Kong Dong
Riding home on the express bus from Seoul he felt really angry and disappointed in himself. The bus was packed. It was the cheap bus, 7,800 won (about 7 dollars) for a 2 hour ride to Taejon. The seats were cramped. There was a first class bus for 10,500 won but he didn�t know how to ask for it in Korean and somehow he always ended up on the cheap one. Siting next to him was a frumpy businessman, not one of the cute Korean women that sat in seats all around him. He slumped in his chair, closed his eyes and tried out the new meditation technique he had learned at the SM center in Seoul. It sounded like S&M center he mused, laughing to himself but it was SM. The sounds of the Korean music from the TV kept coming through. Puchang music. Korean country music.
All That Jazz was a jazz club in the Itaewon district of Seoul. It had a reputation as a place where top local musicians go to sit in and strut their stuff. He had gone to the jazz club with the expressed purpose to sit in on at least one song. He prepared himself.n As he walked in, many people turned to look at him. Who was this new guy in town, walking to the bar with his horn slung over his shoulder like a gunslinger walking into a Wild West saloon. As he listened to the level of the playing, he became discouraged. These guys were smoking. Near the end of the set, someone had yelled out, �Hey let�s hear from the new guy.� Many people turned to look at him, but he had just pretended that he hadn�t heard it and looked down. That was it, the moment. The carpe diem that he hadn�t seized. Now his self esteem was paying the price for it. �I�m not as good as those guys and never will be. Who am I fooling?� The club closed early by American standards, at midnight, and he walked over to the hip hop club down the street and jammed with the young drummers until 3 am. A far cry from the jazz club. After sleeping a few hours in the Chimshilbang, he went to the meditation center, his main purpose for being in Seoul that weekend, and learned about Supreme Master Ching Hai, a self proclaimed enlightened Vietnamese woman who guaranteed enlightenment for you and your family if you would become a member of her group. Now it was 6:30 and he was on his way home.
Thankfully the meditation only put him to sleep and he woke up 2 hours later as the bus pulled in to the Express Bus parking lot in Taejon. He hailed a taxi for the short ride home. Although it was the middle of November it still wasn�t very cold, maybe 50 degrees and because he hadn�t practiced his saxophone at all that day he thought about his options. He could just forget it, that�s what he felt like doing, just take the horn down to the river and chuck it in, or he could go to his office and play, or down by the river where it was a bit nippy, or�.there was one more possibility�.Kong Dong.
Every large city in Korea has one section of town that is known as pedestrian friendly. In the US we call it a pedestrian mall. At night they fill up with hundreds of strolling young people. They go to a restaurant, shop for cell phones, have a coffee or ice cream, get drunk at a bar, and eat street food at a stall, but mostly they just walk around. Taejon had one too. It was called Unhaeng Dong, but it was a 45 minute bus ride from his apartment. Kong Dong was the name of the neighborhood next to his. He lived at Kaist, the elite Korean science university. Just a quarter mile away was Chungnam University, the huge national university of Korea. Between them was Kong Dong. While it wasn�t exactly a pedestrian mall, it was filled with strolling people. Kong Dong was fun. The occasional car just added a little excitement to the mix. It was filled with restaurants, bars, internet cafes, bars, street vendors, bars, and gift shops. The buildings were lined with neon. Every floor of every building had a different kind of club, caf�, gimmick, and each had a flashy sign. Many establishments advertised with the aid of an inflatable balloon that was anchored to the ground and kept full with an air blower. Many of these looked strangely phallic. An oddity of Korean culture, sometimes sexuality was overtly displayed even though Korean women were very modest. All of the sites and sounds were a bit overwhelming, especially when none of the signs made sense. It was easy to get lost there, but not for long as Kong Dong was only 3 blocks wide and 7 blocks long. Mostly it was college students there and they roamed around every night ,especially on Fridays nights. Sunday night would be a little slow. He had never dared to play the street music there before, because there were cars and because maybe some of his students would see him. He had played downtown at the mall though. He decided that he would chance it. He needed some redemption, and if he made a fool out of himself, so be it, he couldn�t feel worse than he did right now. He walked to the main street and found a spot that wasn�t too loud, next to a woman selling jewelry, across from an oden stall and another stall selling flowers. There were bars all around, as well as a bank machine that chimed heavenly music everytime someone put in their bank card. Down the street were a punching machine and a kicking machine. These were always to be found in any mall area. They consisted of firm cushions attached to a metal lever. You put your 100 won coin in there and hit it as hard as you could. It registered the force of your blow with a number between 0-1000. Korea, being a country where everyone has had some Tae Kwon Do training, is a good market for this machine. It got very busy later on in the evening when drunk young men stumble out of bars and need a place to deposit their frustrations and prove their prowess. The machines produce a crash that startles you if you are not used to it. After a while, it becomes a part of the aural landscape.
He nodded to the woman selling jewelry. She looked friendly enough, about 40 years old, chubby and flat faced. He pointed to his saxophone and wiggled his fingers to signal that he wanted to play. Her face broke out into a smile and she nodded. Anything to break up the boredom. He sat down on the sidewalk and took out his gear, his saxophone, his mp3 player, and the small speakers he used for background music. He started playing, wondering if someone would tell him to shut up, or laugh, or just completely ignore him. He looked over at the woman, she was still smiling and that was enough for him. He closed his eyes and played. Somehow it didn�t seem to matter. The street accepted him. Suddenly he was a part of the show. For people walking down Kong Dong that night he was just another attraction. Young lovely couples strolled by, smiled, stopped to listen for a moment, gave a thumbs up and walked on smiling. Young teenage girls excited to see a Western man would stop and listen and give flirtatious smiles and want to take their picture with him. He complied. Sure, you can come and put your arm around me and snap. He just kept playing waiting for that moment when the music came out pure and good and looking for that person who would hear it. He knew they were there. Every so often there would be someone who was moved by the music and would stop and listen and he played his soul out for them, for them. For that moment there was an incredible beautiful closeness.
