US Missionaries in Korea: A Lasting Lifestyle - Episode 3

Jacob Stroll and Cameron McDonald share funny stories from their experiences in South Korea. They crashed a wedding photography session at a church, disrupted a funeral at a Buddhist temple, wore traditional Hanbok outfits, and had a friend miss a river cruise. They also visited a Korean spa for a unique experience. The podcast focuses on their experiences rather than specific details about Korean Christianity. Hello, I'm Jacob Stroll, and this is my co-host Cameron McDonald. Welcome to the third installment of U.S. Missionaries in Korea, A Lasting Lifestyle. This podcast, again, is a bit different than the last two podcasts, whereas instead of any information at all that pertains to anything, we're going to share some funny stories of our experiences while in South Korea. So, our first experience began with our first actual visit to a church. What church, Jake? That was Jong-dong. And what happened at Jong-dong? Well, aside from it being a church primarily for the older conservative folk... The first church in South Korea, by the way. The first church, and the one where, I believe, Aben Seller founded it, and where Kim Kyu-sik helped the other independents, I guess you would call them revolutionaries, state out their ideas in the back behind the altar. This church, we did not, I should say, we were not enthused by the lack of youth there, but we did get to see some youth on that day, and they were getting married. We ended up actually crashing a wedding session, a wedding photography session, so that was something. We tried to get out of there when we could, but I think that we might have stayed a bit long. A bit unfortunate on our part, maybe distasteful even, but we persevered and we went for what we came for, whether it was disrupting that wedding or not. And this wasn't the first, or this wouldn't be the last time, shall I say, that we disrupted a ceremonious event. No. Day 9, we attended the Institute of History of Korean Christianity, and what happened directly before we went into the institute? Well, Cam and I had discovered these wonderful scooters laying around Seoul, and so we made a bet with our teacher and the rest of the group that we could get there faster than them if we only paid a few dollars, and they said, no, you can't, and we did by about 30 minutes. And the reason why we did is because we beat them by probably around 5 minutes, but they spent an extra 25 going to a Buddhist temple where they crashed not a wedding this time, but a funeral, and where they stayed far past their welcome, from what I understand, so. And from what I understand as well, well, yes, that's exactly what I understood as well. But Jake and I, in the meantime, got to eat some food from the local convenience store, and we stayed right outside of the institute waiting for the archivists to be ready for our welcome, which they were, and we learned quite a bit while there. There were so many books, more than I ever expected to see in English in a Korean archive about Korean Christianity, but there it was, and we learned quite a bit from them, and it was a greatly appreciated experience. I'd say part of the reason why this podcast isn't getting into specifics dealing with Korean Christianity is because the events, our experiences, and those we interviewed and talked with, those provide fresh, new, and exciting, I guess, details to the literature that should be fleshed out. But the literature itself is extremely well-developed, and the Korean Christianity Institute, I believe that's what it's called, was incredible. When Cam says that they had an insane amount of books, I have never seen that many books dedicated to a single subject in my entire life in one spot. They have literature saturated, covered, over-saturated even, such to where even if we did do very intense research, we would not have been able to add much past that of our own experiences and our own understanding of what Christianity was like at the time that we were there. Yes, very well said, Jake. And later that day, we got our own Hanbok experience. We did. And this was arguably the most I've laughed while in Korea because upon arriving, we each got to pick our own, well, we didn't get to pick our own suit, but we wanted to pick our own costume, our own Hanbok, and I, Cameron, got so lucky and was given this beautiful blue bandana with a military garb, and I loved it. I thought I looked so cool in it. They gave me a plastic fake sword to yield, and it was so exciting, and I looked at the other men in the group that were on the trip, and I said, look how cool this is, and they became so excited, and then, what did you end up wearing, Jake? I ended up wearing, I believe it's called a Gap, it's like a traditional horsehair hat that we actually saw plenty of people wearing in past photos of missionaries. It turns out that was what scholars wore, so I was a scholar. Yes, he was a scholar at the Gyeongbokgung Palace, which if you wore a Hanbok, you get in for free, which was the appeal behind the idea, and we got to sort of fit in with the Korean culture, which was also just a lovely experience to be able to understand, wow, they felt really cool when they wore this. I hope so. They felt like they had some sort of power behind what they were wearing, and that it could show their place in society, and