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| South Gate into Seoul |
Our first two weeks of our trip and our time in South Korea have flown by. Tomorrow we leave for Japan. Today is our last day. We spend the morning doing laundry and repacking our bags for an international flight, rearranging liquids, gels, shoes, valuables, lithium batteries for either carryon on checked luggage.
After the chores we set out on foot to complete two objectives. We inquired yesterday from our Tour Guide Judy, if there was a traditional card game that Koreans like to play. She told us the game was called Go Stop and that we would need to purchase a special deck of flower cards Hwatu which could be found in a convenience store. So that was first objective. Find the flower cards. Our second objective was to find Russ a South Korean soccer jersey. He started collecting and wearing these lightweight international jerseys when cycling. They also are great conversation starters.
As we walked to the market, we came across a large assembly of people with green balloons waiting for an international peace conference to begin.
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| Chloe Kim shows me the hand sign for peace and restoration of light. |
We inquired about the signs WARP and HWPL. A few Koreans who spoke English came to us to answer our questions about what was going on. You can read more with the links above, but basically both of these groups are advocates of peace through an alliance of interfaith religions.
Yes, we want peace too. We have so much in common as human beings, it is profoundly sad that we allow our worst tendencies of self, tribalism, and demonizing of those different from ourselves to steer aggression into conflict. The hand gesture for this peace group is the L with thumb and index finger as the restoration of Light.
Objective Number 1:
We inquire in convenience type stores for the Hwatu cards. Third time is a success. We buy the cards. Each card is half the size of a regular deck of cards. Apparently this game was originated in Japan. The next step is to learn how to play the game. There seems to be sufficient information on the internet to learn how to play. I wish we had secured these cards earlier and learned from some Koreans before now.
Objective Number 2:
We wander through the crowded streets of the alley way market.
Russ looks in several market stalls, and finally finds a soccer shirt. The home team wears red, the traveling team wears white. He chooses the away. Russ says he likes the collar, but I think that an "Old Blue" would just have a hard time wearing a red shirt.
The salesman digs out a Korean extra, extra large shirt for Russ. Russ usually wears a medium or large in American sizing. But there is quite a difference in sizing between Koreans and Americans.
After achieving our objectives, we stopped for an early dinner, and headed back to our hotel.
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