Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Ya-ta Boy]

[Disclaimer: This is meant as a kind of antidote to the �It�s Official. I�m Famous� thread that got mistakenly resurrected by mistermasan.]

Today was our semesterly hike up the mountain behind our school to Namhansanseung. It�s meant as a kind of Membership Training/Group Harmony thing. It got rained out last spring but last fall was not a terrible experience. I did get to the top and semi-enjoyed it, but not enough to want to repeat the experience. Some of the students �got lost� on the way up and spent their afternoon in some restaurant eating whatever and drinking soju. That inspired me.

When the hike was announced last week I decided to play the Old Man Card. Not familiar? It�s similar to the Stupid Foreigner Card, but restricted to a more elite �clientele�, shall we say? (Around 2002 students stopped saying I �resembled� Bruce Willis--I never did, except for the thinning hair. They started calling me Mr. KFC Man instead. Not an improvement. Lately, that morphed into KFC Grandpa and I have had to do my best to adjust to it. And use it to my advantage, as in this field trip project.) The school agreed that I could drive up to the gate of Namhansanseung and walk to the top from there. I of course put my book of short stories in my coat pocket knowing perfectly well that I was not going any farther than the dong-dong joo restaurant about 200 meters inside the gate.

Just before 1:00, leaving time, I drove into the parking lot and looked with scorn and derision on the all the students and all the teachers lined up, ready to go. Suckers. One of the other teachers came over and said he was to ride with me�his vertigo wouldn�t allow him to walk. Yeah. It wouldn�t be the 3 quart-size bottles of beer consumed nightly, I didn�t ask. So off the students and teachers go and off Crip and me drive.

Ten minutes later Crip and I arrive at the gate, park and start walking into the park. Just past the little dong-dong joo restaurant beside the trail, not more than a couple of hundred meters inside the fortress, I look down at the ice on the trail, the hill ahead of us and tell Crip to go on without me. Sigh. With great regret and resignation I turn around and trudge back down to the little restaurant, sit down at a table in the sun, pull out my book of short stories and begin to enjoy the afternoon. Conrad Aikens� �Impulse� is a terrific short story, I will say. Just as I was finishing it, the first of the students and teachers who had walked all the way up the mountain from school came by on the trail. We all greeted each other with great hardiness and good feelings.

Soon, three of the students from my class came by�and lingered till everyone was out of sight, then sat down, ordered up some makkoli and we enjoyed a chat while they enjoyed their afternoon imbibing. I refrained, since I figured I was on duty...at least until I thought they�d all be on their way back down to this same spot for some dong-dong joo and pindaetuck, like last fall and I would be safe to get a slight headstart on them.

Anyway they left for the top around 2:15 and I went back to my book of short stories. Around 3, just when I estimated everyone would get to the top and start back down to join me, the sun went behind a cloud and the wind came up and I got cold. So I stood up and went to look inside the restaurant, expecting to find one of those heater things.

The restaurant really doesn�t have an �inside�. All the tables are outside, but the owner has put up plastic sheets to block the wind. Last fall, it was a nice place to stop and look out at the scenery and eat and drink. But today, it was cold�and there was a group of people, mostly old men, standing around a table and I didn�t see any heater.

The ajosshi, around 30 years old, saw me and motioned me in, but I didn�t see a heater and I didn�t want anything to eat. I just wanted to get warm. Just then, a halmoni, all pink-cheeked from the makkoli, came over and led me in, pushed the other old men out of the way and revealed a barrel with a blazing wood fire inside. Hurray! Of course he sat me down in the warmest spot and brought over a bowl and poured me some makkoli, offered up the anju and all the halmonis started asking me questions. How old are you and who was older than who�I scored big points by telling two 71-year olds that I didn�t believe they were 71. We soon established who had to click bowls higher or lower than the other and all was good. In the middle of it all, an ajumma comes over with a thermos and gives me a shot of coffee and cognac. Anyway, it was pleasant enough and I enjoyed the warmth, free makkoli and friendly conversation.

After about 30 minutes I decided I should go back outside and greet the students as they came down the mountain and we could all come back inside like last fall and eat and drink together.

So I pace in front of the restaurant, keeping an eye on the trail. 4:00 comes and I�m feeling cold again and starting to wonder where everyone is. This was far more time than the students took last fall. Just then, the pink-cheeked one comes out on his way to the hwa-jang-shil and sees me. Forget the hwa-jang shil. He grabs my elbow and pulls me back inside to the fire. Orders up 3 bottles of makkoli and some more anju. By now his halmoni friends are even more conversational than before. It turns out one had lived in New Jersey for 3 years; another had a son singing for the Metropolitan Opera and a third�s daughter is a hairdresser for Kevin Kline. Anyway, we have a jolly time with my bad Korean and their Korean War-ear English. Did I have a honey? None of these gents has a family now. If I understood correctly, all their wives have died and they come in from Seungnam and Yongin everyday to hike Namhansanseung everyday and meet up at the restaurant for some makkoli and companionship. All of this is told with various ones stroking my thighs and the ajosshi/owner giving me shoulder/upper arm rubs through my coat.

It would have been a lot jollier on my part, but by 4:30 I�m skeptical of what is happening with the students and teachers from my school. They should have been back around 3:45. Have they gone down the mountain another path? But I can�t leave because Crip can�t get home walking. Vertigo, you know. I�m trapped by my sense of responsibility for him.

5:00 comes. I figure I�ll give them the length of time it takes to down one more bottle of makkoli. That turns out to be just around 30 minutes. At 5:30�almost 2 hours later than I expected�I decide I�ve waited long enough. I feel like I�ve been taken on a snipe hunt**.

I drive home, park the car and ring the door bell of the person who lives on the first floor. �Oh, we turned off the main trail a couple of hundred yards above the restaurant where we�d seen you on the way up. We figured you�d left already. We went to a really nice restaurant down below and had some galbi for dinner.� Sure enough. Ya-ta has been left on the mountain-side waiting for Godot.

Grrrrr. Two hours of waiting for them in the February cold and wind, for nothing. I�m just waiting for Rainy Season and the requests for rides home. �Oh, a ride? You want a ride home in my car? Remember when you left me dangling in the February wind? Have a nice walk.�

[**Snipe Hunting: When you take a victim out in the woods on some dark night, equip him with a paper sack and tell him to wait �here� while everyone else goes off to herd the snipes toward him. Then you drive home, leaving the patsy to walk home in the dark.]