After lunch and continuing our search for the elusive bamboo, we again get hopelessly lost and end up eliciting the help of a local taxi driver who drives in front of us to the nearest bamboo tourist site. Actually I think he was napping in his taxi in the main square, saw us crossing and re-crossing in front of him like some real-life screen-saver and just took pity on us. Anyway, here we find a shop which sells everything made of (unsurprisingly) bamboo.
Oh, when I say 'everything' I really mean it. Honestly. It's quite amazing what uses medium sized bamboo can be put to given the application of a small amount of modern technology. Believe me. And stop giggling.
We explore the rather touristy forest, kind of a theme park with taped music playing in the background and big plastic pandas lining the walkways. Some of the pandas require immediate cranial surgery after having had large rocks dropped on their skulls by playful Korean teenagers or possibly by gangs of frenzied panda-brain-eating sparrows. There's also the obligatory big glass tower/dome thing serving as central education-cum-shopping plazza. This is a slightly less phallic specimen than can be found found at some other sites e.g. the botanical gardens in Seogwipo http://activejeju.com/jeju/sights.htm and is selling more stuff made from bamboo. This time the selection is a little less eye watering.
The park is interesting but it's too highly themed for either of us and K wants to show me something more like the forests she remembers from her childhood. Throwing caution to the wind we decide to attempt to find a wilder more rural example and resort to the magic map again - "I solemnly swear..."
Before we leave I'm treated to some Korean street food, this time delicious drop scones made fresh from thick dough filled with a soft sweet paste of red beans and raw cane sugar. Served greasy and piping hot in a paper cup, washed down with my current favourite bevarage, sweet greengage tea.
The forest we do eventually find is a treat. Far fewer people and a much more natural environment bordered by farms and rivers instead of roads and houses. The quiet and spooky atmosphere among the bamboo needs to be experienced, I certainly can't describe it. It's beautiful but at the same time eery, mainly because of the quiet. I was relieved to be driving out of the car-park as night came down!
And so at last to Kwangju to meet K's family for Chu-seok itself. Present are K's older brothers and sister, their partners and kids and most importantly of all, K's mum. We're greeted warmly, sat down and brought huge quantities of traditional foods - including a truly delicious Bulgogi (beef and sesame stir-fry to you lot!).
After the meal we're sung to by the younger daughter of K's older brother. She's just graduated from university studying Korean traditional music and performs several songs accompanying herself on traditional Korean instruments. I could describe this but a picture is worth a thousand words (i.e. about a million of mine) so go here instead:
http://www.lclark.edu/~public/CHRONICLE/Winter2000/arts_alive.html
although you'd need to think t-shirt, jeans & punky hair instead of hanbok.
I'm gutted that I don't have any photos of this - I'm clumsy enough with the camera at the best of times and getting it out in the middle of a family get-together seemed pretty rude so I didn't even bother trying.
After one traditional entertainment we all, including K's 84 year old mum, decamp to a local Norebang (literally 'song room', i.e. Korean Karaoke house) for another great tradition, the family Karaoke contest. I'm sure I don't need to explain Karaoke. In this case we're divided into teams and an accumulator is run on the result of each round. At the end of the evening the winner divides the earnings amoung the kids present.
One thing which amused the outsider - and believe me, I am and intend staying an outsider as far as Karaoke is concerned - was the fact that the equipment doesn't have video clips for all the songs, just the audio. This is obvious really but I'd not thought about it. Consequently footage from cable music channels is displayed while the singing takes place. During K's rendition of 'Papa Don't Preach' we were treated to a section of a wildlife documentary complete with hordes of wildebeest followed by the Seoul traffic news (bad) & weather forecast (good).
At about 2:30am we're finished. K and I decamp to a sauna for the night to relieve the over-crowding in the appartment - there are about 18 people staying. I see a repeat of the news & weather through the changing room window as I lie butt naked and in splendid isolation in the largest hot pool in the mens' section. We crash at about 3:30am with a dozen other assorted familes and travellers, all in our identical sauna t-shirts and shorts, in one of the communal clay-lined sleeping rooms which is warm, pink and smells faintly of camphor. I'd say 'womb-like' but I don't actually recall the smell of camphor from the first time.
Zzzzzz...
