– English Lyrics

Lyrics & Translation

[English]

Hello everyone and welcome to bonus episode  number 138 of the Culips English Podcast. My  

name is Andrew. I am your Canadian English  study buddy and I hope you're doing well.  

Thank you for clicking play and joining me  for another exciting adventure here at Culips.

So, if you're new to this series let me  quickly explain what it's all about. I  

just tell you some stories from my everyday  life as a Canadian guy living abroad in Seoul,  

South Korea. And I hope that by listening to  these stories you will be able to improve your  

English fluency and build your vocabulary,  improve your knowledge of the culture of  

English-speaking people and so much more.  So, if this sounds like something that  

you'd like to achieve then I'm here to help  you and I think you will enjoy this series.

Now in today's episode I'm gonna tell you the  thrilling conclusion to my hiking story. In the  

last bonus episode, I told you all about  this chaotic morning that I had with my  

best friend. He came to Seoul to visit me here  and we went on a hike. And getting ready for that  

hike was an adventure in itself but eventually  we did do the hike and I'm gonna tell you all  

about that adventure. Really, we had two  adventures that day the pre-hike adventure  

and the hike adventure. I'm gonna tell you all  about the hike adventure in this week's episode.

To accompany this episode there is a free,  amazing! It's totally 100% free interactive  

transcript and vocabulary glossary. So,  some of the difficult vocabulary and  

idioms and expressions that you'll hear  me use when I'm telling you my story,  

I'll break those down for you and explain  them in the vocabulary glossary. So,  

it's a great way to study and, you know, know  about some of the vocabulary that I think you  

should know as an English teacher. What do  I think is important for English learners  

to know? I'm going to explain that in the  vocabulary glossary. So definitely check out  

those resources. Free for everyone and the link to  get them is in the description for this episode.

But also, we have a special gift for our  Culips members. If you're a Culips member,  

then we'll also give you a comprehension  quiz just as a way to say thanks to our  

members for their support. Guys  we love you. Thank you to all the  

Culips members out there who are improving  their English with us and who are supporting  

the work that we do here at Culips.  We really, really do appreciate it.

Speaking of Culips membership, if you're  curious about what the fuss is all about  

with Culips membership then I would encourage  you to check out our website Culips.com. Really  

what we try to do with our members is  just give them as many awesome learning  

tools and resources as we can to help them  hit the next level with their English. To  

improve their fluency and to hit their  goals with their English studies. So,  

this includes things like helpful study guides  for all of our episodes, interactive transcripts,  

our member-only series The Fluency Files, we have  ad-free audio, we have weekly speaking classes,  

actually multiple weekly speaking classes. And  it's just an amazing set of tools and resources  

you get when you're a Culips member and it's  all for an affordable price. So, if you'd like  

to sign up and hit the next level with your  English with Culips and also support the work  

that we do here then just check out our website  Culips.com. You can sign up today and get started.

Alright well I think those are all of the  announcements out of the way for now. I  

can't really think of any other things that  I should tell you, any other urgent news. So  

why don't we get started with this week's  story everyone. My hiking adventure in the  

mountains of South Korea in a small town in  Gangwon province called Taebaek with my best  

friend Luke. What an amazing time it was. So,  let's get to that story now. Here we go. Enjoy.

If you haven't heard the last bonus episode, then  please go back, and take a listen to it before you  

continue with this week's story because this is  really part two of two and you need to listen to  

the previous bonus episode to sort of know the  background. But just a quick summary and recap  

of what I talked about in that last bonus  episode. Essentially, my best friend Luke,  

he's been my buddy for over 30 years, he came  and visited me here in Seoul and he said he  

wanted to go on a hike. So, I quickly planned  this kind of spur-of-the-moment hiking trip,  

and we went to a place called Taebaek which  is in Gangwon province here in South Korea.  