I thoroughly enjoyed seeing the hat, the Gap, that looked like a thimble, almost, on top of Jake's head and some of our other members of our group. It was quite enjoyable to take pictures of them and let them relive that experience over and over again. Still, it was quite wonderful to see, and we were greatly appreciative of being able to wear Hanboks. Not only this, but the very next day, goodness gracious, everything funny happens back-to-back-to-back. The Honggang River Cruise, what happened on that day? Well, people were sick on that day. Oh, were sick. They were very sick. They had been sick for a while beforehand, and one of our group members decided to awaken from their sick slumber on that day, and they decided to come meet us after what we had done before, which was the Myeongdong Cathedral and Jubilee Church, and we went to go on this river cruise, and it would help us, I guess, get a better perspective of where we were in Korea. It was a beautiful tour, basically around the outside of Seoul, and we got to see that. We also got to see the pilgrimage that we had went on, that the Catholics had went on. We got to see that pilgrimage track there, and from a different perspective, from the water, and it was an exciting way to, I guess, cap off the day, and the one group member couldn't find us, and so we kept attempting to contact him, both physically and via phone, for him to get on the boat, and he ended up rushing, running, like full-out sprinting from multiple different stations where boats took off to find the right one, and broke into the doors at the last second at the one that we had gotten on, and the boat ended up undocking at the exact same time that they ran to the gate to get on the boat. It was absolutely terrible timing, and yet so comedically perfect. I was the point of contact that he continued to call over and over again, because we were already almost late to getting on the cruise, and he had said, oh, I'm a mile away still, I just got off the train, I'm going to run, I'm going to run, I can make it, and it was five minutes until the boat left at that point, maybe closer to eight minutes, I would say, and so he said he ran as fast as he possibly could, but then, as it turns out, there were two docks that looked very similar from the outside, and he had asked, he had called again once he got there, he said, which one are you on, and I had no idea, I don't know, I'm already on the dock, I'm about to get on the boat, he said, well, pick one, and so we picked one, very wrong choice, might I add, 50-50 chance, and he failed, not his fault, of course, maybe his fault, and so after choosing the wrong one and realizing we weren't in there, he went to run on to the next one, and he let out a very loud expletive over the phone, and when I heard him say it over the phone, I also heard it simultaneously in person, and being able to hear the same loud English expletive twice at the exact same time of looking for this person who had been missing the entire day after two church visits, might I add, was quite enjoyable, as horrible as that sounds. Why could you hear it in person? Well, because he was right on the other side of the gate, and I kid you not, the man that was in charge at the gate told me, okay, are you getting on or not, so I crossed the gate border, and maybe 10 seconds later, I kid you not, 10 seconds, he ran up to that gate and tried to get in, and the man who let me in refused, refused to open it one more time, he was, our group member was left yelling on the other side of the gate to get on the cruise ship after his heroic effort to make it there, and he was left sitting on the dock outside of the boat for the entirety of our trip along the Han River, which, tragic as it was, was pretty funny to talk about. Yeah, I mean, I think the craziest part about the river cruise was people were holding out their hands with food on it, and the seagulls would be in mid-air snatching it out of their hands while there was a moving target, it was quite impressive to see how uniquely nature has evolved certain animals to do certain things, so, yeah. The cruise itself, it was brief, but beautiful, and again, the seagulls were a major part of it, it was fun to see people throwing stuff, and the individual who did end up missing the cruise was a good sport about it, once we got back, he was okay, he gave us some peace signs when he was sitting on the dock, and we re-encountered him after we got off, and he shared his stories of how he almost made it, and that was that day. Yeah. Yeah. That was probably one of the most memorable experiences there that was not linked to Christianity in any way. Absolutely. Yet another insanely memorable experience happened two days later at that Korean spa we previously mentioned in episode two. Oh, yes. My goodness, the most experiential learning I've ever had in my life. That is not the correct way to phrase it. When he says experiential learning, it is in the context of being able to do something new and unique that's in a different culture, but it's not related to the fact that every member of our group was not wearing clothes. Yes. The first time we had ever seen one another naked, and we were a bit sheepish at first, I'm not going to lie. Maybe. A very sheepish experience at the beginning. However, over time we became more accustomed to being around one another