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Apres quelques jours a Seoul, on se dirige a velo direction le sud du Sud Coreen : Suncheon. On prend le metro un peu tard dans la journee pour sortir de Seoul, et on se retrouve dans la nuit a chercher un endroit ou dormir. On trouve un espece de jardin avec deux grosses bosses au milieu, tres joli. En fait toutes les nuits sur la route on a campe pres de ces bosses qui devenaient de plus en plus nombreuses, et c’etaient les seuls endroits plats qu’on trouvait dans les montagnes ou collines omnipresentes.

On se doutait bien qu’il y avait quelque chose de louche, et nos suspicions se sont revelees fondees : les bosses sont des tombes! On a fait que dormir dans des cimetieres! Chose qu’on aurait jamais fait en Europe… Mais c’etait plutot reposant et tranquille, et aucun fantome n’est venu nous troubler… 🙂

On a ete accueillis par Jang et sa famille a Suncheon. Sa maman s’est occupee de nous comme ses enfants, bien qu’on pouvait pas beaucoup communiquer, seulement avec des signes et quelques mots coreens. Elle nous cuisinait des plats coreens vegetariens tous les jours, et nous a lave nos quelques vetements a la main! Meme si elles ont des machines a laver (samsung bien sur!) les mamas coreennes laveront les vetements a la main car la machine ne fait pas un assez bon boulot… Crazy! Et Jang nous a emmene partout : au restaurant, visiter un temple bouddhiste, voir des champs de riz, voir sa soeur qui joue du tambour coreen traditionnel, rencontrer ses amis, gouter du makali (alcool a base de riz cru, c est tout blanc on dirait du lait), bref, on s’est pas ennuyes…

On a aussi fete l’anniversaire de sa maman. Toute la famille etait la pour un grand diner familial. On s’attendait a un truc un peu formel puisqu’en Coree ils sont tres a cheval sur la politesse et le respect. Par exemple il faut toujours utiliser deux mains pour recevoir ou verser une boisson a quelqu’un, et t’as pas le droit de te servir toi-meme. Les deux mains c’est avec toute les personnes qui sont plus agees que toi, et avec tes amis aussi, c’est la position de la main qui change : si tu sers avec la main droite, ta main gauche peut etre placee sur la pointrine, au niveau du coude ou niveau du poignet. On a toujours pas bien saisi le principe, si y’en a une qu’est mieux que l’autre ou si ca depend de l’age de la personne.. Et c’est pareil dans les magasins avec l’argent : toujours donner avec deux mains!!! Ils sont plus indulgents avec les etrangers heureusement car ca vient pas naturellement. Murat d’ailleurs a offert du vin au pere de Jang avec une main.. Grosse insulte! Il s’est fait tout de suite rappele la regle. Heureusement qu’il etait pas coreen! Finalement le diner n’etait pas si formel que ca, du moins a nos yeux, puisque tout le monde  rentrait  et sortait de table pas en meme temps, mais ils faisaient quand meme le truc des deux mains..

On a passe deux nuits dans un temple bouddhiste. C’etait un peu special. Ils nous ont laisses rester la et aller aux repas (vegetariens!), mais on a parle a personne sur le fonctionnement du temple ou comment mediter. Le premier repas, on se pointe juste a l’heure car Jang nous avait dit que les repas etaient rapides et qu’ils n’attendaient pas. En fait y’avait une sorte de hierarchie en place, mais personne nous avait explique! Donc on est passes en premier apres les moines, et Murat en a double un sans faire expres. Il s’est fait attraper par un mec derriere qui l’a jete derriere le moine! Bref on s’est pas fait bien voir.. Mais le mec etait feroce.. On est sortit du temple prendre l’air. Faut dire que ce temple est situe dans la montagne Jirisan, un parc national, c’est magnifique. On prend un chemin qui suit la riviere bordee de bambou et on se ballade sur les rochers dans la riviere. Murat est en pleine realisation bouddhiste, comme quoi il ne faut pas etre attache au materiel et laisser aller. Quelqu’un, peut etre, a du l’entendre puisqu’il glisse sur le rocher et tombe dans un des bassins de la riviere! Plus de peur que de mal, il a rien de casse. Il se releve et dit : “wahou, c’etait incroyable!” Bonne lecon de vie, il s’en souviendra!  😉

Retour a Seoul via les memes routes. On demande de nouveau les visas chinois, et on part quelques jours camper en dehors de Seoul avec John et Insil, nos hotes de couchsurfing. On rentre et on a nos visas chinois, youpi!! Et on a aussi nos visas vietnamiens, donc, mardi prochain on vogue vers la Chine et on se dirige direction plein sud : le Vietnam!!! YEAH MAN!

