Dear Reader, before you read tonight’s entry, I urge you to review the accompanying photo album so that you can see for yourself that I am not merely engaging in sophmoric humor when I write that Jeju Island is a maternal culture with an hyperactive fixation on a prominent feature of the male anatomy. The island has never served as a penile colony, and yes, the culture is matriarchical. BUT–and that’s a big BUT–as I stood and beheld Oedolgae, the lonely rock in Seogwipo, I was suddenly exposed to the naked truth that was hidden right before my very eyes! It is a secret that quite possibly exists just to give the locals a jolly good laugh whenever they watch naive tourists mindlessly ogle the mysterious harubang, bulbous statues that have been erected around the island and stand at attention in kitschy souvenir shops. The phallic images that fill Jeju Island are not limited to man-made creations. Natural, hardened rock formations and pillars of cooled lava flows festoon the island, kindling the imagination.
Am I merely out of my head? The nuances are hard to ignore once you uncover the truth. Surely I’m not the only one who believes that Jeju Island was populated ages ago by libidinous voyeurs with phallic tendencies who passed these traditions on to their progeny…and spawned a generation of souvenir hawkers and tour agents. Could early Jejuans have actually descended from the mythical Phallusians? It’s enough to make you go…hmm.