and these strangers without clothing on. There were a variety of pools at different temperatures, and there were also two rooms in the back that were saunas, and they were incredibly hot, my goodness, one was wood and one was just stone. And that is where I had my unique experience for my life. Yeah, there's going to need to be context given for that, Cam. Yeah. By itself, stand alone, that's an interesting thing to say about being surrounded by a bunch of naked men. Yes. But in that location, the other members of my group did not want to stay in the saunas as long as I wanted to stay. They were with me for a bit, but I stayed a bit longer, and in my time alone, I found myself next to these very large men, large in both height and weight, I suppose. Yes. And nothing against them, their bodies were beautiful. All bodies are beautiful, Cam. Yeah, of course. Absolutely. And they were incredibly kind. I went to sit down, and the seat was burning hot, and my feet were also burning hot, and the man said, like, no, no, gesture, you need water on it. I said, I don't know how to get water there. He said, I'll get you some. And he ran out of the sauna, grabbed a bowl from who knows where, scooped up some water from outside, splashed it everywhere I was going to sit, asked me to sit by him, so I did, and he starts talking to me about, well, why are you in Korea? I said, I'm doing research. I'm doing research on missionary work. He said, no way. He said, I'm a priest. He said, I've been a missionary in 16 different countries across Asia and Africa. I'm from Russia. And the man sitting next to him said, yes, and I'm a priest with him. We both work as priests in Incheon, and we're just in the spa today relaxing with one another, but we've been doing this work for years. I said, that's absolutely incredible. What a weird coincidence that I ran into two priests who had accomplished almost two decades worth of missionary work before residing permanently in Korea in a random spa. It was a beautiful experience, and their friend came in, so I was sitting naked alone with three large Russian men in a Korean spa just speaking about Christianity. We had a wonderful conversation, and by the end of it, I went to leave because it was burning hot. My water had all evaporated, and my butt was burning, and my feet were burning. I shook all of their hands, and I left. I just walked out of the room, and I went back to my friends from the group, and we continued to wade in the shallow waters before joining up with the women in a communal room together. Also with clothes on at that point, yes. It was an exciting experience. I never thought that I was going to be put in that position. Rather not put, but volunteer to be in that position with Cam and Louis like that, another member of our group. Once we had done that, we were all bonded at the hip with that experience, certainly. It made the rest of our trip that much more enjoyable, because we shared that baptism by sauna water, whatever you want to call it. That was a beautiful thing for us to have all shared together. Absolutely. In the other parts of the sauna house, I suppose, or the Korean spa house itself, there was a freezer room where we shared time in there with the women of our group. There was also another sauna, but it was a bit more closed. It was on the ground and very circular. It almost looked like the inside of a teepee. That was also wonderful. The entire experience was great. For context, teepees are something that Native Americans used to live in, especially on the plains. They are circular houses that are made up of long sticks or branches that come together at a point at the top. There are skins draped down over top of them. Yes. Thank you, Jake. There was a cafeteria where we all had some beverages and some chips that were delicious, because all the food there, I thought, was wonderful and also very healthy. That was our experience at the spa. Quite a unique one, I'd say. Yes. It was wonderful. Yes. It was absolutely great. You would find missionaries and Christians everywhere. Everywhere. You wouldn't expect it, but we found them on trains, in lines at the airport. There was one woman who went to... Where was it? Lynchburg? Was it Lynchburg? That sounds right, yes. She went to Lynchburg at Liberty University. Yes. This was at Jubilee. We met her. We met one woman at Jubilee, yes, who went to Liberty University, and also another woman in the line at the airport. You weren't there. Oh, shoot. Yes. We met one woman on our way back to Washington, D.C. We were in line at the airport in San Francisco when we met her. It wasn't even in Korea. She was leaving Korea to go back to Liberty University. Yes. We met them everywhere. The whole place was, surprisingly enough, just swarmed with Christians. On the side of the street, we got quite a few pamphlets as well, but that's to be expected. Yes. Some of the pamphlets were for Christianity, and some of them were advertising distinctly non-Christian services. But a lot of them were Christian. Throughout all of our experiences, we were very excited, I would say, for the most part. But perhaps the most excited we had gotten the entirety of our research came from being told that we were visiting the Hanji theme park. Jake, what was the Hanji theme park, and why were we so excited? Well, Dr. Hsu had advertised this as a theme