low. Lilli and Eunsaem are medium, so you should be referee.” He basically kicked me out because I sucked, lmao. Understandable.
I watched them play 2 games to 11. Sang Jik and Ikje won both times. Lilli said it was because she was too tired and her energy was at 0, lol.
Finally, it was getting dark so we stopped playing. I went back to Sang Jik’s house so he could give me towels and soap. I also used his Wi-Fi for my twice-daily chats. While I was sitting there, Lilli texted me and said I could shower in her and Saemi’s house. I wasn’t sure how different her shower would be from mine, but I figured there was some reason she offered, so I said I would come soon. I finished up my conversations and walked back up to the houses. I hadn’t been to Lilli and Eunsaem’s room before, so I wasn’t sure which one was theirs. It turned out to be the room on top of the toilet that I use.
I was shocked when I went up there. They sleep in a room that has a big area for both of them to sleep, as well as a desk and a fridge. As soon as I saw the bathroom, I knew why Lilli had offered it to me to use. It was a full, regular bathroom with a shower, sink, and toilet! It was great! Both Eunsaem and Lilli said I could use it whenever and even just come over to their house if I ever felt uncomfortable in my own room. I don’t want to impose on their space too much, but I definitely want to at least use their shower again.
Oh, one kind of funny or maybe just awkward detail I will add is that I made a very silly mistake when I took a step onto Saemi and Lilli’s floor without taking off my shoes first! Saemi was like, “Oh, no!” and I knew exactly what I had done. 😖 Saemi said, “It’s okay, I know it’s a different culture,” and although I immediately stepped back and took my shoes off before walking back in, I still felt a bit bad because I actually knew that rule before I came on this trip and yet I had momentarily forgotten. Oof. But everyone is super nice, so I didn’t have to hold on to any bad feelings for too long. I can just move on and it’s okay.
After my shower, I went back to my own abode. Eventually, I started writing the stuff you already read about from the Tuesday, May 21 entry. So, I’m done with that now. Yay! It is 14:26 and I am still at Eunsaem’s cafe. I will write about today’s activities at the end of the day, but right now I am going to make a reservation for my hostel in Seoul for when I leave next Thursday. TTYL!
Hi. It is 16:32 and I am still at Saemi’s cafe. Her shift doesn’t end until 17:00, so I’m just gonna get a head start on writing about today.
For the second night in a row, my sleep wasn’t great because I had to get up and run outside to the toilet and I couldn’t sleep very well afterward. By the time 06:00 rolled around, I was tired and hungry. I had thought about quickly making an egg for myself before everyone else came in, but I was moving soooo slowly. I remembered how long it took for the eggs to cook when Ikje first told me how to do it, so once it hit 06:30, I was like, “Oh, shit, I gotta put my egg in now if I want it to finish before 07:00!” The eggs we had yesterday were really hard-boiled, so I wanted to see if I could cook mine for a slightly shorter amount of time to get it softer.
Luckily, that was easy to figure out how to do. I put the egg in and ate 2 cups of yogurt instead of just 1. I checked the label, and each cup only has 65 calories! Nowhere near enough for me before working outside. Then I went to the fridge to get some bread, and to my dismay, my bag of bread was not there! I remembered having seen Sang Jik take the bread out of the fridge yesterday for some reason, but I didn’t realize he hadn’t put it back. I got sad thinking he might have thrown it away. Then, I saw the bag on the shelf next to the refrigerator. Great! I reached for a piece of bread and the last walnut snack thing I had put in there the other day. Unfortunately, upon taking a bite of the snack, I saw a couple of ants crawling on my hand. Yuck! I threw down what I had in my hands and looked at the bag to see that ants had gotten into it all. I also looked at the shelf and realized there were ants there too. Grrr. And I really liked that bread!
So, with 2 cups of yogurt and an uncooked egg, I was still quite hungry. Luckily, I still had airplane food! I ate the package of Biscoff cookies, and that was…okay. It was something. Finally, Sang Jik and Ikje came in. I told Ikje I had put an egg in the boiler and he put 4 more in so we could each have one. I was like, okay, but I only put it on for 10 minutes instead of the standard 15. He said it should be fine.
At that moment, I felt so stupid. I had wanted to have one egg before everyone got there because I knew that yesterday we didn’t have eggs until the mid-morning break. I would’ve put 5 more eggs in after I took out the first one, but I hadn’t cooked it in time. Ikje said that we would have the eggs at break time again. Ooooof. I said to him, “I’m so sorry but can I please have mine now? I’m so hungry.” Ikje was like, “Oh, okay. You’re still hungry? There are bananas over there!” and he pointed to a bunch of bananas on the bench by the fridge. Next thing you know, all 5 of us had bananas. I said, “Okay, now I have the energy to work!”
Ikje and I spoke briefly before about how good it is not to be picky with food. Yes, obviously I don’t eat meat, but vegetarianism has gained so much popularity that it’s really not too difficult to find good meals in other parts of the world. Even here, only Lilli and I are vegetarian but Sang Jik didn’t even notice at first because they don’t eat that much meat anyway. But beyond that, I’ll eat almost anything and try everything once, which is so important when experiencing different cultures.
So, after we ate the bananas, it was time to go to work. Instead of going back to the weeds, though, Saemi, Lilli, and I went down to the fields next to the chicken coop because Sang Jik wanted us to plant flowers there. That’s the thing about farming in the spring. There’s a lot more planting than harvesting, so you don’t get to see the fruits of your labor for a while. When I saw Ikje later, I asked him if he could send me pictures of the stuff we planted if I messaged him on Instagram later this year. Of course, he said yes.
On the fields, I planted sunflowers and violets. Lilli and I made sure to cover our seeds well to lessen the chance of the chickens eating them while they roamed. I think it will be fine. I’m a bit tired now because today was so busy but I’ll make sure to write more later. Today was such a fun day. It is 19:02. I will write later. Bye.
Hi again. It is 21:54 and I almost didn’t write because I thought I was too tired, but I got some energy after walking over to Lilli and Saemi’s place and talking to my parents. I still don’t think I will be able to finish the entire day, though. Let’s see how far I can get.
So, we left off at planting the flower seeds. After that, the 3 of us went down to another plot of land to plant vegetables and fruit. Down a hill, there were like 7 mounds where we were to plant all sorts of produce. We had to clear rows to make space and then put the seeds in. Each packet said the number of seeds that were inside, but they didn’t seem to be very accurate. I must have had at least 125 chamoe seeds in my packet of “100.” I planted 5 rows of chamoe seeds, and it took a long time. I hadn’t even finished all 5 rows by the time we left for break.