It's one of the, I think it actually is  the highest city in South Korea and also  

the smallest city in South Korea. So, it's way  up in the mountains and there's this beautiful  

mountain there called Taebaek Mountain.  And the word for mountain in the Korean  

language is "San." So maybe you'll hear  me call it Taebaek San sometimes and that  

just means Taebaek Mountain. OK, mini-Korean  lesson embedded in the English lesson here.

So, we had this like chaotic morning. I talked  about it in the last bonus episode. We had to  

rush to the bus terminal to catch our bus  to go to Taebaek. From Seoul to Taebaek,  

it's about a three hour-ish bus ride, a  little bit over three hours. And we got  

up early in the morning to grab the  bus. We finally got on the bus and  

when we were riding the bus to go  to Taebaek we both just passed out.

Now this bus to Taebaek, it makes two stops.  The first stop is in some small village,  

actually I don't even know the name of  it. It's a little bit outside of Taebaek,  

maybe about 20 or 25 minutes away. And  when we stopped at that location then  

most of the people on the bus, and the bus  was sold out, it was a packed bus, full bus,  

probably 40-45 people on the bus. When we  stopped there most of the people got off  

the bus. I think there were only four passengers  including Luke and including me after that stop  

and so the bus really cleared out and that  kind of woke Luke and me up at that point.

So, most of the people got off the bus  and then we took off from that spot to  

go to our final destination in Taebaek.  But we were both kind of groggy. You know,  

you wake up and you're like, what's going on?  You see all the people getting off. Thankfully  

I knew that we were making two stops or else  that might have been a little bit confusing,  

and we may have accidentally got off the bus  at that point but thankfully I already knew  

that that was going to happen, so we didn't  accidentally get off at that spot or anything.  

But we are a little bit groggy. And “groggy”  means that feeling when you just wake up and  

you're not quite with it yet. You know, it's  like your consciousness is like 30% online  

and still 70% offline. You're still sort of  mostly sleeping. That's that groggy feeling.

So, we were both a little bit groggy  and as soon as the bus took off again,  

I think we both fell right back asleep,  but our sleep was interrupted because  

suddenly there was this phone ringing, a  phone ringing sound. And you know what a  

smartphone ring sounds like these days? I  don't know if I can imitate it and I can't  

really remember even what it was,  but it was like a melody, a jingle,  

right? Something that's annoying that's gonna  get your attention so that you can hear it.

So shortly after the bus took off to  go to the final destination of Taebaek,  

this phone jingle started going off and the jingle  was annoying, and nobody was answering the phone.  

It just kept ringing and ringing and ringing and  then suddenly we clued in. Like, oh it must have  

been somebody's phone that was on the bus, and  they got off the bus and they forgot their phone.

So, this phone just kept ringing and ringing  and ringing and then finally some passenger,  

one of the other passengers, got up and started  looking for the phone. We were sitting in the  

back of the bus and this phone was ringing more  from the front of the bus. And so this woman got  

up and she was looking for the phone and then  the bus driver was yelling at her like sit down  

you can't be standing on the bus and walking  around on the bus just let it ring. And so,  

she sat down, and the bus driver was like  I'll find it once we get to Taebaek we're  

almost there. But the phone just kept ringing  and ringing and ringing really annoyingly.

I guess the owner of the phone was pretty  desperate wanted to get his phone back or her  

phone back as soon as possible and so the phone  just kept ringing and ringing and ringing and that  

was like at the end of our sleep. The grogginess  wore off at that point you could imagine with  

the bus driver yelling at the passenger and the  passenger rummaging around and the phone ringing  

and ringing and ringing. Wow, OK, rude awakening.  OK, our peaceful sleep on the bus was finished.

