[Cityscapes] Counting down Seoul's last moon villages

A village bus descends the steep road of Guryong Village in northwestern Seoul, June 19, 2016. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

By Ron Bandun

I feel like there's been an increasing amount of articles and videos lately with sensational titles like "Seoul's last shanty town" or "Seoul's last slum."

Quick, which neighborhood do you think they're all about?

Chances are, you thought of Guryong Village in Seoul's southern Gangnam District. Or Baeksa Village, up in northeastern Nowon District. Both have been given the title of "last" several times in recent years, even though the presence of both invalidates either's claim to the title. And there is another. Which one will be the last standing?

These neighborhoods are all known as "daldongnae," translated literally to moon village. Calling them slums, shanty towns or favelas helps explain what they are, but should be considered inaccurate. There is a separate Korean word for shanty town ― "panjachon" or literally wood board village ― which is close to but not perfectly synonymous with moon village.

Moon villages have their origins as refugee villages, having formed in the postwar era. As refugees flooded in from the North, as well as from the countryside looking for work, they found very little space left for them to live. So moon villages were formed as these war and economic refugees built higher up the mountainsides, closer toward the moon which seems to be how they get such a romantic name.

Their creation was unregulated and spontaneous, a fascinating phenomenon that went disappointingly unobserved by urban planners and social scientists. After Korea Times reporter Park Ji-won visited a Rohingya refugee camp in Bangladesh in 2018, I thought her pictures looked like they could have been taken in a Korean moon village decades ago. So it seems the development of refugee villages must be directed by a few universal principles.

Some of Korea's oldest refugee communities were based in downtown Seoul had originally had a substantial refugee population, including in historic Jeong-dong as well as along Cheonggyecheon and the long narrow property where Sewoon Sangga stands today. All of it was wiped out, either so the government could use the land for itself or just for beautification projects ― or both.

Baeksa Village was formed in 1967 out of those inner-city evictions. The refugees who settled the city center became refugees once again, with many resettling on the slope of Mount Bulam on the northeastern edge of the city. The name Baeksa literally comes from the road number, 104.

A view of Baeksa Village, northeastern Seoul, April 16, 2017. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

Part of Baeksa Village was wiped out in the 1990s to build a Hyundai-brand apartment complex, which towers over the remaining parts of the moon village. What remains of Baeksa Village is an aging community, organized in three lobes built into the folds of the hillside. It's quite picturesque, and reveals an old way of living that's disappearing from Seoul fast. The few remaining residents are elderly, unlike the past when the original population was likely quite young, and as no one new is moving in, it seems inevitable the population will die out.

Baeksa Village, seen on Nov. 18, 2018. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

There have been attempts over the years to preserve Baeksa Village. Many houses bear artistic murals painted as part of a beautification project, now aging with the paint chipping away. But last year the city announced a redevelopment plan for Baeksa Village, putting a hard deadline on this old neighborhood.

An old-fashioned store in Baeksa Village, northeastern Seoul, April 16, 2017. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

Meanwhile, across the river on the slope of Mount Guryong on the southern edge of town, sits Guryong Village, which has the dubious honor of being Seoul's youngest moon village. This can be seen reflected in some of the building materials, which include more plastics and tarps. Among the building materials, I've spotted a banner for Baskin-Robbins which especially stands out.

Housing materials incorporate commercial signs in Guryong Village in southern Seoul, Feb. 10, 2015. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

This area developed during the 1980s, and coalesced into a recognizable community in 1988, the same year as the Summer Olympics which had involved many urban beautification projects. The last population increase came in 1994 with the eviction of a community at the current site of Samsung Tower Palace, a wealthy apartment complex clearly visible from Guryong Village.

Photographers visiting the site tend to take pictures from one spot looking over the village with Tower Palace looming in the background, capturing the extreme inequality present in Gangnam. Actually the skyline has filled in even more with various apartment remodeling projects in adjacent Gaepo-dong.

A view of Guryong Village with Samsung Tower Palace looming in the distance has become representative of inequality in southern Seoul's Gangnam District, Feb. 10, 2015. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

I dislike visiting Guryong because it's a notably miserable place, worse than other moon villages. There are many residents left, so I don't want to bother them or make them feel anxious with my presence. It's at one of the entrances to Mount Guryong's hiking path network, so they do get a lot of through traffic from mountain hikers.

Inequality stands out between Guryong village and highrise construction in the distance in southern Seoul, March 3, 2018. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

There have been proposals to destroy Guryong Village to make way for new developments, but all have met strong resistance from residents who want their fair share and don't want to be displaced again, likely violently.

A frozen stream runs beneath a house in Guryong Village in southern Seoul, Feb. 10, 2015. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

So which will be the last standing, Baeksa or Guryong? I think both will be outlived by Gaemi Village, a moon village located up on the slope of Mount Inwang in northwestern Hongje-dong. Gaemi traces its origins all the way back to the Korean War. Originally it was named Indian Village, apparently because the residents first lived in tents which resembled tepees, but they didn't like the name so they renamed it Gaemi (Ant) Village after the industrious insect.

It is much smaller than Baeksa and Guryong, built on two valley walls facing each other, which gives the residents on one side a beautiful view of their neighbors across the way. Seodaemun village bus 7 goes all the way up the road in the middle, turning around at the top where there are hiking paths leading up to the peak.

Sometime in the 2000s, a beautification project by the district office turned Gaemi into a mural village, inviting art students to paint the walls. For a while it was a popular domestic tourist destination, overrun with 20somethings taking cute pictures of the murals amid the steeply sloped village. But the mural project is no longer funded, and the painted murals are fading away.

Seoul City gave Gaemi Village the enigmatic "Future Heritage Status," intended to preserve the look of the area and maybe save it from the fate of the city's other moon villages. But it's really unclear what this status actually means, or even if the current residents are allowed to renovate their homes.

Tourists wander in Gaemi Village in northwestern Seoul, May 1, 2010. / Courtesy of Ron Bandun

Even as the city stamps down on these hillside communities one by one, replacing them with affluent apartment complexes, the moon village will remain a feature of Seoul's urban texture. While the three abovementioned moon villages have remained in recognizable form up into their final days, other moon villages in more economically successful areas have developed more seamlessly. So there are small traces of moon villages all across the city, often built on uneven land. The old shanties have been knocked down and replaced with brick buildings, the roads have been widened and modern plumbing has been installed, but you can still find traces of their origins as makeshift refugee villages.

One such refugee camp, known as Liberation Village, was formed on the slope of Mount Nam uphill of Yongsan Garrison as North Korean refugees settled in the area. Thanks to decades of relative economic stability, it has developed quite organically, maintaining its moon village texture while losing most of the original buildings. Today it is home to a sizeable foreign population who call the area Haebangchon (HBC).

So Seoul's last remaining moon village could very well be right where you live.

Ron Bandun is a self-described "anarchaeologist."