Curling in Gangneung

Did you know that Gangneung, a city along the coast in the north-east province of Korea, is hosting the World Women's Curling Championships this year? And guess what huge curling fan went to see our women compete? My dear friend Amanda Clozza! Well, I went along too- but only for moral support. I figured what the hell- when in Rome, right?
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I left school a little early to make the almost 7 hour trek up to Gangneung province this past Friday- catching the bus from Suncheon, to Gwanju, and finally to Gangneung, putting me there at about 11:00pm. With big comfortable seats and only 8 passengers, I don't know how the company even afforded the gas for the trip.
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It's never a completely uneventful ride in Korea. About 2 hours from our destination, as I sat in a daze watching a very bad Korean melodrama on the television, the bus either hit something in the street, or a piece of the bus fell off- and whatever it was it made a loud bang loud enough to wake most everyone. Something that any responsible driver would pull over to investigate right? Wrong! Me and the man across the isle looked around, and I saw him lean forward to the driver, clearly asking him what the alarming sound was. I know a very limited number of phrases in Korean, and my favourite one was the driver's only answer. "Mol-lah-yo": I don't know! Wow, that's just great. He decided 15 minutes down the highway to stop and investigate- but all was well and on we rolled.
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Clozza wasn't meeting me in the city until sometime in the wee hours of the morning, so I thought I'd finally give the Jimjilbang a try for a place to sleep. Costing only around $6, it's far cheaper than a love motel. I had an idea of what it was- a wide open shared sleeping space, but I still didn't expect what I was in for.
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Walking in, I paid at the desk and was given a towel and a pair of orange shorts and a gray t-shirt, vaguely reminiscent of a prison uniform. She told me something about the 2nd and 3rd floors, and on up I went. I put my shoes in a cubby and walked through a set of doors to find myself in a wide open locker room with attached shower/spa area, in which a number of Korean women of all ages were walking around in the buff. For such a conservative country, it's amazing how uninhibited Koreans are to flaunt their nakedness in such situations. The don't just go from the shower to their locker naked, in order to get changed. They just stand infront of the long mirrors naked, doing their hair, watching the tv, dressing their children- whatever! Inside the spa, there were different hot and cold tubs, showers, and lots of smaller showers where the women sit on stools where they can do a very thorough scrubbing job.
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After a quick shower I got changed into my own pjs and was about to head upstairs, when I was told no- I couldn't go up there. Through the woman's motions I deduced that I has to wear the prison clothes! Augh, you've got to be kidding. Once I got upstairs I saw that everyone was in fact wearing them, a room full of men and women in matching orange and grey- and men in matching blue and grey. eesh. "one of us! one of us!" haha
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I'll help you to visualize the layout- the sleeping area was a wide open room with a tiled floor and stonework pillars in the centre of the floor. Along the left wall there was a snack stand, a small computer room, a closet of small hard foam squares (sorry excuses for pillows), and a darker sleeping room. Along the back was a bigscreen tv, a pile of mats, and a row of vibrating massage chairs; and on the right a bookshelf and 3 steam rooms of varying temperatures. In the middle? Koreans! All on small 2 inch thick mats, sleeping in various positions, watching the tv, or talking. Men, women and children together. It's not just a place where travellers come either. I was told that jimjilbangs are often used as a night out for the family! Even after 12 there were still people awake, and at 5:00am when Amanda Clozza arrived she said there were kids running around. Only in Korea!!!
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So there I was, in the smaller dark sleeping room with 2 other sleeping Koreans I'd never met in my life, laying on a tiny foam mat with a rock hard piece of foam for a pillow, in orange inmate pajamas, stating to sweat as the heat radiated up through the floor. Needless to say, I've slept better. Some night out! When I woke up to find Clozza in the big open room all we could do was sit there laughing at the hilarity of it all. Fun times.
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We had a most excellent day sightseeing in the beautiful sunny 20 degree weather though. We met up with Patrick, a Canadian I met in Suncheon the weekend before who lives in the area, and he and his very kind coteacher took Clozza and I out for lunch and on a great tour of the city. Over the 2 days we saw the cultural centre where we learned about some traditional festivals, an old archway, a reconstructed administrative centre, a stone pagoda, a Korean historical village, a small lake, and the beach! It's a beautiful expanse of beach there, and the sand is so grainy that it doesn't stick to you when it's wet. Bonus! Although the water was cold we saw one guy surfing, some people out doing boat tours, a man on a parasail, and a pirate. Well, he was missing his eye patch, but he was walking around with a parrot on his shoulder. ;)
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That night was time for the main event- curling!! There were 4 games going on- but we were all riveted to the Canada/China match on the 2nd 'sheet'. Now this may come as a surprise- but Koreans are NOT big curling fans! The 1000 seat rink couldn't have had any more than 200 spectators, and the Canadian section was definately the biggest. We even met a couple who flew over from Dawson City Yukon to watch the game! As we were right in the front row along the side, covered with stickers and waving our flag; one of team members said hello and said she'd have their 5th player come and give us some autographed cards! How great, my first sports celebrity autograph. We attracted the attention of a Korean lady too- who came by and asked to take our picture randomly. Say 'kimchi'! She was even nice enough to come back and repay us with a package of rice sugar cookies. :) We also met a South African couple with their 3 year old daughter there who were teaching in the area. While Clozza taught them the ways of the rock, I was entertained by the little one, sharing stickers and teaching her to yell, "Go Canada!" out over the ice. What a time.
Oh yeah, and team Jones beat China, 11-5. Playoffs are this weekend. . . . I won't be there.
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Go Canada!