Garden State

Some more brief exploring today, as one turn of a corner led me to yet more new discoveries. I came across a church that looks like it's been dropped here straight from rural Kansas, and I think it might be derelict too - something worth checking out as soon as i have more time.
Nearby, a mooch up a small alleyway surprised me by opening up into an area where this woman was busy getting on with her spring planting. Although you'd never know it was there from the outside, she had a pretty good sized plot for growing vegetables, blocked on all sides by crumbling walls and old houses. I think perhaps the plot itself was once the sight of someone's home.
She was a friendly old soul and seemed in high spirits despite the hard and lonely task at hand. We did our best to have a natter, though I've often observed the very old here struggle even to understand what my Korean wife is saying, so her fully understanding my semi-Korean gibberish proved mostly a bridge too far.

Her hand is raised because I was in the process of asking her for a shot - and she was in the process of flatly refusing. I did my best to charm her and pleaded for a pic, but she wasn't interested. I felt pretty bad as I slowly pressed down the shutter button while we talked, hoping something blippable would come out of the blindly taken snap. Taking shots of those who don't want me to is not something I particularly enjoy but the problem is, in Gwangju, if you only took portraits of those who gave you permission you'd average about one a decade.

If you click right here, I've added a shot of her gardening away in what looked like tedious, back breaking work. The shot also gives a good feel of what the general area is like as a whole.




'It's not how old you are, it's how you are old.'
- Jules Renard

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