Korea Pt.8 - Seoul Tower

Ulala and i actually went to Seoul Tower on our second last day (but our last night) in Seoul. It was a nice place to visit at night since it gave us a great view of Seoul all lit up. It seems to have a reputation as a primo date spot (depsite the fact that Koreans have an immense aversion to public displays of affection). Seoul Tower is located at the top of the small mountain that is smack dab in the middle of Seoul. We took a cable car up from near Myeong Dong and then an elevator to the observation deck. The tower itself is quite short but since it sits atop the mountain it still commands an impressive view of the city. It was also still decorated from Christmas, which was a littlle odd.









The washrooms are amazing in Seoul Tower. Even the urinals have a view!


These were near the tower at the top of the hill. They are smoke signals. Signals from all over would be realyed to this station where the information would be handed over to the king (or whoever was in power at the time) and then signals would relayed outwards back to the outllying regions. There is a scene in Lord of the Rings where such signals are impressively used and i found it very interesting to see real ones close up.


and THAT, ladies and gentlemen, finally brings an end to the posts on Korea. yup. now it`s back to my merry adventures in JapanLand. but... i AM goingto New Zealand next month to visit Matt Anaka. so that should be pretty awesome. i think i might have to buy a new and much larger memory card for my camera (or possibly a new camera!!) for that trip!

Korea Pt.7 - Gyeongbokgung Palace

This is the palace that Ulala and i went to on our last day in Seoul. We had to rush through since we also had to jet out to the airport to catch out flight. I`d really like to go back to Seoul for another few days sometime and just spend my time seeing all the palaces and temples. Since i know little to nothing about this beautiful place i`ll just let the pictures do the talking:

Korea Pt.6 - Random pics

These were just some odds and ends from our trip:

They`re all here!! Toocan Sam! Tony the Tiger! That crazy rooster from Corn Flakes!


This is Hubert holding (and making a face at) a FIVE LITRE bottle (if it can really be called a "bottle" of Soju, the Korean liquor taht runs at about 18 to 23 % alcohol per volume and which most Korean people frink in copious amounts. FIVE FREAKIN LITRES!!!!


Adding to my impression that this is a nation of alcoholics to rival the Irish here is teh beer section of the cooler at the supermarket. Please note that the massive two-litre bottles are not soda pop. They are in fact beer. Who the hell drinks beer out of a two-litre bottle?! Koreans. That`s who.


I have no iddea what this ad is for but it makes me laugh. Partly beacuse i think it might be an add promoting bulimia and partly because the toilet is singing!


Dear Americans: you no longer have the market on fatty fried foods! Behold! The cheese-french-fries-and-batter-ON-A-STICK!!! Seriously, though, who thought of sticking french fries to it?




I call it the Wheel Of Thong. It has the power to hypnotize and brainwash men in mere seconds. If the North Koreans ever got their hands on it the world as we know it might end...


This happy little guy was the mascot of the Seoul Olympics and these murals adorn the walls of one of the larger subway stations near where our hotel was in Seoul. I actually vaguely remember him. But it`s one of those cultural-consciousness kind of memories, not the "Oh yeah, that guy!" kind. It took me a while to realize that the blue line over his head is actually a ribbon attached to his hat (a traditional Korean hat). I just thought he was dizzy.

Korea Pt.5 - Daegwang-Ri (part2)

Since much of our tour, led by Ellen`s dad, and seemingly much of life close to the DMZ, revolves around the military and the Korean War i decided to group together these photos into one post of that theme. It was not in fact ALL we saw or did in and around Daegwang-Ri, but it was a prominent part.

One of the first places Ellen`s dad took us was to a war museum which was closed for New Years. So we looked around the grounds and memorials outside. This was only one of many types of planes there:


And this was only one of many tanks on the premises:


This memorial was very interesting, and very large as well. Someday i would like to have a full (English) explanation of the symbolism in this sculpture.


This is one of the militray checkpoints that we came across frequently during our tour. Actually i think this might have been the one that we tried to get through to see the DMZ. We were told that it was closed for New Years Day and that if we went back up the road a ways and told the commander at the soldiers rest station that we had our family grave within the limits than we could be granted permission. So that`s what we did.


In typical Asian-ness the soldiers` rest station had a collection of "cute" mascots that adorned the sides of their buildings and stations:


This was the last photo we could take before they took our cameras away from us and escorted us past the checkpoint and up to the observatory. If the soldiers look young it`s becuase they are; all Korean men are required to do two years of mandatory military service.


