"D" is for "delicious dog"

(Written on a particularly hot day in August.)

From the eighth floor of the office building, a myriad of scents waft through the open windows while I plan my lessons for the day. The sticky sweet of red bean cakes on their outdoor griddles. The pungent dried seafood and fermenting vegetables. Exhaust, sweat, perfume: it all comes pouring in, assailing my nostrils, disrupting my work for better or worse.

After a five-day holiday, we were all back at work, though "all of us" now has new meaning. Last week, we said goodbye to Andy and Casey, replacing the two men with one woman, Krista of Nova Scotia. Unexpectedly, we also said goodbye to my roommate, Sarah, who rushed home to Illinois after receiving news that two family members had been in a bad car accident. Sadly, her grandfather and uncle did not survive. However, Sarah will return in a couple weeks.

She and I had planned to travel to Thailand for our little school holiday, but we canceled plans after the bad news arrived. Instead, I spent many quality hours inside some of Busan's finest drinking establishments getting to know our newest arrival. But no, I didn't drink the whole five days away. I was also able to explore the city a little more. For the first time since I'd arrived two months ago, I didn't have Sarah to guide me. There were a couple wrong turns, a couple missed stops on the bus and subway, but all in all, I think I did pretty well.

Gupo marketing

Just beyond the burrough of Deokcheon, where my school is located, is the burrough of Gupo, which boasts a large wet/open-air market. Now, a supermarket divides its goods into departments: the fish here, the produce there, etc., but there is no such organizational structure at the Gupo Market. A fish monger filleting squid with surgical precision and horrifying speed stood next to a weathered woman hawking melons and peaches. Dozens of live frogs in netted tubs peered over at equally large tubs with a hundred varieties of fermenting kim chis and soy bean pastes. A man gutted a massive hog next to a woman selling socks.

And so it went for blocks and blocks until I found what I simultaneously was and wasn't looking for. I was told I'd hear it before I saw it, but all of a sudden, I looked up to meet the gaze of a big Malamute mutt. He sat in a huge cage with a couple of Lab-looking dogs. Deciding I wasn't worth his attention, he turned his big, furry head back to the toy dog yapping at him from the street below his elevated cage. Sporting a little, green jacket, with ears and tail dyed yellow and pink, this yappy pup was a pampered pet. The big dogs in the cages would not share the same fate -- they were the meat dogs.

The demand for dog meat is dwindling in Korea, I hear. Apparently, only older people still eat it, and you have to search out a restaurant that serves it, though the meat is easy enough to find. Most of my students have never tried it and recoil when they learn I want to.

"Teacher, no!" they cry. "Dog is dirty!"

Fido without his pajamas

I don't know why I wanted to see the dog market. I don't know why I want to eat it -- perhaps just to be able to say I have, to cross it off my list of cultural experiences and be done with it. Certainly, I don't relish the slaughter of an animal I consider a beloved pet.

I took a deep breath and continued into the heart of the dog market. I looked into a butcher case to find Fido without his pajamas on. He was cracked down the middle of his ribs and missing his organs and guts, though still carrying his head and tail. Cage after cage were crammed with large dogs, the kind we're so fond of in Colorado. Only the large ones are fit for eating, I'm told, and they're usually mutts, though I saw some beautiful, pure-bred-looking dogs.

Really, I was expecting worse living conditions. Although the cages were made of wire mesh, they were, for the most part, clean. I saw a few dogs tiffing with each other, but most hung out, fattening up and unknowingly awaiting slaughter. The dog carcasses were more disturbing, and I started mentally tallying how many dogs my apartment would hold. How many could I rescue?

Soon, the dog cages became more varied. These meat vendors were diversified, selling goats, ducks, chickens and rabbits, and it was almost comical to see all these animals sharing the same cages. Sometimes, only the big animals were caged, and the birds kept on top of the cages with twine tied around their legs to prevent escape. Eventually, the dogs disappeared from the cages. I breathed a sigh of relief and left the market congratulating myself on my bravery.

Check out photos of life in Busan on my Facebook page.