Most adventures I seem to have here have all been planned last minute. This adventure was no different. It was Saturday morning when I woke up in bed and had an itch to see more of South Korea. Fortunately, I wasn't alone. As soon as I signed in to facebook (for my usual morning creep) one of my girlfriends asked if I wanted to go to Daegu. Daegu is the third largest city here with over 2.5 million people. I didn't really care much about that, I just wanted to get out of Busan and explore a new place! We managed to round up another one of our friends and within a few hours we were on the road. We ended up taking a bus through Busan to the Busan Train Station which was nice change from the usual subway ride where you can't really appreciate how large a city we actually live in. When we got to our stop, we crossed the seven lanes of traffic to be greeted by sign rockers. I didn't end up bringing my camera for fear of losing it, but if you can imagine a person holding a giant sign, flipping it in the air in unusual ways and playing air guitar - that's exactly what they were doing. One guy was was jumping over his sign like it was a new kind of jump rope. I couldn't stop staring.
The train station itself was enormous. Exits upon exits, all leading to different places. It was a lot different than the single waiting room I was use to in Halifax. Or, the side of the road "Station" that they have where I grew up in Salisbury. The signs were easy to read though and we got our tickets easily enough. It was great timing too cause the next train that was leaving was in 15 minutes. We had just enough time to grab some snacks and get to our train exit. The train from Busan to Daegu took about 45 minutes. When we got out on the other end, it took us a bit to figure out how to exit the building, but we just followed the crowds to where the cold breeze was coming from. Our whole purpose of going to Daegu was to check out their Amusement Park, which is outside... so i'm really not sure what any of us were thinking if you could see what we were wearing. We were completely under dressed. I think we all instantly heard our mother's voices in our head as soon as we stepped foot outside telling us to "Dress for the weather" or "Button up, you'll catch a cold". We were freezing, and needed to find shelter in the subway. A man that was selling fish on the side of the street saw our lost, cold expressions and said "Subway" and pointed straight. This isn't the first time that a Korean has sensed my feelings and helped out, and I'm sure it wouldn't be the last. We all thanked the man and ran for cover in the subway.
It took all three of us, but we managed to figure out how to buy a subway ticket and head in the direction we needed to go. At the next station we had to transfer trains. We were all lost in our own thoughts yet again when a subway worker yelled at us to get our attention and helped us along our way. Luckily, on our way underground to the next tracks we came across an underground shopping centre. They're all over the place here. It was perfect cause we were all in serious need of a second layer of clothing. We came across some horrendous matching jeggins (also known as jean leggings) that we just had to buy. After a quick stop at the subway washrooms (and lots and lots of hand sanitizer later) we got back on the subway and were on our way to the Amusement Park.
By the time we got there, we had a few hours left before the park closed down for the night. When we went up to the ticket booth the lady told us that they weren't running the roller coasters on account of how cold it was (I bet you thought I was over exaggerating). I think at this point we thought we’d warm up after running around the park so we decided to buy them anyway. After the first ride, we pretty much had to pour hot water on our hands to scrape them off the metal bars. But still, our stubbornness persisted and we decided to go on another ride. The coldness combined with the jerking movements of being twirled upside down and bumped all around - to the point where my scarf that was wrapped securely around my neck fell off - all that I could think of was "This is it, this is how I'm going to die". Tears were literally cascading down my face and freezing almost instantly. Nothing about this ride was fun. Actually, I shouldn't say that. It was fun until the ride started to move and we realized what was in store. But still, even after that hellish ride, we still felt the need to get our money’s worth. So, instead of calling a spade a spade and leaving we decided to walk around a bit more and see if there was anything else that might save our adventure.
