Buddhist – lezhok

The next destination after Sacheon is a neighbouring Namhae country.

Namhae country lays on two big islands, Namhae and Changseon, three smaller islands, as I think, having quite funny names, Jodo, Hodo, Nodo, and 65 (76) other uninhabited islets. Namhae Island is the 5th biggest island in South Korea with an area of 301 sq. km., right next after the Ganghwa island (302.5 sq. km), which I visited before. The total population of the country is about 44,642 people.

The Bronze Age dolmens found on the island evidence the people lived here as early, as at inland. The first records about the country appear in 690, during Silla, when the area was named as Jeonyasan-gun 轉也山郡. In 757, it was renamed to Namhae-gun. The name Namhae consists of two quite popular and meaningful characters, nam 南 – south and hae 海 – sea. As a consequence, there are a few geographic objects in the Far East region called 南海. Among them, 南海 – a sea near North Korea, 南海 – the Chinese name of the South China Sea, 南海道 – a region in Japan and so on.

A quick review:

Changseon 昌善島, chang 昌 – prosperous, beautiful, bright; seon 善, same as in Jeongseon country 旌善郡, good, beautiful, good, kind, excellent, best; kindhearted, hospitable, friendly; auspicious, happy, 島 – island;
Jodo 鳥島, jo 鳥 – bird; 鳥 in Chinese usually is pronounced as niao; diao and dao are other possible pronunciations; in the cases when the character designates a geographic place, it is pronounced as que, resembling that of Korean, jo;
Hodo 虎島, ho 虎 – tiger;
Nodo 櫓島, no 櫓 – castle, scull, big shield.

One of the notable spots in the Namhae country is the German village Dogil Maeul.

In 1997, Du-Kwan Kim, the mayor of Namhae-gun, visited Nordfriesland, a city in Germany, where he met Korean migrants, who went to work to Germany in the 60s. The migrants shared with the major a wish to return back to their home country at retirement age. This wish, along with the fact the population of Namhae country was decreasing since 1965 due to the migration of people to the industrial areas, gave the beginning to the village foundation in 2000.

The district acquired almost 100,000 sq. m. of land to build houses which should look as “German”. This also would be an attraction for tourists. In July 2012, the village had 39 German-looking houses.

A view from a roadside.

Because Namhae is an island, one thing I must to do here is to swim! The island is washed by waters of the Korea Strait, which connects three seas, the Yellow Sea, the East China Sea and the East Sea (the Sea of Japan). Consequently, I would expect the water here to be better than in the Yellow Sea, but not as good as in the East Sea.

I think it is that girl with her mother that I gave the shellfishes I collected. The girl did not dare to take my shells, even though she was looking for them, I just threw it in her bucket after the parents made me understand it is ok, they requested her to say “thank you”, but seems she was really shy seeing a hairy stranger. The whole bottom is full of these shells, one just needs to know how to find it, so, I do. The shells won’t float in the water waiting for you to catch them, you need to get into the sand to grab it. I will not die if I live in a wild in South Korea.

Since visiting the Museum of Natural History, I am always looking for fossils, such as dinosaur eggs or dinosaur excrements, just like those.

One of the attractions on the island is Guemsan mountain. With a height of 681 m, it is the second biggest mountain on the island, the first one is Mangunsan, 786m. There is a country with exactly same name Geumsan, 錦山, bordering on the south with Muju and Jinan countries I visited before. The character geum 錦 means beautiful, luxurious, refined or brocade; bearing such a positive sense, no surprise it is used in geographic names.

That day the mountain was shrouded with fog, so, it was hard to see the environment.

On the hills of the mountain, there is Boriam hermitage 菩提庵. Bori 菩提 is a Buddhist term, meaning perfect comprehension, insight, consciousness, and am 庵 means hermitage; Boriam – the hermitage of perfect comprehension. The temple was founded in 686 by Wonhyo, a priest and commentator of the Korean Buddhist tradition. I met this man before when studied the history of Soyosan mountain, Jajaeam temple also was founded by Wonhyo. It seems that the circumstances do not let me see the creations of Wonhyo, as the first time I was too tired to do that, and now, the fog hid the hermitage.

Many stones with words carved on it are lying on the hermitage territory.

The patterns on some stones draw unusual pictures in my imagination, the reddish blot looks like a dinosaur head, and the roundish stone looks like a big tooth.

This is the comparison of that what could I see and that what do I see.

Dinner is the best way to finish the active trip around Namhae country!

The next destination after Jeonju is Jinan (鎭安) country. Characters 鎭安 might be translated as square off; to establish order and calm; to strengthen. This name was formed during Silla times, in 757, by abbreviation, or a kind of transformation of the former name, Nanjina (難珍阿). The middle character jin 珍 (a pearl, jewel) have the same pronunciation as jin 鎭 (here, comfortable and good for living), to emphasize that this region is good for living, as the former name supposes some difficulties nan 難, accoring to records, people in the region are simple and economically very poor***. There was another name of the country, Wollang (月浪, 越浪), moonlight or over a wave.

Jinan is a small country with a population of about 24,000 people.

It is such a pleasure to read the article about Jinan Country on Wiki, one can feel this place is unique and the best (at some moment I thought the author of the article is a graduate of North Korean university). For example, the only double-peaked mountain in the world is situated in Jinan the Maisan mountain. I was very surprised and found a list of the mountains with two peaks (double summit). It is not the only one in the world, nevertheless, I am going to visit it!

To get to the Maisan, one has to overcome a few challenges to prove the physical strength and willpower. Of course, one of the trials is climbing up a hill under the burning sun. Another one is to stand against invitations to the plenty of delicious restaurants on the alley. Huge cherry trees are growing up along the alley. There were just a few people walking, however, this place might serve many visitors.

The next spot after the alley is Geumdangsa temple (金塘寺). The character geum 金 means gold, dang 塘 means square pond, and sa 寺 – Buddhist temple, so the whole name means Golden Pond Temple. It was built in 814, during Silla.

The hanging painting of the Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva, embodying the compassion of all Buddhas. It was painted in 1686. And turtles.

Here is the square pond (dang 塘). A small piece of the Maisan appears from behind the hill. Maisan (馬耳山) means Horse’s Ear Mountain. Guess why?

The closer I come, the more the ear shows up. From this point I could see only the one ear, actually, there are two ears. Until we reached a temple and I saw a sign with the temple’s name 馬耳山塔寺, my friend was saying it is a cow’s ear, and actually, it pretty looks like a cow’s ear. During Silla, the mountain was called Seodasan (西多山 – eastern numerous mountains), during Goryo Yongchulsan (龍出山 – dragon come out mountain), and Sokgeumsan (束金山 – to tie a golden mountain, hard to translate, I think it is like to tie a horse in a bridle) during early Joseon, until it has got the present name, Maisan (馬耳山 – horse’s ear mountain) during the reign of the king Taejong.

On Maisan there is Korean Buddhist Temple Complex, Tapasa (Pagoda temple) and stone pagodas. It is founded by Yi Gap Yong, a lone Buddhist hermit layman, in 1885. He has built as many as 120 conical natural stone pagodas, all without mortar.