KSIS: In the meanders of Gonjiam

Beware, for you may well lose your life in this cursed place.

Gonjiam is a place that was seemingly mysterious, even gloomy. Plunged in the edge of a forest, the three-storey building was small, with its whitish facade and sewage treatment facilities from which one could, it seems, hear sinister screams lost in the heart of the night if one deigned to get too close. Because yes, Gonjiam is not a place like the others, quite the contrary. It was selected in 2012 by the CNN as one of the ten most frightening places on the planet, because it houses many ghosts and other curiosities. Gonjiam, hang in there, is nothing other than an abandoned psychiatric hospital (곤지암 남양신경정신병원).

Opened on 9 December 1992, it was only four years later, on 2 July 1996, that the hospital suddenly closed its doors. Yet its construction takes a decade, so why hurry to leave it so quickly? Initially, the hospital closed following legal problems after the Waterworks Act was passed in the National Assembly saying that the purpose of this Act is to improve public sanitation and thereby contribute to the improvement of a living environment by means of the development of a comprehensive plan for water supply and waterworks installation and, at the same time, the appropriate and reasonable installation and management of waterworks. The law was repeatedly modified and updated, but the building’s sewage treatment facilities were at the origin of the problem: its closure, and its legends.

“The threat is not the ghosts, but the living police, the neighbors, even us. “ – RON BANDUN

Among the legends, we talk about mysterious deaths and doctors becoming just as crazy as the patients. Moreover, the maintenance costs of the building precipitated its closure in addition to the judicial problems. This led the owner to flee Korea in order not to suffer legal sanctions and from then on, Gonjiam was abandoned. This new ‘playground’ greatly attracted the attention of URBEX (urban exploration) enthusiasts who love deserted places frozen in time. 11.000m² then open to them: a main building, two secondary ones, and the roof offering a breathtaking view of the surrounding forest.

The insalubrity of the place has reinforced its gloomy side, which over the years has attracted more and more people to take photos and videos there, which has also fueled urban legends. Even if officially it is forbidden to go there, URBEX not being recognized as legal in Korea, this does not stop fans of the genre. Despite everything, the daily life of the patients, and what they have become, remains a mystery following the leak of the owner. It then began to be said that the patients died suddenly of unknown causes, and were kept sequestered in the hospital. No investigation has yet been conducted.

On the walls, one could see drawings of horrific characters, and traces of bloody hands, weighing down the atmosphere of Gonjiam. The brave explorers decorated the building with graffiti and quickly, it was complicated to distinguish the drawings of the past and those of the present. In 2008, a Korean show named ‘Ghost Spot‘ was filmed there, the presenter being nothing more than a shaman to further highlight the presence of tormented spirits. Among the paranormal phenomena listed, we find: phantasmagorical shadows and appearances, voices and whispers, sudden temperature drops, and curious electromagnetic activities.

But that did not stop the visitors, on the contrary. URBEX fans from around the world flocked, visiting the abandoned hospital especially at night, shouting at the slightest noise and filming themselves experiencing strange events. The noise pollution was such that the neighborhood urged the government to permanently close access to the place. A screen was installed and padlocks were placed, but they were quickly broken in order to continue infiltrating the scene. The police were mandated to arrest the smugglers, and cameras were installed, in vain.

In the end, the villagers could no longer sleep, the sound of filming, the cries, and the dogs barking during the night constantly waking them up. The CNN article has a lot to do with it, because the places mentioned in it as being the strangest in the world have quickly seen an increase in the number of unwanted visitors. In addition, Korean TV channels began to spread rumors that the owner had never actually fled (to the US), but had actually committed suicide in the hospital. It was also said that the water on the walls flowed horizontally and that a vengeful spirit sought justice for the abuse received when he was patient.

Korea naturally ends up making its own ranking of the country’s strangest and most haunted places, with Gonjiam in first place followed by the Golden Ranch of Ganghwa-gun (abandoned house) and Jecheon Neulbomgalbi (abandoned restaurant) of Chungcheongbuk-do. Although the Golden Ranch does not have a particular history, people also began to go there and pillaged the premises, but regarding the restaurant, it is said that upon the death of the daughter of two employees – who was already in a vegetative state due to a disability -, the employees lost their lives in a car accident the same week and the owner committed suicide by inhaling gas from the kitchen. The Ranch was destroyed, and the restaurant bought and renovated.

In this ranking of abandoned mysterious places in Korea, we find other houses (like Yeongdeok Hungga), a swimming pool (from the SNU university, which served as a filming location at BTS for the album ‘THE MOST BEAUTIFUL MOMENT IN LIFE‘, now destroyed), and an amusement park (Yongma Land). Regarding the hospital, it is considered that more than 10,000 people visited it over a period of twenty years. The condition of the rooms and premises, where blankets and stuffed animals were still found, suggests that it was abandoned in a hurry. Would it be due to more than a water problem and economic financial dispute? At the time, the government allocated only 1% of its annual budget to psychiatric care, so financial bankruptcy seems quite likely.

The stack of records of patients who lived within these walls will not give us more information, if it is not their state of health which mainly concerned diseases such as syphilis. Room 206 became a nest of spirits, because it was said that the patients who entered there did not come out alive, and that the owner killed them before fleeing the country. Some explorers talked about their cameras and devices that suddenly stopped working with each flash triggered. The owner was then offered to sell the hospital in order to turn the building into a horror attraction, but the idea was abandoned following complaints from neighbors who did not want to see even more visitors bothering their daily life.

As previously announced, the CNN placed it in its top 10 of the most haunted places on the planet, next to

– Sedlec Ossuary (Czech Republic)

– Island of Dolls (Mexico)

– Catacombs of Paris (France)

– Aokigahara (Japon)

– Accodese and the Foundry (Togo)

– Pobelha (Italy)

– Gunkanjima (Japan)

– Pripyat (Ukraine)

– The gates of hell (Turkmenistan)

However, after a series of several accidents in the ruins of the building, it was destroyed by the government in May 2018. Gonjiam now only exists in the memories of people who have visited it, and through a fictional film in its memory “Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum” released the year of its destruction. The film attracted a lot of international interest, as it was deemed frightening, even though most of the filming took place at the Busan National Maritime High School. Today, a logistics center of the company Coupang has been opened on the ruins of the hospital, so that no one seeks to revive the urban legends of the past.

The only place where it is currently legal to do URBEX in Korea remains the semi-abandoned amusement park Yongma Land. Opened between 1980 and 2011, it went bankrupt after larger parks were created (Lotte World, Seoul Land, Everland). It is always possible to pay a moderate entrance fee of 10,000 in order to dive into the attractions now at the stop to take photos. The current owner is himself a former professional photographer, he remains attentive and offers advice to succeed in your shots. In addition, the park is now used by many locations for filming dramas and Kpop clips!

The most well-known ones are ‘Like OOH-AHH‘ by TWICE, ‘Bar bar bar‘ by CRAYON POP, ‘1004‘ by B.A.P, and regarding dramas we can find for example ‘Sisyphus: The Myth‘ as well as ‘The Sound of Magic‘. Finally, among the groups that have taken photo shoots at the heart of the attractions, we find BTS, EXO, GOT7, PENTAGON, LOVELYZ, RED VELVET or even GFRIEND. If you are an URBEX enthusiast, what are you waiting for to go there? Only 30 minutes from Seoul, Yongma Land is waiting for you!