Busan, Korea’s largest port and second-biggest city, is a popular tourist destination with vibrant vistas and colorful activities. It is also a festival city with a rich offering of art and cultural events. The charm of Busan is an open and hybrid DNA forged over the ages.

Haeundae Beach is Korea’s most popular summer holiday destination with more than 10 million annual vacationers. Besides the sun and surf, beachside walking trails, festivals, and leisure and entertainment facilities attract visitors all year round. On the edge, ritzy high-rise condominiums comprise the most expensive residential property after Seoul.

The Busan coastline, meandering over 300 kilometers along the southeastern edge of the Korean peninsula, is both delicate and rough. The cobalt blue waters of the East Sea become more relaxed as they drift into the South Sea. Along this lyrical curve of land, nature bestowed gifts for the ages, luring people who in turn have responded by entrusting their hearts and bodies to the shores. Sensitivity and imagination inspired by the ocean never lacked. So, Busan elicits a collage of dreams and beckons with sundry voices.

The Many Faces
Busan has seven beaches with chalk-white sands. At the eastern end of the city is Imnang Beach. Toward the western end, Songdo Beach, Korea’s first man-made beach, opened more than a century ago, and there also is Dadaepo Beach, home to the world’s largest musical fountain. The most crowded beach is Haeundae, which fills up calendars with its images and keeps the surrounding residential area the second-highest in property value after Seoul.

Also awaiting visitors are Igidae, Taejongdae and Morundae, all magnificent rocky cliffs washed by the sea. Retaining their primitive aura, these cliffs are covered with forests inhabited by rare and precious plants and animals. Viewed from the lush greenery, the sea seems even deeper and its beauty more intense. A leisurely sea cruise to absorb the night views of Busan is a romantic interlude that is not to be missed.

Sixty estuaries trickle into the sea along the coast of Busan. Finding a fishing spot where the horizon generously sprawls out is a special delight for anglers. And no foodie’s visit to Busan would be complete without locating the experienced women divers in the middle of the city and getting a taste of their catch fresh from the sea.

Then there are the splendid bridges. Spanning the ocean, they promise drivers an enchanting ride. If you drive across the Gwangan Bridge, the Busan Harbor Bridge and the South Harbor Bridge in succession, you will reach Songdo, the southern end of Busan. Then you will find the Busan Port that is bustling with giant cranes and containers, a safe anchorage and stopover for inbound and outbound freighters. Driving further, across the Eulsuk Bridge, will lead to the city’s western end.

Suyeong Bay Yachting Center was completed in 1986 and officially opened in 1988. The yachting events of the 1986 and 2002 Asian Games and the 1988 Olympic Games were held here.© imagetoday

Hybridity and Individuality

The whispers of the sea evoke a myriad of images in our minds. For the sea endows us with an imagination tailored to our own experiences. Thus, when we stand at the shore, we come face to face with our own waves. For the young, the sea represents heart-pounding thrill; for the lonely, a lover; for the weary, sustenance of life; and for the angry, tips on tolerance. For workers, the sea means the source of livelihood, for writers a repository of stories, and for ship captains a journey to places far away. Then it comes across as the laws to follow for the wise, and as excitement for those who still have much to learn. In the morning, the sea may be a girl with long hair flying in the wind, and in the evening, an old lady with creased hands.

The scattering of Neolithic remains throughout the city attests to Busan’s deep roots as a fishing town. The villages dotting the serpentine coastline still retain the age-old customs of shaman rituals, as well as faith in Magohalmi, or Grandmother Mago, the giant goddess who d all nature, and faith in the Dragon King. As Busan evolved to become a metropolis, the serene villages were transformed into places crowded with people striving to earn a living.

Most notably, Busan has heaved and rolled with major events in Korea’s modern and contemporary history. During the Japanese occupation (1910–1945), it was the departure point for ferries shuttling to and from Japan. With the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950, the city became the tearful destination for refugees from around the country. Later, troops dispatched to the war in Vietnam and countless deep sea fishing boats used the Busan Port as the point of departure and eager return.

