This is the second part of Charles Chaille-Long’s expedition to Jeju Island in 1888. You can read the first part here.
At the island of Soando, Chaille-Long tried to find a Korean boat to take him on the final leg of his journey to Jeju but when he asked, he was directed to “a miserable looking craft which was moored near by and which was then serving as a pig-pen!” It was a terrible let-down and threatened to end the expedition, but the American was persistent and through the use of a social lubrication – alcohol – he managed to obtain from the island’s chief a pilot to act as his guide to Jeju. The guide, Yang, ends up being the true hero in this part of the story:
The wind had grown so strong that the waves were like mountains and Chaillé-Long realized they were in great danger. He quietly began to reflect upon the probabilities of reaching Jeju alive while his servants, Kim and Chung, prayed noisily to their gods for deliverance. Yang, however, “sat in the prow serving as ballast as well as pilot, grimly smoking his pipe” and issued orders to the Japanese crew. At one point their situation became so dire that Yang actually abandoned his pipe in order to ensure that the little boat was not swamped.
You can read the rest of the article here.
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love the photo. & (except for the two kids) their clothes look very white like they’d been washed in persil white..which sets off nicely against their beggar faces..
& don’t they reek of distilled ajossi mentality – we’ll whack you with our long pipes if you mess with us (or our women)
that is a 초가집. a poor house with 선비s..i love the yangban legs – 양반다리, of the supposed 양반s
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