So I’m trying to be more diligent about having guest bloggers on the 1st of each month. This month, I’m happy to have asked my cousin Zack to be a Bluebottom Guest. Zack is living in Seoul, South Korea and is working as an ESL teacher. He keeps an amazing blog about his adventures — perZpective. Click here to read more about him and check out his blog.
I’m so happy to keep up with Zack through his poignant words and his beautiful photography. Needless to say, I’m a proud cousin. And I feel like we have a lot in common — both having the itch for travel and adventure.
Last month, Zack’s mom, Kathleen went to visit him. I was so happy to see these posts — Kathleen is a special lady who I made a lot of great memories with growing up.
This is one in a series of posts about their trip. Thanks again, Zack!
And to everyone…enjoy!
xoxox
Zuzu
my amazing cousin Zack
NoteZ: This is the fourth post of a series on my recent trip to Jeju Island, South Korea [Day 1] [Day 2] [Day 3 Pt1]. These images were all shot on a single roll of film in one day. I’ve inserted my photos chronologically into my story by referring to them numerically. I hope this will get you a real feel of how I use my camera, as if you were standing there next to me the whole time on this journey. If you have any questions about Jeju, or anything else you might want to know, please feel free to leave your comment below. I always love to hear what photos you enjoy most!
Drenched, from head to toe. The weather was a wild barrage of wind and water pellets, seemingly aimed straight for us.
“I’m glad you told me to pick up some ponchos.”
“Yea, it would’ve been hell trying to carry an umbrella in weather like this. I’d hate to be them,” we both chuckled at the cute Korean couple struggling with their polka-dotted rainbow umbrella like they were being dragged by the leash of a rambunctious, untrained German shepherd.
Our initial plan, or mine at least, was to make it to the bottom of Jeongbang waterfall, the only waterfall in Jeju that falls directly into the sea from the island. From the few images I had seen, it appeared as if you could go down onto the rocks at the bottom of the waterfall, capturing it from below up close and personal.
As we approached the ticket booth to enter the grounds, I could hear the high winds and crashing waves amidst a constant, bellowing roar that could only be Jeongbang. My eagerness came to a swift end when I realized the path to the foot of the waterfall had been blocked off. Due to the extreme weather, no one was allowed down. I was tempted to sneak past the gate in hopes of making it below, but my mom persuaded me otherwise and we made do with pictures from the top [1].
From there, two trails extended in opposite directions and we first went towards Jeongbang. The path led us over the waterfall about ten feet from the falloff, then along a picturesque pond decorated with a traditional Korean pagoda amusingly juxtaposed to some Christian crosses in the background, and to a small history museum exhibiting a gallery that could be seen in less than 15 minutes [2-4].
We used the museum as an excuse to get out of the downpour for a brief minute, as it was a bit exhausting having to brave it out. My mom refused to pose for many pictures that day to my dismay, while she proceeded to snap away at me like I was some famous celebrity. And perhaps to her I am, which for that I have no reasonable counter, barring the fact that the same logic gets me nowhere with her!
After our short break in the dry bubble of boredom that was called a museum, we were off again, this time to explore the opposite path near the entrance, and by far the more scenic of the two. By this time the rain had actually picked up more than before, to the point where we debated pausing for a moment near the ticket booth to see if it would slow down again, yet I proved the victor of this debate and we marched forward.
This path was just along the cliffside of the sea, offering minimally cluttered views of the sea and the small islands (or maybe just enormous pieces of land) that lay just along the misty distance. We continued along the path for about a mile, stopping here and there to take pictures where the opportunity presented itself. I couldn’t seem to take my eye off of the small islands in the distance, which my images undoubtedly reveal [5-8].
A mile into the excursion, we came upon a flight of stairs heading down a cliffside. Unsure to where it might lead, I told my mom to venture just a bit further to see what lied at the bottom and then we could head back. She agreed, and seemed curious to find out for herself.
To our surprise, what we found was well worth the scaling–another waterfall. This one was much less formidable and luckily was still open to be seen from its feet. My enthusiasm was apparent as I quickly sped for the bottom. I knew this was my chance to get a long exposure of a waterfall, giving it the smooth like characteristic I haven’t been able to experiment with, as was my intentions all along.
Suddenly, as if being blindly led into an ambush, a rain unlike any I’ve ever experienced came hurling down. At first, I couldn’t tell if it was only spray from the waterfall, but it was a noticeable change that I quickly realized was attacking from the clouds. Unable to find a sturdy place for my tripod and finding a real reason to perhaps not test my camera’s waterproof abilities, I never snapped a single frame. My mom got a couple of me, as she intelligently resisted venturing as far as I had, and documented my measly attempt. In retrospect, I was happy she at least got a picture of me in action, although failing, as it proved I was actually there. It will undoubtedly remain a keeper in a personal family scrapbook, never to see the public eye, hopefully.
