Subway platform of Seoul Metro Line 2w, published in The Korea Times, May 29, 1984. Korea Times archive

One of the quiet joys of my first two years in Seoul in the early 1990s was riding the subway to work each morning — a small ritual that became a kind of meditation. Back home in America, I’d always driven everywhere, cocooned in my car, my own music filling the air, convinced that the steering wheel offered some illusion of control. But in Seoul, I surrendered to the rhythm of the city. I was just another passenger in the great underground artery, moving in step with thousands of strangers whose lives brushed briefly against mine.

Every morning, I rode Line 2 — the Green Line — which looped underneath this great city, surfacing twice to cross the Han River in brief shimmers of daylight before diving back underground. It was my first real acquaintance with Seoul, an introduction not through its streets or skyline but through its pulse belowground.

Seoul Metro Line 2 aboveground, published in The Korea Times, May 29, 1984. Korea Times archive

Back then, there were only a few lines crisscrossing the city — including Line 1 (red, now dark blue), Line 3 (orange) and Line 4 (blue) — but the Green Line was mine. It carried me to work, through new neighborhoods, and deeper into the life I was just beginning to build.

Locations of Seoul Metro transfer points, published in The Korea Times, Feb. 5, 1984. Korea Times Archive

Sometimes, when the train slowed and the doors slid open, I’d think of Ezra Pound’s short poem, “In a Station of the Metro”:

“The apparition of these faces in the crowd: Petals on a wet, black bough.”

It seemed to describe exactly what I was seeing — faces appearing and vanishing like reflections in a dream.

Crowds in Sindorim Station, published in The Korea Times, Feb. 2, 1996. Korea Times archive

Source: Korea Times News