It was sitting there on the shelf of the local store as if it had always been there, waiting for me. Who knew Korea would import this?! Regardless, who has two thumbs and is doing the happy dance? Meeeeee!!
I was looking forward to going to the Jinju Lantern Festival in...well...Jinju, last month but it's about a 5 hour train ride down there and I never found the time to go during the festival time period. Bummed me out. Then I learned that Seoul was having one of their own! Being an hour away, it was much more do-able, PLUS Becca's (co-worker) parents were in town to visit from England and it was a great opportunity to take them as well.
It was nothing like I expected. When I think "Lantern Festival," I think street vendors selling their wares, lit lanterns lining the lanes (huzzah alliteration!), and the all important ceremony of lighting your own paper lanterns, making a wish, and then setting them both off onto the river or stream to watch them float into the distance. Imagine seeing hundreds or thousands of these little lit lamps floating by, representing just as many heartfelt wishes of their casters.
Yes, those elements were there, but I wasn't expecting too see rows and rows of giant, colorful, hand-made paper lanterns set on display in the stream itself. It was a sight to behold and for a good part of the night, I was held in wonder. Here are some pictures, though they don't do the lanterns justice. They get better as it gets darker, of course....
We inadvertently started kinda backwards, meaning we were at the opposite end of the stream from where the Lanterns started so the pictures are in that backwards order.
This is Cheonggyechoen Stream in Seoul...we still had to walk a bit before we got to the area where the Lanterns were displayed. But it was a lovely walk....
So here they started...a school of brightly-lit paper fish fixed into the streambed....
So this is where it got even more interesting. The following shows a procession of nobles led by a traditional folk percussion group (Samulnori). This group was kind of like the pied-pipers of their day. If you saw them or heard them in the streets, you knew there was something important going on, be it a festival, a celebration, or the procession of VIPs....
The aristrocrats...
And where were they headed....towards this giant, paper lantern palace gate! I was so floored when I saw this. And the crowd was actually able to walk through it...
Often, at palace gate, are guardian stone lions, though these were, you guessed it, paper lanterns...
On the other side of the gate, there were lanterns representing the Royal Orchestra...
...then the Royal Guards....
...led by the General....
Lastly, after that incredible display of the royal court, were treated to the 12 zodiacs animals. As in the Chinese zodiac, Koreans still put a lot of weight on the year you were born (and your blood type). Some of the animals were facing the other way so I couldn't get them all. The Tiger (my zodiac animal) was facing the other side and was blocked so I couldn't even get a decent picture of it's back. Ah well...
The Boar...
The Dog and The Rooster...
The Monkey and the Mouse....
The Horse and the Snake....
The Rabbit...
The Ox...
This was at the end (erm...the beginning)....
And here's the start....
Oh wait, you can see the Tiger there, on the bottom right corner! lol
As much as I would have liked to have looped around to the other side, by that time in the night, the line to get along the banks of the stream was already horrendous. We counted ourselves lucky to have gotten there early and to have seen everything without waiting. Pretty neat stuff.
Onto the whole being sick thing: I CAN'T believe how many times I've been sick while in Korea. Most of my friends have seen me get one cold a year and that cold lasts about 24-48 hours tops. Then I come here and get sick 3 times in as many months. And not just sick. but SICK....like cough up a vat of mucus on a daily basis, sick. It's literally oozing out my eyes, people! That's how much crap I have percolating in me.
When this last bout began to take shape, I went into work anyway, hoping it'd just go away (yeah, silly me). My boss's wife asked me if I was getting sick again, to which I answered in the affirmative. She wondered aloud why I was getting sick so often. I stated, nonchalantly, that being around kids who sneeze and cough without covering their mouths, wipe their electric green snot on their hands (which they never wash) and then proceed to grab at you all day, may have something to do with it.
She then proceeded to give me this look like I was a cute, albeit uneducated, monkey. "Adults can't get sick from children," she said, as she patted my shoulder.
I kid you not. She believes this.
"Mrs. Moon, of course we can. It's the same germs that get passed around. It doesn't matter where it starts, it can infect anyone, child or adult."
Same, sympathetic look. "No, that may happen in America but that doesn't happen here. You never hear about mothers getting sick because of their children. Adults can make their kids sick but kids illnesses are too lightweight to affect us."
The word for ignorant in Korean is very harsh. As with many words, when translated into Korean (or any other language usually), it's never a pat, equal translation. When you call someone the word for ignorant in Korean, you not only imply their being uneducated, but you call into question their competence and social status as well. The word almost escaped my lips but I managed to stop it before I got the first syllable out. I REALLY wanted to say "What kind of voodoo, country bumpkin thinking is that?!" but "ignorant" was what came to mind first. I don't even know how to say "voodoo" in Korean. Oh wait..."BooDoo."
