A Walk In The Clouds

Today was a holiday here, to celebrate the Korean soccer team’s success. I awoke to a grey, dismal sky. It was hot, though. Very, very hot. Should I still go hiking, as I had planned? After much waffling, I set out. There is a mountain, Young-gi, within walking distance of my house. I’ve hiked to the top once before, in January, in a snowstorm. Today, as I started up the narrow path, the terrain looked so different from only a few months ago. Where then there had been hard sheets of ice and a dusting of snow, today there was a narrow dirt path, made slightly muddy by the oppressive humidity, bordered by thick green foliage. I climbed higher and higher, increasingly aware of the high humidity. What should have been an easy hike was requiring exertion. I finished the supply in my water bottle almost immediately. My hair, pulled back in a ponytail, began to resemble the curlicues of pigs’ tails. A moustache of beads of sweat formed over my upper lip.

When I finally reached the top, I sat on a rock and looked out. The scene was exactly as in January. I couldn’t see farther than a few feet in front of me. Then, snow clouds surrounded me. Today, rain clouds enveloped me. I knew that at the bottom of the mountain lay Daegu, but none of the buildings were visible. I knew to the north was Palgongsan, but couldn’t see even the most prominent peaks. I rested, feeling as though I was in lukewarm steam room. The air I breathed in was so moist, I could feel the dampness in my lungs as I inhaled. If I sat here much longer, I would melt into the mountain. I began my descent down.

As I came to the bottom of the first peak, I noticed I was literally in the clouds. Walking through ghostly formations of white wisps. As I walked, I felt rain. Not drops, per se. It was as if I was creating the rain by my motion. The rain wasn’t falling on me, I was walking into it. The effect was barely cooling. I began descending once again. I exited the clouds, but entered the shade of pine trees. I continued down the path, passing ajumaa with towels pinned on their heads to protect them from the sun, even though the sun had not made an appearance today. At one clearing an elderly couple was playing badminton. The heat seemed to slow the motion of the shuttle as it seemed to float back and forth, back and forth… As I entered my home a few hours later, the rain began. Steady, slow, fat drops, pitter pattering on the uneven walk outside my home. I left my sliding doors open, falling asleep to the steady, soothing rhythm…