Now this picture was taken in the early hours of January 2nd in Daegwang-ri town just outside Ellen`s parents` place. I took it for two reasons: 1) to show how small and rural the town is (and how much it reminds me of most small towns in the Maritimes in Canada - except with more Hangul writing), and 2) because i found it more than a little disturbing that there was a shop with "Nuk" on the sign so close to the broder with North Korea.


And also, right in front of the train station, an army jeep and an army surplus supply store. The military presence really permeates life here in Daegwang-ri.

Korea Pt.4 - Daegwang-Ri (part1)

So i`ve had a crazy busy last couple of weeks. after snowboarding in Shiga, my friend Scooter (aka DJ Bolivia) came from Canada to DJ at Oasis Lounge (which i set up for him here in Osaka). Snedker (Kevin) and Danielle also came down from Tokyo and a bunhc of us hung out for a few days and then all went up to Tokyo for another few days. and then i came back and worked and planned and schemed (some of which is secret so i cannot divulge here as yet until perhaps later in Spring!). today is in fact my only day off this week (i know that i had five days off when Scooter et al. were here buut that was exhausting!) so i am going to try and play a little blog ketsup. i mean, "catch up," i`m just really hungry.

AND SO: i give you, for your viewing interest and long over-due, pictures from Daegwang-Ri, a small town North of Seoul in Korea, and close to the DMZ (De-Militarized Zone) between the two Koreas. it is also, more inportantly, Ellen`s home town and where her incredibly nice family lives and works. her mom runs a restaurant close to the train station (actually, truth be told, Daegwang-Ri is prettty small, so just about everything in town is "close to the train station"), and her father is a police officer (and a pretty high rank from what i gather). her brother was also there, but i won`t even try to spell his name because i am sure i will get it completely wrong. Ulala and i stayed in their house/apartment, above the restaurant, and were treated to a lovely couple of days and a LOT of great Korean food. most of these pictures are from December 31st and January 1st.

This was the train line we took out into the sticks North of Seoul. it felt like a bit of an Odyssey since we were tired from sightseeing and to connect to this train line we had to go all the way to the end of the longest line (a little NOFX reference there for those who know). it was also late and we missed our first connection so we had to wait about an hour until the next one. so in reality i guess it isn`t all THAT far out of Seoul.


This was the sulfur hot spring that Ellen`s mom and brother took us to. It was great! the men and women had separate areas for the baths. We tried the hot bath and then the steam room and then the cold bath (FREEZING!) and then the hot bath again. Then we dried off and met up the girls and tried some of the dry saunas (like the "Ochre Chamber" and the "Salt Chamber" among others) and ate some fruit and watched the New Years countdown on the big TV in the lounge area. All in all a pretty good and refreshing welcome in the new year!


On January 1st Ellen`s dad took us around the region to show us some historical sites (most of which pretained to the Korean War. i was amazed at how fresh the wounds still are since it is a war that i know little about. Most of the places we visited (like the observatories that look into North Korea) prohibited photography, so there are only a few pictures to show. This one is of a bell that sits atop a hill that is close to the DMZ. Near the bell is a plaque extolling the virtues of the many brave men who died trying to capture and re-capture a particular hill.


This was a temple that we visited on "Dad`s Tour". It was closed for New Years but we still had a chance to walk around the grounds. Next to the temple was a beautiful frozen river and valley.


From Left: Ulala, Ellen`s brother, me, Ellen`s dad and mom, Ellen, and Hubert, Ellen`s boyfriend. This spread is a good example of the fabulous food we were treated to at almost every meal.


and THIS, beleive it or not, was breakfast!! spicy meat soup and... some other stuff. it was actually quite good! I`m used to having hot sauce ono my eggs in the morning so spicy breakfast was nothing new to me. I think Ellen`s mom especially liked my appetite for spicy food. =)

Snowboarding in Shiga

Still more posts and pics coming from our trip to Korea but i thought i`d share some of the pictures from last Sunday`s outing to Shiga fro some snowboarding. The winter here has been super mild so the snow isn`t great but it was still nice to get out on the hill again for a little practice. We`ll probably try and go once again this month before Spring officially makes its comeback. According to the old Japanese calendar Spring actually started last week with "Setsubun," an awesome festival which involves throwing beans at demons to drive them out of your house while shouting "Oni wa soto!! Fuku wa uchi!!" (lit: "Demon out! Fortune in!") For boarding we went up to Shiga, to a hill called Hakodate-yama, on Lake Biwa (the biggest lake in Japan), which you could see as you went down the short runs. The view was amazing and the weather was nice, whic hmade up for the crappy rental gear and mediocre snow. Also, perhaps most important, the company was good. We were invited by two friends of ours here in Osaka, and it was great to get a chance to hang out with them outside of a bar or niteclub! =) Enjoy the pics!