Break time was pretty silent. We just ate our eggs and drank our tea. I don’t remember anything particularly interesting happening. Oh! Except for the fact that Saemi invited Lilli and me to come with her to her cafe after lunch. Obviously, I enthusiastically said yes. She said there was a temple there that we could walk around. It all sounded quite exciting, and I was looking for something else to do after lunch rather than sleep.
Ugh. There is a buzzing bug flying around my room right now. I hope it doesn’t disturb me all night. Actually, on that note, I’m gonna settle in. I have a feeling I will be very tired in the morning, so it’s probably not best to spend too much time writing now. It is 22:11. Tomorrow, I will write about the rest of work after break, lunch, the cafe/temple time, dinner, and the rest of the night. That’s still a lot, yikes. But it must be done! Today’s activities will get all the attention they deserve when I continue writing tomorrow. Good night!
Thursday, May 23
Hello. It is now 14:55 and I am writing this entry from Lilli and Saemi’s room. Saemi is currently at her barista job. I will just get right into continuing yesterday’s story.
So, after the mid-morning break, the 3 of us women went back down to our planting area. Lilli put on some music that was pretty much all American pop. I liked when Ariana Grande’s song “we can’t be friends” came on. Lilli said she absolutely loves that song.
We finished all the seeds at around 10:45 and Saemi said we could just pack up and go back up to the kitchen early. As we were working, Lilli had mentioned the importance of not watering the plants during the day. She said that watering them at night when it’s cooler will allow the plants to soak up the water without the sun evaporating it. She explained to Sang Jik later that he must look up how much water each plant needs because they are all different, but none of them should get too much water while they are still small seeds because then they will get flooded out. I was very impressed with her knowledge and when I told her that, she said that she learned from her mother when she used to help her tend their garden back home in Germany.
After work, if you recall, I came back to my room and wrote in my journal. At lunch, we had the usual food, but we also had a simple soup that, for some reason, I found to be the most delicious soup ever. I really don’t know why it impressed me so much, as it barely had anything in it. The broth hit my tongue in ~just~ the right way, with a touch of spiciness on the way down. IDK, guys. It’s hard to describe the taste, lol.
One thing that happened at lunch that I kind of felt bad/awkward about was that I found myself relying on Ikje too much. I was so grateful to him for translating between Sang Jik and me when we didn’t understand each other that a couple of times I just asked questions about Sang Jik directly to Ikje, expecting him to ask Sang Jik in Korean for me. After doing that twice, Ikje looked at me and said, “Joie, you can ask him directly. He will understand.” Right, of course.
Another thing that happened during that time is that when Ikje and Sang Jik came over right before lunch, Sang Jik literally just went over to my bed and remade it for me. Now, of course I’ve been making my bed every day. I’ve been taking extra care to leave my small area very neat because it’s the same room in which everyone meets every day. The only reason Sang Jik remade my bed is because I put the wrong blanket on top. He was like, “This is the Korean style.” Alright, lol. I won’t make that mistake again.
After lunch, I got to do what I was most excited about: going to the cafe and temple! Eunsaem asked me if I had ever been to a temple and I said that I couldn’t remember ever having done that. I told her that I’m Catholic, so I always go to a church, and many Americans are Christians who go to churches too. I told her that there are Buddhists in the U.S., of course, but any temples we have are nothing compared to those in Asian countries.
We got in Saemi’s car to go to the cafe, and it was a nice drive that lasted about 30 minutes. I read some, but I also looked out the window some to see parts of the town. Lilli had changed into this adorable red dress that she told me she had gotten in Japan. She also had her hair down. She looked very beautiful. I had changed into my flowy yellow pants and white shirt and put a white bow in my hair. I also put on earrings for the first time since I had gotten there. Lilli and I looked very summer-y. I felt quite pretty.
When we got to the cafe, I was blown away. First of all, the cafe wasn’t just near the temple. It was literally the cafe of the temple, which was basically a tourist site. Well, it wasn’t just a tourist stop, I guess. It was a place where tourists could go and walk around freely, though.
Anyway, Lilli and I decided to sit and chill at the cafe for a little bit before exploring the temple area around it. I ordered some snacks and a mango drink from an electronic kiosk, and Lilli helped me a bit with it because she had already been to that cafe before and was familiar with the menu. Mainly I just picked what I liked based on the pictures, lol. Lilli got an iced matcha tea. She said she loves matcha but they don’t have it in Germany.
We picked a spot to sit that was overlooking a GORGEOUS, shimmering river. I couldn’t believe it. It sunk in that I was really here, in South Korea, on a solo trip, chilling with a German woman at a temple cafe. It was a good feeling.
I continued writing in my journal for a while and ate my snacks. I slurped up that mango drink so fast that I got brain freeze! It was just so delicious 😭. I didn’t feel like finishing everything so I saved half of one of the egg tarts (Lilli had taken the other half), my Oreo, and my cookie, which I had only taken a bite of. I rolled it all up in napkins and stuffed it in my fanny pack. Good to go.
Lilli had also been writing in her little book that she had bought in Japan. She was writing about her time abroad this past year, but she was only at February. She had written in a small journal about her time in Osaka and now she needs another to write about the city she went to after that. She will look soon for another journal to buy. The Osaka journal is quite beautiful.
I told her about how I put my journals online and she said she would never do that with the stuff she’s writing now because she includes her very private thoughts about what she’s experiencing. As she should. I’m just an oversharer, lol.
After she finished her journal and I had finished my snacks, we were ready to go on our walk around the temple. Y’all. Just look at the pics. We saw so many beautifully adorned rooms with Buddha statues and art and sculptures and Llli was able to explain a lot of facts about it all because she had been there with Ikje before and he had told her a lot of stuff. She even told me that whenever there are 3 sets of stairs next to each other, it’s not proper etiquette to go on the middle set of stairs. She had to remind me of that rule before we went back down the stairs later because I almost made a mistake, lol. I’m learning!
Next, we did something that made me realize that SK is officially one of my favorite countries: we took a walk on the trail around the area. I’m obsessed with the mountains and the greenery and the nature around here. Plus, every single person I’ve met has been nothing but nice. Sorry, Portugal. You’re out of the top 3. It’s now Costa Rica, Italy, and SK, not necessarily in that order. 😊
As we walked, Lilli and I had a great conversation about multiple topics. First, when I told her that South Korea is now one of my favorite countries, she said that while the nature is indeed beautiful, she doesn’t like how the wealth is concentrated in the big cities like Seoul and Busan. She has noticed how poor and old Gurye is, while Seoul has enjoyed the vast majority of SK’s recent modernization and growth. I hadn’t thought of that before.
