Mark managed to wind up his final exams around 1:00pm on Friday and we headed for the train station by taxi. The driver must've thought we were in a hurry, because he drove through Daejon like the proverbial bat out of hell. I had both my feet braced against the seat in front of me in preparation for impact!

We boarded our train and immediately realized why it would have been worth the extra KRW 6000 ($5.60) to get a first-class ticket. Our car was packed with riders hanging off of every available surface. Although we had reserved seats, people were practically sitting in my lap. The air inside the car was stifling, and before long a curious, and uniquely Korean phenomenon began to assail our nostrils, namely, Kimchi sweat. As you know, I lived in Korea for several years as a child, and I have vivid memories of being assaulted by this nasty odor whenever confined in a small space with several natives. Most Koreans eat Kimchi for every meal, so consequently, when they sweat, it reeks of pickled cabbage, garlic, and chili. Quite nauseating to Western nostrils.

Despite the assault on our olfactory sensibilities, we arrived in Seoul without permanent damage. Gazing upon the cosmopolitan splendour of the national capitol, we felt like a couple of bucolic hillbillies who'd just fallen off a truck filled with giant white radishes. We loaded up a nearby taxi and moved to the Lotte...hotel that is...swimmin' pools....movie stars.

Scruggs and Flat play blistering banjo outro.

The Lotte is a spectacular 5-star property located in the heart of downtown. Due to the SARS hysteria, we had secured a double room at the incredible rate of only $200/night, this included two comped meals. The hotel staff all spoke impeccable english and were very helpful. Our room was on the 20th floor and had a terrific view of the mountains thanks to the recent rains which had scrubbed away the normally rank smog of the city. The room was also equipped with a high-definition TV and a space-age toilet with heated seat, and an automatic bidet to gently cleanse your inner Frenchman with a refreshing spray of heated water...or so I'm led to believe.

We cleaned up and decided to have a drink before dinner. The main lounge is a spectacular open atrium backed by a series of artificial waterfalls and koi ponds...very relaxing. I ordered a Mai Tai and Mark had a margarita. While we waited for our drinks the house band regaled us with phonetically sung AM hits from the '60s and '70s including, "To Sir, With Love", "Baby I'm-a Want You", and that evergreen death-pop standard "Seasons in the Sun". Our drinks arrived. The Mai Tai was a diabetic's nightmare, all sugar syrup, no rum and it cost $10 to boot, but it was appropriately garnished with a melon slice and a little umbrella. I sipped it thoughtfully and observed the bar patrons, they were a motley crüe of older men accompanying ridiculously young women who were most likely mistresses or prostitutes, and middle-aged Korean housewives resting up in between shopping excursions to the nearby Lotte Shopping Center and duty-free shoppes.

After finishing our drinks, we decided that it was time to eat. Our meal coupons could be redeemed at one of 5 restaurants in the hotel. Now we weren't expecting much in the way of haute cuisine from a freebie meal ticket...we couldn't have been more wrong! We decided to eat at the French restaurant located on the top floor and graced with an inexplicably Germanic name, "Schoenbrunn". The decor was over-the-top faux Louis the XVI, and the view was even more spectacular than our room. We both chose the filet mignon course and Mark purchased the cheapest bottle of Bordeaux that he could find on the incredibly overpriced wine list. The waitstaff were highly trained, properly obsequious, and choreographed every action as if it were modern dance a la Twyla Tharp.

The first course consisted of a smoked salmon salad with capers and caviar drizzled with a sour-cream sauce. This was followed by an lovely cream of mushroom soup sprinkled with crispy garlic croutons. Superb, but we were unprepared for what came next: a tiny dollop of palate-cleansing coconut sorbet in a long-stemmed glass served in a tureen of dry ice that rendered our surroundings nearly invisible with a thick cascade of roiling fog. Our filets were served hot on the heels of the sorbet, they were perfectly cooked in a wine reduction and accompanied by whipped potatoes, fresh Korean vegetables, sauteed mushrooms, and a dollop of sliced macadamia nuts in a sherry cream sauce on the side. Orgasmic. Dessert consisted of a rich tower of chocolate mousse topped with fresh raspberries.

Thusly fortified with wine and food, we headed out into the evening for more entertainment. We navigated the subway to the Daehongno district, an area popular with young Seoul-ites and filled with nightclubs with names like Boogie-Boogie, Colossus Hof, and Bonanza Hole. We settled for an establishment with a somewhat more mundane moniker...The Live Jazz Club. Here we first encountered the rather annoying concept of the "side dish", essentially a cover charge disguised as a small dish of salted peanuts for which we were charged $5 each with an additional $7 tacked on for a beer. The evening's entertainment turned out to be a local student combo who played off of sheet music on stands. They lackadaisically played a single number then took a break, so we kicked back and did some people watching. There were several westerners present, men with Korean girlfriends, but no American GIs that I could see, as they probably confine their activities to the Itaewon district near the Yongwan military base. Mark and I were clearly being checked out by several of the girls present as potential date material, but since both of us are going steady, no moves were made on our part.

The band returned to the stage after about an hour, and they'd clearly done something to loosen up in the interim. The drummer pounded out a sharp, snare-driven groove, with the guitarist and bassist about a quarter-beat behind laying down a smooth modal blues vamp. The sax player and pianist did their part by layering on some glassy solo work. We stayed for a few more numbers then headed back to the hotel.

