The lkl korea Trip 2010

Thursday 6 May: Sancheong County, day 1

24. A sense of direction

I’m somewhat stiff from sleeping on the floor. Throughout the night different parts of my body were suffering from pins and needles. But the location was peaceful, and I get up rested. Overnight rain has made everything seem greener, but low cloud clinging to the hilltops and wisps of mist rolling over the trees threaten more moisture later.
The sound of the river at the edge of the pension grounds is refreshing, and it's time to sample the bathroom: a highly focussed hand-shower in a room designed for water being splashed everywhere. This is a room designed for Koreans and Japanese. The water-everywhere concept has not yet caught on in the West, and neither have the napkin-sized towels. The latter do an efficient job though.
I’m wondering what sort of people come to this place. It’s quiet and remote, so maybe they come for the walking, but I remain puzzled by the concept of a lodge with private jjimjilbangs. But there is no chance to interview the manager, because the driver has arrived to take us to Sancheong. We say farewell to Miss Lee, who is heading back to Seoul today, and set off.
Maybe I haven’t looked hard enough, but I’ve never seen any road maps of Korea. When I’m on the road, I like to know where I am, where I’m headed, and where I am in relation to various landmarks. I’m very old-school and like to have things in hard copy. A road atlas is my constant companion in the car.
Korea seems to be very 21^st Century. Every car I’ve been in seems to be equipped with a Sat-Nav. Amazing devices, which when working, and if fed with the right data, are a boon to mankind – or at least to the driver, because they don’t satisfy my own needs for general orientation in hard copy. And I can’t help think that a Sat-Nav ruins one’s sense of direction. As you turn a corner, the screen always re-orients itself so that Ahead is Up: North, South, East and West are meaningless concepts to a Sat-Nav. All it’s interested in is getting you from where you are to where you want to be. If you’re lucky.
My schedule says that we have to leave our hotel in Hadong Country at 10am and will arrive in Sancheong County at the herb festival at 12 noon. I can’t understand why it takes two hours to travel to the next county, when it only took four hours to get down all the way to Hadong from Seoul. But I leave it to the experts.
Before we know it, we’re on an expressway and getting somewhere fast.
That somewhere is Namwon. Jeollabuk-do. Not the next county, but two provinces away. But with no map, the driver sees nothing unusual at all in the direction he has been heading, and we motor onwards. As far as he’s concerned, the Sat-Nav says go straight on, so that’s what he does, even though straight on is North West from where we started, when we want to go North East⁹.
Not to worry. We get to the right place in the end, with the help of my friend who’s exhibiting at the Herb festival, and who has secured the services of the local guide. Where one piece of technology failed us, at least the cellphone doesn’t let us down.
We enter Sancheong town precinct, passing through a disinfectant spray to limit the spread of foot and mouth disease. Kyung-sook and our local guide are waiting for us to show us some of the sights before meeting the local mayor for lunch.

25. Turtle, Phoenix and Seal

Sancheong is a land of mystery and legend. It’s also a small part of Korea with ideas well above its size. Sancheong rice is sent to Cheongwadae. Sancheong dried persimmons are sent to the Queen of England (they have a thank-you letter to prove it). Their strawberries are the sweetest and most expensive in the land, and indeed the early-season fruits which seemed to be everywhere during my visit were among the finest I have tasted.
But what is more precious is the landscape itself. Sancheong means, broadly, mountain purity. The mountain part is easy: Sancheong lies at the foot of Jirisan. The purity comes from the fresh water in Sancheong’s rivers. More important than the obvious features of the landscape, though, is the hidden power, the ki of the earth. Sancheong boasts as spot with one of the strongest levels of energy in Korea.
Nestling on the slopes of Wangsan, one of the peaks in the Jirisan region, is a giant turtle-shaped rock weighing 127 tonnes. Its shell is carved with ornate designs. It rests flat against the mountainside, and is said to be one of the strongest sources of ki anywhere. Rest your hands on the rock for a minute, and you will benefit from that energy.
It is said that Lee Charm came here recently, laid his hands on the stone, and made a wish. Before long, he was head of the Korean Tourism Organisation. On a more mundane level, we were invited to test the rock’s mystic powers. “Make an ‘O’ shape with your thumb and index finger,” instructed Mr Min, our guide. “Try to keep that ‘O’ shape while I try to force your fingers apart with my hands. Remember how hard or easy it is for me to break the ‘O’.” We duly obeyed. “Now place your hands on the rock for two minutes and try it again.”
We were amazed. Was it that our bodies were reinforced with elemental Ki energy? Was it that we knew what to expect? Was it that Mr Min wasn’t trying so hard the second time? Was it that I was reinforcing my index finger with my middle finger? Whatever, I could just about imagine that I managed to withstand Mr Min’s strength for slightly longer after that brief infusion of turtle-power.
Further up the hill was another ornately carved stone, in a perfectly circular shape. The stone is known as The Mirror. And there is a magical tale about it. Originally, the rock was a plain grey. Then, one day, two years ago, the figure of a white phoenix magically appeared in the centre of the stone. It was a portent. And on the same day, 100 wild ginseng roots were found on the slopes of Wangsan, the King’s Mountain, in Sancheong County, a record harvest for one particular day. It was the day that the new Presidential Seal had been completed, something that happens only once every 100 years.
Such is the power of the Earth in Sancheong. But the special energy in Sancheong is more than being just about the Earth. It is about the sky, the earth and mankind being in harmony with each other. The sky brings blessing, the earth brings opportunity, and people help things to happen. Sancheong is said to be the area in Korea with the strongest harmony between sky, earth and mankind; Ha-neul, Ddang, Sa-ram.
It is in this auspicious spot, right by the turtle-rock (symbolising the land) and under the watchful eye of the Phoenix mirror (symbolising the sky), that some traditional temple-style buildings are being constructed. In one of these buildings, in 97 years time, the next presidential seal will be made, using ancient Korean craftsmanship techniques. The seal will be imbued with all the special energy of this special part of Korea.
Until that time, the buildings will form part of the Sancheong infrastructure, helping to host an expanded mountain herb festival, and a festival devoted to Heo Jun, local medical hero and author of Korea’s latest inclusion on the UNESCO world intangible heritage list, the Donguibogam textbook of traditional Korean herbal medicine.