A little bit of versatility

The small, compact but hugely versatile ‘blue van’, in Korea, is as common as seeing a red bus, black taxi or grey sky in London. It took me just a couple of months for the van to take its toll on my thinking cap, and it has done so much now that I thought it would be worthy of a mention.

Its colour is navy blue, its size is somewhere between a Ford Galaxy and the Post-Man Pat van. It sits two and I believe goes under the category of ‘dropside’, which I translates to ‘it doesn’t have a roof at the back and the sides drop down’. Its versatility in Korea, I’m sure, would seem somewhat freakish outside of Asia.

Something I hugely admire in Asia is their workman like ability to adapt things to suit their exact needs. They don’t go out and buy something just for convenience, they don’t say “oh that would be helpful, lets buy one of those”, they would more likely say “Why don’t we just use the tea crate to ferment our Kimchi?” or “I think this is fine, just take this bit off, put this here and weld this to that and that will be good enough”. Quite refreshing.

Just to cement the role of this vehicle in Korean society I will start my reel of examples with this.

Learner drivers in Korea come in their 3’s, 4’s or 5’s. Unlike at home, in England and I’m guessing most countries, you take your lessons with just you and your instructor. In Korea you will see a procession of yellow cars making their way down the 8 lane high street, all stopping now and then to bring up the tail. So, one day, to my shear delight, a procession of the ‘little versatile van’ came rumbling through Oryudong. How fantastic!! They’re so pivotal to the ‘to-ing and throwing’ of the country that they even have dedicated driving lessons/instructors for them.

I have seen an abundance of goods being transported around in these vans; washing machines, living room furniture, substantial kitchen appliances, a huge widescreen TV was once seen being hoisted upon the deck. I have also seen someone cramming their entire house onto the back (including the kitchen sink – no lies). Another function of Mr. Versatile is the collection of old computer parts. I have seen the same van working the area numerous times. He has a loud MC style speaker on the top of his van and he works his way down the street shouting out some enticing information to his local Oryudong-ians. On the same street I have seen another van, identical in colour, posture and presence, only this time the back is overflowing with cabbage, which is being delivered to the local Kimchi fermentation factory. Other goods that make their A-B journeys on the van are Soju, Beer, Cooking Oil and numerous others consumables.

The van also acts as a mobile shop. The van stops wherever it likes, the ‘dropside’ feature drops to the side and then the haggling can begin. Selling anything from mixed fruit, nuts, fish (living fish by the way, still swimming and bopping around in fish tanks), DVD’s (on the deck there are racks reminiscent of a DVD section in HMV) , socks, pants, herbs, dried fruits, just apples in huge gift sets, just oranges in huge gist sets and just pears in huge gift sets. You can also purchase cooking oil, gold painted piggy banks (horrific), rotary chickens (spinning and cooking before your eyes), etc etc. The list could and will go on another time.

The one thing that provoked me into writing this blog was the latest addition to the Mr. Versatile of a van. We had another election last week. I have noticed that the little blue van is also being used within the electoral campaigns. The standard cut of the blue van has been thrown through a ‘Pimp my Ride’ style car garage. It comes out with an overpowering sound system, light polluting jumbo vision TV and a small deck area for our local contingency to stand on and serenade the on-looking voting public.

The blue van. A truly versatile and remarkable piece of machinery. Images below.