Korea

Back
South Korea
Pusan Korea is about the southern most city on the Korean peninsula but is still cold as hell in the winter. In January 1976 I remember standing on the fan tail (freezing my ass off) for a Captain's call. (funny thing was the absentee pennant was flying). They had us out freezing so they could bring drug dogs through the ship, after a while we were allowed in on the Mess Deck. I remember getting stuck with a pier watch while in port. There was a shack on the pier with a 55 gallon drum with a fire in it and a couple of ROKs. Here I am wandering around freezing with a 45 while the ROKs had sub machine guns and a heated shack. Pusan was one of the few ports I did something beside drink in the local bar district. I actually took a cab with a couple of guys from the ship to a sweater factory and bought a couple of sweaters.
Pusan had two bar/red light districts Texas Street and Green Street. Green Street was only open when a carrier was in port and they had to bring additional girls down from Soul. There was an US Army base Hialeah and we had a few altercations with the soldiers because they were waiting on a payday and our sailors were cash rich. Their girl friends were going for the money. The base commander asked our captain to keep his men off Texas Street and the old man said no. There were only two places where I would shack up instead of going back to the ship, they were Korea and the Philippines. Both had martial law and a midnight curfew and midnight was to early to go back to the ship. The difference between Korea and the Philippines was that at midnight in the Philippines you had to be off the streets and out of the bars. In Korea you just had to be off the streets. The first night I was in Pusan I was drunk in a bar near closing time. The bartender wanted the equivalent of a few dollars to sleep the night on the floor of the bar. I said screw that and started wandering the streets after curfew. As I was staggering down the middle of the street I occasionally noticed people skittering in and out of doorways and shadows. I was planning on getting back to the ship without the advantage of a cab when it finally dawned on me that we were at anchorage and the liberty launches wouldn't be running. I finally decided I needed to find an alley or someplace similar to hide for the night. I don't know if someone got word to her or she saw me out a window but when I looked up there was a girl standing on the comer in front of me in a translucent negligee. She took my by the hand and led me indoors to her room. She did more than just share her bed that night. The next morning I had very little money to give her for saving my stupid ass. Partially because I wanted to keep cab money to get back to the ship. I always regretted screwing her, figuratively not literally. Another night in Pusan I picked up a young lady at a bar on Texas Street and were bought some groceries before going back to her place. The only time in my life I ate a fried egg, I always eat scrambled. I complained to her that the girls in the Philippines seemed to shy away from fellatio. That night it turned into a national pride night to prove Koreans were better than Filipinos. We also pulled into Chinhae Korea but there was no local bar/girl district I could find and actually ended up back on the ship by curfew. I did manage to go to a sweater factory and buy two sweaters. Still have one of them over 40 years latter.

Someone's picture of Texas Street from 2010	Some Won I still have from Korea (600 Won is worth $.56 on 10/31/13)
	Prior to Korea we had been in Hong Kong. After leaving Korea in January of 1976 the USS Worden (CG-18) off loaded our Terrier missiles at Sasebo Japan and returned to out home port, Yokosuka Japan in the Tokyo area, for a 10 month yard period. Sasebo is in the bottom grid row, second from the right. Pusan is in the lower left corner of the grid square two squares above Sasebo and Chinhae one square to the left of Pusan.

Back