I’ve never been so eager to escape rain. This type of rain doesn’t exist in Texas, or not to my knowledge at least. My previous anticipation to live in a country with a monsoon season has now turned to a dreary fear of what it might actually be like. All I know is we booked it back to our car about as fast as we possibly could. This also signaled an end to our outdoor activities for the day unless it was to die down some, we would simply use the safety of our car for seeing the island more before heading back home. We were both already feeling worn out, in need of some nourishment.
Before heading back to the hotel, I decided to take my mom to a traditional Korean-style market, if we could find one that is. I knew they would have a large selection of food, including some fried snacks my mom would love. I don’t think she knew what to expect, nor do I think anybody would coming from the States. An extensive stretch of vendors crowded the roofed mall-shaped building, each selling their own unique selection of cuisine with each vendor organized into categories. In other words, as if shopping for a certain item in the grocery store, all the live fish vendors have their section of the market and all the fabric vendors in another, so on and so forth, making it simple to navigate.
We found a market in the nearby city, and even managed to score a parking spot, which proved to be the more difficult of the two tasks. A short side note, driving in Korea is insane. I’ve come to the conclusion that I don’t believe traffic laws are enforced here. Seoul is about ten times worse than Jeju, and I found the island to be difficult enough. The two important guidelines to driving in Korea: don’t let another car hit you, and as long as your car can fit there, it can go there. No area, no matter the congestion of people, is off-limits to cars. I’ve been in Myeongdong at midnight on Saturday, one of the most crowded areas in Seoul at one of its peak hours, to find cars creeping through crowds of hundreds, honking as if the people were doing something wrong. It’s utterly ridiculous. Being my first time to parallel park in Korea, I was happy with the results.
Live fish dominated the market [9], which was no surprise due to the island being heavily supported economically by the fishing industry. As I like to put it, my mom is a fan of fish that doesn’t taste like it came from the sea. Or better yet, as long as its fried, it’s ok. She didn’t care too much to try any type of fish while we were there, but fell in love with some of the street food snacks, which just so happen to be fried.
After the market, it was time to call it a day. We headed straight for the hotel where Mom and I both enjoyed the comfort of a bed, leading inevitably into naps for the both of us. Needless to say, it was still one of the best parts of the day as Mom and I are both heavy supporters of well-managed naps.
About an hour and a half later, clear skies and a fresh burst of liveliness cued round 2 [10].
I hadn’t quite finished my roll of film for the day. I had some frames left that I had reserved specifically for night. I wanted to capture a wide range of the whole day instead of a limited display of one time period. I remembered an intriguing port area we had crossed while driving around earlier in the day. I thought I might try exploring some of it at night, hoping it would be well-lit and have a couple of good views. My mom’s rest gave her the energy to join as well, although we both opted for some coffee to get the flames going again and stopped at a Dunkin’ Donuts on the way [11].
It was about 9:30pm by now, finally dark enough to be nighttime, but hopefully not too late to keep us restricted from going anywhere. I used the Korean GPS in the car to try to pinpoint where this place was. Although it took a bit of effort, we eventually found our way back to this old fisherman’s port.
Honestly, it wasn’t as grandiose as I thought it might be. I was planning to take pictures of the boats in the port, but none of them were lit up. On the other hand, the bridge just around the opposite end of the port was beautifully lit in a rainbow of colors. I hadn’t even noticed during the day, while at night I couldn’t miss it. We drove all the way down to the end of this little cove and found some parking near the entrance to the bridge. I was crossing my fingers curious whether or not we were going to be able to get a decent view of it. I got my answer when we found the entrance clear and nobody on guard, and assuming it was open to the public we head for the bridge, eager and delighted.
I burnt the rest of my roll under this bridge [12-17]. Although the late hour and absence of my tripod meant a possible lack of clarity from long exposures, I made do the best I could. My favorite picture from under the bridge was actually the view back inwards of the cove. Setting the shutter speed to a bulb release, I left the shutter open as I counted for 5 seconds, willingly sacrificing clarity to smooth out the water and light up the racing clouds. The result left me pretty satisfied, although I still wish I could’ve used a tripod for the shot, as I would’ve liked the buildings to be clear in contrast to the moving clouds and water.
The exploration of the bridge and port would be the end of a long day for us. We were pleased with all that we did that day, squeezing in two waterfalls amidst a monsoon, testing our taste buds at a Korean market, and playing around under a rainbow bridge in the middle of a clear night. Everything we saw that day was beautiful and unique, it’s not often people see Jeju like that, but I imagine for the people who live there, this was a prime example of what life is really like on this island. Not always a sun-filled beach paradise, but an island full of all types of environment, from rain to sun, beaches to cliffs; Jeju appeared to have it all.
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- my amazing cousin Zack
Zuzu Bluebottom 