For each and every episode in our bonus series, we give you a 100% absolutely free interactive transcript and vocabulary glossary. And if you’re a Culips member, then we’ll also throw in a comprehension quiz.

And if you’re a Culips member, you also get so many extra bonuses and benefits that are designed by our team of expert English educators to help you reach your goals with the language. So, if you’d like to learn more about all of those benefits and bonuses that you get when you’re a member, then you can just visit our website, Culips.com, to learn all about them and sign up if you’d like to.

We’ll also put a link in the episode description so you can just follow the link, learn all about Culips membership, and sign up to become a member. I have a couple of announcements I’d like to say before we get started with today’s stories. Announcement number one is about our small-group conversation sessions. Have you heard about these yet? In fact, we just started them up last week.

The idea is that you can listen to a Culips episode and while you’re listening to it, you’ll probably have some ideas that pop into your head, maybe your own opinion or maybe a question or something like that. And that’s great. Like, you can have this internal conversation with yourself, right? I know I do this all the time.

Even when I’m listening to the news, I’m thinking about my opinion and my reaction to the news story, and that’s awesome. But it’s nice to sometimes be able to share our ideas and to communicate with others. And especially when we’re learning English, right? That is probably the goal of like 99% of English learners: is they want to be able to speak English.

And so, we want to facilitate that. We want to be able to make that really easy for you. And so, what we’ve started doing is hosting these small-group conversation sessions. Now, if you are a Culips member, this is only for Culips members. It’s one of the benefits that we provide to our members. What you can do is you can join one of our small-group conversation sessions.

There are several that happen each week. And you can do that. we’ll have them tied to a recent Culips episode so you can listen to the episode and then join the small-group conversation session. We’re going to pair you up with some other Culips members. We’ll give you some discussion questions in advance so that you can know what we’ll be talking about in the session.

And we’ll also have an English teacher there, a Culips staff member, who will help make sure that things are organized and will be there to help you out or answer any questions that you may have as well. So, this just started last week, we just launched them last week. One session was hosted by our study guide writer, Indiana, and another by our other study guide writer, Alina.

And I heard that they went really, really well. The feedback from both Indiana and Alina and the participants was really positive. In fact, I will be starting my small-group conversation session this week on Thursday at 8 p.m. Korean standard time. You can see the schedule for all of the sessions.

There will be three happening this week and several throughout the rest of the month, so just log into your Culips account. And you can go to the small-group conversation sessions schedule that’s in the menu and you can see how to join. It will be happening on Zoom, so you’ll just join on Zoom. And yeah, I’m really looking forward to this week’s session.

And if you’re a Culips member, please join us. If you’re not a Culips member yet but you’d like to join in on the fun and participate, just sign up and become a member. And we’d be happy to have you join us for the conversation sessions. The second announcement that I have is that later in the summer, at the end of July, I’m going to be visiting Osaka, Japan just for a couple of days.

I’ll only be there for two days, just as a brief stopover on my way to Canada. I’m going to go back to Canada and see my family a little bit later in the summer. But I know we have a really big fan base and lots and lots of listeners in Japan. So, I just am putting it out there. I’m if there are… two things. I’m wondering two things.

First of all, is there anybody that could help me organize a Culips meet-up in Osaka? I don’t speak Japanese. I’m very much a foreigner in Japan. I’ve visited a few times, but I don’t really think I have the skills or talent to organize something like that. So, if somebody would like to work with me and help me organize that, one of our Japanese listeners, then please get in touch with me.

That could be really awesome. Secondly, if you would like to participate in this, if you live in Osaka or the surrounding area and would be interested in attending a Culips meet-up, maybe later in the summer at the end of July, please send me a message.

And if there are enough people who are interested in doing this, even if it’s just like a handful, maybe five or 10 people, it could be cool to meet up and speak in English and connect with you guys a little bit. So yeah, I’m just throwing it out there.

If anybody is interested in A) helping me organize it, or B) just participating in a Culips meet-up in Japan, in Osaka later in July, please let me know. You could email me at andrew@culips.com or just send me a message through our Discord server.