Then, we had a long conversation about the K-pop industry. Y’all know I love my K-pop, but I appreciated Lilli’s and my conversation about the unsustainability of the industry. First, Lilli asked me how long I think K-pop will last. Initially, I wasn’t sure what she meant by that. She continued, however, by explaining that she thinks the K-pop craze will die down in maybe 20 years or so because there are too many groups of men and women who work in conditions that are very difficult from the time they are young teenagers and it is all oversaturated. She thinks that eventually, somehow, a scandal will come out and it will all come crashing down.
I agreed with her on pretty much all her points. I personally only follow the girl groups closely, and I see how terribly skinny they have to be to maintain this “perfect” image of beauty. They are also not allowed to date because they have to maintain an image of availability to attract fans who have this idea that they may somehow have a chance with one of the stars. Also, they are sexualized at a very young age because the production companies who manufacture all these groups start training them at like 13 years old. It is very toxic.
The part where we talked about how skinny the girls have to be reminded me of a different convo that Lilli, Ikje, and I had at the kitchen table during one of our meals the other day. I think it was I who said something about liking Ariana Grande, and then Ikje made a comment about how she is too skinny nowadays and I was like, “Yeah, you can see her bones.” Lilli jumped in and said, “You shouldn’t judge someone for their body because you never know what they are going through.” True that.
On the walk, Lilli also said she hates how unoriginal everything sounds in K-pop. Any given song sounds like it could have come from literally any of the many, many different groups. None of the groups are unique. Now that I completely agree with. I could listen to a song and have no idea if it came from ITZY or TWICE or a group I’ve never heard of. I do recognize the voices of the women in BLACKPINK, though, so songs from them would probably be the only ones I’d be able to differentiate. But it’s just too much! I remember I made a joke a little while back, maybe a couple years ago, after seeing how many K-pop groups kept popping up, some with over 10 members. I said, “It seems like every person in South Korea is either in a K-pop group or in the military!” Anyway.
We also talked about the pros and cons of solo travel. Lilli has been away from home for a long time, so she had a lot to say. This is only my second time doing this and it’s only for 2 weeks, but we had common thoughts. We both agreed that an awesome part of solo travel is the fact that every decision you make is your own. You don’t have anyone else dragging you down. I told her about how I was supposed to go to Spain for my first WWOOFing trip with my friend Rebecca, but she got COVID 2 days before the flight. Once I went by myself, I realized that I was actually better off. If you go with someone else, it’s easy to keep to yourselves, but if you’re alone, you are forced to engage with the other people around you and make new connections. That’s why I wanted to do WWOOFing again by myself, and it has been even more wonderful than before. It’s been so cool to be with 3 other WWOOFers, all with different backgrounds, which is different from how it was in Spain when I was the only WWOOFer at the farm. Perhaps this will be the last time I go WWOOFing by myself, though, because I know J-P would love it too and it would be good to take him with me. Lilli said she hopes that whenever she gets a partner, he will also enjoy traveling because she doesn’t plan on letting anyone else slow her down. So true!
One downside Lilli mentioned is that when she’s alone and experiencing something beautiful, she doesn’t have anyone to share that moment with and talk about it with. A picture or description doesn’t cut it. That’s also very fair.
When we finally finished our loop around the trail, Lilli decided to walk some more because she hadn’t reached her 10,000-step goal for the day yet. My tracker said I already did, though, and I was tired anyway so I went back to the cafe and kept writing at a table outside. At 17:00, Saemi came out and Lilli had already come back, so we left the cafe.
On the drive back, we listened to music, and “Into the Unknown” from Frozen 2 came on, lol. Saemi had told me that she loves Disney animation and Pixar, so I guess that song choice wasn’t too surprising. Also on the drive, Lilli pointed out the library where Ikje teaches English, and Saemi might have accidentally run over a cat…We aren’t sure though! We’ll just assume not…😬
When we got back, it wasn’t quite dinner time yet, so we all decided to take a short rest. I even kept resting when Saemi and Lilli came into the kitchen, but I got up when the men came in. Dinner was uneventful, but everyone had to run out to do different tasks before we even had tea together. One of those tasks was watering the plants as Lilli had instructed. I did not go down with them because I was too tired. I told Lilli I would come up to her room later.
I cleaned up the kitchen table and wrote a bit and went to lay down around maybe 19:00. I set an alarm for 20:30 to go up to Lilli and Saemi’s room. When 20:30 came around, though, I felt like a weight of tiredness was holding me down. I forced myself to get up so I could at least say good night to Lilli and Saemi. I did as such, but I also realized I had Lilli’s hotspot that she had been letting me use from her phone so I didn’t have to keep going all the way down to Sang Jik’s every time I wanted Wi-Fi. I figured I would use the time that I had to sit outside the room and…what? Yeah. I called my parents. It was like 08:00 EDT by that point. We even talked long enough for Mom to read CNN Five Things news, which we usually do when we are all in the States!
After a while, I felt like I couldn’t stay up any longer. When I got back to my room, however, I somehow found the energy to write just a bit more. As I already mentioned in yesterday’s entry, I stopped writing and finally went to sleep after 22:00.
I’m finally done writing about Wednesday, and it is 17:40. I have been writing non-stop in Lilli and Saemi’s room for almost 3 hours! Y’all, these entries are too freaking long. But I am committed to getting every detail. I have to go back to my room/the kitchen to get ready for dinner now, so I will start writing about today’s events later. I’m glad I finally finished Wednesday. I guess I’m just gonna have to keep finishing entries a day behind, lol, because there’s no way I will get today’s entry done by the end of the night. I’ll have to finish tomorrow. Also, my pen is dying. Ugh! I’ll deal with that later. Anyway, bye!
Friday, May 24
Hello. It is 06:16 and I woke up early so I am going to write just for a little bit before the others come in. I will start right at the beginning of yesterday. Good thing I brought multiple pens!
I woke up quite tired because I had gotten up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and I couldn’t go back to sleep for a while. I even read while I was awake during that time, which didn’t help. For breakfast, which I ate at around 06:30, I had 2 yogurt cups, a banana, and the rest of the snacks I had saved from the cafe. When everyone came in, we sat down at the table and had some tea. Sang Jik also brought us some flat rice cakes that were very yummy and had a touch of sweetness to them. I was like, is there sugar or syrup somewhere in this? Lilli said it’s probably just the sweetness of the starch itself. Either way, yum. Also during that time, I showed Sang Jik some pictures from our time at the cafe and temple and told him how much fun we all had. He was happy for us.