After a while, the flower vendor across the street brought a little plastic chair for him to sit in. He felt like part of the family. They liked him. He looked over at the oden stand. The woman waved and gave him the thumbs up. It felt pretty good except that his hands were getting cold and it was getting hard to play the notes.
Just as he started playing a jazz standard, Yardbird Suite, a giant chicken walked down the street and started dancing in front of him. Really, a giant chicken. Well actually a person in a giant chicken costume. It was another way the establishments had of advertising. They hired people to dress up in costumes and just walk around. Sometimes there was a Superman or gorilla. This one was advertising a chicken restaurant. He had seen it before. Usually it was surrounded by a group of woman who were taking pictures or talking with it. He had never spoken to it before but he had waved. Now it was right in front of him, dancing. Quite the spectacle. A Western guy playing the saxophone for a dancing chicken. Everybody stopped to look and laugh. At first he felt like getting up and running away or shooing the chicken away, but then he shrugged, �Who cares, its better than playing by the river.� When the song was over the chicken turned around. �Hi,� he said. The chicken didn�t say anything, just put out its hand for a high five. He did the high five with the chicken. The chicken made a gesture by putting his upper arm parallel to the ground with his forearm perpendicular then pulled straight down, �Yes.� Everybody laughed including him. Actually it was amazing how expressive that chicken was with just a few gestures he�.she�.you really couldn�t tell what it was�could express a lot. �My hands are getting cold. I think I can only play one more song.� The chicken lowered its shoulder and head, somehow expressing sadness. It came up close to him and from the costume emerged two small hands. He grabbed onto the hands. They were slim and soft and warm. So warm. The chicken massaged his hands sensually and quickly feeling came back into the fingers. He was beginning to like this chicken. His imagination flared. Then the chicken leaned its mouth close to his ear. He waited, open to anything. His dreamed that there was a beautiful Korean woman inside. Then the chicken spoke. He heard a deep voice come from somewhere inside, �Let�s me and you take a walk together when I finish work.� The soft hands felt so good as they rubbed warmth into his hands. He looked into the chicken�s eyes for some seconds caught between 2 worlds. Then suddenly, he pulled his hands away. �UH� no that�s OK. I already have a girlfriend. I like girls.� The chicken gave a final squeeze to his hands and then went back to being a chicken and shrugged a big stage shrug and turned around and waved, then turned back to the musician and raising his hands like a conductor , conducted him to start playing. He played a fast version of �My Funny Valentine�. The chicken danced and people were delighted. After the song was over a group of young women came over and wanted to take a picture with the chicken. They were talking about something, trying to get the chicken to answer, but he wouldn�t. Finally they came over to the musician. They said in broken English, �We want to know is it he or she.� They tried to look into the costume, feel they arms, etc. �We want to know.� The musician looked at the chicken and the chicken looked at the musician and somehow through the plastic and fur and feathers and flesh and bone, there was a communication there. He hesitated. �Both,� he finally said. �It�s both.� The crowd gave up a cheer. They were satisfied. The musician was satisfied. The chicken was only partially satisfied but that wasn�t the musician�s problem really.
His hands were starting to get cold again, but he played another one. The chicken hung out in the general area dancing to the music, waving. The woman from the oden stand brought over a big bottle filled with steaming water to warm his hands. The jewelry woman ran over to get it. The water bottle felt great. It was better than the chicken. He was back on the road again. He felt like part of the family of Kong Dong and next time he would stand up in the jazz club and say his piece, whatever the reaction. No more chicken. He played for almost 2 hours, because it was so fun. People stopped and gave him coffee, tangerines, a piece of cake gift wrapped from a fancy store. One romantic couple stopped and really listened for 10 minutes. When they were about to leave, the woman looked at her lover and said something. He nodded. She walked over and gave the musician the rose that her boyfriend had given her. He gave the cake to the jewelry woman next door who said she would give it to her 9 year old daughter�..right.
When he finally finished he went to return the chair. The man nodded very dignified. The musician looked at the stall. It didn�t only have flowers, it had other things including hats. He thought with sadness about the cool hat he had lost about 1 month ago. He scanned the hats and unbelievably there was one that looked a lot like it right there. To be sure, it wasn�t as classy as his had been, but it was a nice cheap copy. Because he had lost his hat he had shaved his beard. The two had gone together. He felt his smooth face. The weather was getting cold. Although Korean people said he looked better without it, he hadn�t adjusted to his new look. His face was too narrow. He tried on the hat. He turned and looked for a mirror. There was a woman standing there. �Moshisoyo,� she said, (you look cool). That was it. He resolved to buy the hat grow his beard back. Maybe his strength lay in it. �Olma ieyo?� (how much). The vendor looked surprised. He had thought the musician was a bum. �12,000 won.� He dug out the money. The man clapped his hands. �Thank you,� he said in English. What comes around goes around. He jammed the hat on, slung his instrument over his shoulder, and hopped on his bike for the short ride home. Darting in and out of cars, he somehow felt that he was more home than ever.
pictures of Kong Dong