Deep in the heart of South Korea lies one of the most popular ski resorts in the country. It's a place of steep slopes, icy snow and sub-zero temperatures. This is Muju Ski resort. The six waegooken involved have no idea what's in store for them. It's a hostile place with very little food, few places to sleep and absolutely no ATMs. They must learn to work together to battle the elements or they'll be voted out. 24 hours, six people, one survivor (writer's note: we all survived, fortunately. And nobody was voted out either).
Muju. Where do I even start? I suppose the beginning is a good place. I'd been looking forward to skiing in Korea since I got here. I even had my parents ship my ski clothes to me once the weather got cold and I finally went this past weekend.
It is not easy to get to Muju. There are quite a few steps involved in the process. My friend Dave and I boarded the slow train to a town called Yeongdong, about an hour and a half away from Daegu. Dave had forgotten to go to the ATM before we left, but said he'd go once we got to the ski place. I'd taken out W300,000 the day before (although I spent about 40,000 the night before, but I still felt like I had plenty for the weekend), so I thought that would be no problem.
We arrived at Yeongdong and then took a cab to the bus station, where according to the directions on the Muju website, we'd have to take a bus to the Muju bus terminal. The station is virtually deserted. We go in and Dave asks for 2 tickets to Muju. They do not take credit cards, nor do they have an ATM. Anywhere in town. I'm not kidding. The woman shows us the bus schedule and we have about two hours to wait until the next bus. The internet said there was a bus from Muju terminal to the resort at 12:15, and the next one is after 2. It's already about 11, so we decide to walk back to the train station and catch a cab to the Muju bus terminal to make sure we are able to catch the bus. The cab ride was about 20 minutes and cost a little under W30,000.
The Muju bus terminal is even smaller than the Yeongdong one. We go to the counter and look at the bus schedule and what do you know? There is no 12:15 bus anymore. Well, it just gives us time to look for an ATM and grab some lunch. Hah! There is no ATM in this town either and there aren't any places to eat. Okay, that's not exactly true. There was a pretty grotty looking kimbab place in the bus station. We gave up hope and went back into the train station to figure out what to do next. That's when we noticed a group of 4 non-Koreans standing by the benches and we decided to go up to them to see if they're planning on going to Muju and what they are going to do. We all said hello and talked a bit and they told us that they had some sort of deal worked out with someone and they were getting a ride with a Korean friend in a car to the resort and said that we could hitch a ride with them if we wanted to. It was our lucky day! There were 2 cars and just enough seats to hold all of us.
In another 20 mins or so we arrived at the Muju Ski Resort town and got out at a snowboard shop. The 6 of us get our ski rental things and change into our ski clothes. Everyone is given a lift pass except me for some reason, but I'm assured I can get one at the resort. We go to pay for our ski rentals and Dave's pass and it comes out to about 70-some odd thousand won. And they don't take credit cards. And they don't have an ATM, but that's okay because I have plenty of cash and surely they have an ATM at the resort.
The ski shop gives us a lift to the resort and we're all standing in the parking lot and the guy says he's going to get me a ski pass and it will take just a minute. It's 55,000 and it must be in cash. A few minutes turns into ten, then about twenty and we tell the others to go ahead without us. It's already past 2pm and the slopes close at 6 to get ready for the night session. Leora, Jake and Darren go on ahead and Andy waits with us because he wants to ski with his Korean friend. He finally comes back with my pass and we head to the slopes!
I've gone skiing in Colorado and in Lake Tahoe and I was expecting it to be similar. I haven't skied in a couple years so I was looking around for the bunny slope to practice on. Umm, where is it? Oh, there doesn't appear to be one (there actually was, although it was really steep for a beginner hill!). As a side note, Jake and I were the only ones out of all of us who had ever skied before. This will become an important fact soon.
The lines for the ski lift are INSANE. As with most places in Korea, there isn't so much a line as there is just a giant mass of people standing around. Also, I have never seen such crowded ski slopes in my life.
Almost an actual photo of the ski slopes.
We randomly picked one hill to go up and got into line and ended up right behind the others. They'd been waiting in the line for at least 15 minutes and had gotten nowhere. It is wicked cold out and we stood in the "line" for over an hour before finally getting onto the lift. My hands were so numb I couldn't bend my fingers. It was about a 5 minute ride to the top and I was pretty nervous about getting off the lift, but I managed to get off without falling, so I felt pretty confident about my abilities.
There was a little shop at the top of the hill and I absolutely could not stand the cold anymore so I went inside to thaw out a little. Man, it was painful and I was fighting back tears. Leora and someone else (I can't remember who) had bought cups of hot chocolate and we had just sat down so they could drink it when we got kicked out because the shop was closing. They literally had one sip before they had to throw their drinks out. Back out into the cold we go!
