The bus to Gyeongju (about 4 hours from Seoul ) was uneventful. It was interesting to see a very familiar countryside (it looks a lot like Japan) with church spires and steeples popping up here and there. It’s easy to forget there is a strong Catholic tradition in Korea.
At first glance, Gyeongju was a dump. At second and third glance I was still of much the same opinion.
I would not recommend going there unless you are on a guided tour. It was the seat of the Shilla Kingdom for 1000 years and is a town with a rich and proud history and culture. It’s full to the brim with Unesco world heritage tombs and temples and palaces. But each sight is miles apart. The time and effort you expend in making your own way by local bus is energy-sapping and soul-destroying. Figuring out a transportation system in a foreign language is difficult enough when you’re based in a place for months. But when you’re only there for two days, it’s a baptism of fire.
I actually love seeing the local colour of a rural bus system. The old leather-faced farmers, the emerald green paddy fields out the window, the parcels of vegetables and exotic fruit piled on peoples laps, the background babble of a foreign tongue. That’s the fun part. But when another bus inexplicably passes by without stopping, and it’s raining, and you’re standing over an open drain, that’s when your spirits can flag. I may have even shouted something very rude out VERY loud, much to the enjoyment of the local grannies waiting with me.
The centre of Gyeongju really reminded me of some of the regional Thai towns I’ve visited. The covered market beside the tiny train station was hot and humid. Stalls were made of off-cuts of wood and metal and old sheets of plastic. Scrap chic. Everything comes in piles: piles of leafy greens, piles of shining aubergines, piles of clammy fish with no ice and a side of flies (the ‘l’ is intentional). A bucket of rotting offal sat next to the ubiquitous stall of plastic flip flops. Who can say why? And at each stall the sellers lounged about fanning themselves, propped up, waiting for something to happen. I really felt a sense of déjà vu.
As downtown was kind of ugly, I was thankful that my hotel was about twenty minutes outside of town in the heart of the countryside. I shouldn’t have been. It was a worse dump than the hotels I saw in the centre. Seriously, this place made the Bates Motel look charming. It will go down as the second worst place I’ve ever slept. And bear in mind that I am someone who has slept on train platform benches, Sydney beaches and Tokyo gutters (only that one time). The title of worst hotel still goes to the Laotian room where crunchy cockroaches scuttled on the floor below my bed throughout the night.
I think most normal people would have run at the sight of the hotel. Maybe I didn’t want to be bested by the place and my reward for sucking it up was a great rest. I slept better there than I have anywhere else this trip. The irking thing was really the cost. It wasn’t so cheap and you honestly couldn’t pay me to stay there again.
The best thing by far about my time in Gyeongju was Bulguksa Temple. I've put a picture of the gardens above. Like I said, loved it. I wasn’t so wild about the Unesco protected mountain I had to climb (on an empty stomach) to get there. But it was a peaceful, beautiful Buddhist temple with great views of a sweeping valley below.
An interesting cultural point: In rural Gyeongju, like in Okinawa, tombs are a big deal. But in Korea, the tombs are round, green mounds of grass. Like in Okinawa, though, they are scattered about in unexpected locations. Probably again based on good feng shui. The Shilla Kings tombs in Gyeongju were massive hills of grass, but the locals’ ones were just little grassy knolls the size of a small tent dotted about the fields of rice. I found them much more impressive and tried to get some photos from the bus as we sped by.
At first glance, Gyeongju was a dump. At second and third glance I was still of much the same opinion.
I would not recommend going there unless you are on a guided tour. It was the seat of the Shilla Kingdom for 1000 years and is a town with a rich and proud history and culture. It’s full to the brim with Unesco world heritage tombs and temples and palaces. But each sight is miles apart. The time and effort you expend in making your own way by local bus is energy-sapping and soul-destroying. Figuring out a transportation system in a foreign language is difficult enough when you’re based in a place for months. But when you’re only there for two days, it’s a baptism of fire.
I actually love seeing the local colour of a rural bus system. The old leather-faced farmers, the emerald green paddy fields out the window, the parcels of vegetables and exotic fruit piled on peoples laps, the background babble of a foreign tongue. That’s the fun part. But when another bus inexplicably passes by without stopping, and it’s raining, and you’re standing over an open drain, that’s when your spirits can flag. I may have even shouted something very rude out VERY loud, much to the enjoyment of the local grannies waiting with me.
The centre of Gyeongju really reminded me of some of the regional Thai towns I’ve visited. The covered market beside the tiny train station was hot and humid. Stalls were made of off-cuts of wood and metal and old sheets of plastic. Scrap chic. Everything comes in piles: piles of leafy greens, piles of shining aubergines, piles of clammy fish with no ice and a side of flies (the ‘l’ is intentional). A bucket of rotting offal sat next to the ubiquitous stall of plastic flip flops. Who can say why? And at each stall the sellers lounged about fanning themselves, propped up, waiting for something to happen. I really felt a sense of déjà vu.
As downtown was kind of ugly, I was thankful that my hotel was about twenty minutes outside of town in the heart of the countryside. I shouldn’t have been. It was a worse dump than the hotels I saw in the centre. Seriously, this place made the Bates Motel look charming. It will go down as the second worst place I’ve ever slept. And bear in mind that I am someone who has slept on train platform benches, Sydney beaches and Tokyo gutters (only that one time). The title of worst hotel still goes to the Laotian room where crunchy cockroaches scuttled on the floor below my bed throughout the night.
I think most normal people would have run at the sight of the hotel. Maybe I didn’t want to be bested by the place and my reward for sucking it up was a great rest. I slept better there than I have anywhere else this trip. The irking thing was really the cost. It wasn’t so cheap and you honestly couldn’t pay me to stay there again.
The best thing by far about my time in Gyeongju was Bulguksa Temple. I've put a picture of the gardens above. Like I said, loved it. I wasn’t so wild about the Unesco protected mountain I had to climb (on an empty stomach) to get there. But it was a peaceful, beautiful Buddhist temple with great views of a sweeping valley below.
An interesting cultural point: In rural Gyeongju, like in Okinawa, tombs are a big deal. But in Korea, the tombs are round, green mounds of grass. Like in Okinawa, though, they are scattered about in unexpected locations. Probably again based on good feng shui. The Shilla Kings tombs in Gyeongju were massive hills of grass, but the locals’ ones were just little grassy knolls the size of a small tent dotted about the fields of rice. I found them much more impressive and tried to get some photos from the bus as we sped by.
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