By 07:30, it was time to get started for the day. I wasn’t sure exactly what we were doing, so I just followed Eunsaem. Sang Jik basically tells her everything in Korean about what we are supposed to do in the morning, and she relays it to Lilli and me. I walked outside and said goodbye to Sang Jik because I thought we were going to separate places like usual, but he was like, “No goodbye!” It turned out he was driving us all in his truck down to the area where the chickens were. I was just like, oh, okay, cool.
When we got out of the truck, I said goodbye to him again, and he laughed. We were actually all going to the same place that day!
The 5 of us walked past the chickens (Lilli stopped to feed them first) and went into a shed that looked like a greenhouse because of its roof. There were slats of wood in there that we took out and placed in the back of the truck. There was also a bookcase full of books in that shed as well. I wonder who, if anyone, goes in there to read them.
Once we put the wood in the back of the track, Lilli, Eunsaem, and I climbed back in along with it while Sang Jik drove and Ikje sat beside him in the front. We were going to the treehouse to all work on it together. Cool!
It is now 06:34 and I better hurry up and eat my breakfast before the others come in. I got up early enough to prepare an egg for myself, so I will have that, one yogurt cup, and one chamoe. When I come back, I must write about the Sang Jik v. Lilli tea situation that happened before the work day started 😲. TTYL!
Hi. I’m back. It’s 14:19 and I am at Eunsaem’s cafe again. It’s really nice to be here. Alright, let’s pick back up.
What I wanted to mention before was something that happened between Lilli and Sang Jik before work yesterday. Lilli is usually the one who pours the tea out of the teapot after the leaves steep for a few minutes. For some reason, she stirs it a little bit by shaking the teapot before filling everyone’s cup. That morning, however, Sang Jik stopped her and said that it’s not Korean etiquette to shake the teapot like that. She looked very annoyed and was just like, “…Okay?” Then, she put the pot in front of Sang Jik and said, “Why don’t you take care of the tea from now on, then?” I don’t think Sang Jik realized that Lilli was upset/annoyed because he just laughed a little and repeated that it’s just not Korean etiquette. Lilli said, “I heard you the first time.” Hmm. It wasn’t until this morning when we were headed to work that I asked her what that was about. She said that she was already upset about other things on her mind that morning, but Sang Jik had really annoyed her with his comment because she hates old men telling her what to do. Fair enough. She also doesn’t like Sang Jik enforcing an etiquette rule like that in a space where it is just us 5 and it is so informal. I understand that. Korean culture does have a lot of rules, I think.
Ok, so back to the start of the treehouse work. The treehouse is right outside Sang Jik’s house, so when we got there I automatically picked up the Wi-Fi and got a lot of notifications at once. I had to keep myself from looking at them while we were focusing on Sang Jik showing us all the treehouse stuff, lol. I mean, that’s a big reason why I didn’t get a SIM card when I got here. I didn’t want to have the temptation to scroll at any time of the day or night. I did appreciate using the Wi-Fi at Sang Jik’s house or on Lilli’s hotspot for the times I called home, though!
Anyway, when we first got to the treehouse, Sang Jik spent a LOT of time explaining all his tools to Saemi in Korean. At a certain point, I was like, how is she gonna remember all this to translate to us? Well, she never even had to do that because our actual assignment had nothing to do with the power tools Sang Jik was showing off. All we had to do was take out nails from wooden boards using pliers. At first, Lilli and I were trying to pull the nails straight up with brute force, and that was giving us a hard time. Eventually, Sang Jik came to show us how to do it in a way that was much more careful and efficient. He showed me first, and then Lilli. When he went over to her, I heard her say, “I understood you the first time,” and, “I just did exactly that,” in the same annoyed tone she had at lunch. Yikes, lol.
Overall, that work was pretty chill, and I liked it. The best part of the morning was that we had our break time snack at Sang Jik’s house and I finally met his wife! Turns out, the woman I thought was his wife a few days ago was actually just a neighbor bringing us some food as a nice gesture. I also found out that a woman I saw Saemi hanging out with on Wednesday was Sang Jik’s 27-year-old daughter! I hadn’t spoken to her, though. Apparently, she doesn’t speak English.
I loved the food we had at the house, but we had coffee instead of tea. Yuck, lol. Also, Sang Jik’s wife didn’t even eat with us. Bummer.
After break, we finished up the last of the nails and us 3 women were instructed to go up and do some more weeding until lunch. While working, I had a really fun conversation with Saemi about musicals! She told me that she loves the song “Defying Gravity” from Wicked and the song “Roxie” from Chicago! She even started humming it and I hummed along too. She mentioned other musicals she likes such as The Lion King and Jekyll and Hyde. I told her that one of my favorite musicals is Hadestown, which is a Greek myth. I thought she might know more about that show than my other favorite musicals, Next to Normal and Ain’t Too Proud, but she didn’t know it. I also told her that I was in Godspell, The Wiz, and Ragtime while in college and that I was cast as a dancer in Brown’s production of Chicago, but we never got to perform it because of Covid. Big sad.
Eunsaem also told me that she is applying to a 3-month acting academy program that will take place later in the year and that she is disappointed that theater in Gurye is not a very big thing. In fact, apparently Sang Jik started the first theater troupe in Gurye! That’s wild. She asked me if there were a lot of theaters in the U.S. and I was like, oh, yes, there are major theaters all over the country like in California, Boston, New York City, and Washington, D.C. She said that the only big theaters in South Korea are in Seoul. I guess Lilli was right about most of the big things in South Korea being concentrated in Seoul.
Anyway, I was really excited for lunch because it was not at the farm. We went to a restaurant! That was my first time at a restaurant since I’ve been here, and Sang Jik generously paid for us all. Saemi told me that there were 2 vegan/vegetarian options and I just picked one of the names she said even though I didn’t know what either of them was. As I said, I’m not picky. It ended up being noodles and rice and vegetables all mixed together. I ate it all up. It was good.
Sang Jik’s wife joined us for lunch and I sat in front of her. She doesn’t speak much English at all, but when I used a translator to compliment her on the ring she was wearing, she was able to tell me in English that her sister gave it to her.
Somehow, I also got into a conversation with Ikje about the cost of American colleges. I think Sang Jik may have asked him about something related to that so Ikje asked me. As expected, he was shocked at the price. Yeah.
After lunch, we all headed over to the cafe that Sang Jik’s wife runs. So both she and Saemi work at a cafe, nice. She gave us all free drinks. I got a kiwi yogurt drink and it was so yummy! I got brain freeze again, lol. It was just the perfect cold drink to have in this hot and sunny weather. Also, on the way to the cafe, to which Saemi drove Lilli and me, Saemi played “Defying Gravity”! It was so fun jamming out to that. Jackson 5’s “I Want You Back” also came on and Saemi said that she loves Michael Jackson. I think the entire world knows MJ, lol.
