Bogged down on Kodaesan

My hiking club braved the incredibly muddy trails on Kodaesan, the mountain that overlooks 'South Korea's northernmost train station Sintan-ri." One definitely feels the proximity of the 'enemy' while hiking: numerous bunkers, ditches, hideouts, and sentry posts are scattered all over, and it's not unusual to meet S.K. soldiers in full war regalia. They are so young, wide-eyed and pimply, one feels more sorry for them than in awe of them.
The new hiker from Canada, Mike, was very excited about being there. He kept humming the M.A.S.H. theme and, fascinated by the bunkers, he'd go in looking for god knows what exciting 'war object' and disappointingly finding only used toilet paper and land mines of a kind that can't kill you but you definitely don't want to step on them. When you don't get excited about being so close to North Korea is a definite sign that you've been in S. Korea long enough.

We had been asked to bring along our crampons, but we didn't need them. The snow and ice thawed completely turning the trails into rivers and pools of heavy sticky mud. We waded as best we could, but going down was mostly sliding on all parts of our bodies.

After the hike we enjoyed a dinner of barbecued duck and some fiery side dishes. Our dong-dong ju- infused selves were quite raocous on the train riding back to Seoul, so much so that a gaunt and miserable looking ticket collector approached us twice in a not so polite attemt to shut us up. We tried to oblige but all we could do was to be quiet for a second exploding inevitably in laughter which made him even angrier. Somehow, we reached Seoul without being kicked off the train. As we were leaving the train he stood by on the platform and if looks could kill this entry would not have been written.