park. And to Americans, a theme park is a park, typically an amusement park, with a theme to it. So either that theme is dragons or it's water or something. But there's a theme to an amusement park, and all of those have rides. And, I mean, we were thinking roller coasters, you know, something. Because we didn't read Korean, we don't know Korean. If we had, we'd realize that Han meant Korean, and Ji meant paper. And so it was a Korean paper theme park. And it was not an amusement park that was themed around Korean paper. It was just a Korean paper museum. Which, I guess to say just doesn't do it justice, because it was quite an enriching experience. It was awesome. It was certainly one of my favorites while I was there, but when I say that she had said theme park, we had thought, oh, we're going to an amusement park with some kind of theme to it. But it was a paper-making experience. That was a wonderful experience. We were taught how to take this, I believe it was white mulberry pulp, and they had this huge tank of water with this pulp sort of saturating it. And then we would take sieves and stick them into the water and slowly move them up in a pattern, that kind of, in a flowing pattern. And we would get all of this mulberry pulp into this wooden slat now, and it would be flattened out. And then we would take this, pull it off, and throw it on a giant hot plate that was standing vertically. And we would then peel the paper off when it was ready, and we would write stuff on it. And it was a hell of an experience, I can tell you that. That was very fun. What was on the top of the building? What was on the top floor, dude? Oh, goodness. The top floor, well, first of all, there was a balcony overlooking the surrounding area, which was absolutely stunning. The other part that was stunning to me was that we were the only people there, so we got to take our time in looking at all of these paper exhibits, which was incredible since it was a paper museum, a Korean paper museum. And not only were there portraits on the walls illustrating the many uses of this paper, but there were also 3D diagrams that illustrated different Korean cultural events using hanji. And there were different natural scenes, there were scenes with people, there were scenes with animals, there were just buildings, Korean buildings. And it was genuinely a beautiful exhibit showcasing all of this paper. There were portraits on the walls that were three-dimensional as well. There was a tiger that had its whiskers sticking out of the frame. It was just gorgeous. And to be able to see that in a non-crowded area is a rarity, at least in my museum-going experience. So it was certainly something that stuck out, and it was greatly appreciated. So even though we were a bit taken aback by expecting roller coasters and seeing a singular building, the inside of that building was something to be grateful for. Yeah, we even naively ran through the building trying to find the entrance to the theme park. That was hilarious once we realized that there was nothing other than just the paper. And then we kind of settled into the fact that it wasn't just paper, it was this beautiful Korean experience. And this museum where people had spent hundreds upon hundreds of hours putting together these large sculptures. It's basically a sculpture garden, but with paper. It was beautiful. And it was also in Wanchou, we should say that. Yes, it was. And again, another part that adds to the beauty of that city. And now, before we end, we have one more story. So the last four or five days of the trip is when we went to Gunsan, Jeonju, and Busan. But not all of us went. Only, well, a majority of the group went, but Jake and Dr. Leeson stayed behind in Seoul. Dr. Leeson to finish her work, and Jake to eat more KFC. Yeah. And the experiences I heard from that trip were just as funny then as they are today. And we weren't around to help Jake in any way, shape, or form. So whatever happened to him in Seoul without us there was entirely up to him to solve. And he had no one, literally no one in the city or in that half of the country besides Dr. Leeson to fall back on. So Jake, what were your experiences when the rest of the group was gone? So, I mean, I had stayed behind. I had not been feeling good the day that we left. And I realized afterwards that after they had left to go to Gunsan and Busan and Jeonju that, well, Dr. Leeson and I had a lot of homework to do, both respectively. And so I had spent most of the day, most of the days going to places with free Wi-Fi. One of them was KFC so I could work on this project that I had to do over the summer. And in my haste to get there at night, I wouldn't walk because, well, it was boring. It was not nearly as fun as the alternative. And the alternative got me there in five minutes. And the alternative was riding on a scooter. So they had these scooters, as we talked about earlier, that kind of dotted the streets. They were purple. They were called beam scooters. And we have them here in major cities. I know that we just got done giving an Asian Network, I guess, conference presentation in Atlanta. They had them there. I know in San Antonio they have them. In Philly they have them. But here they were everywhere. So I figured we'd take advantage of them again. Well, I did while Cam and the others were in Gunsan, Busan, and Jeonju. And