The story that I’m about to tell you today in this episode is called “Weekend away.” The reason I titled it “Weekend away” is because, well, a couple of weekends ago, I went away. Very creative titling, right? Wow. Good job, Andrew. Pat yourself on the back. Yes. OK. Let me tell you all about my weekend trip. That is the theme of this week’s story.

So, a couple of weeks ago, I went to a small city on the west coast of South Korea called, and this city name is one of the most difficult words, in my opinion, in the Korean language to pronounce. For whatever reason, the sound that I’m about to attempt to say is really difficult for me to pronounce.

If I butcher it too much, I’m sorry, Korean listeners, it’s just a really hard one to nail, but the city is named Boryeong. Boryeong is kind of famous in South Korea. Like I don’t know, maybe internationally, I don’t think too, too many people have ever heard of this place. Correct me if I’m wrong. If you live in Mexico or France or Australia, and you’re like “I know about Boryeong!”

Well then, I’ll be corrected. I’ll stand corrected. But as far as I know, the city is not very famous outside of the country. However, inside South Korea, many people know about Boryeong because it has this famous mud festival. It’s called the Mud Festival. It takes place every, I think it’s July or August. In fact, I’ve never been to the mud festival, but it is really famous.

Or should I say infamous in South Korea because it’s kind of a dirty festival. It’s very muddy, right? No, actually, I’ve heard rumors about this festival before. Because I’m not sure if it still happens now, but definitely back in the day, when I first moved to South Korea, there were many, many foreigners who would go to this festival. And it was kinda just this big party zone.

Lots of people going wild and drinking and playing in the mud. Like, I don’t know, so I’ve heard lots of stories about Boryeong and its famous mud festival. And yeah, I’ve never really had the drive to go to one of those festivals before, but perhaps one of you out there has. So, if you had a good time at it, let me know.

Maybe I’ll check one out in the future, although it seems like the kind of thing that would be more fun to do when you’re younger. But anyways, that’s why Boryeong is famous. It’s famous for this mud festival, at least in Korea.

Pretty much with everybody that I’ve talked to about this story, like my friends, students, and colleagues, when I said, “Oh yeah, I went to Boryeong the other week,” they said, “Oh, mud festival? Did you go to the mud festival?” But no, I didn’t go to the mud festival. So, as I was saying, Boryeong is on the west coast of South Korea, on the West Sea.

That part of the sea is really, really muddy, a lot of silt. It’s not like the East Sea. The East Sea in South Korea is really, really nice. It has these beautiful sandy beaches and clear water. It’s really scenic. But the west coast is more muddy and marshy and not as great for like swimming, and that kind of thing.

Or so I’ve heard. But actually, when I was there, I spent some time on the beach, and I’ll talk about that in a moment. I thought the beach was really nice. So, all of these rumors that I’ve heard about the West Sea are not necessarily true, but anyways, we’ll save that for later. Why did I go to Boryeong?

Well, as you know if you’re a longtime Culips listener, one of my hobbies is running. And so yes, I did it again. It seems like that’s the only reason I travel these days, to go running. And that was the case for this situation as well. So really, you can divide the running season into two parts: there’s the spring running season and the fall running season.

In the summer, it’s really just too hot to participate in any races. And in the winter, it’s the opposite. It’s too cold to participate in any races. So, there are many races and marathons that are held in the spring and fall, but in summer and winter, not so much. So, that’s kind of nice.

Like, you know, you have some time to go hard and participate in races, and then some time to rest, train, and relax. And so, for this spring marathon season, I participated in three races. I guess really only one technical marathon. I did the Seoul Marathon, the Jangsu Trail Race, and the Boryeong Half Marathon.

Those are the three races that I signed up for, and yeah decided to do, this spring season, and now my running season is finished. I’ll talk a little bit about running in the half marathon here, but I know I’ve talked about a lot of running on Culips throughout the spring season, so I’ll try and keep it short and sweet. But anyways, that was the reason that I went down there.

