new belt: found!

Thank goodness.

Slowly but surely, over the next 50-some days, I'll be prepping for my second cross-country walk from Seoul to Busan: 550 kilometers and about 26 days. I'm probably going to create a "Kevin's Walk 3" blog for that purpose, but for the moment, I'm concentrating on what items I need for this walk. Most crucial is a belt that I can slide through my Gregory pack's hip-belt assembly. What I've been looking for is a belt that is exactly the same as the Texas-sized leather belt I currently use, except for the buckle, which I want to be a single square of metal instead of several pieces capable of breaking into parts like in 2017.

I found exactly the belt I was looking for Saturday evening in Itaewon, and on my first try, no less. Itaewon's main street has a series of big-and-tall stores that cater to Westerners and to larger-than-normal Koreans (of which there are many, and their numbers are increasing). I went into the same store I'd visited on the day of my friend Kent's funeral; a different lady was there, and I initially ignored her as I surveyed the belt rack. My eye lit upon a belt that looked uncannily like the one I was using right at that moment, and I saw with joy that it had a solid, one-piece buckle. The construction of the belt looked to be almost exactly the same as mine, so I took it into the back corner of the shop, closed the curtains of the makeshift fitting-room area, and did some tests. I took off my own belt to compare lengths; the new belt was a few inches shorter, but could easily span my girth with plenty of room to spare. The new belt's holes didn't reach as far as they should have, but that wasn't a problem because, at home, I knew I had a belt-hole-making kit that I've already used to make holes in my current belt.

So everything checked out: the belt looked and felt tough, was easily long enough, and had exactly the buckle I wanted. And I didn't even have to dig deep into my small storehouse of Korean vocabulary to ask the lady to find exactly the sort of belt I wanted. The thing was priced at W25,000, which may be about what I'd paid for my current belt. Given how crucial this piece of equipment will be on the walk, I paid the price gladly.

So: that's one crucial piece of hiking equipment down. I think I have pretty much everything else I need, equipment-wise (including a poncho this time!); I'd purchased a bunch of new stuff in 2017; by the end of the trek, the backpack and my bandanna were the only things that needed replacing.* I still have a fresh trekking pole, which I'd carried, hilariously, across the country on my backpack, but never once used. That means I won't have to shell out for a new goat's foot for the tip of the pole. Good thing. I also know I'll be carrying much less stuff with me this time around, so this second trip down to Busan ought to be less burdensome.

I'm still waiting on HR to give its okay; my team leader talked with an HR staffer about my upcoming walking trip, but that talk apparently didn't result in the official email telling me my trip had been cleared by the Powers That Be. I might have a small celebration on the day I get that email, which I hope will arrive this coming week. Life definitely feels much more meaningful when I know there's a big walk in my future.

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*Recently, I had to buy new walking shoes because my current pair, purchased last year while I was in the States, has already worn out thanks to the miles I've put into them since last August (quite a few of those miles having been added during my trip to France last October). I'm going to try not wearing my new shoes too much until September, at which point I'll need to wear them so as to break them in while I train my feet and body in earnest for the big trek. For now, I can do my prep at a slow, lazy pace, but come September, things are going to pick up speed as my departure date—Saturday, September 28—approaches.