Gimhae.

The forecast said rain so I decided to save the sea-side temple for a different day. So I looked at my Busan subway map and thought that Gimhae National Museum sounded like a good place to go to today, mainly because museums are usually inside. I trooped it out there and easily found the museum. The museum was under construction so instead they had a special (free) exhibition hall. It was cool. Gimhae actually means "sea of iron" and I learned a lot about the history of the city and the wars they went through. There were a lot of artifacts in the exhibit. Very interesting to say the least. I love seeing the intricate designs in old, ancient artifacts. It just baffles my mind how people were so clever so long ago. It started to rain and I took shelter in a tourism information center. A lady spoke a little English and gave me a very useful map and guide of Gimhae. After reading through the booklet, I decided to go explore. Luckily, I didn't mind the rain because I had rainboots

A fishing net from some ancient period

and an umbrella, which I think people who don't own those two items are crazy. It stopped raining and didn't rain for the rest of the day, at least in Gimhae. It was sooo nice too, maybe in the 50s-60s. I walked through the city center and stumbled across the Royal Tomb of King Suro. Again, another free exhibit. It was a little park area with traditional style Korean buildings (like you'd see in a postcard). There were tombs and the information signs were in English too. My phone had already died so I took all of my pictures with my camera and I forgot to pack my USB cord (obviously) so I can't post them. Bummer. Gimhae is a very historic town and there were lots of statues and cool photo opps. After exploring the tomb of King Suro, who they say lived until he was 150-something, I came across another ancient area. These style buildings were a little different, yet still very ancient. There were more tombs and lots of pottery objects. When I left, I realized there were a lot of foreigners in this city. Not Americans though, I'm not sure what country they were from. You know those people in the movies that kidnap women and sell them into the sex trade? They looked exactly like that. And I'm not kidding. They were all men and every time I walked by them, I got stared at. I couldn't tell if they were staring at me because I was, like them, a foreigner in Korea.. or if they were going to abduct me and sell me to Indonesia or something. Anyways, the Korean people of Gimhae were super nice. Everywhere I went, at least one person spoke a little English and asked where I was from. Even when I was just standing in the middle of the sidewalk, a lady walked by me and had a huge smile on her face and said "Hi." She made my day.

the front of the exhibition hall

As I was approaching the subway late that afternoon, my eyes spotted this cool statue thing so I aborted the subway mission and crossed the street to check it out. By the way, pedestrians do not have the right of way here. Even if you're in a crosswalk, you need to yield to oncoming traffic. How ridiculous. The statues were of these soldiers in their armor. I decided to follow the trail. To my delightful surprise, I found another free museum. This museum showed information on how the tombs were built back in the day and what they contained. They also showed soldiers and armor depending on their class. The highest class got to wear cool pants and had safer armor whereas the lowest class didn't even get a helmet for protection. Crazy. It was very interesting. Outside of the museum was a hill with stepping stones, so I walked to the top. Here is where they actually dug up the tombs and found the artifacts for the museum. Super cool.

 Today was a fun day for this lone traveler. Check ya.