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Pink Muhly Grass at a Café in Bongseong-ri, Jeju
A November Afternoon in Search of Meaning
November 1, 2025, in front of a café in Bongseong-ri, Aewol-eup, Jeju City. The moment the car door opened, a sharp gust of cold air rushed in. A horse farm nearby sent a faint, earthy smell drifting through the air. But whatever discomfort that brought vanished the instant I saw what lay ahead.
Across a wide, open field, a soft pink wave rippled in the wind. Pink muhly grass.
Bongseong-ri: A Wide Open Field of Pink Muhly
Bongseong-ri isn’t a well-known tourist spot in Jeju, and that’s exactly what makes it worth visiting. The pink muhly field spreading out in front of the café is spacious enough that you can take photos without fighting through crowds, which makes it a great pick for families.
The nearby horse farm adds a rustic, pastoral feel that’s part of what makes this place distinct. The occasional smell drifting over from it is a small price to pay for such an unfiltered slice of Jeju’s countryside.
The wide field in front of the café
Two Kids, One Pink Umbrella
The real gift of the trip wasn’t the scenery — it was the kids’ faces. Two children, holding a small pink umbrella that matched the grass around them, hopping and laughing as photos were taken. Their laughter, caught through the camera lens, made the cold and the faint farm smell disappear completely.
Maybe that’s what travel really comes down to in the end — not perfect weather or a perfect location, but the expressions on the faces of the people you share it with.
Under an umbrella that matched the grass, two kids at their happiest
Finding Happiness Within the Given Moment
Standing in front of the pink muhly grass, a line from Viktor Frankl came to mind.
Frankl argued that happiness isn’t something people should chase directly — the more you pursue it as a goal, the further it tends to slip away. Instead, he suggested, happiness comes as a byproduct of recognizing and acting on the meaning already present in whatever situation you’re in.
That afternoon in Bongseong-ri wasn’t ideal by any conventional measure — it was cold, and the air carried a faint smell from the farm nearby. But within that imperfect setting, two kids ran around under a pink umbrella, and watching them, I felt something close to real happiness. It wasn’t a trip planned around finding happiness. It was simply staying present in the moment — and happiness turned out to be what that moment left behind.