And I chose Boryeong specifically because my running buddy, Jimmy, he told me that he participated in this race last year. And that it was a pretty well-organized event, and that he really enjoyed it. He also wanted to go back this year to try and break his record from last year.

I think that’s one of the things that’s most attractive to Jimmy and to me as well about running and about marathoning. Is like, it’s not about competing against others, although I really, really thrive on that and I love that as well. I love beating other people for whatever reason. I don’t know if that’s a positive thing or a negative thing, but it really fires me up.

Not necessarily in all aspects of life, but in running, it does give me a lot of motivation. But even more so, it’s about competing against yourself, beating your old record, and going faster than you were able to in the past. That is just really, really fun. That’s one of the main reasons, at least why I enjoy running.

So, Jimmy said, “Hey, you know, we need to select some races for the spring season. Let’s do Seoul for sure. Jangsu looks interesting.” And then he recommended Boryeong as well, just as a way to close up the spring running season. And so, I said, “Yeah, OK, let’s do it. It looks good to me.” And also, we convinced one of our other friends who runs with us sometimes as well.

He’s a pretty private guy, so I’ll just give him a nickname. Let’s call him Rocky. Rocky, OK? We also convinced our other friend, Rocky, to join us. And, we’re all married, and Rocky even has a child as well.

So, it’s not very often these days that we get to get together, but we decided, “Hey, we’re going to have a boys’ weekend away in Boryeong.” The boys are back in Boryeong, and, to reference the Thin Lizzy song, and we’re going to run the half marathon and then just hang out and spend some time together. Like I said, it’s not very often that we get to hang out and… and do that these days.

So that’s what we decided to do. Now, the race took place on Saturday morning, but we went down on Friday. And we all arrived at different times. I arrived first and I took the train down from Seoul to Boryeong. It took about like two and a half, three hours on the train. If I recall correctly.

I took the slowest train possible, not by choice, but the bullet train, the KTX, doesn’t go to Boryeong. So, I had to take the slowest train, which is called the Mugunghwa. Mugunghwa train. And mugunghwa is the name of a flower, it’s the national flower of Korea, and it’s famous for blooming and blooming and blooming again.

I believe the name of this flower in English is the Rose of Sharon. Anyways, that’s also the name of the slowest train in Korea. So, I got on the Mugunghwa. And I gotta say, I absolutely love train travel, whether it’s the bullet train or one of the other slower kinds of trains. It’s just so much better than any other kind of travel, in my opinion.

You know, you don’t have all of the hassle of taking an airplane, going to the airport, and going through security, and checking your bags. And all of that stuff is just really, really time-consuming, and annoying. So, plane travel is like, you know, sometimes necessary, but it isn’t that comfortable overall. It’s really tiring and is a lot of work.

However, with the train, and I guess it’s true on the bus too, but for whatever reason, I do prefer the train. You just show up to the station and then walk right on. You don’t have to even show your ticket in Korea. There’s a train worker who just walks up and down the aisles of the train. I’m not exactly sure what they do.

They have like a tablet computer and they’re checking to see if you’re sitting in the right seat. I guess they can see if someone has bought a ticket for that seat or not. And if it shows like an unsold seat, but somebody is sitting in it, then they’ll probably give that person a talking to and maybe fine them or ask them where their ticket is or something like that, I’m not sure.

But you don’t even have to check in with anybody when you get to the train station and get on the train, you just find your seat, sit down, and then a few hours later you arrive at your destination. I think one of the nice things about the train is that you can get up and walk around and move around if you need to stretch.

There’s also a washroom on the train and some other convenience facilities as well, so overall, I really do like train travel, and I had a nice trip down to Boryeong. Actually, the way back was terrible. That’s like a whole different episode in itself. Oh my gosh. I just forgot about that. Short synopsis of the… the train back.

And let me know if you like the sound of this story and if you’d enjoy hearing the whole story. Maybe I can tell it next week. On the way back, there was a young family with a mother and… and two small children. And when I mean small children, I think they were like maybe four or five years old.