Finally, it was time for us to go our separate ways. Sang Jik’s wife stayed at her cafe, Saemi drove to her shift at the temple cafe, and the rest of us went back to the farm. Lilli decided to take the 20-minute walk back up the hill, but I did not feel like doing that, lol. Sang Jik drove Ikje and me back up to the farm and were all able to sit in the front together. Nice.
Once we got there, I stayed at Sang Jik’s house to get the first of my twice-daily dose of Wi-Fi. Ikje said, “Are you going to call your mom again?” I said, “You know it!” Then he said, “Does she wait up for your call every time?” and I was like, “Pretty much!” I truly don’t care at all if anyone thinks anything about how much I talk to my mom. We both love talking to each other and it works for us!
After about 20 minutes of talking to my parents, I went back up the hill. I don’t like staying outside Sang Jik’s house for too much time. It feels awkward. Instead, I grabbed my book and journal and went to Lilli and Saemi’s room. Lilli let me use her hotspot and just chill out in the room while she went about her own business. I really appreciate her hospitality. Since I had Wi-Fi again, I decided to try and call J-P. It was past midnight for him by then, but he picked up anyway and we ended up talking for almost 45 minutes, so that was really nice. Then, I wrote in my journal until it was time to go back to my room and chill before dinner. There was still stuff on the table from breakfast, so I cleared it up. Then, Ikje came in and asked me to start preparing dinner while he went to feed the chickens. He also said that Sang Jik wasn’t coming to eat dinner with us.
Preparing dinner pretty much consisted of setting all of our usual food on the table in their regular plates and setting out utensils for everyone. I started by myself, but Lilli and Eunsaem came down soon and we worked together. I told Lilli that Ikje had gone down to feed the chickens and she wondered why he was doing it so early. We remembered how difficult of a time we had putting the chickens back in the coop the last time we had let them out too early, and we suspected that Ikje might face the same problem. We were right. He came back in and was like, “I failed.” Lol.
Agh, y’all, my hand hurts. I have to stop for now, even though I’m almost done with this entry. It is 15:56 and I will leave the cafe to go walk around for a bit. The only things I have left to write about from yesterday are Eunsaem’s acting application video, showing my Spain pics to Ikje, and Sang Jik coming back later for dinner. Bye!
Saturday, May 25
Hey, y’all. I think I’m getting a little burnt out. I’m writing this at 09:20 on Saturday, May 25, right before the 3 of us women will go back out after break. I don’t have much time to write, but I just wanted to get something in.
I’m burnt out writing this journal. The entries are so long and I keep running behind. It’s Saturday and I haven’t even finished writing about Thursday. Oop. Gotta go. TTYL.
Hello again. It is 22:04 and I just came back from going down the hill to stay outside Sang Jik’s house and talk to my family and J-P. I actually talked to Ashanti for the first time so I got here, so that was nice. I’m writing now just to say that I’ll be taking a break from this journal. It got too tiring, and after 2 days of writing for 3 hours straight, I realized that the time I’m spending writing about the trip is actually taking away from my experience on the trip. So, I’m taking a break and will write in a different format later on. Maybe that will be in a few days, or when I get to Seoul, or maybe on the plane ride back. I’m taking quick notes on my phone as things happen so I can remember as much as possible when I do start writing again.
Alright, that’s all for now. Good night. ❤️
Saturday, June 1
Hi! I am writing this from the sky on my way back to North America. It is 04:38 in Korea and 15:39 in Toronto, and we have about 3.5 hours left on the flight. Everyone has been sleeping, of course.
I am actually so glad I stopped writing last week. I felt a lot less stressed and pressured to sit and write every detail that happened each day. Now, the trip is over (😢), and I must finish what I started. The headings below are a bit different because they will describe the day I’m writing about, not the day on which I was actually writing, like I was doing before. So, let’s start by finishing up the days I started writing about before…
(The evening of) Thursday, May 23
So, as I mentioned on Friday, May 24, the last few things I wanted to say about Thursday, May 23 were Eunsaem’s acting video, showing my Spain pictures to Ikje, and Sang Jik coming back later for dinner.
When Ikje came back from unsuccessfully trying to put the chickens back, the 4 of us sat down for dinner. After dinner, Lilli and Eunsaem ran off to film Eunsaem’s acting video. As part of Eunsaem’s application for the 3-month acting academy, Lilli was helping her film a scene she had to perform. Eunsaem ended up showing me the video on another day and I was very impressed! I was particularly impressed by a part where she had to laugh in response to someone who wasn’t there. It’s not easy to do a convincing fake laugh, I think.
When Eunsaem and Lilli were gone, Ikje and I had tea together. I always enjoy talking to him because he is such a worldly man and he has a lot to say on many topics. I also showed my pictures from my time as a WWOOFer in Spain. Specifically, I showed him pictures of my outdoor kitchen and shower. I explained to him that the shower consisted of a wooden cubicle with a hose that only let out cold water. Ikje went, “So, what? You didn’t like it?” And I was just like, “Well, it was just a lot different from this.” Lol.
After a while, Ikje left and I got ready for bed. I went to Lilli and Eunsaem’s room to shower and I used Lilli’s hotspot to call my family. Only Dad picked up, which was unusual. Mom is usually the one who picks up when no one else does, but Dad told me she had a 07:30 meeting (it was about 07:45 their time when I called). I spoke to Dad for a little bit but I told him that I wasn’t going to wait outside at night for Mom to finish her call, so I would talk to her another time. I also told Dad to tell Ashanti that I was disappointed that he hasn’t picked up a single time since I got to SK, even though I’ve been calling around the same time we would talk if I were in the U.S. Dad said he would relay the message.
I went back to my room and finally went to bed around 21:00. Something funny happened after that, though. After I had fallen asleep, Sang Jik came through the door and woke me up, saying, “Joie? I’m going to eat dinner now.” Half asleep, I mumbled, “Okay.” For the next few minutes, I lay there listening to Sang Jik take out all the food, eat, and wash the dishes. The whole process didn’t take too long, but it was just a little funny. That’s finally the end of Thursday, May 23! Cool!
(What happened on) Friday, May 24
On Friday morning, I woke up and had yogurt and a banana for breakfast. I also did something I should have done before. Remember the chocolate moon pies Ikje had given us to try? Long after I had eaten it, I realized that they seemed to have had marshmallow in them. And you know what marshmallows are made of: gelatin. I was annoyed that I had most likely eaten gelatin without thinking about it, but I wanted to check the ingredients just to make sure. Of course, the box was all in Korean so I took a picture that I would translate later when I had Wi-Fi. Long story short, yes, it was indeed marshmallow in the moon pie and it was therefore not vegetarian. They just be putting dead animals into anything, huh?