I was driving to KFC on one of these things at night. And how late was that, Jake? Very late. It was like 2 a.m. KFC was open 24 hours. So I was driving there at 2 a.m. and wasn't wearing a helmet. And I didn't realize that was a crime, but apparently it is a crime. And I was crossing the pedestrian crosswalk. And a policeman, you know, put on his sirens, kind of flashed his sirens at me a few times. Because I didn't get the point the first time. And the reason why I didn't get the point the first time is because I'm going to say this again. I didn't think it was a crime. And everyone else was looking at me like they expect me to do something. I'm flying across this intersection. And so I'm thinking, okay, I didn't cross when I should have. I might have crossed in front of traffic. I don't know. And if that's true, that's really illegal. I might be detained for that or something. And so they pulled me off to the side of the road and started talking to me in Korean. I don't know what they're saying. And eventually they said, you have your passport on you. And I didn't because it was in the hostel. I had nothing. I had no forms of identification on me. Why did you have your passport on you, Jay? Because people don't just carry their passports around on the street. I have my driver's license. So I showed them my driver's license, Pennsylvania driver's license. And they don't know where Pennsylvania is, I don't think. I mean, it was very clear that it was American. And they probably thought it was one of the states. But it sounds a lot like Transylvania. I mean, it really could have been anywhere in the world that Pennsylvania was. It's not a recognized country. So it wasn't going to do it. It wasn't going to get the point across. There was no American. There was no, I guess, official thing on it that said I was an American. So I was terrified that not only did I do something completely illegal, that I was going to be detained overnight for it, and that I was going to be subject to the Korean judicial system. And I am, like, terrified, out of my mind, standing there, until they charged me with this crime. And they charged me with the crime of riding a scooter without a helmet on. At this point, I think I got visibly agitated, because that is such a minor infraction. And I had kind of let all of this adrenaline slough off of me at this point. And so I wrote them. They had, at this point in time, we had been conversing over translator apps. And I said, so am I free to go, or do you guys need me in jail? And they said, I didn't have my passport. And they said, go home, go on foot, don't go on the scooter. And I said, okay, I can do that. And so I ran back to my hostel and slept there. But I had thought that I was alone, and I was going to be put in a jail cell, and nobody was going to be there, and that was terrifying. So that's my experience. What a memorable thing to have happen to you, Jake. Yep. Didn't get to go to KFC. No, that sucked. I did like KFC. They had some good stuff there. Yeah, they did. The menu was different than the United States. It was. It's the same as McDonald's elsewhere, too. They had some gourmet stuff at KFC that they don't have in the States. I think it's because they want to give off a good impression to the Korean people. But in the United States, it's cheap hot dog food. And it serves its purpose. In Korea, it seemed more like an actual restaurant, which was interesting. But anyway, that's my experience. Absolutely. Nothing that rivals that happened down below. We went to quite a few different churches. We went to the beach one night. But other than that, I can't say that I got pulled over by any stretch of the imagination for riding scooters. Jake did call me after that experience and told me not to ride the scooters for fear of being pulled over as well. So I heeded that advice. I didn't ride scooters the rest of the time that we were in Korea. But I did look fondly on the experiences we had while on them together. Oh yeah, we would ride the river walks. And we rode to the World Cup Stadium. It was beautiful. It was. There were some really great experiences on those things. Or just walking around the city in general. Or even riding the buses. Within the podcast, U.S. Missionaries in Korea, A Lasting Lifestyle. We want to thank you very much for listening if you've gotten this far through. Yeah, absolutely. I think that this was a wonderful experience, Cam. Thank you, Jake, for all that you've done. Thank you again to Dr. Shun, Dr. Leeson, Asian Network, of course. It could not have been possible without you. And to the other members of our group. I doubt you'll ever listen to this. But here we are. I thank you guys too for making it such a memorable thing to have happen. Yes, thank you for, especially to our teachers in Asian Network, for giving us the experience of actually being able to talk to Korean Christians face-to-face. Of being able to interact with the research material that we otherwise would have just had to have read face-to-face. Like we can actually tangibly connect these ideas to each other. It was a wonderful, truly a wonderful experience to have. Thank you so much. All right. Well, we'll see you guys later. If you ever want to contact us, please do so. If you find a way. If not, we'll try to contact you maybe. All right. Have a good one. See y'all later. Bye-bye.