And so just… the mom was traveling with these kids by herself, which seems really stressful to me. Like it looked like she was super stressed out and had her hands full. And unfortunately, the train was so busy that she couldn’t buy three tickets together. I was in car two, I believe, and her kids were sitting a few rows in front of me.

She got her kids seated, put their stuff away, and set them up with some juice boxes and some snacks. And then she said, “OK kids, mommy’s way back in car six or something and I’m going to go sit in my seat, so you kids just be good here and sit down and don’t leave the train. And if you have an emergency, come to car six.” Which is like a long way from car two, right?

These kids are really small. And this is a big train, and it was packed. Like, it was a sold-out train and there were people standing in the aisles, so it was really busy. So, anyways, the mom goes to find her seat, so you have these two little kids by themselves, which you don’t see very often, right? You don’t see little kids like that by themselves. And they were adventurous little kids.

They sat still for, I would say, maybe three or four minutes and then after three or four minutes, then they decided to explore. And they’re running all over the place. And jumping all over the place. And really annoying everybody on the whole train. They were really cute but also kind of annoying.

And they got up to all sorts of trouble, so it was hard to relax on the way back to Seoul after the weekend. But that’s a whole different story for another episode. Like I said, if you want to hear that whole story, let me know. It had a really interesting ending, actually. But maybe I’ll… I’ll tease you with that and we’ll save it for a different time. Anyways, back to the story here.

I went down to Boryeong, arrived in Boryeong. I got there first and there’s actually no train station in Boryeong itself. It’s a little bit outside of the city in another place called Daecheon is the station. So, I got off there and I took the bus to the beach. We had this, I don’t want to say nice hotel, but nice enough hotel right close to the beach.

There’s like this strip of an entertainment zone right beside the beach where there are a lot of restaurants and bars and hotels and all sorts of places where you can have fun. Boryeong is that kind of destination where I think a lot of people go to enjoy a weekend away, maybe with their family or friends and eat some delicious seafood.

There are so many different seafood restaurants and yeah, little bars and restaurants and places to hang out and to have some fun for a weekend away. So, I arrived first and then shortly after I arrived, then Jimmy arrived and then a little bit after that, Rocky arrived. So, it was cool to catch up and see my friends again. They were coming from other parts of the country.

They don’t live in Seoul, but yeah, we all met up there in Boryeong. And then we grabbed some dinner that night and we decided to keep it pretty tame and go to bed early because we’re all lame and in our 40s. And also, we had to wake up the next day to go and run the Boryeong half marathon. So, we went to sleep, and we were all sharing one hotel room.

It had two beds, it had one single bed and a double bed. So, they were all crammed together though. So, it felt like one bigger bed. And unfortunately, I… I got the middle. I drew the shortest straw. So, I was right in the middle of Rocky and Jimmy, but thankfully they didn’t snore too much. And I was also pretty tired from my long day of travel.

So, I was able to get a good sleep and I think we probably were in bed by 11 or so. And in the morning, Jimmy and I got up a little bit earlier than Rocky. He likes to sleep in later and we were doing the half marathon, Jimmy, and I, but Rocky was doing the 10K part of the event.

So, he was a little more relaxed than we were about preparing in the morning, but Jimmy and I got up earlier and we drank some coffee, and we had a bagel and peanut butter. Jimmy actually brought his toaster with him cause he’s like, “There’s no way that a Korean hotel room is going to have a toaster and we must have toasted bagels in the morning!”

So, shout out to Jimmy for bringing his toaster all the way with him and also for bringing some bagels and peanut butter. He had like a lot of supplies that he brought with him that was very good in the end. And I was thankful that he brought all of those with him. So, as for the race itself, I didn’t really have a solid race plan.

You know, throughout the spring, I think I’ve stayed in pretty good shape. I’ve sort of dipped with my running. I was running more earlier in the spring, but then through May, I got really busy. I’ve talked about what I was up to in May in a recent Culips episode. I think it was bonus episode 103.