Anyways we finally got to Taebaek,  and we arrived I think just before 9  

in the morning somewhere around 9 in the  morning, I can't exactly remember. And  

as soon as we arrived our first goal was to  store our bags somewhere. We had backpacks  

with us and of course in our backpack we had some  supplies for hiking. We had also our clothes for  

after hiking and for the next day and I think  just some other little things. We probably had  

our cameras maybe our headphones just some  stuff that we didn't really need to bring  

up the mountain with us, right. You don't need  to bring your clothes for the next day up the  

mountain with you. You don't need to bring  your headphones up the mountain with you.

So, we wanted to find a locker where we could just  bring our essentials and then we could store our  

other items that we didn't really need until later  in the day. And so, Luke was like “There'll be a  

locker in the bus terminal, right?” And I was  like, “Hmm maybe.” I wasn't so certain. And we  

arrived at the bus terminal and it's a pretty old  bus terminal here in Taebaek. Guys you got to know  

that this is like way out in the countryside  away from the modernness of Seoul. Seoul is a  

very modern high-tech city, cutting-edge city.  But once you get outside of Seoul things are I  

guess like they are in the country in most parts  of the world, right? The pace of life is a little  

bit slower. Things change a little bit slower.  It's not as modern and so of course in that bus  

terminal there were no storage lockers. Also, it's  a small place. I don't think there are a lot of  

tourists who are visiting Taebaek, especially  not international tourists or tourists from  

different countries. Probably a lot of domestic  tourism, Korean people going there to do the  

same thing that we did to go to the Taebaeksan  hike. But not too many international visitors.

So, unfortunately, there were no lockers  in the bus terminal, but the good news  

is there's also a train station just right  across the road from the bus terminal. So,  

I said let's go over to the train  station. I had a feeling that we'd  

have better luck in the train station to  try and find some storage lockers. So,  

we walked over to the train station and  we took a look and no lockers there.

So, at this point I was kind of like I think we're  just gonna have to carry our full bags up the  

mountain. Of course, we only packed for one day.  We're gonna do the hike spend the night in Taebaek  

and then go back to Seoul the next day. So, it's  not like we had tons and tons of things with us.  

But still at the same time we didn't want to have  to hoof it up the mountain with those extra items.

So, we had to go back to the bus terminal  because we had to catch a bus from the  

terminal up to the mountain at the start of the  hiking trail. And as we left the train station,  

we noticed there was a small tourism information  office. And so, I said to Luke, “Hey let's go in  

there” because I actually didn't know which bus,  we had to take to get to Taebaek mountain. So,  

I wanted to ask there what bus we need to take  and also maybe they would have a locker. Like  

that would kind of make sense that there might be  a small storage locker in the information office.

So, we stopped in the office and there was just  this wonderful lady working there. She was so  

kind, and friendly, and nice. And if you are the  boss of the Taebaek tourism information office  

please give your employee a raise because she  is just amazing. It was great to talk with her.  

She was so friendly and gave us information about  the area and told us how to get to the mountain.  

We spoke in Korean as well which I really love  because it's not so often that I get to travel  

like this in the country without my wife.  And when I travel with my wife who is Korean,  

like a lot of times in this kind of situation  people just naturally speak to her and kind  

of just assume that I can't really speak Korean  at all. And I kind of get ignored to an extent.  

But in this kind of situation where it's  me and Luke and we're both Canadian and  

very visibly foreigners, well then there's  no option but to speak with us. And so,  

we had a nice conversation and I just love  that it had been a little while where I got  

to have a nice kind of small talk conversation  with somebody in Korean. So that was cool.

And the really nice thing I asked her like do  you guys have any lockers? Is there any place  

where we can store our bags? And she told us  that the train station used to have lockers but  

for some reason they just removed the lockers  and that was a little bit unfortunate. But she  

offered to watch our bags for us. She said if  you trust me then you can put your bags here.  

And she had this place which was like a direct  line of sight from the CCTV security camera. So,  

she's like I'll put your bags here. They'll be  in direct view of the security camera so that  

if something happens to, we can just watch.  And you know of course I 100% trusted her.  

