A Viking Abroad: Busan!

I AM POSTING ALL THE PICTURES AND VIDEOS AT THE BOTTOM.

This is going to be a long post. A lot happened this weekend and I saw a lot of places. Luckily I remembered to take pictures because I know I haven't been doing much of that lately. I wanted you guys to feel like you were on the trip with me! Welp...here goes!

I left from 경산 (Gyeong San) station because it's closer than 동대구 (Dong Daegu) station which I normally leave from. This also allowed me to take the 무궁화 (Mugunghwa or Moo Goong Hwa) train which is much cheaper than the KTX or SRT. The mugunghwa is one of the original high speed trains made by Korea and still goes pretty fast, but it's nowhere near the speed of the KTX so it's much cheaper. I'm fine with this as Busan isn't very far away. It ended up taking about an hour and fifteen minutes to get there.

From the Busan station it was just a few minutes by bus to the next stop which was a famous market in the area. I was starving at this point and really wanted to try some local street food. However, there was a street performance of some traditional Korean music by the culture center in Busan. Don't worry, I got a video for you guys.

After the performance I finally got into the market for some food. Omg this food was incredible. I really wish I could have eaten more haha. It wasn't inexpensive though so if you go there don't plan all your meals around the market.

Right across the street from the Korean market, there is an international market. While the Korean market is mostly food with some clothing shops and jewelry shops sprinkled in, the international market is almost exclusively clothing. Unfortunately there still is nothing that fits me here. They have XXXL sizes, but they equate to XL in the states haha. They fit me like undershirts. That's fine though, it gives me something to shoot for.

Following the the market it was time to head to the hotel and check in. Walking back to the bus stop, there was the famous fish market right there. Decided to take a walk around and see what all the fuss was about. There were SO MANY kinds of fish, and it was pretty amazing. I'm not even a big fan of fish, but I was impressed. Also I noticed the people there were very aggressive when it came to trying to get you to buy there wares. This is pretty atypical for Korea so it was an interesting social facet.

I finally got to check in at the hotel and it was very nice. It was about a 5 minute walk from famous 해운대 (haeundae) beach. It was night, and it was also time to sit on the beach and drink some beer and eat some fried chicken. That was the life, chimek on haeundae beach. I won't have many more memories better than that one in life. The sound of the waves crashing 5 feet away, the beautiful stars, sand under my feet, the lights from buoys out in the ocean, and of course some chicken and beer to top it all off. Don't worry I have pictures and videos, like I said I documented this trip pretty well for you guys.

After the beach it was time to go take a shower and enjoy the beautiful room. Most importantly it was time to sleep, I was exhausted after a long 3 days of filming and the traveling. The next day was also a very eventful one with some really good food.

Breakfast was some of the leftover food from the market the day before and it was delicious. The first destination was back on the island right next to haeundae beach. There are some beautiful views, and the APEC house which housed some of the most important and famous global summits in recent history. This was really cool to see.

After the island it was time for an early lunch before people started packing places. Guess what?! THATS RIGHT SUSHI TIME! Omg this sushi was incredible. So fresh. So good. Actually most of it was sashimi. But the combination of that along with the sauce, and the view of haeundae was great. This place was literally right on the shore, and overlooked the beach. What a cool location. There were some other pretty famous places around there like "hill spa" which is a spa you can stay in overnight. It also has an incredible view.

After eating it was time to hit up the local Buddhist temple. Man this was a fascinating place, and really got me thinking. There's a huge push right now for one world church, and the unifying of all religions. People are making claims that they are all the same, and all religions serve the same god. This is so ridiculously untrue, but there's a lot of misinformation out there that people twist to suit their agendas. I started thinking a lot about Islam vs Christianity specifically because of recent world events.

The Quran and the Bible are extremely similar as far as the Old Testament. Islam seems to be mostly fueled by revenge, and true believers of Islam are the ones who are creating the violence. The ones "peacefully" following Islam aren't devout enough in their faith to live it. The same goes for Christians, they are all over the place in the church claiming to know Christ but their actions speak otherwise. They do not practice what they preach.

The difference between Islam and Christianity lies in our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Jesus abolished the Old Testament covenant and replaced it with a New Covenant through the shedding of his blood for us. There is indeed a lot of bloodshed in the Old Testament, and a lot of zealous behavior for the Glory of God. I started to think about how if Jesus had never come, Christianity could be much different. Anyone who thought they had been spoken to by God could be trying to commit genocide for His glory. A very interesting hypothetical situation to ponder over in my opinion.

