DJ Fest

Sexy Laura

Headed up to Seoul to go to DJ Fest.  It was just outside of a small town way out to the east of Seoul in 양평(Yangpyeong, not to be confused with Pyeongyang) which took about an hour and a half to get to from central Seoul.  Seoul subway is ridiculously huge and still quickly expanding. Line 1, by far the longest and split into two long, busy branches south of Guro, is about 200km long.  It really puts the 10km Edinburgh Tram line into perspective.

  There'd been a problem booking weekend camping, despite my worrying we were able to buy tickets at the gate.  The site said it'd sold out but honestly it was the smallest, quietest camp site I've been to at a festival.  Not going to get to go to Wickerman for the fist time in about 5 years this year so this was my 2012 music festival.

Flash Mob!

Saturday was pretty quiet, saw the first band on at one of the smaller stages - Soul Train - who were a really good Korean jazz show.  Saw a few other bands, got some beer.  We were playing Frisbee when a bunch of people started a flash mob nearby!  Tried the silent disco for a while.  Where it was you couldn't take any drinks in (presumably as it was all astro-turfed) so we didn't spend much time there that weekend.  Got a korean to give us pen tattoos whilst we were there.  Laura had 음악 좋아해 (I love music), Mark had 코젱이 (literally "nose-person" which is slang for foreigners).  I wanted 왕자지 있어 but went for 외국이 which means foreigner.  Everyday I hear little kids (and adults) stopping in the street, pointing and saying "wow! a foreigner!" so it seemed appropriate.  Had to scrub it off at 찜질방 the next day.


Saw a few more bands, headed back to the tent nice and drunk about 2 or 3.  Hardly slept due to the loud music which continued until about 7am.  Sunday or lunch decided to head into town. On the way we stopped off on the other side of the river at a park for some sun, a book and the playground/outdoor gym.  Whilst we were eating pizza the weather suddenly turned.  One minute it looked fine, the next kinda dark, then the wind suddenly built up and rain started pouring down.  You could see the sand swirling wildly before the storm really started - pulling down part of the roof of the building next to the pizza place.  With no way of checking/securing our tent and no umbrella we decided on hitting 찜질밤 until it died down.

Tentageddon

When we got back to our tent, it had obviously been upside down at some point.  The pegs had been ripped out or torn off the tents.  Tentageddon!  The main stage was even blown over.  The damaged Jelloshot stall decided to give out all of their sweet alcoholic goodness in syringes for free that night.  Our tent was kinda miserable, damp where it wasn't wet, but by the time we passed out about 4 it was dry enough.  No main stage meant that the acts were moved around onto other stages.  Sets were meant to be reduced, but the schedule just went out the window and bands played wherever they could.  

Main Stage Ruins

DJs from Mars were a particular favourite, throwing in a few KPOP mixes too.  A couple dozen 외국s stormed the stage, climbing up at the front and dancing along for about 15 min until the Koreans got extra security and started pushing them off.  They were kicked off as it wasn't safe, but neither was being pushed off.  A few people I knew complained about being forcibly removed, but to be honest they knew they shouldn't be up there and hadn't listened when they were asked to get off.


There were Koreans passed out everywhere.  I guess that's why the camping was so quiet - they just planned blacking out for a couple hours then sleeping on the early subway back.  At one point it got quite annoying as half of one of the big tents was "off-limits" as it was covered in so many peoples picnic sheets. Obviously I decided that they should sleep somewhere else and just walked over them instead of standing outside in the rain!  We packed up our stuff, hit the 찜질방 again and it was time to make the long journey back.


In short, music and camping was amazing, shame about the main stage but our weight in free Jelloshots definitely made up for it.  Having your festival site near a town was the best idea since the contactless TMoney cards they used for all purchases on the festival ground.  No cash, just BEEP and you're done!