And Taebaek's a small sleepy town. I didn't think  that too many people would be going through that  

tourism office anyways. And especially to mess  with a couple of bags. And like I said we just  

mostly had our clothes in there to wear for  the next day and after the hike anyway. So,  

it's not like there were really  really valuable things in our bags.

But she was kind enough to offer to  watch them for us. To keep an eye  

on our bags for us. And that's  a great idiomatic expression,  

“To keep an eye on [something].” Please add that  one to your vocabulary if you don't know that  

one already. “To keep an eye on [something]”  just means to watch something for someone.

So maybe if you had a dog and you were going away  for the weekend, maybe you could ask your neighbor  

to keep an eye on your dog. To come and watch  your dog and to take care of your dog while you  

were away on that weekend trip. Something like  that. That's how we can use this expression.

So, the tourism information office lady she  offered to keep an eye on our bags for us and she  

just said make sure you're back by 6 p.m. because  that's when I'm clocking out and going home. To  

clock out is like an old expression but it just  means to finish your shift at work, right? Back  

in the day people had punch cards. I mean this  is even before my time, so this is really back in  

the day. But I know I've seen this on movies and  TV before. You'd have this punch card, this card  

that you would put into a kind of machine that  would make a punch and say that you started work  

at this time and finished work at a certain time  and we would call that clock in and clock out.

So, we still use this expression today  to clock in to clock out even though  

we don't use the punch cards anymore. But  the lady at the tourism information office,  

she was gonna clock out at 6 p.m., so  we had to return back to that office  

to get our bags by 6 p.m. But she was  kind enough to watch our bags for us.

So that was great. After that we went across the  road again to a little convenience store and we  

stocked up on some supplies. I think we got some  water, we got some chocolate bars, some bread,  

and we also bought cup noodles. “Cup ramyeon”  is what they say in Korean here. And that's  

just like those instant noodles that are so  delicious. And Korean people a lot of the  

time when they go hiking they'll stop either  at the top of the mountain or halfway up the  

mountain to have a little snack. And they bring  the cup noodles and it's just a wonderful snack  

to have especially on a cold winter's day  because we were doing this hike in January.

So, we got our cup noodles, our instant noodles,  and I also filled up my water bottle with some  

hot water so I could actually make the  instant noodles at the top of the mountain  

because I didn't think there would be a hot water  machine up there. As high-tech as South Korea is,  

I didn't expect to see a hot water machine at  the top of the mountain. So anyways we are all  

geared up, we had all the supplies  we needed, we dropped our bags off,  

we were ready to go. We went over to  the bus terminal, it was perfect timing,  

we only had to wait a couple of minutes  and then we were on the bus to get to the  

trailhead at the start of the mountain. And  when we arrived it was a winter wonderland.

It was absolutely beautiful. Taebaeksan is a  national park so it's a really well-developed,  

well-kept park. And the trails are really clean.  It's a nice area up there and blanketed by snow  

just makes it even more beautiful. It was just  a really, really nice scenic spot in the forest  

with, yeah, deep snow everywhere covering the  trees. Just gorgeous and quiet. I don't know if  

you've ever been outside in the forest in the snow  but it's a quietness like you can't find anywhere  

else. Just so peaceful, so quiet and really  really amazing to be in that kind of environment.

So, we were planning to do a loop. The trail  that we were to take was kind of a circle. It  

would go up one side of the mountain and get to  the peak and then go down the other side of the  

mountain. And so, we found the trailhead where  the trail starts, and we were on our way. We  

had our crampons on our shoes, and these are  kind of spikes that you attach to your shoes  

because the trail was quite snowy. It was totally  covered in snow and those are necessary items for  

hiking in the snow. You won't get enough grip on  your shoes otherwise. So, we had some crampons  

that we put on to our hiking boots to allow us  to walk up that snowy trail without slipping.  

I think I told you in the last episode  that I did end up falling over once but  

I probably would have fallen over maybe  10 times if it weren't for the crampons.

