Wutai Banosaru Transformation 2010 Hindsight

Looking back on ten years on the mountain. It has been a long, strange journey, and I don't know if it was about money, or work, or ambition as much as it was about emotions, family, friends and freedom to live in nature. Having just left Taiwan to return to Korea we are thoughtful about how much our lives have changed and what has become of 'Banosaru', our mountain home over the years. Looking back on it all now and shuffling through the old photographs the primary feelings going through me are that TIME gives, and TIME takes away. We are all exchanging youth and health for success and wisdom.

In this first set of pictures you can see (from top to bottom):
1) the mountain as it was before we began construction;
2) early landscaping using stone and one of our first dwellings, a tent;
3) the same spot as it appears now, overgrown in flowers and bamboo with the red house in the background.

In this second set of pictures you can see (from top to bottom):
1) the beginnings of our first two guesthouses;
2) the original cabin and the raw landscaping as it was in 2001 or 2002;
3) Brusan's parents in front of the original cabin.

In this third set of pictures you can see the completed guesthouses with friends, campers:

In this fourth set of pictures you can see the evolution of the upper level and the construction/completion of the Red House, our official Banosaru Residence!

Life and times (Set 5) on the mountain

In the sixth and seventh sets of pictures you can see the evolution of the main level, and the construction/completion of the lower guest house, from 2002 to present. In hindsight it seems that few people would be so crazy as to undertake such a project, and I never dreamed that it would become what it is. There is much still to do and I can't imagine what the Mountain Retreat will look like in 2020.