Anyway, soon it got to be 07:00 and no one was around. As soon as I thought about going up to Lilli and Eunsaem’s room to see what was up, Lilli came in and said it would just be us working in the weeds that morning because Sang Jik and Ikje were off the farm and Eunsaem had stayed up until like 02:00 finishing her acting academy application, so she was resting a bit more. Alright, fine. Lilli and I put eggs on to boil and we put one in for Saemi just in case she came down for break time and wanted one.
[NOTE TO READER: Just for context, this is the exact point where I stopped writing on the plane. The rest of this blog, including part 2, was written in the days and weeks following my return home and is therefore based on the notes I took on my phone throughout the rest of the trip and everything else that I could remember.]
Then, we got our tools and went out to take care of the weeds by the persimmon trees.
As we worked on different areas, Lilli and I spread further apart from each other, so I decided to play some music on my phone. Eventually, I was far enough away from Lilli that I couldn’t see her anymore, so I started singing along with my music. I didn’t think she could hear me, but all of a sudden I saw that she had only been out of my field of vision before because she was behind a tree, and she was actually much closer to me than I thought. I started to get apologetic about playing my music too loud/singing without realizing she could hear me, but she was like, “No, don’t stop singing!” I was like, okay then, I won’t! Lol.
At this point in the trip, Lilli and I had been spending a lot of time together, and I was really enjoying getting to know her better. We talked about her educational goals (she wants to study international relations at Dresden), the past 9 months that she has been traveling through Japan and Korea, and her family. She’s a really cool and smart young woman :).
At break time, Saemi still hadn’t come to the kitchen. Lilli mentioned that we should put on the rice for lunch, but neither of us had any idea how to do that. She called Ikje who told us where to find the rice, but there wasn’t any left. Ikje said he would call Saemi and talk with her about plans for lunch. When we got back outside, Saemi ended up joining us to work for the rest of the morning and informed us that the new plan for lunch was to go to a restaurant again. I guess you just can’t eat if you don’t have rice, so we had to eat elsewhere! I wasn’t complaining, of course. I like going out to eat.
When it was time for us to go, I quickly changed into my blue, African-style Baltimore dress because Lilli and I wanted to go to the cafe with Eunsaem again after lunch. I only brought 2 nicer outfits on this trip and I had already worn the white shirt and yellow pants, so the dress was my only other option. Lilli wore her Japan dress again, which was cool.
This time, Sang Jik’s wife did not join us at the restaurant, so it was just the regular 5 of us. I got a yummy noodle dish called Bibim guksu, and I liked the fact that it was quite spicy.
Eunsaem also got the spicy dish but Lilli got a milder noodle soup. She let me try some and I commented that it tasted like ramen to me but she completely disagreed, haha.
One other thing that happened was that when we first got to the restaurant, Lilli and Saemi grabbed appetizers to share from a counter by the wall. It was a plate with kimchi and some other vegetables, similar to what we had at lunch and dinner every day and some of the exact same stuff as what we had at the other restaurant. As we ate our food, Ikje pointed out a board on the wall next to us that said that if you got an appetizer plate and didn’t finish it, you would be charged an extra ₩1,000! I looked at how much of the plate we had left and I was very doubtful that our table would finish what we had, so I just slipped Sang Jik a couple ₩500 coins because I felt bad about the potential extra charge and wanted to take care of it since he was paying for the whole meal. The waiter came over, though, and said that he wouldn’t charge us because it was our first time coming and we didn’t know (and I guess Lilli and I in particular looked like tourists so he may have taken pity on us). That was very nice of him.
After lunch, I mentioned that I wanted some ice cream because I had seen some good-looking stuff in the freezer when I came in, and then everyone ended up getting ice cream. We sat outside and ate our ice cream and chilled for a bit and that felt really nice.
While we ate our ice cream, Ikje mentioned to Lilli that if things don’t work out with international relations, she might consider law. Ikje said she’s a very good debater and speaker, so it might work out well for her. I mentioned the fact that my ex-best friend’s mom is an international lawyer who travels a ton for work and even worked at the Hague. She liked the sound of that. It seemed like by the end of the conversation, Lilli was seriously considering international law as an option. We’ll see how things work out for her!
After that, Eunsaem, Lilli, and I left to go to the cafe. I didn’t get as much food as I did the first time I went. I just got a cherry ade and some bread. One really nice thing that happened was that the cashier recognized Lilli and me as Eunsaem’s friends and he gave us a 10% discount on our food! I also met this nice woman named Jenni who also worked there and she seemed to have taken a liking to me. She talked to me for a while and told me that she worked in entertainment as a producer of K-dramas and Korean movies and has been to San Francisco and Los Angeles for work. She was super cool and friendly and I enjoyed our conversation.
Of course, I couldn’t be at the cafe and not take advantage of the Wi-Fi by calling my parents and J-P. It was around midnight Eastern time but Mom still picked up even though Dad was asleep. While we were talking, she told me something that made me REALLY upset. Apparently, even though I had explicitly asked my parents not to, my dad posted on Facebook a photo that I had sent him of me in Korea. I felt like he really betrayed my trust. I had said multiple times to both of my parents that I wanted to wait to post stuff because I wanted to tell my story my way. I like to post after coming back from a trip and I especially only wanted to post after finishing this blog. Dad, however, decided to post one of MY photos that I had only sent to him and Mom and offered no context for why I was in Korea or the significance of WWOOF. The post made it seem like it was just some simple touristy trip, which is the exact opposite of what I wanted to emphasize. I was very angry and texted him to take it down and hoped he would see the message when he woke up in the morning.
However, I was grateful to my dad for doing something else I had asked him to do: tell Ashanti that I missed him and that I wished he would pick up my WhatsApp calls. Ashanti ended up texting me to say that he hadn’t had notifications on for WhatsApp. After that, he was much more active on the app.
Then, I spoke to John-Paul for a long time. I always call my parents before J-P because J-P talks a lot more, haha. After that, I went back to sit by Lilli and eat and do some more writing and reading. Lilli got up to walk around the river again, but I stayed a bit longer at the cafe. I had to finish my NYT games while I had the chance, you know?
I finally got up and walked towards the river again by myself. I took fewer pictures and just soaked in the sun and the scenery. I don’t think I could ever get tired of the landscape in South Korea.
I also realized that there weren’t many people around, and I got an idea. It was the perfect opportunity to fulfill my dream of doing one of my K-pop dances in Korea! So, I did. I set up my phone camera and filmed myself dancing to the one song I know by heart: Fancy by TWICE. Y’all know I had fun AND looked cute while doing it.