So, we got our crampons on, we were off,  

and it was just a beautiful start of the  hike. We were about 30 minutes into our hike,  

maybe 20 to 30 minutes into our hike and  suddenly there was a park ranger. And the  

park ranger gave us the X sign and the X sign  here when you cross your hands, and you say no,  

OK? The park ranger said no you cannot continue  anymore on this trail. It is closed and he didn't  

really tell us the reason why. I could imagine  that maybe there was an avalanche, or the trail  

was obstructed by a fallen tree. Maybe a tree had  fallen over due to the weight of the heavy snow  

on the tree and maybe was blocking the trail.  I don't know. He didn't tell us the reason,  

but he told us everybody's got to turn around  and we're hiking with some other people. Just  

sort of we all started at the same time so it  was me and it was Luke and maybe five or six  

other Korean people there as well and he told us  all, nope trail’s closed. You can't do this trail.

So, we had to go back to our starting point,  and yeah, this took like probably 50 minutes  

to an hour off of our hiking time or added it  to our hiking time, right? Because we had to  

walk up like 20-25 minutes, and then we had to  turn around and go back 20-25 minutes. So yeah,  

I don't know, 40 minutes to an hour. I wasn't  really timing it, but wasted time or added  

time. I don't want to say it was a waste because  it was still a nice hike, but added time on to  

the total hike time. And so instead of doing that  loop, what we had to do is just the path that we  

were supposed to come down. We just ended up going  up that and then coming back down the same path. 

So, we went back to the trailhead where the  trail starts, and then we went up that trail,  

and thankfully that trail was open, and there were  no closures, and we were able just to hike all  

the way to the top of the mountain. Probably took  us an hour and a half to two hours. Like I said,  

I wasn't really timing it, but it wasn't an  intense hike at all. I don't think it was too  

steep. There were a few difficult areas where we  had to push a little bit harder, and it got our  

heart rates up. Our hearts beating, and we were  breathing a little bit heavier, but those sections  

didn't last very long thankfully. So, most of the  trail was rather gradual. And “gradual” just means  

that it's going up at a rather slow easy slope.  OK, it's not too steep, not too much going uphill,  

just nice and steady, slow and steady. We got to cross some bridges over some creeks,  

and it was just so scenic. If you're watching  the YouTube video version of this episode,  

then I'll definitely include some pictures and  videos so you can see what the beautiful scenery  

looks like. And I'll also put some pictures  on our Instagram and our Discord community as  

well so you guys can get a visual about what I'm  talking about here because my words can't do it  

justice. It was just so beautiful and so peaceful. Oh, and there's one funny story that I wanted to  

tell you about about this hike. That is when  we were starting, Luke went to grab his gloves,  

and he realized, "I don't have any gloves." So,  he was like, "This kind of sucks." Like it wasn't  

too cold out. It was around zero to minus one  Celsius-ish, so just around the freezing level,  

not too cold. But at the same time, you  know, you'd kind of like to have some gloves,  

right? In that kind of situation just  to keep your hands toasty and warm. 

So, Luke had no gloves. He forgot them here  at my house in Seoul. And so, he was like,  

"Oh, that sucks. I forgot my gloves. Guess I'll  just have to put my hands in my pockets." Now I  

brought a pair of mittens with me. I think  I've told you this on Culips before, but I  

have kind of bad circulation, and in the winter  my hands get really cold. And because of that, I  

like to wear mittens. I find like mittens are the  best for me. They keep my hands toasty and warm. 

So of course, I brought my mittens with  me, but I also found a pair of gloves that  

I had accidentally just had in my pocket.  Like I mean, it wasn't really an accident,  

I guess. I had just worn them there before,  and I put them in my pocket, and I forgot  

about them. And so, I had two pairs of gloves.  I had my mittens that I was going to wear,  

plus I had this thin pair of fingerless gloves.  They were fingerless gloves, and in fact, I think  

they were my wife's maybe. For whatever reason,  I had these fingerless gloves. They had a thumb,  

the thumb was covered, but the fingers were cut  open, right. So, I guess this is nice if you  

need to like use your fingers for something.  It's hard to manipulate things, you know,  

if you want to use your phone or something. I  don't know, take your keys out and use them. 

