Jeju island English speaking tour guide

*Notice- This article is written by non-native English speaker.

Sometimes people say “You will regret if you don’t travel when you are young”.  Well, some parts it’s right but I don’t agree with the words. Definitely you can travel even though you got old. I believe that age is just number in traveling. It might be harder to travel when you get old in comparison to the young. However, don’t be afraid of hitting the road. You can do it and I saw people did it.

The George couple are from Switzerland and German Swiss.  That was all I knew about them before I met them.  At the airport, waiting for someone holding a picket with names at the gate always makes me nervous. What are they like? How do they look? Are they young or Old? Well, Frankly speak I prefer young travelers to the old. 

Because we can go anywhere we would like without concerning  physical strength with the young but when i travel with the old they slow other people down. And normally the old tourists are picky in meals and accommodation. That is my perspective of old people until I met the George couple.  Any way I was wishing some young couple coming to me with gentle smile. But….. actually the people who came to were the old wondering around at the gate looking for me. However, they seemed very friendly and its impression released me my nervous a little.

Sometimes I can hunch if the travel would be good or not. In this time I hunched that this travel with them would be good.  But my concern was the weather…….

I was woken up by the heavy raining sound and there was so much foggy over Halla Mt.( I can see Halla Mt outside of the window). When I picked up the Georges they asked me how the weather would be like for upcoming three days. Well…. I felt sorry to answer the question even though terrible weather was not my faulty.

An itinerary for the first day was The natural folklore museum, Samseonghyul, Manjang gul lava tube, Seongsan sunrise peak and Seongup folk village. We were traveling on the eastern side of Jeju island.

Before I start traveling I always visit to the natural and folklore museum and Samseonghyul because Jeju travel can be more rich when they have a concept of natural and culture and understanding of myth of Jeju founders. Actually it’s very different between having a concept of Jeju island or not for people’s travel.

At the Yongdusam rock they seemed to have culture shock with dive woman’s cooking with chopping a raw sea food and its still squirming on the plate. Mrs Geroge asked me ” People eat that still moving in the mouth?” I said “It’s delicious” She shook her head seeming disagree with. However, food is a kind of culture.

Europe has it’s own way to cook and so Jeju does. The food squirming on the plate and pick them up with chopsticks is a culture of Jeju island. You might think it is primitive but it’s still our culture which we can’t change. They asked me again ” Don’t you have a stove in your kitchen?” Well, I just lagugh and said “Yes, we do. We just don’t use it”.

Mrs Geroge spent her life in Vietnam until 14 years old. So she seems to know about Vietnam and food very well. We decided to have lunch in a Vietnam restaurant. Well, personally I like the food in the restaurant but she seemed doesn’t like it. She left half of them. When you travel other country the most problem is having food. You have to have an open mind for the food in the country where you are traveling because it is a kind of culture.

Most of travels don’t realize magnificence not until they know the process of lava tube made. The George told me he traveled so many countries but it is the first time to see a lava tube. He just said “it is amazing”. In term of lava tube, the opinions divided into two parts. Some people really like it but some others are easily disappointed by size because it is much smaller than line stone caves. So, I must explain about lava process of a lava tube made before we explore it.

After exploring Manjang lava tube we headed to Seongsan ilchulbong. When we went out of the tube it was slightly raining. On the way to Seongsan ilchulbong we ran across dive women working on the sea. Wow! we were lucky! Woman divers are not for tourists. Actually they hate tourists becaust they think tourists disturb their working with taking photos or poking the sea food they caught. So, before we got off a car, I warned them that dive women don’t like to be taken picture of. Even though I told them they took a photo and it made dive-women angry. One of dive-women charged on her seeming breaking her camera. She was so scared. Well, I bet she would like dive women any more. However, I explained about dive-women in the car before we reached Seongsan ilchulbong. They seemed still terrified with angry woman diver.

We climbed on the top of Seongsan ilchulbong. And then we were heading to Seong-up folk village. We had a good conversation in the car. It is very important time to me to get to know about other country from my clients. We talked about the current situation between North and South Koreas and unclear threatening from North Korea so on. They talked their won town in Switzerland as well. Their home town is so small with 25 thousand population and so peaceful.

They have a big festival once year for two weeks and they have half million visitors in those time. It seems like Jeju island. We have such small population but we have 10 times bigger visitors every year. He continued his story. There are 3 languages are spoken in Switzerland; 70% people speak German, 20% people speak French, and 10% people speak Italian. He said there is another country which is spoken by two language. The name of the country is Belgium. Flemish and French are spoken in the country.

According to his saying the people speaking each language fight with other people in Belgium but in Switzerland people are get along with each other. Swiss might give some jokes each other but that’s all they don’t go farther. Well, something like this conversation we had on the way to the hotel. They seem even though Switzerland is small they are really proud of their country. And I would think people must be smart to live in Switzerland.

The itinerary for second day was deadly serious. We should go 9 places included Seogwipo and Sanbang Mt and Songak Mt. Both of the Georges are over 70 years old and I wondered if they could completed the itinerary. I was thinking I was about to stop the travelling if they felt tired. When we got to Oedolgae it was rainy and windy and waves are rough. But the scenery was spectacular. When I take people to lonely solitary rock I always tell three stories to my clients about Oedolgae. One is Halmang Legend and the other one is Choi young general story and another is Geological theory. Most of my clients like the first story. George said he likes the first story. Well, I knew the Georges would like the first story as well.