So, if you want to hear about all of the things that I was up to in May, check that episode out. Because I was a little bit busier, it was harder to keep up running a lot, but I was still running consistently throughout the spring and I felt like I was in pretty good shape, but I didn’t really have a plan that I was trying to follow or anything like that.

I just wanted to go out there, give it a good effort and maybe if I felt like I could try and break my personal record in the half marathon, which my previous record, spoiler alert, my previous record, was I think an hour and 26 minutes and 38 seconds or around there? Something like that.

So, I wanted to try and beat that speed if I was feeling good and maybe come in the top 20 if I felt like I could do that. So, there was actually more people at the race than I thought. And when Jimmy and I arrived at the starting line, I told him that I don’t think I’ll be able to finish in the top 20 because there were many more participants than I had originally thought there would be.

And also, there looked like a lot of serious runners, like people in really good shape and just like even watching them warm up, I was like, “I don’t think I’m going to be able to finish in the top 20 here, Jimmy.” But for the first time in my life, I started right on the starting line. We lined up early, we arrived at the starting area early.

And usually when the race starts, I’m way back. I’m like in 500th place or something like I’m way, way, way back from the starting line when the starting gun goes off and it’s time to start running. But this time we were early enough and prepared enough, that we were able to get like, I don’t know, right, right close to the front.

So, when the starting gun went off, pretty much I was already at the start of the pack. And of course, that’s where all the other fast runners hang out, right, is right at the start. So right away from the starting gun, the pace of the race was really quick. And there were some people that just took off, maybe like 10 guys that just took off and went really, really fast right from the get-go.

And then I was in a pack of maybe about another 10 guys that were going fast, but not as fast as those initial 10. And when you train for a marathon or any running event, you always hear or something that I’ve always heard and have read about time and time again is like, don’t go out too fast.

If you go out too fast and if you use all of your energy right from the very start, then you’re going to end up being passed by so many people at the very end. So, I had that in my mind. I was like, “Don’t go out too fast, Andrew, don’t go out too fast. Just maintain!” And, you know, “Slow and steady wins the race!” As we say, slow and steady. But of course, did I listen to that advice?

No. And I went out at a pace that is really, really fast for me. And there’s something interesting about racing is that you get this boost for some reason, and you can go faster than you usually can, but it doesn’t feel difficult. And so, I was like riding that high. I was feeling that boost and I was running really, really fast, much faster than my usual pace is, but I felt comfortable.

And after a kilometer or two, I joined up with this pack of runners, just like you see on TV. This was so awesome to me. I have never done this in my life, but I was with a pack of runners, and we were all running fast together. We were near the leaders of the race. We were like maybe in the, I don’t know, fifth to tenth position.

So, I was in this little pack of runners at the start, and it felt awesome. But the pace was so fast that after about five or six kilometers, I had to say, “All right, guys, you go ahead. I can’t keep up.” But for that first five or six kilometers, it was really, really fun. Like I said, I’ve seen this on TV a lot before and on YouTube, but I’ve never participated in a running pack like that.

I have to give respect to one of the guys that was like neck and neck with me running that whole way, because although we didn’t say anything to each other, I think the pace was maybe fast for all of us. So, we weren’t talking as we were running. We were just… all you could hear was the breathing, our breathing.

But looking over at him, he must have been at least 10 years older than me, probably maybe even older than that. So, a lot of respect that gives me like a lot of hope with the sport that even though I’m getting a little bit older, there’s still a lot of potential for improving even as I get older and older. And so yeah, to see some guy probably in his early 50s, outrunning me.

Yeah, I talked about being competitive earlier. I was like, “This old guy, I got to get him!” But I couldn’t do it. So, a lot of respect for… for him. And for the other runners who are in that pack. And like I said, eventually I had to let them go cause they were just going too fast.

So, when I slowed down a little bit around the six kilometer or so mark, then I found myself in no man’s land, the leaders were ahead of me, and the rest of the runners were behind me, and I was just running alone. And most of the race was like that. I was just running alone, running alone. It was kind of gray overcast day. Nothing was too exciting in terms of scenery or anything.

