Gyeongju to Seoul

We undertook our return to Seoul by car, planning to get back at around six o’clock. The route inevitably traversed South Korea’s scenic Sobaek mountain range, which is pierced through and through by a vast collection of tunnels.

We first stopped Haeinsa, or the ‘Temple of the Ocean Mudra’ in English. This complex’s claim to fame is housing the Tripitaka Koreana, a UNESCO-listed collection of Buddhist scriptures carved onto over eighty thousand wooden printing blocks. Dating back to the 13^th century, the collection is also “the world’s most comprehensive and oldest intact version of the Buddhist canon in Hanja script,” as per the Wikipedia page. The building, and along with it its precious artefact, miraculously escaped destruction on several occasions – mostly accidental fires. Our tour guide told us that at some point, a couple of fanatical Christians even tried to burn one the temple’s Buddha statues. According to Mr J, the Christians in question were Protestants, who in Korea have the reputation of being more extremist than the more tolerant Catholics.

Perhaps the most gripping story of the temple’s escape from doom took place during the Korean War, when the UN ordered the complex to be bombed. The area had long been occupied by North Korean forces using guerrilla warfare tactics. However, the Korean pilot tasked with carrying out the mission disobeyed orders, for which act he is commemorated on the temple’s grounds.

Ironically, when a new storage complex for the tablets was built by Korea’s dictator Park Chung-hee, the trial tablets sent to the building started to rot, and plans to move the tablets out of the temple were abandoned. The project designed to save the tablets almost became their ruin.

There is also a rumour that birds and other animals avoid the temple’s storage spaces, but these rumours were quickly dismissed by a local guard who said birds have to be constantly shooed away.

 A pagoda at Haeinsa

 A stand for wooden tablets at the Haeinsa Museum

 Stacks of wooden tablets

 The river below Haeinsa

 Cascades

 A monument to the pilot who saved Haeinsa

 A forest path

 The gate of Haeinsa

 Wishes written on papers in the shape of Bodhi Tree leaves

 Haeinsa

 A dragon drum

 Worshippers walking through a meditation maze

 The main shrine at Haeinsa

 A dragon at the corner of the temple

 Monks walking towards a funeral

 A smaller shrine

 A dragon head on a roof

 The wall of the wooden tablet vault

 The ornate eaves at Haeinsa

 The back of Haeinsa

 A pagoda at Haeinsa

 The long path to Haeinsa

 Common mormon

Silver-washed fritillary

The second temple we visited on our journey from Gyeongju to Seoul was Beopjusa. My dad added this stop the day of, as we were due to arrive in Seoul far too early and there were many interesting things to see on the road. Beopjusa’s most distinctive feature is a massive standing golden Buddha. Already impressive by himself, the halls under his feet are filled with thousands of smaller Buddha statues. The temple also has a five-story pagoda and several of its shrines are adorned with depictions of Hell’s torments.

 The forest path to Beopjusa

 The pagoda at Beopjusa

 The golden Buddha and the pagoda at Beopjusa

 A Buddha carved into a rock 

 Great golden Buddha at Beopjusa 

Hundreds of golden Buddhas in the hall under the great golden Buddha

 The central hall under the great golden Buddha

 Central five-storied pagoda

 A smaller shrine

 The main shrine at Beopjusa

 Little lanterns on a tree

 The main shrine at Beopjusa

 Beautiful roof detail

 Five-storied pagoda

 Giant bowl for cooking rice for all the monks in the temple

 The mountains behind Beopjusa

 The river by Beopjusa

 The gate to Beopjusa

The road by Beopjusa

As we were originally due back at six, I arranged to have seven thirty dinner with a friend I had not seen since graduating high school. However, with our extra stop, we were behind schedule and the navigation put our arrival at 7:15. The number kept climbing with mounting traffic in Seoul until it was at around 7:40. What was I to do? Ask the driver to find a place with Wi-Fi, or perhaps borrow his phone? With both solutions entailing far too much social awkwardness, I decided to wait it out and see. A little past six, we hit the traffic going into the city. However, we soon found there was a fast track for busses and vans carrying over five people. Somewhat guiltily, we slid into the fast track and sped into the city using the car’s tinted windows as a smoke screen.

The ruse worked and I even ended up having enough time to shave once we got back – we had decided only to pack hand luggage for our flight to Jeju, so I was deprived of my razor for a couple days.

Dinner was an experience. I learned that halfway through college, my friend had a vision and decided he would enter a seminary after completing his studies and military service. Our conversation was fascinating. I asked him about his views on North Korea, and after a pause he said something along the following lines:

“If there is a war during my time in the military and I’m killed, I think I will die a martyr’s death.”

“Why?” I asked, not even bothering to conceal the puzzlement in my tone.

“Have you heard about the visions of Fátima?” my friend asked.

I nodded absent-mindedly, still trying to process what I was hearing.

“Really?” He asked slightly bewildered.

“Oh, no – the what?” I asked.

“The visions of Fátima. Mary appeared to three kids in Portugal during World War One and told them there would be another war if Russia did not begin to worship her. So I believe that we have to fight Communism.”

“So let me get this straight: some Catholics believe that –”

“No, no,” my friend cut me off, “most Catholics believe this vision. Or at least they believe it was possible; there isn’t anyone who will deny that this happened.”

“All right,” I pressed on, “so because Mary said in that vision that the Communists have to be defeated, you believe that if there’s a war with North Korea, it’s going to be a sort of – a Holy War?”

“Exactly!”

“And do most Korean Catholics think that?”

“Oh no, definitely not,” my friend laughed and I sighed a big sigh of relief.

Among my friend’s other interesting takes was the idea that going to church would solve all problems inherent in the Confucian system. “There is no conflict between Confucianism and Catholicism,” he responded to my question about the Rites Controversy, “traditional rites have nothing to do with religion. But still, the women in the house do all the work, and they don’t like that, and the mother doesn’t like her mother-in-law and they spend the whole time arguing. If they just went to church, they would just listen to the sermon and be quiet.”