I had to retreat back into the teacher's lounge before I said something I'd regret. Apparently, we in America are so weak-willed, we allow our children to infect us with diseases even when they wipe it all over us or practically breathe it into our lungs. But why should that even matter when children's illnesses are too mild to even affect adults? Incredible.
Anyway, my coughing became worse and I stayed home the next two days. This morning, my boss came to pick me up to take me to another doctor, since the local one's prescription didn't really seem to be helping. This one was an ENT doctor so maybe I'd fare better in terms of a diagnosis and resulting prescription. When they called me in, I noticed something similar with the local doctor: the examining room was wide open and all patients could see each other while being checked out by the doctor or nurse. It was a like a conveyor belt of patients. The doctor was sitting on a stool with wheels and he'd just talk to a patient for 5 seconds, do something to them, then send them on their merry way while he wheeled himself to the next patient. In a matter of 10 minutes, he saw and treated 6 - 7 patients. My boss told me, proudly, that Korean doctors (private) see as many as 300 patients a day while American doctors see a measly 70.
The medical sitcom "Scrubs" had illustrated that a doctor speaks to their patients for an average of 11 seconds before moving onto the next. Our dear Dr. Thomas Kim has attested that this is actually true in real life. Apparently, in Korea, if you're talking to your patient for 11 seconds, you're doing it wrong.
The doctor asked me what was wrong and before I even finished speaking, he stuck some long instruments up one of my nostrils and proceeded to suction it out. At least, that's what I assume he was doing. Initially it was fine but he kept going deeper and deeper until it seemed like he was practically poking my brain with those things. I have a pretty high threshold for pain, especially when it's unexpected, but this hurt LIKE A MOTHER. I clenched my fists and tried not to cry like a baby. It lasted only a few seconds but it felt like hours. Then I realized that he had only done one nostril. Woe is me. My nose felt so violated and it was about to be again. There was absolutely no warning about this. He just did it. He didn't tell me that it would hurt or not hurt or what exactly the procedure was for. His only comment was, "You endured that really well." My butt was still clenched, it hurt so much. He then said that, by the sound of my cough, I should really go so an internal med doctor and get a chest x-ray done. Thanks and buh-bye. At least he didn't charge me for the nose rape.
As I was bring driven to the internal medicine doctor across town, I gave the ENT doc the benefit of the doubt: Maybe he didn't tell me what he was going to do so I wouldn't stress out and clench up over it...even though every sphincter I had in my body did clench up.
After waiting about 10 minutes in the lobby, I got called in to see the doc. I sat down and told him my medical history and what I had been dealing with in the past few days. As I was leaning over the desk, talking to the doctor, the nurse, from out of nowhere, sticks a thermometer in my ear WITHOUT ANY WARNING. I nearly jumped out of the chair. Who does that?! Who just comes up and ear rapes you while you're talking?! Korean nurses, that's who.
Everyone else seemed to think it was normal. No wonder they go through so many patients a day. They don't bother wasting time in telling you the little details -- like what they're going to stick in your body or why. After my chest x-ray, I was told I was going to get a shot. I entered a little side room next to the front desk. This is the second time I've dropped trou this week but hey, whatever it takes, right? So I closed the door and proceeded to pull my jeans down. The door then opens and another nurse comes into to get something. I tried to close the door behind her but her ass was in the way and she wasn't budging. Meanwhile, my own butt was hanging out for all to see. "What are you doing?" asked butt-in-way-of-door nurse to the one about to administer the shot. "Just administering a shot," she replied. "I see," answered b-i-w-o-d nurse. I still can't close the door. She finally left and I got the shot but damn, no respect for privacy, man! I mean, I was kind of expecting it as a whole but just keeping the door wide open as I'm standing there with my butt-cheeks to the wind was NOT anything I was prepared for. So the tally for today was nose rape, ear rape, butt cheeks on display.
The only upside to this is the cost of healthcare here. The first local doc I saw was under my boss's insurance and the visit was $3 while the prescription drugs were about $5, so $8 total. The last two doc visits were not under insurance and they cost me a whopping, get ready for this, $25 (this is including the visit, exam, x-ray, and meds). No wonder Koreans go see their doctor for every little thing...it doesn't cost them an arm and a leg.
Anyway, grateful that no other orifices had to be violated today, I went home and took a nap and tried to have more soup even though I couldn't taste anything. After two rounds of the latest meds, I do feel a little better but it may have more to do with the western medicine that Adi slipped me during our late night drug deal (she gave me some of her stash of Nyquil and Dayquil). We'll see how this play out but, man, I think my nose and ear may need to go to therapy.