Whenever people flooded in, Busan was obliged to find them food and shelter. And each time, the city gave everything it had to give. Throughout its long history, Busan thus acquired openness and liberalness. And when immigrants were accepted, disparate cultures intermingled, turning Busan into a cultural melting pot. The resulting hybridity is the true “spirit of Busan.”

Hybridity and tolerance are the two sides of the same coin. The capacity to tacitly cope with all the grueling historic events comes from Busan’s generous spirit. Such generosity has formed the character of its residents, and consequently sown a flourishing local culture. The energetic and creative nature of Busan natives drives its thriving popular culture, encompassing traditional folk arts, pop songs, movies and festivals.

Oryuk Islets (meaning “five-six islets”) at the mouth of Busan Bay are a symbolic landmark of Busan and state-designated Scenic Site No. 24. Among the islets, only Deungdaeseom (Lighthouse Islet) is inhabited. © Busan Metropolitan City (Photographer Kwon Jeong-uk)

Throughout its long history, Busan thus acquired openness and liberalness. And when immigrants were accepted, disparate cultures intermingled, turning Busan into a cultural melting pot. The resultinghybridity is the true “spirit of Busan.”

Hybridity and tolerance are the two sides of the same coin. The capacity to tacitly cope with all the grueling historic events comes from Busan’s generous spirit. Such generosity has formed the character of its residents, and consequently sown a flourishing local culture. The energetic and creative nature of Busan natives drives its thriving popular culture, encompassing traditional folk arts, pop songs, movies and festivals.

Hillside Dreams

The hillside neighborhoods are another lyrical facet of Busan. Through the Korean War and subsequent industrialization, the city expanded, and needy people built their shanties high on the hillsides. Peering past the overlapping s of roofs and water tanks, a different Busan emerges below. To those who led honest lives in the neighborhoods, the sea was like a faraway door that had to be opened. They opened that blue door onto their lives, onto their dreams, and onto the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Born in the hillside neighborhood of Yeongdo, I grew up gazing at Busan’s nocturnal sea through a cracked window. At night, a gigantic ship lay in anchor. The light spilling out was glorious, like threads of gold and silver strewn over the dark water. After the ship departed, another one would replace it. That is how I learned about the depth and breadth of the world. The imagination that the sea taught me to use enabled me to live as I do now, as a poet and wanderer, roaming the world lugging a backpack.

In Busan, the sea is not something that comes to those who wait but a door that one must reach out and open. In the seaside atmosphere to which the blue door leads, a rich offering of cultural festivals awaits: the Busan International Film Festival, the Busan Biennale, the Sea Art Festival, the Busan International Rock Festival, the Busan International Performing Arts Festival, or the International Sea Literature Festival. Among this growing number of festivals are some that have gained international renown.

A 14.15km² island lying off the southern coast of Busan, Yeongdo sheltered refugees of the Korean War. In 2011, renovation work on the island d Huinyeoul Maeul (White Rapids Village), which is now a well-known location in movies and TV shows. The Japanese island of Tsushima is visible from a 3-meter-high embankment here.© Busan Metropolitan City (Photographer Kwon Gi-hak)

Dynamic Culture

Busan also hosts assorted festivals with a strong regional flavor. The Busan Jagalchi Festival is a reminder of the city’s infinite connection to the sea. The festival includes a rite to pray to the Dragon King (yongsinje) for safe journeys and an abundant catch of fish as well as a rite to appease the souls of fish. At the Haeundae Sand Festival, artists from numerous countries sculpt sand into statues and structures. And every autumn, the Busan Fireworks Festival embroiders the night sky with color and light. The Anchovy Festival is as lively as the thrashing waves; the Busan Sea Festival opens simultaneously on five of the city’s beaches; and countless other events with a maritime theme offer fun and romance all year round.

On another note, the B-boy (break dancing) competitions at Mt. Yongdu Park exude the passion and wildness of Busan. The temperament that has molded the spirit of Busan has also turned the city’s culture into the people’s power. Non-mainstream fields of art and culture, such as indie art and art criticism, have become firmly established as a source of the creative strength behind Busan’s identity.

All of this occurs against a backdrop of shimmering waves. The iridescent waters embrace in-visible but constantly rolling ripples that become a poem ringing out in a deep voice, warm and strong.