The Real World: Korea: Camp ChungDahm

Whenever I go on work sponsored events I always feel like I'm at summer camp and rafting last weekend was no exception. We took the oh-so-classy ChungDahm buses to the same area we went skiing about two hours (including the rest-stop) away.

While preparing for the trip, an email warned us to wear clothes we'd be ok with getting wet. I figured there would be a little splash here or there or an occasional water fight might break out, but the first thing we had to do was get completely wet. At this point I was just thankful I wore a bathing suit and brought an extra change of clothes and a towel. After "Rafting 101," we were off.

When I first heard about rafting I was picturing huge white rapids, dangerous rocks, and potential head injuries, however, that wasn't the case. It was more among the lines of canoeing in a huge blow up raft and I kept thinking that I should be singing, "Just Around the River Bend" from Pocahontas. About midway through our journey, everyone in my boat had to switch to another boat so that my boat was empty. It was straight out of the Titanic when they were filling up the lifeboats with as many people as possible. Once a few other boats were empty, the guides stacked them on top of each other and we used it as a platform to jump off of. It was fun, except for the fact that my lifejacket was 100 times too big on me and I think I had my helmet on backwards so when I was in the water it restrained my sight a bit (picture a little kid with a helmet on that's too big and covers their eyes). We ended up playing some more games that involved a lot of falling into the water and before I knew it, we were back at the base.

After rafting, we had the opportunity to go ATVing in which I got extremely muddy, got cleaned up, and headed to dinner. Korean dinners always involve a lot of soju and mechju (beer), games, dancing, and fun. It wouldn't be a hwa sik (work party) without ending the night with norebang (karaoke).