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FOREVER LOVIN  JAH— GEORGE CARLIN LOSING STUFF

yes yes,, so the rootz got onto their cute bicycles and pedalled down to the south to visit ,, Mr Jang and his grande family.

it took about 4 days to get there,, and along the way we certainly saw Korea. its pretty samo every where.. green green ,, hilly mountains and tombs next to chilli and rice plantation. yep that sums it up. we couldnt find a small winey rd and had to stick on the busy rd most of the time,, which made it a bit boring. we were fed up after 2 days but couldnt afford the bus fare so battled on to the south. up down,,, up down. car car. noodle noodle.

finding places to camp was pretty easy as loads of green,, but flat green was hard to find. our first nite we slept at the top of a hill growing seasame leaves,, looked pretty cute up there,, there was a stone buddist style bench ,, a little tree like mr Miagia’s one from Karatee Kid ,, and 2/3 humps in the ground ,, kinda like the ones you see on tellie tubbies.  sweet….. so we pitched up there and had breakie on the budda bench.

next nite,, same story,, at the top of the hill,, this time a chillie plantation of some sort. in a little village in a gorge. however this time there were many telly tubby bumps,, everywhere infact. about 92 of them to be precise.  at that moment in time we realized that they were graves,, not telly tubby play places.  from that point on,, the sunset felt creepy and gloomy,, it felt creepily sleepy,,  ever seen the 1968 film “” Night of the living Dead”. a bit like that.

so the next day we made a vow to find a camp spot early so that we didnt hav to camp with the telly tubbies from the living dead!! unfortunately ,, we couldnt find shit,, so we just planted our tent overlooking the village with the bumps behind us. we decided to become friends with them and after that,, all was peacefull.!1

the next DAy we got to Suncheon,, our family (Mr Jangs grande Family actually), we speeded up that day and cycled hard as didnt want to sleep with theeee bumbs agains.

in korea,, they have many traditions,, like this two hand philosphy. two hands to recieve 2 hands to give etc. we didnt know this,, also you cant pour your own drink,, and the young one in the crowd has to top up the empty glasses with alcohol,, wit 2 hands of coarse.       anyways Jang popped open a bottle of strawberry wine,, like we all do, , and told muzz that he had to offer a glass to Jangs farther first.   “”  oldest first,, youngist slave”” so muzz gladly did,, however he did it with one hand,, kinda like an english waiter at some bar, whilst watching the footie.  this supposedly was incredibly insulting,, and if muzzy wasn’t a foreigner it wod b another story. only kidding Koreans are pretty chilled actually.. but its funny seeing them bowing down infront of you when entering the supermarket and giving you change wit two hands etc. if Geroge Carlin came over hear,, you would hear him rant for hours about them. funny stuff.

it was Jang’s mums birthday, so for a change rootzbiketour made her breakfast. for all her life, she has been eating rice for breakie… so we decided to make her an omlettle wit a bit of fried potato on the side. she loved the omelette as it was spicy but didnt dig the bread toO much,, she served herself some rice. also she had seaweed soup as its a tradition here to have seaweed soup the next day after your birthday. they also have a hang -over soup which is Delicious. koreans love korean food,, they dont like other food too much. apart from the youth of coarse,, you see them in the fastfoods.

BUDDHA BUDDHA

SO jang showed us around his home town and we visited some temples saw some monks and ate vegetarian monk food. tasty wit a capital T. he then made a few calls and got us to stay a few nites,, free at one of the temples at Jirisan mountain. we had quite a peaceful time,, we eat veggie food wit the buddist monks,, and prayed to the big budda for hours. we went for a walk along the bamboo and stream after a meditation session. whilst walking along the stream , on the rocks. we were talking about the meditation,, muz was talking crap as usual, saying how he felt non materialistic –the feeling of letting go,, being non materialistik on ideas,, thoughts as well as real objects. ha ha,, and at that moment muz slipped on the rock and fell into the stream. amelie cried out “” oh my God are you ok?””,, muz replied, sitting in the water ” wow that was amazing””. shortly after he got naked and swam in the lagoon whilst waiting for his clothes to dry. a new born Bicyristian,, fovever lovin JAh!!

We cycled back to Seoul after a week or so of chillin,, had a great time wit the family,, felt like xmas ,,chillin on boxingdaykinda stuff. nothin to do.             we took the same path bak as it was the quickest. we camped with the telly tubbies again.

TUESDAY we head to china on the boat. we r really excited as china is so so cheap compared to over here,, eg a beer cost 20 cents there. here it cost 1 euro 50. so we just chillin out here with our host john. he is the coolest guy in town ,, by  far man. he is the dude,, more chilled than Mr Lebowski himself,, more dude too. together wit the dudes girl Insil (she dam cool too)we all went and camped under a metro bridge 40 km from soeul, made a fire and had beans, drank beer, made farts.

check out george carlin on you tube,, his talk on’ losing stuff’. funny stuff.

catch ya laterrrrrrr

ITAEWON

WRESTLE MATCH IN METRO

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RICE FIELDS. THEY EAT RICE FOR BREAKIE, LUNCH AND SUPER

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MUZZ SPINNING A CHAIN BALL THING WITH HIS HEAD,, SOME KOREAN TRADITION

our first live GIG… like flight of the bike chords but not as gud !!

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