So, it was a little bit boring to tell you the truth. And I didn’t even bring any music to listen to. I didn’t bring my headphones, so I had no tunes. So I was just trying to, you know, just run a good race.

I knew I wasn’t going to win or come in the top 20 probably, or even maybe break my PR, I felt like maybe I could do it, but after those initial six kilometers of really fast running, I felt a little bit tired and I was like, “Ugh, OK, let’s just finish the race.” Kind of mentally gave up on all of my goals, but I just kept in it, kept running, kept running, taking it one step at a time.

And then I started hearing footsteps behind me and I got passed and then I got passed and then I got passed again! And getting passed can be really demoralizing. I don’t know. It just almost makes you feel like giving up for whatever reason. But I tried to hang in there and stay positive.

And eventually I got to the halfway mark, which is where you turn around and that part of the race really sucked because it was flat for most of the race. But then suddenly in like the little area that you have to turn around before you go back to the finish line, which is in the same area as we started the race, there were three big hills that we had to go up and go down.

So that part really sucked, but I did well on the hills. And I was able to gain some ground on some of the people who had passed me before. So, I felt like, “Hmm, some of the running that I’ve been doing in the hills is like paying off” because I was able to do those sections a little faster than the other runners. And then you always get a boost of motivation once you pass the halfway mark.

So, like, “OK, it’s halfway done. Now I’m just going back home, taking it home, you know.” So, I was able to hang in there and keep it going. I wasn’t running as well as I would have liked, but I was still running pretty well. And as I got close to the finish line, I noticed like, “Hey, I might be able to hit my PR! It’s going to be really, really tight to break it.”

And then I could also see one of those runners who passed me and really demoralized me right at the very end. I could see him on the horizon. So, at this point, I had just over a kilometer to go and I thought to myself, OK, let’s try and do this. Maybe I can kill two birds with one stone here.

Maybe I can pass that runner who passed me earlier and just sort of get my revenge on him that way for passing me like almost 45 minutes ago.” It was much earlier in the race that he had passed me. And then maybe I can also break my PR.

So, I was pretty tired at this point, but I found an extra gear and I put it into high gear and started running really, really fast, as fast as I could for that last, maybe 1.2 kilometers. And I achieved both of my goals. At the very end of the race, I passed that runner who passed me earlier.

And guys, you could probably hear my voice, or if you’re watching the YouTube version, you can see in my expression that for whatever reason, I just really love passing people like that. I don’t even know who that runner was. And it’s not like we were competing at all for a top position. I think at the end, I probably came in around 16th or 17th place.

So that’s another goal that I hit. I was able to hit the top 20. So, I got a top 20 finish. I broke my PR. My new PR is 1:25:09, which is not bad. And also, I passed that runner at the very end. So, all in all, a successful marathon or half marathon, I should say. Jimmy also broke his PR. And then our other friend, Rocky had a good run, and he ran much faster than he was expecting to.

He broke his expected time, I think by almost eight minutes. So, he was really excited with that. And we finished and it was like 10:30 in the morning by the time we were done the race. So, that left us with a lot of time for relaxing and hanging out the rest of the weekend. All right, everyone, that’s going to bring us to the end of this episode.

Since you made it all the way to the end, I’m going to give you this week’s completion code. What should we do for this week’s completion code? How about we use the keyword: “Mud.” Mud. M-U-D. So, what I’d like you to do is either leave a comment on the post for this episode that’s on our Discord or Instagram or YouTube.

And you can either just leave a one-word comment, “Mud” that will signal to me and to everybody else that you completed this episode. Or if you’d like to go a little bit more advanced, you could leave an example sentence using the word “Mud.” And both of those will be OK. That’s your completion code “Mud.” You’ve got some homework. Go ahead and make those sentences.

OK, so I’ve really been a chatterbox today. I’ve talked a lot. I think I should leave it here for now. So, everybody, please take care. Happy English studies as always. And I’ll talk to you in the next Culips episode. Bye bye.