The Horizon of Illusion
1/5/04
 
 
“Traffic.” My excuse. I gargled with the weight of morning phlegm damming my throat. It was 7am, alarm ringing, Aden talking, and I didn’t want to go through the motions of early rising just to be rewarded with a pricey cab ride trapped in a net of 8am commuters, with the aggravating inability to understand a cab driver who, despite constant shrugs, keeps trying to ask questions in the yet uncracked Korean. This exact scenario was what took place the last trip to the Daejeon city bus terminal. And so I managed another hour of dreams before the last minute scramble out the door. We learned a lot from the last trip to Pusan, mainly that we didn’t need as much stuff. This time we stuck just with the minimum for warmth, dignity, and photography. By 10am we were at the station, staring at the giant time schedule of tiny red lights, and then purchasing our tickets for 18,500 won. Coffee was still not taken care of, so we headed to a near-by donut shop. The air was cold and sharp, and blankets of snow clouds hovered above us as my peripheral caught a woman almost getting run down by a speeding Kia fruit truck. I’m getting used to seeing these close encounters, although I’ve never seen a hit, it would be more surprising if I could tell you the numbers of the “almost hits”.
Our bus left Daejeon at 11. I spent the 3 1/2 hour ride relaxed and reclined. Managing to get caught up on some reading and buying a much needed laser pointer at a rest stop, categorized the ride as progress. The laser makes asking questions with charades much easier. We arrived in Pusan and headed to another coffee shop on the beach to kill time and enjoy the view of the eastward ocean, the stage of the purpose of this trip. But first we walked through the labyrinth of squeezed, isle-less markets. If they don’t have what you want they’ll find it, kill it, and sell it to you with a friendly smile.
Later that night we met our friend Dido in a subway station and headed off to dinner. Over dinner we learned that civilians do not own guns in Korea. When one wants to hunt he/she simply rents one from the government. The restaurant served green tea in small bowls and brought out a delicious appetizer of chopped fruit coated with a thin bit of light mayo, it’s much better than it sounds. We left to meet another friend Sunny, having only an hour until the clock struck the high-note and 2003 was over, we jogged up hundreds of steps sharing each one with at least two other people. Security was present although the excited mega-crowd seemed to be more passive than back home. Everyone was weaving themselves deeper towards the main attraction, using sharp elbows and shoulders as needles. Every year in Pusan the Buddhist monks hang a van-sized bell under a pavilion in a central park. Light entertainment lights up the family saturated crowds during the countdown, but at midnight the Monks heave again and again a shaved and polished hanging tree-trunk against the bronze chime releasing a deep, hypnotic, ominous drone, one that we were all translucent to and connected by.
            It was all over by the time we saw what we heard. The mass was receding, slowly but steady, like thick oil from a small hole. As our horizon lowered we could begin to see the performance set-up and walked to the front to take pictures. The lighting was great.
            Walking back, through alleys lined with so-ju hofs (bars) and other varieties of vice venues, I felt an alarming feeling for that date and time. Back in New Orleans, at Mardi Gras the ground, walls, air, and even people’s eyes radiate the resin of a miraculous explosion of mad, crazed, and excessive, chaos.  However, that is contained in the sinking city. But yes, I felt tranquil and calm during the first footsteps of this year. Sober. Sleepy.  A taxi brought us back to Dido’s house and we set up a makeshift party and played the parts until it was decided an hour and a half rest would be more beneficial than pulling an all-nighter.
            Soon we woke up. It was 4:30am. We had to make it via subway to the other side of town to a new eastward-facing bay bridge where the city was to greet the first sunrise of the New Year. Walking into the streets the cold quite darkness of morning embraced us as we crossed a desolate university campus. We were accompanied only by the thick trailing steam from our breaths. Turning a corner just a few blocks later, we joined a few people headed in the same direction; this soon multiplied exponentially with every turn thereafter into thousands, eventually inundating the subway, exceeding maximum capacity. It was 5:15am. Six feet from the loading dock, we watched three entire trains pass by, all with room for just a few from our stop. The train ride was only comparable to the density of front rows of a sold-out concert; breathing can only afford vertical space.
            Honestly, by the time we got off the subway the excitement for me was wearing thin. We walked for another half mile with our backpacks until we saw the bridge. It is modeled after the San Francisco Golden Gate and is just as majestic in its grandeur and statue.  As I noticed people overflowing from the entrance ramp, and my eyes followed the sea of black hair, I realized there was no way we could make our way to a suitable spot and I had the motivation of a bear in winter to try. But we’d come this far and I had given up on getting a spot to set up the tripod and camera so I said nothing, however Aden suggested taking a chance on time and heading towards Haeundae beach, the idea was a godsend.
            Recent news of a loved one in poor health was depressing me. My eyelids were heavy, creeping down on my dry, bloodshot eyes. They were trading colors with my pale cracking lips. I could taste the bitter flavor of sleep deprivation in my throat. Nevertheless, it was just before dawn and the cool, deep purple celestial light that devours all but the most determined stars and gives the earth back its shapes for all to guess at, separated me from my hedonism. It reminded me of our purpose. Then I realized that what I was witnessing was, probably a million people, painstakingly making their sleepless journey through the night to witness a sacred sunrise of a symbolic new beginning at an architectural feat, just as humans have done around the world for over 10,000 years. People who had little reason to suppose that God was anything more than a great spirit whom they were a part of, did this, and celebrated the message that nature’s creation is as unstoppable as time. What it was is simply beatific and healing, for I know sadness cures neither love nor life. And my mood switched to fresh and curious.
            Along the beachfront we stopped at around 7:30. The day was well into light by now and the sun was still not visible anywhere in the cloudless sky. The sun was due to appear at 7:45. At 5 till drumming could be heard from the middle of the bridge. The minutes past and the daylight grew brighter and the drumming faded. Sitting on some cement boulders with a view composed of the bridge stretching across the bay, we waited, and waited. The morning seagulls were finishing breakfast as the distant ships crept through the water. The lighting would make some think the sunrise was a sham, or perhaps a victim of terrorism. Then, long after 8, about 10 perspective inches above the horizon Dido saw the faint red ball emerge from an oddly invisible but opaque band of pollution. The filth, probably from N. Korea, produced a fake horizon broadcasting a failure in our advances since this ritual began within our species. Scattered cheers came through the crowds as different groups caught the faded sight. Mostly they were cheers of relief to head home. Which we did.