I have lived in South Korea for almost a year and a half now and like anywhere, once you get a routine going and you are familiar with your surroundings, it is easy to get into a rut and get bored. It is easy to forget that you are in such a foreign and wonderful place and to become complacent and to stop DOING NEW THINGS!
Doing new things re-opens your experience of the world you are living in and reminds you that your daily world is only as big as you allow it to be. New experience makes your world huge and exciting.
This weekend I met up with two friends in the city of Pohang about an hour and a half north of Busan by bus. It was a little cloudy and threatening to shower lightly but who cares. We were there for the official fireworks festival of South Korea. The year before I went to the massive fireworks display off the Gwangan bridge out at the coast. It was a scary experience because of the sheer mass of people. We discovered we were trapped on the beach at all sides and that the only way out was to FIGHT our way through a dense crowd, the kind where everyone is trapped by one another and people start to panic and fight. After that we were lifted off our feet by the crowd and carried by our rib bones into the subway car where my friend found she couldn't breath. So! We decided, NEVER AGAIN!!
The Pohang fireworks festival was so relaxed and lovely. Just the right amount of people to feel that you were somewhere where SOMETHING good was going on. After a false start at a beach side food stall, where we were served inedible fish which when we complained about was taken, put onto a different plate and served back to us, we found a DELICIOUS restaurant and sat out on the open patio waiting for the fireworks.
As my friend commented, fireworks are in her top five things in life, up there with family and friends. And as they started I realised she was right, they really do strike you in the heart. She also noted that no matter how old someone is, everyone feels like a four year old awed by life while watching fireworks, open mouthed, head tilted back taking in the star spangled beauty in the sky.
Anyway....I loved the weekend. The big explosive red hearts that popped into the deep blue night sky made me feel love for whoever it was who was making that beauty, and it made me feel so happy and at peace and I remembered how great Korea really is. I think the BBQ and the alcohol helped.....but chaknow!!
Life life life. Too good.