Everland by night from our hotel room (top)Everland by day (below)
I thought we were off to a bad start as we entered the car-park. There was enough tarmac to enable the new super-jumbos to land and have somewhere to park side by side. What was frightening was this was only the overflow. This is going to be a long day.
I
t turned out not so bad due to rain. Radio-active ('nuculear' from Japan), toxic, acid (from industrial china) rain had been forecast to fall all day. This meant the myriads of buses cancelled at the last moment leaving the park practically deserted. At first it also meant most rides were closed due to wet conditions, but as the weather gradually cleared, rides came online till at 4pm the park was full steam ahead, everything was opened.
The best part for us was the lack of crowds meant no queues and the longest wait experienced was the pause till the next car arrived. I really think we got our moneys worth. I almost enjoyed my self until I realised;
Do you know that scene is the first Shrek movie at the entrance to Duloc where all the rules are delivered in that endlessly cheerful, high pitched, hi tempo, happy-happy-joy-joy sing song voice?
Well we have been subjected to 12 hours of it at Everland Amusement Park. Everland is the Korean version of Disneyland and in many ways is all but Disneyland with a few changes to avoid having to make royalty payments. If you think disney music is painful do not plan a visit to everland.
To put Everland into perspective, America may have invented kitsch and Japan may have advanced kitsch to generation 2.0, but I really think it took the Koreans to perfect it. Everywhere you look is an attendant waving at you with a huge smile (I'm sure they go home with tired grin muscles). The double handed queen's wave must leave them with RSI, given they wave to everyone entering rides or buying an ice-cream.
Just about everything at Everland is fake and a copy. This not only includes many of the rides that are better nown from other parks around the world. The food though is most noteable. The only thing missing from the restaraunt that sold us hamburgers was the golden arches. Actually that isn't quite true. Our 'combo' meal contained what looked for every bit a cheese stick. You know the sort, a yello/white plastic coated sausage made up of processed dairy product. Well these stickes are industrially processed here too, but they contain more flavour as they contain, somehow, fish. I can assure you they taste no better than cheese sticks.
Kitsch and naffness really kick into high gear as you reach the gift shops. If you think this is the usual store near the main entrance, think again. The main gift area is a shop that stretches for at least 500m and honestly there is less crap at Werribee sewerage farm. It hasn't stopped Amelie begging for that essential item that makes life complete and more often than not usually involves marabou and pink.
The park has many aspects. There is the tame younger kids area with rides and activities designed to thrill anyone around 3yo. There is the zoo themed area with animals presented in cages/displays, shows and theme rides. Finally there are the usual massively spectacular rides designed to satisfy the death-wish of any self respecting teenager.
Speaking of teenagers, I can reliably inform you that Melbourne has “Gothic” all wrong. We mistakenly think of paper-white skin, black lips/eyes and voluminous black unkempt clothes. Very rarely does colour appear and then it is usually blood red. Here at Everland, Gothic is pink and sweet. The Gothic gift shop had nothing black and in fact all clothing suited more a princess than a gargoyle.
Some of the zoo cages left me a little sad. The animals looked bored and driven to despair cramped into relatively small spaces. However some other displays are spectacular. The Safari ride into lions, bears and tigers is a bus and we literally look animals in they eye through the bus window. The driver throws morsels of food, so at one point Amelie caught they eye of a huge brown bear standing on hind legs peering into the bus looking for a tasty morsel. It was no surprise little Amelie found it both fascinating and scary.
What surprised us was Amelie's reaction to the rides. I think the noise and speed of some intimidated her, especially the happy-happy I love my family and am having a wonderful time because they brought me to Everland.
She sometimes had to cajoled onto each ride only to scream and cheer all the way through and request a second turn straight away. She loved the carousel, Global Village (a direct copy of 'Its a Small World', the Amazon raft, the Safari with the bears, the Roller Coaster, the Haunted House, but most of all the Ball House. She had endless fun loading the air cannons to shoot Mum with little foam balls. Given half a chance she would have gladly shot Omma all day.
The shows were most interesting. Animal shows were great, but many of the live people performances, were a little wooden, to the point of appearing almost amateurish. Nice bodies, shame about the two-step. Amelie of course loved it all. The colour, the pretty costumes, the acrobats and the seal that clapped every time his trainer turned his back , then shook his head to say he didn't do it.
Because we had a hotel room at the resort, we stayed to the very end. I now know why God invented the LED light. It was to enable Everland to have a grand sound and light night parade.
Never before has so much neon been ignited purely for entertainment. At least in down-town Seoul it has a purpose..... advertising. Here it does nothing more than entertain. That is until they start that endless mind numbing happy-happy, joy-joy music and dammit it reached the time when I found myself humming the tune. It was then I decided to be grumpy as that makes me truly happy-happy.
Soon after the grand finale to the day began in the All Seasons garden. You may have seen the pictures of Tulips in full bloom. The final event is a spectacular sound, light and fireworks display relpleandent with animatronics, real actors and of course over the top histrionics. I have discovered that you know when a particular character is speaking to the sound over the PA by waving in great gestures. Honestly an old Shakesperain actor hams it up less.
Once again, apart from the warning that fall-out from the fireworks and may be hot, so protect children and old people, the story was delivered entirely in Korean. this meant once again we were left to our own devices to interpret the story. I understood the plot entirely this time. The good-guys won and won well, if the never ending celebrations were anything to go by. There were more happy endings than the Star Wars Trilogy...... and ther were 6 of them!!!
Tired and happy we made the long walk to out hotel room to discover that practically all we could see from the window was Everland. So I dreamt sweet dreams of Fly Fishing the springtime tailing trout in Tasmania.
No comments:
Post a Comment