However, this isn't the case and Jesus did come. He died on the cross forever changing the world, and forgiving us of our sins. In Islam Jesus is indeed there and is a prophet, however He is not the divine Son of God. Don't let this simple fact be downplayed for it is everything. If Jesus is not the Son of God, and did not die on the cross for our sins, and was not resurrected and taken up in to heaven, then our faith is false, as Paul explains in Corinthians.

"15 Now, brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand. ²By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.

³For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance^[a]: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, ⁴that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures, ⁵and that he appeared to Cephas,^[b] and then to the Twelve. ⁶After that, he appeared to more than five hundred of the brothers and sisters at the same time, most of whom are still living, though some have fallen asleep. ⁷Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, ⁸and last of all he appeared to me also, as to one abnormally born.
⁹For I am the least of the apostles and do not even deserve to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. ¹⁰But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me. ¹¹Whether, then, it is I or they, this is what we preach, and this is what you believed.

The Resurrection of the Dead

¹²But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? ¹³If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. ¹⁴And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. ¹⁵More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. ¹⁶For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. ¹⁷And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins. ¹⁸Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ are lost. ¹⁹If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are of all people most to be pitied." (Corinthians 15 1-19)

Super intense stuff, but amazing. These days it's stigmatized to talk about other people's "god" as the "wrong" god. People are very sensitive about their religions. I couldn't help myself from thinking, however, while I was at this Buddhist temple about all the poor souls that didn't know Christ. Here they were burning incense to some concrete and golden statues. Not only that, but there were different statues for different parts of life. One to pray to for "having a son", and for "academic achievement". Regardless of being brought up as a Buddhist you have to think that one day you would begin to question what this statue is doing for you.

Most people would counter with, "well you've never seen your God so how do you know he exists? wouldn't you think one day that you'd realize an invisible all powerful man in the sky isn't real?...science, logic etc". Certainly I haven't seen Him, and if I did I wouldn't be alive anymore. Reading the Old Testament assures us of that. More importantly though I know he is real because I have felt Him in my life. I have seen His works in me. I have felt His love. Something I wish everyone could feel, because it is the greatest feeling I have ever felt and ever will feel. Complete and utter serenity. Complete love. I admit I long for that feeling again, as in my life it hasn't come often. I'm completely ok with that though because I know He is there watching over me, and that He loves me. I know by my relationship with Him, His response to my prayers, and everything that I see around me.

There are some studies that talk about how there is an inverse relationship between intelligence level and how religious people are. I think this is fascinating, and it makes perfect sense. Intellectual people tend to believe that they have done everything on their own. Especially the ones that live in America, the culture promotes this. 'Put in the work and with our freedom you can be anything you want to be'! Great slogan for capitalism, but not how things work. God should be credited with the good fortunes we all have.

"But if we attribute the good to God, it's only fair that we attribute the bad too!". This is actually something I struggled with for a long time. A fun twist on 'why do bad things happen to good people?'. I didn't have the answer until our church started reading through Job this past month. Wow, this book has been so good for me to read. I wrote a little about this earlier on in one of my blogs but it bears repeating. Job is the perfect dude, he's got a ton of money, he loves God, he's got a great family, and he's popular. All these bad things happen to him though, but he refuses to curse God. Even though the only 3 friends he has left on earth tell him he's at fault and must have done something to deserve it. He knows he didn't, yet remains faithful that God has a reason.

This lesson is so unbelievably powerful, and needed. So many people lose their faith because their grandmother got cancer, or their best friend was taken in a car accident. Tragedies like these that happen to those we love, and good people are a test of our faith. They also help to remind us that death is not final. There is life after death, and while we may mourn here for their bodies we should be more focused on whether or not their soul was saved. Thinking about this really gives a different perspective. It gives a real urgency to our evangelism. We may go at any time, have we done what God asked us to do?

Haha I don't know how this post got so preachy, I guess I just had to elaborate on what I was feeling at that Buddhist temple, and my thoughts. I certainly don't have all the answers, I just hope that my thoughts can help others in their faith who may be struggling with similar things.

ANYWAYS, after the Buddhist temple it was time to head back towards Busan station and catch a train back to Daegu University! This time instead of the mugunghwa it was the SRT to 동대구 (Dongdaegu) which is the in between train. Faster than mugunghwa but slower than KTX, only by a little though. Therefore the price point is in between for a train that's pretty close to the KTX. After getting in to dongdaegu I took the bus back to the university and crashed! That's it guys, look for the next post soon about my boring first day back haha. Thanks for reading!

Korean Word/Phrase of the Day: 부산에서 가고 싶어요 (Busan Eh Suh Ga Go Sheep Eo Yo) This means I want to go to Busan.

TLDR: I am broken. I am blessed.