Jeju island,the largest island in South Korea, has been a country’s favorite holiday destination because of its exotic charm scenery and  tropical climate.  This island is also regarded as Samda-do which means there are abundant of 3 things; stones,wind and women. 90% of Jeju island is covered by lava soil and stones because it is volcanic island and it is located on the path of typhoons, so that we have lots of winds and storms. Women had been always outnumbered men in Jeju island for a long time.

*Notice- This article is written by non-native English speaker.

Jeju island is a volcanic island. The volcano started erupting 1 million 300 thousands years ago and it had kept erupting for more than 1 million years constantly. That’s why this island has 368 craters and more than 120 lava tubes. There is the highest mountain in South Korea called Mt. Halla (1,950m)  which is also a volcanic crater  in the middle of   Jeju island. There are two big cities one is Jeju-si and the other one is Seogwipo-si. 2/3 population in Jeju live in Jeju-si because it is a capital and administrational city and Seogwiposi is more like touristic city. Diverse kinds of tangerines are grown in Seogwipo-si and they are exported to mainland and carrots are grown on the eastern side and potatoes are on the western side.  There are two big industries. One is agriculture and the other one is tourism. Actually In 1960s to 1980s Korea was under the military dictator ship, so that people didn’t have free to go abroad for tour. Instead of going to aboard, people chose Jeju island for an alternative. Since then tourism has started growing up. Now you can’t imagine Jeju island without tourism.

According to legend, Jeju-do was founded by three demigod who came out of holes in the ground and established the independent Tamra kingdom. Early in the 12th century the Korea dynasty took over, but in 1273 Mongol empire ruled by a son of GingisKhan(KubilaiKhan) conqured the island, contributing a tradition of horsemanship, a special horse(Mongolian pony horse and quirks in the local dialect. During the Joseon period, Jeju was used as a place of political and religious exile.
The Japanese colonization period of the early 20th century can be traced through abandoned military bases and fortifications on the island. From 1947 to 1954, as many as 30,000 locals were massacred here by right wing government foreces in events of collectively labelled the ‘April 3 incident’ Recent decades have seen Jeju’s economy shift from mainly agriculture to tourism. In autonomous province, giving it a level of self government that is encouraging further economic development. The World Conservation Congress was held there in September 2012 and ambitious carbon-free eletricity generation ventures are being tested. Jeju has come under fire from conservationists and other protesters for the planned Korean Naval base at Gangjeong on the island’s southern coast.

*Notice-This article is written by non-native English speaker.
 

 
Hi! today I wan to introduce a movie titled ‘Ji-Seul’ directed by O Muel.

‘Ji-Seul’ means ‘potato’ in Jeju dialect. People fill up the stomach with potato when there is only little food around. However, the story of this movie is about the Massacre April 3rd occurred in Jeju island from 1947 to 1950.

Many years have passed since one of the most tragic incident in Korean history swept across Jeju island. Simply known 4.3 Massacre.

 

 
In 1945, The world war 2 was finished won by US and allies.
Thanks to that, Korea became independent from brutal colonization of Japan.
However, as usual, all of the domestic problems started on that point. We became independent but not completely. Korea’s independence had splited into two countries, South and North.
Korea couldn’t afford to set up a proper independent government by ourselves due to lack of experiences and finance, so that South went to under the influence of U.S and North was controled by Soviet Union.

 

 
U.S represented ‘Lee Seung-man’ while Soviet Union made ‘Kim il-sung’ stand before people.
Then Korea was splited by two ideologies ‘capitalism and communism’
Lee Seung-man wanted to own his government without North Korea but he soon faced
huge resistance by people. People wanted an unified independent government not splited one.
It caused lots of commotions in everywhere in South Korea and the people who involved were put down by police and soldiers indiscriminately. And…….Jeju island was the center of the commotion

 

 
The police and Soldiers from main land infiltrated into Jeju island and to start brutal put down the uprising. The killing were committed under a policy of “driving out communists” and It also destroyed the bonds of trust between communities.
Jeju people were too innocent and ignorant to know about ideology, so called capitalism or communism. However, people were just killed by the name of rioters.
More than 30,000 innocent people were killed by the soldiers, who didn’t know the reason people have to be killed. In that time total population in Jeju island was about 120,000.

If you want more information, click here

 
By the way……. this movie is not a documentary on the massacre. It doesn’t show any political color. It Just shows the brutal massacre from the perspective of Jeju local people.
Before enter the cinema I thought this movie is just low budget well-made B movie but 10 min after movie started I was just being absorbed into the movie. The story is really compelling as well as beating sound, unforgettable scenes and music. Most of all the dialogue in Jeju dialect which is humorous in contrasted with the such tragic situation is superb.

 

 
I admire the director’s passion and effort to the movie. Not because it teaches us lesson such as ‘not forget the tragic from the past’ but because this movie shows what happened in that time in our neighbors perspectives.
If my comments still doesn’t appeal to you…… How about this?
The movie ‘Ji-Seul’ awarded a grandprix prize in the Sundance Movie festival.