No Call Number: Roadtrippin to Myogol Village

I was just feeling sorry that I haven't really had anything new to blog about when I remembered that I saved one entry for later six months ago. Time flies! Anyways, here it is--our trip to Myogol Village.

The weather has been lovely, so we decided it was time to take the car for a spin. I liked the pictures of Myogol Village we had in our Daegu guidebook, so we decided to head west. Since moving here, we have had to learn to live without Google maps. There are internet maps in Korea, of course, but they are in Korean. We carefully consulted our map and gassed up the car, and we were off. It took about half an hour to get out of the city, partially because it is a widespread city and partially because there's a lot of traffic. As soon as we left the buildings of Daegu, we entered downtown Dalseong, another of Korea's not-cities with tall buildings and dense commercial areas.

We finally made it onto the open road. We passed plastic covered farms, which is how Daegu continues to have fresh produce in the winter. We turned off on a tiny road and headed out towards Yukinsa Shrine, which thankfully had English signs. The rural road passed under an ornate entrance and we were suddenly surrounded by traditional Korean houses with wooden latticework and tile roofs. These buildings are beautiful, and I never tire of them. They were surrounded by earthen walls topped with latticework.

We squeezed into the driveway and found ourselves at an old housing compound. The sign on the front told the story in English: This was the Park clan's compound. Park Paeng-nyeon compiled government publications (he was a librarian!) for King Sejong and his son, Munjong. When King Sejo usurped the throne, he fled, plotting with six officers to restore the throne to the rightful heir. The plot was betrayed and Park was imprisoned, where he died. His pregnant daughter in law was sent to Daegu as a slave. When her son was born, she exchanged him with a daughter of a maidservant so he wouldn't be killed. The home we visited was where the servant raised the Park heir in hiding. By the time he came of age, the political climate had shifted again and he was restored to honor. Yukinsa shrine, at the center of the village, is for the slain Park Paeng-nyeon, who remained loyal to the king though it cost him his life. Or so the story goes.

There were orate turtle carvings all over the buildings. We wandered through the shrine and housing compound, then walked through the village. We saw thatch roofed storehouses, gardens, and traditional Korean houses. This is a bit different from the palace compounds we have seen in the past, since some of these houses belonged to (more) regular joes. There were also some beautifully restored traditional houses that were occupied. A very nice guide gave us an English brochure and spoke to us in limited English. I don't think English speaking folks make it out there on our own too often.

We headed back for civilization and one of our favorite restaurants, which is called “Traditional Korean Restaurant,” for sam gyup sal.