One of the girls spotted bumper cars - everyone's favorite! How could that not make this trip worthwhile..... I'll tell you. After waiting in the freezing cold for about an hour one of my friends decided not to go on because she was too cold. So that meant we were down to two. I wanted to call it quits too but when I asked my remaining friend if she really wanted to do it there was almost a sparkle in her eye that she tried to hide when she said “kind of”. I couldn’t call it quits now, not after seeing that look. About 15 minutes later it was finally our turn. Most of the people that went on the ride at the same time as us were probably 14+ and mainly guys - I’ll mention this now so you don’t think I’m completely horrible with what I’m about to say - After the woman opened the gate, we both ran to our vehicle of choice and buckled ourselves in. The steering wheel was made of metal so at this point I was almost positive I was going to loose one of my fingers to frost bite on this ride. I was however happy about one thing... this is the horrible part I was warning you about earlier... I was happy I was finally able to take my frustrations of this failed adventure out on everyone around me. My strategy (yes, I had one) was to drive my car on the outer edges where no one was to pick up speed, then, target a little kid in attempt to give him/her whiplash. Horrible, I know... especially since I'm a teacher now. But, I'm just being honest and I had so much evil fun doing it. This one time, I had a certain kid in sight. He was driving a purple car and was probably 16 or so. He saw me coming but had doubt in his eyes that I would be so daring to hit him straight on. After all, what adult would do that to a kid? Apparently he never met my kind before. I went for it laughing like a mad woman and rammed into his car. We both jolted backwards in shock of how hard the collision actually ended up being. The look on his face was priceless as he gave me the thumbs up and said "Good job!" My girlfriend that was waiting on the sidelines said she never saw me that intent to do something so evil before. She couldn’t stop laughing though and wished she had a camera to catch some of this on film. Every once and a while I’d pass by my friend in the other bumper car and would nod in approval after hitting an unsuspecting kid. Oh, my... I really shouldn’t be documenting this.
One of the girls spotted bumper cars - everyone's favorite! How could that not make this trip worthwhile..... I'll tell you. After waiting in the freezing cold for about an hour one of my friends decided not to go on because she was too cold. So that meant we were down to two. I wanted to call it quits too but when I asked my remaining friend if she really wanted to do it there was almost a sparkle in her eye that she tried to hide when she said “kind of”. I couldn’t call it quits now, not after seeing that look. About 15 minutes later it was finally our turn. Most of the people that went on the ride at the same time as us were probably 14+ and mainly guys - I’ll mention this now so you don’t think I’m completely horrible with what I’m about to say - After the woman opened the gate, we both ran to our vehicle of choice and buckled ourselves in. The steering wheel was made of metal so at this point I was almost positive I was going to loose one of my fingers to frost bite on this ride. I was however happy about one thing... this is the horrible part I was warning you about earlier... I was happy I was finally able to take my frustrations of this failed adventure out on everyone around me. My strategy (yes, I had one) was to drive my car on the outer edges where no one was to pick up speed, then, target a little kid in attempt to give him/her whiplash. Horrible, I know... especially since I'm a teacher now. But, I'm just being honest and I had so much evil fun doing it. This one time, I had a certain kid in sight. He was driving a purple car and was probably 16 or so. He saw me coming but had doubt in his eyes that I would be so daring to hit him straight on. After all, what adult would do that to a kid? Apparently he never met my kind before. I went for it laughing like a mad woman and rammed into his car. We both jolted backwards in shock of how hard the collision actually ended up being. The look on his face was priceless as he gave me the thumbs up and said "Good job!" My girlfriend that was waiting on the sidelines said she never saw me that intent to do something so evil before. She couldn’t stop laughing though and wished she had a camera to catch some of this on film. Every once and a while I’d pass by my friend in the other bumper car and would nod in approval after hitting an unsuspecting kid. Oh, my... I really shouldn’t be documenting this. After we released our bumper car carnage onto Daegu we couldn’t stop laughing about everything. We ended our amusement park tour with going up to the “drop zone” tower which over looked the city. It was also where you could go bungee jumping under warmer conditions. The view was absolutely beautiful so we decided to grab a beer on the top floor lounge and laughed a little more about our day then went on our way.
I’m sure we probably would have had a completely different experience if we had of went during the summer, but then again it definitely made for a unique experience that we wouldn’t of have had otherwise.
Until next time....
