train out of busan

A couple of years ago when I was traveling through South Korea, I decided to take a day trip to Busan with a friend, whom I will call “Kate”. Since Kate is fluent in Korean, she was in charge of navigating around the city. However, she confessed early on that she was 길치 (gil-chi), meaning she has a terrible sense of direction. I didn’t think twice about it because she works in intelligence.

It was one of the longest days of my life. Sparing you the dramatic details of the day’s events, I will say that, most importantly, I missed out on Busan’s famous Sweet Stuffed Pumpkin Seed Pancakes because of my pride. You see, the vendor requested that I call him 오빠 (o-ppa). There’s a certain connotation there, and even though it was supposed to be taken lightly, I refused. Who would have known that he was going to be the only Sweet Stuffed Pumpkin Seed Pancakes vendor that we ran into on our trip?

Anyways, at the end of a long and eventful day, we found ourselves by Busan’s beautiful beach at our own little happy hour chatting about this and that. Before we knew it, it was time to make our way back to the train station. Kate pulled out her phone and confidently said that the bus stop was to the left. We walked for about a minute when she stopped mid-conversation to say, “Oh! We’re going the wrong way!” at which point she started sprinting in the other direction.

We ran and ran. Luckily, we made it in time for the bus. We asked the bus driver if we could get to Busan’s train station by 8:30. He gestured at all the traffic, and said it would be nearly impossible to make it there in time.

He let us hop off (not before scanning our transport cards, of course!), and we hailed a taxi. After hustling into the vehicle, Kate told the taxi driver, a man presumably in his 70s, that we were trying to get to the train station by 8:30.

This man went off about how young people these days are so irresponsible, have poor judgment, etc. Seeing as he was driving us to our destination knowing full well he could not get us there in time, we requested to be let off. He begrudgingly agreed. As we jumped out of the taxi, he said “YOU PEOPLE SHOULDN’T LIVE THAT WAY!”

We hailed another taxi and pleaded our case. This taxi driver turned out to be our hero. I have NEVER been in a car with someone who drove so fast. Bless his heart – he even paid a toll fee to take a shortcut. Of course, Kate and I were there cheering him on in the back seat. The spending money from my wealthy cousin went to a good man that day.

We were ecstatic to find that we had arrived at the train station with 10 minutes to spare. Kate read the departures information, and we made it onto a train where we each took a seat. We were so relieved to finally be on our way home!

Feeling a lot calmer, I visited the washroom and came back to my seat. I pulled out my phone at 8:31 to check my ticket.

And would you believe it?

We were on the wrong train.