After that, I walked a bit more and then turned around to go back to the cafe. I explored the other floors of the cafe that were styled differently and sat on the bottom floor to write and read again. It was a very peaceful time. Eventually, 17:00 hit and it was time to go back to the farm.
Dinner was uneventful, but I guess being at the cafe drained my energy because I went straight to bed afterward. I fell asleep and didn’t wake up until 02:00 when I had to go to the bathroom. When I got back to my bed, I couldn’t fall asleep right away so I ended up staying up until 04:00 finishing Dixon, Descending. It was quite good. I eventually fell back asleep for the last couple of hours before my alarm went off.
(What happened on) Saturday, May 25
Saturday was the worst day—and the only bad day—of my trip.
As I was washing my face in the morning, I felt something weird on my nose and around my mouth. I took out my phone and looked at myself in the camera to see what it was and I saw these disgusting little bumps on my face! It kind of freaked me out. I was like, is this an allergic reaction? Did something bite me at night? I didn’t think I was dying or anything but I felt very uncomfortable. I kept it to myself during tea time because I didn’t think it was an emergency and thought that maybe it would just go away. 🤷🏾♀️
Eunsaem’s, Lilli’s, and my job for the day was to pick berries from a large tree down the hill from the chickens. Yay, harvesting! The fruit looked like blackberries but did not taste anything like them, so I wasn’t sure exactly what they were. It was kind of fun picking them, though. We used ladders and I even climbed the tree a little bit to get up higher. I love climbing trees.
On the way down to the tree, I asked Lilli if she had ever broken out on her face while she was at the farm. I asked because I thought that maybe it could be that I was getting used to the water of another country, and perhaps she could have had a similar reaction. She hadn’t. She said that she didn’t notice anything on my face, anyway, so it couldn’t be that bad. Unfortunately, that didn’t make me feel that much less anxious/nervous.
Anyway, although the berry-picking was nice because it was our first time harvesting something and it was different from our regular weed-whacking work, I was quietly getting upset with myself because I noticed that I was going slower than Eunsaem and Lilli at filling up my container. To be honest, looking back, I think my attitude was a bit unreasonably sour because of the allergic reaction thing in the back of my mind. At break time, I didn’t even have an appetite for my egg, so I put it in the fridge to maybe have it for breakfast another day. It is so unlike me not to eat!
Also during the break, Saemi started choking on her egg :(. Well, not like really choking, but a piece of egg yolk went down the wrong pipe and she couldn’t stop coughing. She eventually went outside to try and take care of the situation. While Saemi was gone, Lilli told me something that I hadn’t realized about myself. She said that I often look down or look away during conversations, and it bothered her because it made it seem like I wasn’t listening to the people talking to me. I was shocked because I had never had anyone say that to me before! I knew at that moment that I was letting my self-consciousness and nervousness about being portrayed a certain way by the people at the farm get in the way of my interactions with them. I had read online before coming that people in South Korea are quieter than Americans, so during the trip I had been overcompensating for my usual loud, over-the-top, and overly talkative personality by appearing meeker and making myself smaller. I guess that translated to me looking down while talking to people to maybe make it less likely that I would drag out a conversation longer than they might have thought was appropriate. Maybe I care too much about pleasing people!
It was taking a while for Saemi to come back, so Lilli thought she may have been smoking. We both agreed that doing something that often makes one cough and puts bad stuff in your lungs after almost choking on an egg seemed like a weird choice. Turns out, Saemi had been smoking, and when we told her that we thought that was weird, she was just like, “Why?” Lol.
For the latter part of our morning work, I changed out of my sneakers and put on my galoshes instead so I could get deeper into the muddy areas under the tree. That actually ended up making me feel better because I was able to reach places that Lilli and Eunsaem couldn’t and fill up my container faster. I enjoyed working among the bees (I love bees), but I had to be careful not to fall off the ladder when I got scared about other bugs (spiders, beetles, wasps) falling on me as I picked the berries. Lol.
One funny thing that happened while we worked was that the chickens we had let out of the coop in the morning before starting the berry-picking work ended up coming down and hanging around the tree with us. There was one particularly adventurous chicken that walked all through the mud and under the ladders and everything. It was really cute.
After we finished collecting all the berries we could, it still wasn’t time for lunch yet, so we moved on to another task. Even farther down the hill, there was a pile of spiky tree branches with leaves on them. Our task was to pick all the leaves off and put the branches in a basket. The branches were really spiky so even though we had gloves on, they sometimes poked through our gloves and pricked our fingers. Apparently, the branches make a really good tea when boiled in water.
Eventually, it was time for lunch. Saemi and Lilli carried the basket of spiky branches up the hill together, while I carried the berries. I was really proud of myself for being strong enough to carry all the berries up the hill by myself. It made me appreciate all the time I’ve been spending at the gym with Tiffany.
During lunch, we all talked about how Sunday is our day off and considered what we would do for that day. We would have lunch at 11:30 and dinner at 18:00 still, but other than that we could do whatever we wanted. I asked Lilli what she thought she might do but she didn’t know.
I also asked Ikje and Eunsaem if one of them might be able to take me to get some bread after lunch in the afternoon. I really wanted to replace my bread because I had been getting quite hungry in the morning before work and I missed the bread that went bad. Unfortunately, all 3 of the people who had cars (Ikje, Eunsaem, and Sang Jik) were going to play rehearsal that afternoon! That was the first time I actually got frustrated regarding the lack of independence I had on the farm because it was impossible to get anywhere without a car. I was hungry in the morning, my bread had gone bad, and there was nothing I could do about it because I was at the mercy of other people’s schedules.
One good thing that happened was that someone finally showed me how to use the washing machine in the shed beside my room. Turns out I only needed to press 3 buttons. Don’t know why no one had told me that before.
After lunch, everyone left to go do their own thing: Ikje, Eunsaem, and Sang Jik prepared to go to play rehearsal, and Lilli went to go work on her application, which she was really stressed about. I began to feel very lonely. A lot of bad feelings were piling up. I decided to go to Lilli’s room and ask to use her hotspot so I could vent to my parents about all the stuff going on and how I was feeling. I also just wanted to be in a space that felt a bit more comfortable than my own room at the moment (the biggest reason being that there were fewer bugs in Lilli’s room because it was in an enclosed space). While I was in there, I took a picture of my face to see how bad the bumps had gotten, and to my complete disgust, the bumps that had started on my nose and cheeks had spread to the entirety of my face, including on my eyelids! I was so stressed and grossed out.
