Remember how people always say that challenges make you discover things that you never knew about yourself? I got through one of those challenges last Saturday.

Professor Han, one of the design tutors brought his studio on a hike up Mountain Kwanak. Professor Han is easily my favourite tutor in the school. He is a part time tutor and works in Spacegroup! He was the one who got us the chance to intern in the office and after our internship, he invited us for lunch in Seoul and presented our certificates and salary to us! I haven’t been taught by him before, but my short meeting with him over lunch was a very pleasant experience. He looks like Tadao Ando, and is very affectionately known as H-ando amongst the students. He’s charismatic, eloquent and has a very very charming smile! His mannerism reminds me of the oriental version of Richard Gere, somewhat like a good bottle of wine cos the older it is, the better it gets! All these charisma probably comes with age and experience.

Anyway, the hike was the most dangerous thing I’ve ever done in my life. I’ve never been so close to death ever in my life. The feeling was overwhelming and still continues to overwhelm me now each time I relate the story.

We all knew it was going to be cold, so the night before we dug out our thickest clothes and prepared ourselves for the weather. I guess growing up in a cosmopolitan city like Singapore with absolutely no mountains made us think that it was just going to be a normal, ordinary hike, just like the ones back at Bukit Timah hill. I mean how difficult can it be right? What we didn’t expect was the intensity of the hike, the insanely steep slopes, the undulating terrain, the rough surfaces. It was climbing, abseiling, repelling, cardio workout, mental fight all mashed up into one. And halfway through our hike it started raining so heavily and the rocks got really slippery. You gotta be there to really grasp what it was like. Some parts of the hike, we had to get down on all fours and use every ounce of energy in us, to propel ourselves up that ice cold piece of rock. Other times, we had to slowly lower ourselves, sit on the rock, look for a flat rock surface below, slide ourselves down and at the same time mentally estimate our landing, while constantly keeping our eyes on the next rock to grip after the jump. It was a hands, feet, muscles, brains, eyes coordination. Not forgetting the crazy palpitations of our hearts. I’m so glad I don’t have a weak heart if not I really would have just fainted on the spot. I don’t know, I can’t even begin to describe it. It’s like an all-consuming but yet excruciating moment. For a moment I thought I wasn’t going to make it down the mountain alive, or that even if I did, I wouldn’t have gone through it without hurting myself. I kept having this mental image of myself falling, or slipping. But my friends were very nice, they probably were feeling just as distressed, or maybe they were distressed coz I was so slow and helpless, but their constant encouragement and hyped me up quite a bit. I’ve never felt so determined to get out of the mountain alive, and boy am I glad that I did.

This is Prof Han, all ready to scale the mountain! It was the last I saw of him because once we started he was blazing a trail of his own. He was so fast. Either he is very experienced or he was mountain goat in his previous life or something. I would very much like to believe its the former : ) Anyway because he was so fast, we got split up into two groups. The faster bunch managed to keep up with his pace. But obviously I was slow so I was in the second group haha. Some of the guys in our group were really fast but took the initiative to stay behind together with the slower girls so I was really impressed : )

Mel and I before the hike! I looked like I was ready to scale the mountain but it really wasn't the case. I almost gave up halfway hahaha! Mel on the other hand was "ordained" with the name of Frodo because she surprised us by being so fast and agile hahaa

Before we got to the foot of Kwanak mountain we had to trek up this little village. There were so many aunties and uncles there and the amount of North Face and Solomon equipment they own is really remarkable. But then again Korea being the number one country with the most mountains per square foot in the world, it is not surprising that mountain climbing is probably their most popular activity. And it is nowonder that they are real good at it.

The first part of the hike was already quite torturous. I was sooooo slow the guys decided to carry my bag. I need to exercise more hahaha!

Anyway the mountain we climbed was in the shape of a blazing fire. So there were several peaks. Here we are at the first peak. We took some time and hung around for a while to enjoy the scenery and to take pictures, moving off only when the Prof called and asked us to hurry up! haha

That's Chang (korean) and I on the first peak! Mel the paparazzi sneakily took this picture from some angle and accused me of holding Chang's arm and putting my head on his shoulder. I did not!!!! The girls call this the scandalous photo and kept teasing me about it. But I'm posing this up anyway cos I think its a nice picture muahahah.

That's Mel and I on the second peak. The view was breathtakingly beautiful and I couldn't help but take some time to marvel at God's beautiful creations. I like how the little buildings are built so densely together and how I had a panoramic view of the whole area

See the little humans on the face of the mountain? Yep that was how we climbed up the mountain. On all fours. When it got too steep, there were ropes to help us propel ourselves upwards. There are times when there are no footholds at all, so we had to use the rope and our arms to pull ourselves upwards, all the time clinging onto the rope for dear life, while hearing the guys repeat time after time "keep going, keep going, DON'T look down.."

That's He-won the Korean guy who can pose damn well. We got to one of the peaks and there was a Korean flag and that got He-won feeling very patriotic. I really like the last picture of him, he looks like a soldier!

That's Chang looking lost in the woods haha

Yuting took this series of pictures of us and I think they turned out very very well! Look at the red, yellow and orange of the leaves!

At this point we started hearing monks chanting and it was really really eerie. My roomie thought that they were chanting for the souls of the people who died on that mountain! How freaky!

Alright that's me and the people helping me. Gosh I don't know why I was so lousy but I was really grateful for their help!

There's a fort at the top of the mountain...

H for Hyehan!

Us! The second group, at the helipad!

Looking back, this adventure has really been the challenge of a lifetime. I'm still unsure if I'll ever do this again, but I must say that I totally enjoyed the trip and the great time of teamwork and unity.