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Signs of Progress

This is a pretty crummy picture but what it represents is a bit of a milestone for me. Since I had the surgery my condition has improved dramatically and Yujin and I went on a long walk with mild exertion on Saturday and a long hike with serious exertion on Sunday (up the cable car and over and down the other side and back up to Seokbulsa, the temple carved in stone) and neither time did I suffer even mild symptoms. It wasn't very hot though, which is the true test. It was great to be able to get out and do some hiking.

I have completely lost the tourist attitude and I forget sometimes to even bring my camera along. I actually took pictures at the South Gate while I was out yesterday but I was so blown away by the temple I forgot to get it out. I sat for a long time in the temple. It was so quiet and peaceful. I would like to go to that place again.

We had left my scooter at the gate of the park where the cable car goes up but after we hiked all the way down the other side of the mountain and then half way back up in another place to go to that temple we only had three hours to get all the way back up to take the cable car down again to the scooter. I know there was probably a short cut to the top from the temple but as you know nothing is marked and I couldn't risk a descent in the dark if we missed the last cable car down at 7pm and Yujin was wearing Brikenstock's which she always does but the descent to the temple was basically "bouldering" and she wore out her little toes and although my balls were fine my knees were not and I was already into the Advil.

So we walked down further from the temple (still on the wrong side of the mountain) and came to a little noodle shack at the end of the paved road up from the other side. There was a taxi parked there with nobody in it and I asked a guy sitting there where was the driver and he said he didn't know (Yujin was in the bathroom) and I sat there and here comes this guy drunk off his ass and he goes over to the taxi and tries to get in and it is locked of course and he starts kicking the door and cussing. He then tried the doors of all the other cars. I am just sitting there watching all of this.

When Yujin came out of the bathroom the guy and his wife I had been talking to said they would give us a ride but it was a delicate situation given the belligerent nature of the drunk so we hiked down the road a way and when they finished their noodles they picked us up. They dropped us off very near the scooter and it was a minimum cab ride to the pick-up. We thanked them profusely and I gave them my two hiking apples. Home and then to the Bali Sauna and Jimjilbang for a scrubbing, steam bath, and massage chair. I slept soundly.

Dakbal: Chicken Feet



“Put enough spicy sauce on anything and it will taste good” I repeat to myself as I prepare for my first Dakbal moment. Slowly, I pick up one of the spindly chicken feet in front of me and, checking for toenails, prepare to put yet another alien object into my mouth (no jokes please, I’m aware of how that sounds.)


To be honest, Dakbal was an easier jump to make than the above paragraph lets on. First off, the feet were suffocated with a red hot sticky spicy sauce (I had a bit of a Lady Macbeth moment in the bathroom afterwards) so I knew hot would be the dominant sensation. Secondly, they looked like they had more meat on them than some of the odds and ends you find in a box of mediocre fried chicken, and last but not least, the toenails had been removed, something I usually insist on in a pre-dinner snack.


As for the eating of the things, that was a different story. I first attempted using chopsticks, but despite my ever-improving skills was unable to angle it sufficiently enough to get a bite in edgeways. Next I downed tools and plunged in fingers first, making a pass at the chicken feet head on. This time however my teeth barely scraped the skin and I ended up with a face full of hot sauce that reminded me of when I dressed up as the Joker at Halloween. Thankfully my next attempt proved more successful, and I was soon dismembering, biting and slurping my way through the whole batch.




Once in, most of what was going on had to do with the hot sauce they were covered in. It was like that crimson, sticky, slightly sweet lava you sometimes get at fried chicken places, with a fair number of chilli seeds and slices thrown in for good measure -REALLY hot! The meat meanwhile clung together in little pockets of goodness and was by in large, tender and easy on the way down, with some slightly crispy skin giving it a bit of extra character to boot.


At 1000 won for ten, you really can’t ask for much more.

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