I sent my parents the picture of my face and then stepped outside the room to call them. I started crying about all the things that had upset me up until that point in the day. It felt good to let out all the frustrating feelings by having a little crying session. My mom told me that I should probably ask Sang Jik and Ikje to take me to a pharmacy to get some sort of medicine as soon as possible because the situation seemed like an emergency. At first I was hesitant because I didn’t want to make a problem (🙄), but I shortly realized that I needed to speak up for myself about something like that. Also, side note, by that point my dad had taken down the picture he posted on Facebook and all was forgiven.
I wasn’t sure if Sang Jik and Ikje had already left for play rehearsal, so I went down to Sang Jik’s house to sit and use the Wi-Fi there instead of at Lilli’s just in case they might still be there. I texted Sang Jik and told him that I needed help, hoping that he would be able to offer me a solution even if he was already gone. I figured, maybe he had some Benadryl or something like that in his home that I could use. After I sent the text, I sat and called John-Paul to vent to him as well. I appreciated him listening to me even though it was very late at night for him.
To my great luck, Sang Jik and Ikje hadn’t even left the house yet! While I was still talking to J-P, I saw them come out and get in the car. I hung up on J-P and ran over to tell Ikje the situation (and show him my face) and ask him for help. He translated for me to Sang Jik and before I knew it, they told me to hop in the car and we were off to the pharmacy! I was quite grateful in that moment. It took us like 20 minutes to get to the pharmacy, and that made me think about some of the drawbacks of rural life. Not only can you not get anywhere without a car, but everything is farther away. At home in the DMV, I can walk to a drug store in less than 10 minutes.
Once we got to a pharmacy, Sang Jik gave Ikje his own credit card (so generous!) and Ikje helped explain my situation to the pharmacist. Ikje was seriously a lifesaver on this trip. Ikje, if you’re reading this, thank you so much! 😭
All I could really do was stand there and gesture to my face to convey to the pharmacist what I needed help with. Between that and Ikje’s help, we were out of there in a few minutes with some cream that I was supposed to apply to my face 2-3 times a day until my symptoms improved. Thank goodness the pharmacist said that out loud and Ikje relayed that information to me because everything on the label was completely in Korean, obviously.
After all of that, Ikje was like, well, there’s no time to take you all the way back to the farm, so you’ll just come with us to play rehearsal. Alright, whatever. The play rehearsal took place in a little library, and we had to take our shoes off before entering. Luckily, the building had Wi-Fi, so I could just chill on my phone while the rehearsal was happening. I also used the Wi-Fi and my phone camera to translate more of the information that came with the face cream. The biggest thing was that I was supposed to stop using it as soon as my symptoms improved. Got it.
To my surprise, J-P was still up by the time we got to the rehearsal space. It was 01:00 for him, but he was there to talk on the phone with me as I gave him updates about what happened after I had hung up on him earlier. Aww, how sweet. We talked for a long time while I sat in the stairwell outside the library room. What was funny was that, at the beginning, the actors in the room were doing very loud vocal warm-ups. Even J-P could hear it through the phone. But hey, both J-P and I are performers. We know how these things are, lol.
After a while, we hung up and I went back into the room to see what was up. At that point, there were about 10 people doing a read-through of the script. It was the first rehearsal day, so everyone was just getting familiar with it. I was really impressed with them! They all seemed to have good energy. I didn’t know what the heck they were saying, of course, but I could tell they were saying it with passion. :)
Rehearsal didn’t end until 17:00. When it was time to go, I decided to ride home with Saemi so I wouldn’t have to squish in the front seat of Sang Jik’s truck in between him and Ikje again. The only thing about going home with Saemi, though, was that I had to wait for her to stop smoking, lol. Everyone smoked there!
One thing that happened that made me feel…I don’t know…just, weird, I guess, was that when I said “annyeonghi gaseyo (goodbye)” to folks leaving the rehearsal, everyone chuckled. I was like…am I not saying it right or something??? Someone said something to Ikje and he told me that they thought my accent and pronunciation were quite good, so I just trusted that they had good intentions and brushed it off. But also…wtf???
Riding home with Saemi ended up being a great idea because she had to stop to get gas and go to the grocery store. I was very happy to go with her to the grocery store because that meant I could get something more for breakfast! They didn’t have any bakery-style bread, but I did pick up a package of sweet pancakes. I was glad to have found them because my coworker Caroline had recommended them to me before I left the U.S. Yay! I could now stop pestering everyone about taking me to get bread.
As Saemi and I continued our ride back to the farm, I asked her how rehearsal went and what the play was about. She told me that it went very well and that Sang Jik was actually the one who wrote the play and it was about the history of Gurye. I found that so cool!
When we got back, it was time for dinner. We spoke again about plans for the next day and Lilli still didn’t know what she wanted to do. I was trying to follow Lilli’s lead because she had been at the farm longer than I had, and I didn’t want to be alone on the day off, so I wanted to do whatever she (and possibly Eunsaem) was doing. Now, I’ll admit that this was most likely the result of the bad feelings that had already been piling up throughout the day, but I got the sense that perhaps I was being annoying or too clingy and I suddenly felt very sad about not having the same connection to everyone else because I was a short-term WWOOFer. Because I am so extroverted, it really hurts me when I feel like I can’t connect with the people around me.
So, dinner ended with no set plans for the next day. Oh, well. But the night wasn’t over yet. As I was getting ready for bed, I noticed a spider crawl across my pillow. And not just a small dust spider either. It was about as big as the top of my index finger. UGH! That did not help my stress about the allergic reaction or really anything that had happened during the day. I consider spiders friends, generally, but I had no choice but to ~take care~ of that one and others that I had initially let make webs beside my bed. I had actually noticed what looked like a small spider bite on my wrist a couple of days prior but I had ignored it. Oof.
After that, I decided to go back down to Sang Jik’s house and call my regular people again. I had been using my cellphone flashlight for light up until now, but for some reason I decided to pull out my headlamp to use instead. And guess what? It was barely working. It just emitted a faint light that was basically useless. What a string of bad luck! At least I still had my phone flashlight.
When I got back down to Sang Jik’s house, I had to be careful not to go right in front of the house because I didn’t want all the dogs barking at me and disturbing other people. I just got close enough to connect to the Wi-Fi and called my family from there. This time, Ashanti picked up! Woohoo! It was a bit awkward that the first time I spoke to him since coming on the trip was on my worst day, but it was still nice to speak to him. After that, I spoke to J-P again, and then it was time for me to go to bed.
What a day!
Thanks for sharing . I am living vicariously though your myriad of experiences.
Wonderful! I enjoyed reading this and can't wait for the next week. You have quite a spirit of adventure. Thank you for sharing.