One Month Check-In

Tan and I landed at Incheon International Airport on August 22^nd.

One month ago.

It feels strangely longer, like we've been in Daejeon, South Korea for a year or more. Bangkok, and Thailand, seem like a world away, but then I've always been kind of present-oriented, and this particular present has been very intense, with lots to do and with many things that I need to get up to speed on. I guess time moves slow when you're changing cultures.

We've settled into our rhythms, and are slowly expanding our awareness of Daejeon and what it has to offer. Over the Chuseok Fall Harvest holiday, we finally made it to the “old downtown” area of Daejeon, which consists mainly of the long-standing open-air Jungang market, and a more modern Euneungjeongi Cultural Street where all the teenagers of the city seem to congregate. There is a gigantic video screen towering overhead at the latter place, which flashes K-Pop stars who advertise various things and a cartoon undersea world among other things.

During the same holiday period, we also got in a tour bus ride to the Expo Science Park (which looked and felt like a deserted Star Trek filming location), the KAIST campus (one of the main technology institutes in this city), and the hot springs of Yuseong. The tour guide spoke no English but we had fun being carted around.

Daejeon is “far from Seoul” urban living, with row after row of apartment blocks broken up by an occasional university, a random piece of park-land, and the usual assortment of malls and stores. There isn't much English signage, which keeps things interesting if you're ever looking for a particular item. At times, as I've wandered about, I've remembered the urban landscapes from the Japanese monster movies I used to watch as a child.

But it's less bleak.

In point of fact, it's a nice place to live, especially where we reside, on the eastern edge of town. Here, you can walk out of the apartment and wonder at the peacefulness of a Sunday morning, with people taking their time to get from here to there, often as not in and out of churches. The cool of the morning is as exquisite as the sight and sounds of baseball on TV's in the evening when we sit down for dinner.

All of this is a huge change from my Thai experience.

In Bangkok, it was a constant battle through an over-saturated sea of people and vehicles, and a grudging acceptance of long bus rides (not in distance but in traffic jam potential) and navigating sidewalks choked with food stalls, clothing vendors, and Hello Kitty accessory salesmen. It took me 40 minutes minimum by van on an overhead expressway each way to travel back and forth to my campus, not counting motorcycle rides, the walk to my office, and the dreadful afternoon traffic which could stretch the homeward commute to one to two hours.

Daejeon is so much calmer and easier. I can walk to my classes in 15 minutes, which is something I have grown to love, and it never feels crowded unless you choose to head to the aforementioned markets on weekends. There are fewer sidewalks, but those that are here are open for foot traffic only. We have also noticed bike paths leading everywhere, paralleling the canals that run through the city, which makes us ache for the day we can finally rent or buy bicycles.

I have noticed particular bits and pieces in Daejeon which feel “Korean” and not Thai.

For one, there are exercise machines on the hilltops overlooking the town.

Lots of them.

Highest Gyms in the World

Spread out about the walking paths, in shaded areas, are weight racks, and leg press machines, and everything else a gym rat could want, if they were intending to walk up a mountain to head to their exercise room. I find that fascinating, as well as the fact that they are not going unused. I hike by them on my way toward one of the best viewpoints overlooking the city, and I see people of all ages stopping to work out. The hills are alive with bench presses.

I also always enjoy taking the subway here (there's only one line in town that follows a meandering path east to west). Whoever designed the system decided that users should be treated to more calming sounds as they traveled from place to place. As you wave your coin at the entry/exit points, you hear the twittering of electronic birdsong in recognition. The subway gates are permanently open; they only close if you try to scramble through without waving your coin. I have so many painful memories in Bangkok of having the Skytrain gates open and slam into my hips as I tried to sprint through. In Daejeon, there is also classical music in the subway. It's there to signal that a train is approaching. How clever to opt for this instead of resorting to the usual robotic voices, beeps, and whistles that so many other subways around the world use.

On the negative side, I've seen much more out-in-the-open physical violence and arguing, which is not so calming. I've witnessed a handful of arguments between strangers, and at least one fight between a nattily-dressed old man and a middle-aged man (dressed in an orange hiking outfit). This occurred only a few days ago in front of a jazz band which was playing in the aforementioned market area. Nobody tried to stop this, even as it escalated and continued around the periphery of the concert for about half an hour.

I get the sense this happens more often than not. Every time we walk about, people bump into us and collide, and then continue on their way without a backwards glance. I guess it's a more physical country. If this ever happened in Thailand, I would expect an “excuse me,” a bow of the head, or at the very least, a smile, before the other person moved on.

Of course, there are some things I miss from Bangkok, especially the food diversity. Korean food seems healthy, but it seems a bit plain compared to Thai food, and we have yet to really expand our menu.

But in general, our appreciation, 30 days and counting, for our new home away from home, continues to grow.