These fingerless gloves, they're just sort of  like maybe even for the autumn, right. They're not  

meant for cold weather in the winter at all. But  because these fingerless gloves belong to my wife,  

they're kind of on the small side, and they're  super tight on me. I don't even know why I had  

them, but I can kind of fit into them. But  Luke has bigger hands than me, and so I knew  

like there's no way that he's gonna be able to  squeeze into these fingerless gloves. And so,  

I was the nice guy, and I said, "Hey, you  can take my mitts. It's not too cold out.  

I'll just wear these gloves that I have in my  pocket randomly from my wife." And he was like,  

"Amazing, crazy that you had two pairs of gloves.  This is perfect." And we're off on our hike. 

Now this didn't cause any problems going up.  It totally fine. But when we finally got to  

the top of the mountain, suddenly, I guess we  were protected by the wind going up the side of  

the mountain. But when we got to the peak, then  suddenly it was crazy windy. And the peak of the  

mountain is actually really beautiful. I'll share  some pictures of it. There's this really cool kind  

of altar. And I'll put some information in the  description for this episode about that altar  

and I’ll link to it on Wikipedia if you want  to learn more about it because it is a kind  

of cool place at the top of Taebaek mountain. I  won't go into the details here, but really nice.

And also, there's this kind of tradition  that hikers in South Korea do at the top  

of every mountain. You'll see a sign that says  the mountain's name, and it usually says how many  

meters above sea level it is as well. And it's  tradition that you should take your photo with  

this sign. And so, when we finally got to the top  of the mountain, actually it was pretty peaceful  

walking up the top of the mountain, but when we  got to the peak, then suddenly there were tons and  

tons of people. And the line for taking a photo  with that Taebaeksan mountain sign was quite long.  

There's probably like 50 people waiting in line. So, as we were waiting in line for that photo to  

get our photo with the mountain sign, man, it was  cold. The wind was whipping. It was blowing really  

quickly. Suddenly it went from just this chill,  calm, peaceful, beautiful winter hike up the slope  

to the top of the mountain, and then suddenly it  was like we were in Antarctica or something. The  

wind was just blowing and howling, and everybody  was.... We are huddled up like penguins trying  

to stay warm together as we waited in line to  get our photo with the Taebaek mountain sign. 

And in that time, that's when my hands started to  get really freezing cold. And my fingers were like  

totally unprotected, right? I had no covering  on my fingers. So, I had my hands in my pocket,  

but I had to take my hands out. I wanted to take  some photos, and Luke was like, "Can you take my  

photo here?” “Can you take my photo here?"  He's on vacation, right. He was visiting,  

so he wanted some kind of souvenir photos,  right? So, I had to take his photo a few times,  

and I was taking some video as well. And so, my  fingers were just like turning purple. They were  

getting really, really cold, and yeah, it was bad. So finally, it was our turn in line. We got our  

photo with the mountain sign, mission  accomplished! And it was time to go down  

the mountain. We couldn't have our instant noodles  at the top of the mountain. It was just way, way,  

way too windy. And in fact, nobody was eating  there at all. It was just way too windy. So,  

it was time to go back down the  mountain, to descend the mountain. 

And as we were going down, I have to say  going down for me personally is often much  

more difficult than going up the mountain.  For whatever reason, it's just more wear and  

tear on your knees, right? It's more difficult  on your knees. And also, we had a very snowy  

trail. Remember that there was a lot of snow  on the mountain. And so, going down was much  

more slippery than going up. And so, we had to  kind of, in fact, it was really fun going down,  

I want to say that. We are carefully walking  down, but in fact, we were more like sliding down. 

