Seeking refuge from a culture fixated on all of the trappings of material success, S-- and I attempted to restore our inner vitality by hiding indoors in a room furnished with all of the comforts necessary to completely unwind and forget about the world outside. Downtempo beats wafted through the cool air as we buried our heads under the covers and got down feathers stuck in our hair. Creamy Swiss chocolate bars were guiltily confiscated by grabby hands from the minibar fridge. We did absolutely nothing but chillax. We barely noticed how quickly the hour hand had made a complete rotation before nearing check-out time the next morning.
When S-- went downstairs to negotate an extension to our stay, he was informed that the hotel was nearly booked, save a few rooms on the bottom level of the hotel's rear and one room on the corner of the fifth floor. Intrigued by the latter option, a staff member accompanied him to see the room for himself. It seemed okay enough, almost identical to the one we were in except that the spring mattress was replaced by a traditional Korean ondol setup. There was one peculiarity: a giant red object covered by a thick tarp that blocked about a third of the view outside. We had also seen it from our first room, though it was difficult to make out exactly what it was -- it almost appeared to be a giant red buoy in a sea of glass and steel.
We spent the entire evening contentedly in the room or out exploring Hongdae without thinking twice about the large object outside our window. However, while packing last minute the next morning, S-- gazed out the window and paused for a short moment before asking suddenly:
"Is that... a Santa outside our window?"
"A what?"
Sure enough, the hotel had wrapped a giant, styrofoam Santa in a plastic tarp and stashed him away on the 5th floor deck. He had definitely seen better days -- the end of his faded hat was broken off and the tips his fingers were weather-worn. It seemed so grotesque and yet, so fitting at the same time that this filthy, forgotten giant should exist as such under a meager shroud. This wasn't the wizened icon that graces young children's dreams alongside gingerbread houses and oversized candy canes but the one which uses his awkward, lumbering form to distract people from their distractions and lure them into shoppes offering tantalizing solutions to their boredom. The image of Santa in a body bag seemed to serve two metaphors: one for the dying essence of the holiday spirit itself and one for the ultimate destination of the aforementioned "solutions" -- in an larger-than-life garbage bag that's becoming increasingly difficult to hide.
How much longer will our society convert nature's gold into rubbish and sell it as modernity and progress?