We're standing at the top of the hill and for the first time I realize "dear god I have to get down this hill somehow". Any confidence I once had was now gone as I looked down into the abyss. A bunch of ski resort people were at the top of the hill yelling at people and blowing whistles. The slopes were closing and we had to go down right that minute. Well, here goes nothing. I start sliding down and I try to go slow but I keep getting faster and faster and so I try to zigzag like I was taught in my lessons but I think there was something wrong with my right ski because it would not turn. I'm heading right towards the fence and dodging Koreans as best as I could. I made the decision to wipe out because if I didn't do it then I might get killed. So I fell hard, my poles flying behind me. I'm lying in the snow trying to crawl up the hill, but I can't. Two skiers picked up my poles and brought them to me, so I tried to stand up. It's really difficult to stand up with skis on. I tried to hoist myself up using the poles, but my upper body strength was not cutting it. I tried to take the skis off but couldn't do that either. I had no choice but go down the hill on my butt.
Using the skis as a sled, I would go down the hill for a few seconds really fast then put my hands out in the snow to slow myself down before I killed someone. This caused snow and ice to get up my shirt, down my pants and into my gloves. It was cold.
Dave finally caught up to me and we were going about the same pace. He was snowboarding and falling frequently, although I give him props for doing as well as he did because I failed hard at snowboarding when I tried. He tried to help me to my feet but it just wasn't happening so I continued my butt sliding. The hill seemed to never end! Every time you'd go down a hill there would just be another one and I was getting pretty cold and tired. Finally a girl on the ski patrol came up to me and I asked her to help me out of my skis. She unclipped me and I was FINALLY able to stand up. She collected my skis and told me to meet her down at the base. I walked down the hill for a few minutes and then this other ski patrol guy with a deflated rubber raft attached to his waist approached me and told me to get onto it. I protested but realized that he wasn't trying to be nice, they were closing the hill and I needed to be down. So I sat down, my face red, being pulled down the slope. I was pleased to find that 2 of the others were rescued as well, so I felt better knowing I wasn't the only one. I can't imagine trying to ski for the first time ever on that giant hill!
When the six of us were all together, we went over to Popeyes to grab some food. We were planning to get some Korean BBQ after the night ski session but we wanted something to keep us going for the next few hours. Walking up to Popeyes, I slipped on the icy sidewalk and fell. It was pretty embarrassing and even more painful. We found a table in the super crowded cafeteria and sat down to eat. Dave, Jake and Andy wanted to go out again as soon as the slopes re-opened but Leora, Darren and I were not going back up the Mt. Everest slopes again any time soon. We said we'd stay at the bottom and practice on the beginner slope for a while.
While practicing before the bunny slope, all of my ski knowledge came rushing back so I was able to give them a crappy lesson about how to stand and turn, but I think it was somewhat useful. I also realized, while skiing down the little hill, that I'm not a bad skier, the conditions around me were making me bad. I've never skied on manufactured snow. It was really, really icy and that made it hard to control your speed or direction. There were also about 20,000 Koreans standing around on the hill so navigating was also a serious issue. I managed to get down the hill once and was forced to wipe out at the bottom lest I kill people. We went up one more time but it seemed more crowded the second time so I just sat down and went down on my butt again.
At 10 we all headed back into "town". I say "town" because it's not much of one. Dave and I were going to try to find our own hotel but the others asked us if we wanted to stay in their room. It was a sauna style room, as in there is no bed and you just sleep on mats on the floor, so we would easily fit. We agreed and we split the cost of the room. It worked out really well because we had so much fun and saved a load of money. But of course, it had to be paid for in cash.
After dropping the stuff off in the room, we went back down to try to find some dinner. We asked the ski shop where to eat and they said they have food there but there's no other food in town. We then asked if there is an ATM around and they said no, the only ATM in the entire city is at the ski resort welcome center. In Korea, your ATM cards stop working by midnight, so we rushed up there to make it in time. We get in and see the ATM in the corner and....it's dead. Not even closed for the night, completely off. The guy at the front desk said it
might work the next day.
We go back to our hotel and buy some soju, beer and chips, then try to find some food. There are about 3 restaurants in town and all were closed except for this chicken place, so we ended up going there and getting some pieces of chicken and take them back to the room. We killed the chicken pretty quick, then did the same with the Sunchips. And the booze. It was quite a fun night and we didn't end up getting to bed until after 5am. The night was somewhat eventful thanks to the drinking ("Darren, what are you doing in the cupboard?").
The next morning we said our goodbyes to the other 4 and then Dave and I had to make our way back home somehow. Supposedly there was a bus going to Muju Bus Terminal, but we had to wait for over an hour. We walked around looking for a 7-11 or coffee shop, anywhere to get food and/or money but found nothing. We ended up sharing a cab with a Korean family back to the bus terminal for W10,000. Thank god Dave remembered that he kept a W50,000 bill in the back of his wallet for emergencies, because we would not have gotten home without it. We took a cab back to Yeongdong from Muju, then we caught a train back to Daegu. Luckily, the ticket kiosks at the train stations take credit cards!
At the end of the day, we decided if we go skiing again, we're trying High One. Maybe they have an ATM there.