Luke and I both grew up skiing and snowboarding,  so we kind of have pretty good balance in the  

snow, I think. And so, we were both sliding down.  And in fact, we saw some other hikers that had  

kind of plastic seats. And I guess you just like  get to the top of the mountain, and you want to  

sit down, you can have this sort of portable seat.  But they were using those portable plastic seats  

to slide down, to toboggan down the trail. And  Luke and I were both jealous. We're like, "Oh,  

that's the way to do it." We needed toboggans in  that moment, but we didn't have any unfortunately. 

But we slid down. And eventually, about halfway  down the mountain, there was a Buddhist temple.  

And many hikers would stop at the temple and  have a little break there, drink some water,  

eat some snacks, eat some instant noodles. And  so, that was what we were going to do too. We  

stopped at the temple, and really cool temple  in the mountains. I'll put some pictures of  

the temple as well. I think I took some photos  of it, so I'll share those with you as well. 

And we stopped to have our instant noodles. We  got our little cup noodles ready, and I took out  

my insulated water bottle. OK, important point:  insulated water bottle that's supposed to keep  

your water hot. OK, Took out my water bottle  to make the instant noodles, and can you guess  

what had happened? That's right, the water had  cooled down. So, that hot boiling water that was  

put into my water bottle not too long ago, just  like a few hours before, had already cooled down.  

It was lukewarm. And so, we couldn't actually  make the instant noodles, which was upsetting. 

And actually, the Buddhist temple there, they  were selling instant noodles and hot water,  

but it was kind of a ridiculous price, I thought.  And I was like, "I just can't justify paying that  

much for some instant noodles." So, we had to  skip the hot instant noodles. We drank some  

lukewarm water. We had some bread, I think. We  had a chocolate bar as well. We kind of powered  

up through some snacks. And then continued on  our way back down to the bottom of the mountain.  

And it took us maybe an hour and a half to  get back down to the base of the mountain. 

And at this point, my hands were absolutely  freezing from those stupid little fingerless  

gloves. So, I asked Luke, "How are your hands  doing?" and he said, "Oh, my hands are nice and  

toasty and warm." So, I said, "OK, give me your  gloves. I'm freezing. I need to put those mittens  

on." In fact, he had a pair of mittens. I was  like, "I can't stand it. My hands and my fingers  

are just totally freezing." So, we traded. He  saved the day by giving me those mittens back. And  

yeah, then pretty much, we were finished the hike. After hiking in South Korea, it's a tradition,  

something that you must do, I feel like you  must do. And Korean people out there listening,  

tell me if you agree with me or not. But  you got to go to a little restaurant,  

a local restaurant. And most hiking trails, most  of the popular ones anyways, will have some kind  

of restaurants built up around the start of a  popular hiking trail. And Taebaek Mountain here  

was no exception. There were a lot of little  restaurants right around the starting area of  

the hike and the finishing area of the hike. And so, after the hike, then we went to one  

of those restaurants. And we had a pancake, Korean  style pancake made out of potato, which is a local  

specialty vegetable of the Gangwon region. So, we  had this beautiful Korean style potato pancake. I  

guess the most similar Western food that I could  compare it with is like a hash brown. So, if you  

know what a hash brown tastes like, it's a little  bit similar to that, not exactly the same. It's  

not deep fried or anything like that, but kind  of tastes a little bit similar to a hash brown. 

So, we had this nice big, beautiful potato  pancake. And we also had a bottle of rice  

wine called “Makgeolli” here in the Korean  language. So, some makgeolli, some potato pancake,  

and yeah, it was just a great way to relax  after the hike and to warm up a little bit. 

And yeah, after we had finished with that, we  took the bus back to the city. We went back to  

that tourist information office, and we said  hello to the lady again, and we got our bags  

and thanked her. And we were on our way. I think  it was around 4:30-5:00 p.m. in the afternoon  

by this point. We checked into our hotel, and we  showered and changed and relaxed for a little bit. 

