Pocheon Mountain
So we all piled into a van and drove to Pocheon which is about 90 minutes outside of Seoul. Korean people customarily bury dead people in the mountains, and we were going to my grandparents’ graves in the mountains around Pocheon. This is a nearby rice paddie. I guess the paddies are full of leeches.
Here’s another view of the paddies. They go all the way to the little town at the base of the gigantic mountain back there.
These stairs go up to a burial site and the signpost says who’s buried up there.
Here’s where my grandparents are buried. On the back of the tombstone there are inscriptions which basically map out a geneaology of their family line. I’m on there too along with all my sisters and cousins. When nobody was looking I chiseled a big “#1″ next to my name.
Afterwards we went to lunch in this little town. We went to a restaurant that specialized in blood sausage. I really wanted to take a picture of the blood sausage but it seemed too socially transgressive to pull out my camera during a solemn occasion. Instead I wandered around and found these big-ass pots. I don’t know what they’re for.
After lunch we went to this mountain preserve-type area. I guess my grandfather was a dedicated naturalist and he locked down thousands of acres of forest land which can never be developed on. He also planted a lot of pine trees. There’s a kind of retreat center there and some walking paths.
On the way back to Seoul we got stuck in traffic and I noticed this ad on the side of a truck. I wish pumping gas made me feel this sassified!
