1 month in South Korea - Day 23 & 24 - Jeonju
Arrived in Jeonju on the previous night, I had only 2 days in Jeonju. Besides the Hanok village, I was quite uncertain anywhere else to go. But it turned out that although I visited the village 3 times, I still missed a lot of places in the village.
After having a wonderful breakfast with the best chicken soup ever, I had a fancy bicycle tour to the Hanok village with my host. I might make him a bit upset with a lot of questions like: why do they call it a slow city? Do you think it is still a slow city? Are those real hanboks, or just for rent type? With the traditional fabric? 🤓 He couldnt answer with certainty and had to check up to the Internet to give me reasonable answers. We kept talking although there were more and more disagreements and opposite points of view. It was uncomfortable but at least we could learn from each other and that was what we wanted. We could laugh and he liked my sunblock story, ha ha
I went to the Hanji museum by myself. My host forgot to tell me that it was in a Hanji mill, so I was kind of about to turn around when the security approached me. But he welcomed me and asked in English “museum? Museum?” I was always curious about Korean and Japanese paper covering the door, and now I had chance to learn about it. It was so good to be warmly welcomed and have a hand-made hanji experience. I loved to be here and to learn how a traditional material came to modern life and had many future potentials
On the way back to the meeting point, I got off at stop with interesting sidewalk vendors. Turned out, it was Jungang market and there was a cover on the ground engraved “ Rice cake street” I enjoyed walking around the market with attempt to find the best rice cake shop. Finally, I found one, I believed. It was super cheap, super delicious, offered tables inside, happy faces of the owners…,and the shop was on the TV show👍 (Most host tried a few of cakes and agreed it was very delicious and cheap) Somehow I took a bus to the inside of the Cheonbuk university campus. That was the first time I saw a huge soccer field inside a university. The campus was like an town of its own. I had to asked 2 Koreans to find the way out 😅 That night, my host was dedicated to rent a car and planned to take me and his lovely girl friend to the cherry blossom park. But traffic jam occurred and we all liked to go to the Hanok village. He introduced me a lot of places in the village but he still recommended that I should check out this village more by myself.
I had another wonderful breakfast on the second day, and got ready to Moaksan. The hike to the summit was the challenging one ever but it was good for my spirit and health. On the top, I met a group of old people. When they knew I came from Vietnam, they gave me some cookies. One man introduced that he was in Vietnam war and could sing a Vietnam song. Confidently, he sang. Although I couldnt hear a word, the rhythm was definitely correct. They invited me to have lunch with them but I refused because I didnt want to bother them much. If I had been able to communicate in Korean, I would have liked to “bother” them, ha ha 😎 Anyway, they called me back and gave me a kimbab. I took another trail to go down and it was so beautiful and perfect
This trail led to Geumsansa and it had 3 parts: beautiful pine trees on both sides, a stream along the second part, cherry flower trees. Or you could hear the wind and bird first, the stream, and the bee buzz. They were trying to make Geumsansa bigger and build its own website. Very promising! I visited the Hanok village for the third times and took the map at info desk. Yep, I missed a lot of places and I couldnt make it up because of raining and time limit. Anyway, I slept in Spalaqua jjimjilbang that night, the best jjimjilbang in this trip.
