Ain't No Mountain High Enough

It’s been a while since the last instalment from The Tefl-on Don. On my latest adventure I went hiking, a pretty nerdy activity. The only other time I’ve had the opportunity to go hiking was when I was at school and it was part of the Duke of Edinburgh Award. Do you want to give up your weekends to hike on a wet Welsh mountain, or to volunteer at cleaning arses an old people’s home, or how about getting molested by a “supervisor”? Maybe that’s why I’ve never been hiking before because I associate it with shitty arses and paedophilia. Anyway, that’s the Duke of Edinburgh in a nutshell.

I rounded the troops and we went hiking up Achasan Mountain (possibly the smallest mountain in Seoul, but still a mountain all the same). Hung over from a steady Friday night in Cheonho it didn’t seem like such a good idea that morning but we powered through. It was a steady stroll to the top, not too steep but pretty long. The higher you go the better the view, at only 287m high it didn’t take too long to get to the top but even so it was high enough for me.  I can tick it off the bucket list now and can write off climbing Everest, I’m content with that. We found a viewing point and we cracked open the soju. After such an achievement it seemed rude not to have a celebratory drink. It probably wasn’t the best idea to have a few drinks and then stumble down the mountain but never mind. As we enjoyed the view it was perfect for a photo opportunity. I pulled out my Arsenal flag that I kept quiet from the guys and held it proud (even despite the shocking end to the season that we’re currently having). I stood there with Karl as two true Brits abroad. Karl wearing his Nottingham Forest shirt and the Arsenal flag blowing in the wind, you can take the boys out of England… The only things missing were our Union Jack shorts and bright red British tans.

We decided to carry on the trail which for some reason continued up, we in fact weren’t at the top of the mountain so we carried on, finally we reached the summit. Having reached the top officially we had to drink some more soju just to make the arrival official.

We sat down on the grass and enjoyed the view. For only the second time in Korea I was racially targeted. A Korean guy told us to get off the grass as there was a sign which said we couldn’t sit there, understandable I suppose. So we got up and moved but he didn’t seem to mind the other 20-30 Korean people sitting on the grass. Maybe the sign said “No dirty foreigners are allowed to sit on the grass”. I should have remained seated and I would have been known as the Rosa Parks of Achasan Mountain. I’ll know for next time.

One of the problems with being at the top of a mountain slightly hung over is that after walking for many miles you have to walk all the way back down. You start to question whose stupid idea was this? Then I realised it was mine.

We reached the bottom and Scott’s pedometer read that we had hiked 9 miles. It got me thinking about the song by Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell – Ain’t No Mountain High Enough. The lyrics to that song are:

There ain't no mountain high enough
Ain't no valley low enough
Ain't no river wide enough
To keep me from getting to you

They’d obviously never hiked a mountain between them. I'd just hiked a mountain - there are plenty of mountains high enough to keep me from plenty of people. It's exhausting. I don’t think I like anyone enough to climb a mountain just to see them. What kind of person says that, anyway?

“Where are you?”

“I'm on the other side of a mountain, through a low valley, and across a river. If you want to see me then you've got to go through that.”

Not worth it.

Anyway, it was another new adventure for the Tefl-on Don. Maybe I’ll do it again, who knows?