Korea Pt.3 - Day 2 in Seoul

On December 31st we woke up nice and early at the StayKorea Guest house and headed out into Seoul. Ellen took us to "Leeum : Samsung Museum of Modern Art" using some tickets that her uncle had given her. The gallery is owned by the Samsung family and is a spectacular gallery. As one might expect from a gallery that bears the Samsung moniker, the technology was wild. We got (free with our corporate tickets - thank you Ellen`s uncle!!) a digital audio guide that hangs on a chord around your neck. Now, audio guides are nothing new, but these digital ones were amazing. They had a touch-screen that you activated in your choice of over half a dozen different languages. As you aproached any particular work an infra-red sensor in the floor would trigger the guide to begin speaking about that individual piece. You could pause, stop, go back or skip any part of the guide by simply walking to another work and standing near the little black circle in the floor. The only flaw in the system was that if you wanted to wander off a bit from the work you were hearing about and pehaps got a little too close to another one, the guide would switch to the new piece suddenly, causing me to backtrack a few times to hear something to its conclusion. The audio guide also allowed for a lot more detail on each piece and its importance in teh exhibition. We went through two separate wings of the gallery. One was housing a special exhibition of traditional Korean pottery and a whole room filled with fascinating Buddhist artifacts of cultural and historical importnace to Korean Buddhism, something which interests me greatly but that i know little about. The other gallery was dedicated entirely to "modern art" - installations, abstract painting and multi-media works, mostly by Korean artists heavily influenced by or influential to Western artists. The gallery`s purpose seemed in large part to show the tandem between Western and Asian (especially Korean) modern art. Hubert pointed out, and rightly so i believe, that this shows that success in art, at the end of the day, is essentially marketing. Many of the Korean works were just as impressive and just as pioneering, though most of the names were new to me. I did recognize most of the Western artist names, though. The audio guide proved itself invaluable in this section since modern art remains somewhat esoteric to laymen like myself who enjoy but cannot even pretend to understand. My favorite piece in this wing was a massive painting by Choi Wook-Kyung from 1977, "Untitled". I might see if i can find some of her work online to put in a future blog post.

After the gallery we went down to Myeong-Dong to have a superb Bibimpa (mixed rice bowl) lunch and wander around shopping and checking out the city. Here are some odds and ends from the day:

Outside the gallery there were these two spidery sculptures. Alas, i forget at this moment the artist`s name but some of his (her) work in this spidery series are also installed outside Roppongi Hills in Tokyo.


This is Hubert and Ellen in one of the only photos i was allowed to take inside the gallery.


Bibimpa lunch (i`m sure i`m spelling the dish name wrong but oh well...)




Seoul Tower, which made me rather homesick for the CN Tower - something i never really expected to feel!


The crowds in Myeong-Dong looking for cheap goods. I didn`t see anything that seemed worth buying, but i wasn`t looking for discount brand name bags or jewellery. I did buy a nice ring, though. Cost me about 4 bucks Canadian.


This was an interesting sight. In preparation for New Years Eve festivities, some people were selling roman candle fireworks on the street super cheap. Later on we would watch on TV as hundreds of thousands of people would gather in the downtown area for concerts and the Countdown. Many of these people would be holding these fireworks over their heads and firing them into the air, right smack in the middle of downtown, between the skyscrapers. In this picture you can see they are left unattended in front of some phonebooths while the vendor is just out of frame negotiating the price with some customers.


There were also a rather surprising number of street vendors like this one selling LOTS of stuffed animals. Either Koreans are somewhat obsessed with cutesy stuffed dolls or this is a key date spot that i was unaware of. The same thing appears in Osaka (though not quite so many of these vendors) in places where guys are likely to be convinced to buy something soft and cute to impress a girl they are in need of impressing.


And this is the East Gate. The one you have likely seen in pictures of Seoul is actually the South Gate, but the East Gate is certainly also dramatically impressive (if somewhat smog-stained) as it squats amongst the equally massive shopping centers and disused Olympic stadiums, a quick-moving river of traffic swirling around it.