No trip to Busan is complete without a visit to the self-proclaimed Machu Piccu of Busan, especially since it’s been a life long dream of mine to visit Machu Piccu. Gamcheon Culture Village doesn’t share the same sort of history Machu Picchu has, but with its tiled buildings overlooking the sea, perhaps its other nickname, Korea’s Santorini is much more apt.
Busan is a wonderful place to visit. It’s famous for its rocky cliffs and sea views, its seafood and seagulls. The people are nice and friendly, much more willing to help a lost tourist out than the people in Seoul. What no one warns you about though, is how much walking Busan requires.
Most directions will tell you to take the bus from the Toseong station up the hill to the Village. Please listen to what everyone says. My mom and I are the kind of people who like to wander into places normal tourists don’t go and prefer to walk over taking public transportation. Unfortunately, we also tend to overestimate our walking ability and underestimate the distance. It was a steep almost 20-minute hike (I mean hike; that was no walk) up before we finally huffed our way to the entrance of the village.
But oh, was the pay off worth it.
Gamcheon Cultural Village is a relatively new attraction, as evidenced from this 2013 article on CNN. Then, only Korean maps and signage were available but people are quick to adapt. The friendly lady at the tourist information centre located right at the front of the village could speak English fluently and a few key Mandarin phrases just as well as she sold me the Chinese map for 2,000won. You could collect stamps on the map as you toured the village and get freebies with it.
It was a Sunday morning so there was a decent crowd milling around but just like Ihwa Mural Village in Seoul, there were still many crook and crannies to disappear into for a bit of peace and quiet. What made it better than Ihwa Mural Village were the various cafes that were hidden among the alleys, each with their own homely charm. Sitting on the roof with a cup of lemonade and overlooking a surreal view, I felt the stress from a hectic month at work bleeding away. Even manmade wonders like this could be beautiful, and it was hard to imagine the amount of planning and painstaking hard work that must have gone into making sure the thousands of houses dotting the hill were all painted in pleasing shades of pastel.
An event was being held where visitors could paint their own fish wooden board, which would be displayed around the village eventually as directional signs. Turns out the mouths were the forked end, pointing tourists in the right direction. I accidentally painted my fish upside down but that’s okay! Remember that scene in Finding Nemo where Nemo escaped the fish net by swimming against the flow? … Yeah, neither do I.
Of course, any mural place had to have wings, of course. I seem to sprout wings whenever I wear this shirt, hmm? (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧
I don’t know where the Little Prince fits within Gamcheon, but he seemed to be popular around here. The queue to take a photo next to him stretched around the corner.
I couldn’t wait my turn so I took one… alone :c
Taking pictures was nice but my favourite part of the entire village was one of the attractions where you could get a free postcard if you bought the map earlier. They had two letter boxes, one for immediate postage and one that would mail out the letters a year later. Postage was a mere 500won so I took the chance to write to a few friends. I also wrote to myself but it is surprisingly hard to address yourself. My handwriting ended up a bit squiggly because I was embarrassed to be so cheesy at myself but no one would see the postcard except for myself, a year later anyway. I mean, if I assume postmen didn’t try to read the back of postcards.
The most iconic piece of art in the village is located is right next to the main entrance. If you miss it like we did, you’ll have to walk all the way uphill again after reaching the last stop to catch it. Come on, self, you bought the map for a reason! Why didn’t you read it and save yourself the extra half an hour hike?
If you align your shot right, the cutouts should blend into the background. I had to practically plaster myself against the road the take this shot and still couldn’t get it completely right.
There’s a metaphor for life hidden in this piece of art I think, something about being invisible when we should be invincible or losing ourselves in the bigger picture.
In a way, it was sort of appropriate that we saw these sculptures last. The rest of the murals were jarring against the older alleys, obviously manufactured and a nuisance to the actual residents living in the houses. This one was a demonstration of trying to fit in. But hey, not all of us will blend in, no matter how hard we try. Some of us were meant to stand out and shine, never to be hammered in like the rest of the nails.
It’s hard to believe that only 50 years ago, Gamcheon Cultural Village was once the slums and not the budding artistic hub it is now. Times change, people adapt and learn languages. Every piece of art in this village must mean something to its artist for it to be immortalised in such a grand project but who knows? I’m not a art critic nor a poet and I left my bullshitting skills behind in the last gender and culture class I took. I’m just someone, who just like everyone else, came here for the perfect selfie.
JQ ☆ﾐ(o*･ω･)ﾉ 