It was midnight, and we were still ready for fun, so we stopped in at the Lotte's British pub for a nightcap. I had a whiskey sour that  contained a more than adequate amount of hooch and cost only $8 this time. We opted to play a few rounds of billiards in the back room where we were treated to the sight of a group of totally inebriated Korean businessmen pawing at their equally drunken hostesses who were furiously attempting to fend them off. Within a few minutes, they all appeared to pass out with their faces buried in plates of food! Good times. Mark and I each won a game, then we decided to turn in.

Mark and I slept like rocks after our busy evening, then awoke late on Saturday morning. We rushed through our ablutions in order to get downstairs in time to take advantage of our free breakfast coupons. The morning repast was served buffet style and consisted of both Korean and Western dishes. I could think of nothing less appealing  than kimchi and fried cuttlefish in the morning, so I opted for an omelet, sweet roll, and fresh fruit.

The weather was sunny and cool, with relatively low humidity, so it looked as if we were in for a fine day of sightseeing. Our first destination was the antique shopping district of Insadong. Upon our arrival, I was immediately accosted by a gaggle of cute, giggling 7th and 8th graders who belonged to an English club called Wakey. They wished to practice their language skills with me by performing a brief interview. I happily complied. To their infinite delight, Mark snapped a couple of pics of us. I thought they were going to squeeze the life out of me. For cooperating with them, I was presented with some small bags of candy and a card which read:

Welcome to Korea!
We are English club called Wakey
We belong to Key-san Girls High School which is located in Incheon
Wakey means "Wake Up!"
Thank you for your interview with us
Enjoy your stay in Korea
Good luck to you!!

Too cute.

We continued on down the street, stopping in various shoppes that specialized in beautiful Celadon pottery, calligraphic supplies, and carved Korean masks   called Hahoe. I picked out a very nice hand-carved rendition of a character called the Scholar (Sanbi). I also purchased a traditional tiger print for my daughter, Emma, as well as little pottery kimchi jars filled with ginseng chocolate bon-bons, and several other small items, all very reasonably priced. After a while, we decided to stop at a traditional little tea house for some cold barley tea and cakes. If I haven't mentioned it already, barley tea tastes like the odor of old gym socks. Mark appeared noticeably ill afterwards.

After some more shop browsing, we headed back to the hotel for lunch. Mark had his eye on the wine restaurant, and in particular, was desirous of munching on some cheese, something Koreans seldom partake of. We ordered a bottle of Australian Chardonnay and a plate of grilled bread with an assortment of soft, but not excrementally runny, cheeses to spread. Visually, we were entertained by the sight of 15 gorgeous Korean Air Stewardesses sitting at the bar drinking wine with those ubiquitous white gloves on.

Sated with fine vino and quality dairy products, we hooked a cab to the Korean Folk Museum which is situated on the grounds of a palace called Gyeongbukgung. The museum is located inside of a huge concrete building topped with a pagoda in the Silla Dynasty style. A faux Korean village had been constructed on the grounds surrounding it. We wandered through the collections and were particularly enamored of the dioramas of primitive village life which featured carefully sculpted dolls with creepy smiles surrounded by gigantically disproportionate plastic vegetables. We also wandered the palace grounds which featured some exquisitely restored buildings as well as a fine collection of Korean village totems which are more than vaguely reminiscent of Polynesian tikis.

Later in the afternoon, we returned to the hotel yet again and sat down on the wide shady plaza to enjoy a beer or three. The weather was perfect. We were soon approached by two lovely ladies who again, wanted to interview me. They were not, however, part of an English club but rather college students majoring in Hotel Management. I was given a questionnaire to fill out and one of the women seemed absolutely transfixed by my salt-and-pepper goatee. She asked me what it was called in English, and kept complimenting me on how "beautiful" it was. I also attempted to explain the concept of the "soul patch" to her, but she had some difficulty grasping that.

It was now time to cash in our last meal coupon, so we ambled on down to the traditional Japanese restaurant in the hotel basement where we enjoyed a feast of fresh sashimi and tempura, accompanied by hot sake. We were both pretty tired out from our day of sightseeing and the previous evening's drinking, so we decided to turn in early. I bought a ticket for the airport shuttle and called it a day, falling asleep immediately. Mark decided to buy another bottle of wine and stayed up to watch a movie on the teevee.

I got up around 5:30 the following morning, said my good-byes to Mark, and hopped the bus to Incheon. A family of fat, loud, obnoxious Americans rode with me. They were all deathly sick, coughing up phlegm, and complained incessantly about Korean culture. How embarassing. I hoped they didn't have SARS. I killed some time, and my remaining korean currency by purchasing a couple of ceramic bottles of Chrysanthemum and pine-needle folk liquor called Kyeryoung Paegilju. I also found some nice amethyst and diamond earrings for my wife, Joyce.

I climbed aboard my plane and steeled myself for the marathon flight back to the US. Naturally, the fat, deathly ill Americans sat right behind me. After all the fabulous food I'd eaten in Korea, the airline meals seemed even more like swill for farm animals than they had previously. Fourteen hours later, I landed in Minneapolis where Joyce and Emma met me at the baggage claim. We drove out to the Mall of America and had an overpriced burger at Planet Hollywood, surrounded by fat, obnoxiously loud Americans. I was home.

The End