And then we went out on the town, and we had a  beautiful barbecue beef dinner. We walked around  

Taebaek. Of course, as I mentioned in the last  episode, Taebaek is the place where I spent my  

very first year in Korea when I first came to  this country. So, it was very nostalgic for me  

to walk around through Taebaek. To see the old  apartment that I used to live in. To see some of  

the old places that I used to visit and go to way,  way, way back when when I first came to Korea. 

Especially now, like, you know, that I know a lot  more about the language and the culture of South  

Korea. When I first came to this country, I was  pretty much a blank slate. I didn't really know  

too much at all. But now that I've lived here  for many, many years, and I've acquired some  

knowledge about the culture and the people and  the language, it was just interesting to visit  

again and to walk around and see some of the old  familiar places. So much has changed in Taebaek,  

but also so much is exactly the same.  So, it was a real trip. It was really,  

really interesting to go back and experience  that with, I guess, a more knowledgeable, wiser  

perspective this time. So, that was really cool. And then, yeah, we didn't get up to too much that  

night in Taebaek. Things kind of closed down  early, and it was pretty quiet after our dinner  

and our walk. So, we went back to the hotel.  We were also pretty exhausted from that long  

day of hiking. We got a good rest in, and  we woke up the next day, had some breakfast,  

and then caught our train back to Seoul. So,  it's just a quick, short and sweet trip to  

Taebaek, a wonderful hike, a 10 out of 10  experience overall. And I think, everyone,  

that'll bring me to the end of this week's story. So, if you made it all the way to the end, thank  

you so much for studying English with me today.  You put in some time, you put in some effort,  

you put in some work. And I can assure you that  this is what you need to do to improve your  

English fluency. So, you're doing the right thing,  keep going, great job. And if you keep it up like  

this, you will achieve your goals in English. Now, before I let you go, I have to share this  

week's completion code with you. The completion  code is, this week, it's actually going to be a  

phrase, an expression. And I would like you to  make an example sentence with this expression  

and leave it in the comments either on the  YouTube page or our Instagram page or our  

Discord community. And that will signal to me  and signal to all of the Culips listeners out  

there that you did it, that you made it  all the way to the end of this episode. 

So, for this week's completion code, let's  go with the expression "to keep an eye on  

[something]." Remember the lady at the  tourism information office in Taebaek,  

she kept an eye on our bags. She watched our bags  for us when we went hiking. So, I'd like for you  

to make an example sentence using this expression  "to keep an eye on [something]." And yeah,  

I'm very interested to see what you come up with.  Go, go, go, and I look forward to your comments. 

All right, everyone, I've been talking and talking  and talking today. I think it's time for me to  

wrap things up here. So, please have a great  week of English studying up ahead. Take care,  

as always, and I'll catch you in the  next episode. Until then, goodbye.

Key Vocabulary

Vocabulary	Meanings
hike /haɪk/ A2	noun - a long walk, especially for exercise or pleasure, usually in the countryside verb - to go for a long walk, especially in the countryside
chaotic /kəˈɒtɪk/ B1	adjective - completely confused and in disarray
spur-of-the-moment /spɜːr əv ðə ˈmoʊmənt/ B2	adjective - done or decided without planning
groggy /ˈɡrɑːɡi/ B1	adjective - feeling weak and confused, especially after waking up
crampons /ˈkræmpɒnz/ B2	noun - a pair of metal frames with spikes, attached to boots for walking on snow and ice
gradual /ˈɡrædʒuəl/ B1	adjective - happening or developing slowly over a period of time
toboggan /ˈtoʊbɒɡən/ B2	noun - a long, narrow sled for sliding down snow-covered slopes verb - to slide down a snow-covered slope on a toboggan
nostalgic /nɒˈstældʒɪk/ B2	adjective - feeling a sentimental longing for the past