After a lovely afternoon at the Lake, I decided to continue the exploring with another attempt at Downtown. The main reason for this is that Downtown is the night-life hub of the city, so it really should be experienced at night. Also, I have been wanting to spend some time trying to figure out how to take pictures at night. Oh, and there was rugby – the first Tri-Nations match not in the middle of the night (even if it was just New Zealand vs Australia).

So, armed with camera and some cash, I headed down to the bus stop for the second time in a day. One of the things I find odd about Daegu is that the city seems to get busier as the day goes on, so that by Saturday evening the streets are bursting with people. This is the reverse of SA, where people go home as dusk approaches, especially on a Saturday when they need to fire up the braai and chill the beers before the Rugby. One advantage of the Korean approach is that there are regular buses late into the evening. I contemplated taking a bus directly to downtown, but the last time I did that it was rather a long trip. Also, the website I’ve been using to find my way around suggested that the best way to find the area I wanted was to aim for one subway station short of Banwoldang (where the buses go). It turns out that Downtown is divided into two parts and last time I visited it, I stayed on the East side. This time I needed to be on the West, so I took my usual work-bus (number 1-1) and hopped off opposite the Fashion-Exchange, which was disco-ing away happily into the night. This is my personal transportation hub. I’m more familiar with the buses here than anywhere else and my nearest subway station is here. Nearest to the office, anyway, but I think possibly also to where I live, because the subway line doesn’t come that far – I live on the South-Eastern edge of the city, so it’s a little out of the way for subways.

So Manchon Subway Station is a station with which I am now familiar. I’ve been here often and know my way around. Unfortunately, knowing my way around the station hasn’t helped me find my way around the travel-card-reloading machine. I keep asking people about it but so far everyone I ask has a car and knows nothing about the bus. Luckily the universal language of holding out a travel card and a W10 000 note is intelligible to the nice people working at subway information offices. The nice man loaded my card and I headed down to the tracks and caught the next train in the direction of Munyang (subway directions are indicated based on the name of the last station on the line in that direction). I got off at Kyungpook University Hospital Station, as per website directions, and started to head up into the night.

There is something a little eerie about subway stations, particularly at night. Something about going down and down into the depths of the earth where everything is run by machine seems rather like the plotline of a weak horror movie. Apart from the information offices, the subway systems here don’t seem to need all that many people. The turnstiles are electronic, people needing to buy single tickets can do so from automatic machines, all the directions are given by brightly lit signs and an electronic voice announces when a train is about to arrive and the next station on the train. Perhaps this is part of the reason that the Kyungpook University Hospital Station was strangely silent when I got off the train and followed the ‘Way Out’ signs up a flight of stairs on Saturday night. As I reached the top of the stairs a man passed me rushing in the opposite direction. And then I was alone. Utterly alone in a world of tiles and artificial lights and yellow and green and white signs pointing in various directions. My South African woman-alone-at-night-in-isolated-place hackles were raised but it didn’t really feel dangerous in the criminal sense. It felt more like a bad horror movie. Thankfully the next set of stairs brought me to a level with other people. There even appeared to be a table-tennis place on this level, where people could go to play table-tennis.

At the top of the final flight of stairs (Exit 1), I stopped and took in the warm summer night. I was next to a busy road with huge buildings all around me except for the ivy-covered older building across the road. The contrast of the older building against the huge, brightly lit skyscrapers behind it was a perfect picture of how Daegu has grown upwards in between the older bits of the city that remain.

I headed off down the road and after a block turned right into a busy street (busy with pedestrians as well as cars). The first part of the street was lined on both sides with various businesses including what struck me a lot of wedding dress shops. Shops here seem to cluster together by type an awful lot. About a block or two up, I glimpsed the sign for the bar where they were likely to be showing the rugby, down a road to the left. This is the place I wandered around looking for for ages last time I went downtown. Clearly it is actually very easy to find if you come from the correct direction. Before heading there, I thought I’d wander up the road a bit. The pavements were filled with people and I wanted to get a sense of what else was around the area. There were bakeries and fast food places and restaurants and I saw the Samdeok police station. And then I crossed a road and got distracted by a park.

