Narrating Korean Life - Part 4: Along With the Mountain Gods

Wiemun Gate / Photo Courtesy of David A. Tizzard

There are days in Korea when the city feels like it’s trying to eat you whole. Horns, neon, motorcycles, students rushing to private academies, and every surface coated in a coffee-fueled barrage of efficiency. But just north of all this, silently, patiently, the mountain waits.

Bukhansan is sprawling. Ancient. Unmoved by the frantic tick of modern Seoul. You can walk for hours and forget about capitalism, politics, and convenience stores. It’s also where I found myself last week, hiking toward Baegundae Peak. I took the hard way up. Because, well, I don’t really know why. Maybe some vague memory of Nietzsche. Maybe something to do with masculinity. Or maybe just poor planning.

Setting off around 3 p.m., the June sun was still brutal. Thankfully, however, the crowds were sparse. Everyone I did see was heading in the opposite direction. For much of the hike, I was accompanied by no one but the sound of cicadas and the distant laughter of streams trying to hide themselves behind rocks and trees. The air smelled of stillness. The mountain was letting me in gently, as a guest rather than a conqueror.

I passed three temples on the way up. I always stop at mountain temples. They’re different up there. Less touristy. Less performative. These are quiet spaces where monks speak softly and the woody incense doesn’t compete with the smell of food. My favorite of the day was Amita Temple, perched off a smaller trail that seemed to suggest only the curious or the lost were invited.

According to local lore, this was once home to the great Monk Wonhyo during the Silla Dynasty. But despite the importance, there’s no audio tour or K-Buddhism to guide you. Just a white bridge leading over to a shaded path lined with magnolia trees. As I approached, I saw three people walking barefoot toward the temple. They weren’t monks. Just regular folks, bare soles against the earth. When I asked, they smiled and said it helped them find inner balance. I nodded as if I did this sort of thing all the time, while internally wondering how many blisters they’d earned for their enlightenment.

Korea’s most enlightened rule-breaker

Monk Wonhyo (617–686) remains one of Korea’s most revered religious thinkers, and also perhaps its most endearingly human. He was a Buddhist monk who, according to legend, reached enlightenment not in a temple or on a mountaintop, but in a cave after mistakenly drinking water from a skull and then realizing that perception shapes reality. Zen enough for you?

But Wonhyo wasn’t your typical ascetic. He walked away from an official pilgrimage to China, fell in love with a princess, and fathered a child who would later become a great Confucian scholar. He also preached Buddhism in marketplaces, sang, danced, and made the scriptures accessible to everyday people. In short: he was the kind of monk who would’ve happily accepted your offering of makkoli if it helped you understand impermanence.

That he is associated with Bukhansan’s temples says a lot. It tells us this place is more than just a fitness destination for middle-aged hikers with trekking poles and North Face jackets. It’s sacred ground. And like Wonhyo, it doesn’t demand perfection. It just invites you to sit, breathe, and maybe think about things a little differently.

Finally arriving at the temple, I found myself sitting under the gaze of the towering Amitābha Buddha beside the small pond. I felt something shift. Not a religious revelation, just a kind of quiet. The good kind. The kind that doesn’t need explaining.

The universe blinks

Further up, the trail turned rugged. Ropes. Slippery stones. And, in my infinite wisdom, I’d worn my running shoes. I clambered the final ascent like a man playing tug-of-war with gravity, wondering if spiritual clarity could be attained through thigh cramps and a dodgy shoulder from weekend football.

At the summit, an elderly man sat beneath the fluttering Taegeukgi. He greeted me not with surprise but as though he’d been expecting me. He seemed faintly amused by the state I was in. Then, right on cue, it started to rain. Not before, not after. Exactly as I reached the peak. That kind of timing makes you question coincidence. It felt like the mountain was saying hello. Or maybe goodbye. Or maybe just laughing at me. Sweaty. Wet. And not having had a drink of anything for the past couple of hours.

In Korean shamanic traditions, the sanshin (mountain spirits) are believed to guard these peaks. They’re often depicted as old men with long beards and tigers at their feet. Not deities to be worshipped in the Western sense, but guardians to be acknowledged. That late afternoon, soaked and smiling at 850 meters above sea level, I gave a small bow to whoever or whatever might’ve been watching. You don’t need to believe in these things for them to feel real. Or so I’ve been told. I was also hoping the sanshin would protect me on the way down as the rocks were now slipperier than ever.

I made my way down through the rain, thoughts stretching wider than the valley below. Finally, there was food waiting at a small roadside spot: Korea’s reward for those who walk its mountains. I ate slowly, the cold soybean broth sticking pleasantly to the insides of my cheeks. The kind old lady running the restaurant told me I looked tired. I told her she looked like she’d been here forever. We smiled.

Korea isn’t just high-tech cities, exam stress, and ten-step skincare routines. It’s also mountain trails, ancient temples, and gods that live in rocks and rain. It’s barefoot pilgrims and unexpected showers. Down below, we live our lives climbing things. Careers, social ladders, ideological hills. But every now and then, it helps to climb something that doesn't move: something that’s already perfect just being there.

Next week, I’ll be back in the classroom. Teaching students about culture, religion, and meaning. But I’ll also be thinking about that smile under the flag. And the moment the sky opened for me: right on time.