SATURDAY JAN 14. 2012. This morning I ran up Jangsan Mt. where the Korean army had emplaced land mines to make things more exciting for trail running… see happy mined trials.

Back home, I started writing an essay on two movies I’ve been thinking about a lot.  The essay compares “The Notebook” and “Blue Valentine”. Two movies that have a lot in common and seem to be in dialogue.

Then got on the first train out of Jangsan for Yangsan.  Yansang’s the furthest point in the green line of the Busan subway. This is the first part of my plan to go to every end point in Busan’s subway system. It took me about 1.5 hrs to get to the station… I live at the other end of the green line in Jansang. I wrote part of my graduation play for the kids I teach on the train. On the train, I listened to the later works of Bob Dylan and read Atlas Shrugged on my iPhone.

Pretty soon all the cosmopolitan Koreans got off the train and the old Koreans got on. They were ajimas and their male counter parts.  Yansang must have the ajima manufacturing plant and all ajimas must have been recalled for their weekly perm. The train went above ground and I saw the Nakdonggang river glistening in the afternoon sun.  Across the water,  strawberries fields spread away into the hilly horizons.  White apartments buildings grew out of the green eastern hills.

Yansang was a little boring. Here is what I thought was most interesting.

 

Then I went to see “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” good movie but with a lot of sexual violence.

David Fincher is the shit. I hope Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross do an evil cover of Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep”.

The movie finished late… at 00:05… I ran across a darkened Lotte Department store to catch the last train out of Seomyeon. I failed. The train had left a long time ago… sad face… took my fail as a sign that I was going to find something interesting on the streets of Seomyeon… perhaps a mystery to solve…

I followed my intuition… found some friendly Korean soldiers out for a night of fun waiting outside of the Milk Boy club (which I first thought was a gay bar and then remembered I was in Korea and that there’s no “doble sentido” here).  The line to get in was too long but the Koreans kept me entertained until they told me I was going to be waiting for an hour to get to “the best dancing hall this side of the street.”  Took a picture of them. Koreans, like most other humans, love the immortality of a photograph.

Couldn’t wait an hour. Took a cab back to Jangsan.

At home, I listened to a Fresh Air episode on Rin Tin Tin, a Ted Talk on inspiration and a Moth podcast about the holocaust.  Then I made my necessary FB check and saw a picture of Lionel Richie… decided that THAT was definitely a sign to listen to All Night Long.