My last trip downtown was partly inspired by a desire to find two parks, one of which I stumbled upon after wandering for a bit, but I still hadn’t seen National Debt Repayment Movement Park (Gukchae-bosang Memorial Park). On the off-chance that this was the park I’d been looking for, I wandered in. Before I go any further, I have to say: imagine living in a country where it is perfectly safe to wander through a park at night all alone. It blows my mind a little. This park was well-lit and full of people. From where I walked into the park, I could see a group of teenagers and young adults playing basketball. Watching them, under arbours covered with creepers and vines, were couples chatting and sitting together and holding hands. I wandered along a path between trees, looking out over the playground and found myself in another section of the park. The first thing I notices was a large rock with a lily pond in a depression in the top of it. I walked slowly on. Parks are often peaceful places but this one, despite various ponds and walks and beautifully designed places, was more busy than peaceful. An impression possibly partly created by the huge screen splashing its garish music videos and advertisements across the paths and gardens.

In the corner of the park is a huge bell that is apparently an important part of New Year’s celebrations for many Koreans. It rests in a Korean style display building (floor, walls, roof, ornate dragon designs). Beyond that were teenage boys on skateboards and BMXs. Along the paths, a pair of children were playing an informal game of badminton. People walked along in pairs or couples, sometimes trailing children on tricycles. On the benches, people sat in couples, friends shared take-away dinners and one little boy sat with his grandmother. As I walked along, I was thinking a lot about how necessary parks like this are in cramped urban surroundings where gardens are a relatively unknown luxury. I can’t imagine growing up without a garden, but in some ways I suppose parks are the normal alternative for thousands, maybe millions of people. Strange how far apart childhood experiences can be.

As I was leaving the park, I saw something strange. Occasionally I will spot something in Korea that makes me stop and take another look because I’m not sure I trust my eyes. The whole park is laid out with beautiful gardens, exquisitely manicured and populated with local trees and flowers, some (like hibiscus and pines) familiar, others unknown to me. On the way out of the park, I passed some mielies (maize). I’m not sure I’ll ever quite get used to the idea of mixing flowers with vegetables in this way, partly for the simple reason that I can’t imagine a world where the mielies wouldn’t get stolen. These plants were not just in a square patch, however, they were planted in a circle around a tree, like sentries around the tree, so that the tree actually seemed to be growing out of the mielies. Very odd.

By this stage, of course, I’d missed most of the rugby but I headed to the bar anyway, via a gentle strolled through the incredibly crowded night-life streets – packed with bars and restaurants, but also baby-clothes shops, shoe shops and many others that I’d never have associated with night-life but which were all open on a Saturday night. Commune’s (the bar) was open and full of people watching the last few minutes of the match. Commune’s is the kind of slightly dingy place that reminds me of the club we used to go to at varsity and a place with many happy memories, CJ’s. It is situated in a basement and the walls, under various murals and pictures, are a dark colour, possibly black. It is also regularly full of foreigners (some of whom are not American/Canadian), so it’s a good place to go to immerse yourself in cultures-not-Korean for a little. Also, it’s sometimes nice to hear a whole room full of people speaking English. As soon as the rugby was over, some of the customers insisted that the Ashes cricket be put on. I felt almost at home.

After a drink at the bar (their G&Ts are not up to Moz standards), I headed home. It was now too late to take the subway/bus route home, so I took a deep breathe and went to find a taxi. This is the first time I’ve taken a taxi entirely on my own and I still don’t know exactly how to tell the taxi driver where to take me. This is one of the reasons that I find public transport easier to manage – because the stops are fixed, I don’t have the challenge of explaining where I want to be. Thankfully, my taxi driver knew some English. I had written down on a piece of paper what I needed to say, but it turns out the different ways of pronouncing the ‘g’ sound were causing me problems. In spite of this, I got home, happy with a good night’s exploring, even if I did miss the rugby, and glad that I’ve finally found the park.