Beautiful Busan

This weekend we caught the speedy train right down to the South of South Korea, to visit some of our new friends in Busan, the second biggest city in S. Korea. It looked a bit like Scotland with a load of high rise buildings dumped on top although the tour book likened it to San Francisco?!

Everyone has said great things about the beaches here so we thought we'd better go and have a look for ourselves. In Summer, these beaches are absolutely heaving and there is literally not an inch of space left anywhere. We were a little bit surprised when we reached the beach and were confronted with this spectacle that blends in so well with the scenery...

Along with Starbucks, Mexican food and drinking in Foreigners bars, we did actually manage to do some cultural stuff too, and went to visit the Temple of Haedong Yongkung. It has an motto which I will take with me wherever I go....
"The only thing must be answered by and through your heartfelt prayer whatsoever"
Glad to have cleared that one up then.

The temple itself was very impressive and quite spectacular being just by the sea, and there were some excellent stone carved lions, dragons and some other less identifiable
animals.


The statue of the female goddess backs out onto the sea and people used to come to her and make offerings and pray for rains so the crops would be successful that year.

Finally, there were a couple of these dragon heads guarding the temple which I thought were great - each one was about the size of a small dog.

Kidnapped by aliens...

I have discovered that there is an unusual attitude to dealing with the emergency of a fire over here. It appears that rather than risking a miserable emergency evacuation, your last moments should be spent doubled up with laughter at the ridiculous looking emergency head gear you are encouraged to wear. How anyone would manage to pick themselves off the floor and calmly evacuate I just don't know...

Black belt with chopsticks...

I am proud to present my latest achievement... picking up cucumber batons with chopsticks!

I have had a hazardous week in that I have nearly been wiped out by scooters on pavements on a number of occasions, although luckily despite people also driving cars along the pavements they tend to be going a bit slower.

We saw a great example of Korean parking outside our apartment block this week - this car was actually parked down some steps. I suppose they were actually putting an off roader in the city to good use though.

Up close and personal...

As many of you know, I am quite prudish, perhaps a bit of a wallflower, so I was somewhat embarrassed in some of the positions I found myself in last night... It all started out as an innocent Bikram Yoga session... so far there has been a mixture of male, female, Korean and Western teachers. Last night's one was a bit special, he was wearing only shiny lycra hotpants for a start. I couldn't quite place his accent.. American, Canadian, possibly with a Texan slant? Couldn't tell. But he did say Meeeeeeha instead of mirror. Alot. In fact over 26 times. Hard to practice calm meditation, balance and poise when you'd rather be in kick boxing the teacher. Anyway, I digress.

I'm not sure whether it was because I was lucky, special, in need of help, good, bad or plain blonde, but he managed to give me lots of "hands on assistance". I would have thought that after an hour of hot yoga when I was drenched in sweat it would have been a pretty bad move on his part. First he decided to hold my feet down in this pose.... not too bad, but I try to avoid my feet whenever possible and I certainly wouldn't advise anyone else to go near. (excuse poor drawings... it's hard to draw in paint with a laptop mouse, and I know it's not to scale or physically correct, but I'm sure it gets the idea across...)

Secondly, I got some lower back support in the next pose pictured - my shorts were at the completely drenched stage by this time, but if it's all in the name of a good stretch then I suppose it's ok... I should point out here that my shorts were a lot bigger than the ones pictured, but his weren't far off these beauties...

The last bit of assistance was too much, but I really wasn't in any position to argue (literally, it's a thyroid compressing pose so I actually couldn't breathe, swear, or tell him to go and have a look in the Meeeha and have a word with himself about wearing miniscule lycra hotpants...). He held my feet in the "rabbit pose" - so called because I guess Mr Bikram thought "arse in air pose" wasn't very eloquent!

I've been to North Korea...

Yesterday we went to the DMZ (de-militarised Zone) that separates North and South Korea, and it was an amazing trip.

The first picture shows the South Korea soldiers squaring up to their North Korean counterpart, (can't see him but he's at the top of the steps) with the middle of the line of the DMZ running straight through the middle of the huts, which have doors at either end and are used for peace talks. There was one N. Korean on the steps, and at least one watching through the window with binoculars. We weren't allowed to point, gesture, wave or do anything that could be construed as provocation, although how much of it is theatre I don't know. There is a barracks holding over 100 soldiers just down the road that apparently can be mobilised and on the scene in 90 seconds though...

The second picture is me in North Korea! The S. Korean soldier next to me stands on the exact mid point, and protects the UN flag on the table. They all wear dark glasses to intimidate the N. Koreans, and stand in that pose which is the "rock" or ready to fight pose of Taekwondo, of which all of these soldiers are black belts!

One of the more memorable stories from the area is when the US went on a mission in the 80's to trim back some branches of a tree, in order to be able to see one check point from another. A group of 3 set out, and within minutes were ambushed by 30 N. Korean's who killed 2 of them with axes, which they now have displayed in the N. Korean peace museum (?!). 3 days later, the US went in with 15 tree surgeons, 50 troops and had cover from a Battleship, fighter planes, and helicopters and the tree was successfully chopped down! The third picture shows this area, next to the Bridge of no return which used to be the only route between the two countries.

My absolute favourite stories are about the tunnels though... In the 70's, South Korea discoved the first of 4 tunnels that the N. Koreans have dug into South Korea, all aimed towards Seoul. At least 2 of them were large enough to move up to 30,000 troups and armoured vehicles through per hour. They reckon there's probably about 20 around in total but they haven't found them all. But, the best part is that when they were first discoved, the North Koreans denied digging them and said it must have been the South Koreans, despite the directions of the explosions and digging directions, in what has to be one of the best ever "it wasn't me, honest" scenarios. THEN, it get's even better! When one of the tunnels was discoved, as the N. Koreans were retreating, they painted the tunnel black with coal dust and said "we were mining for coal, honest" despite the fact the entire area is solid granite! Brilliant! We were able to walk down into one of the tunnels which runs under the DMZ underneath the ground in the picture above somewhere.


The last picture shows one of the biggest flagpoles in the world, holding the biggest flag which is about 30m long, and stands in paradise village in N. Korea. You can only see it flying in a hurricane because it is so big and heavy and was constructed to outdo the S. Korean flag pole which is a mere 150 tall and therefore 100m smaller. Ironically for Paradise village, nobody actually lives there. Possibly because they got fed up with having 6 to 8 hours of propaganda per day blasting from speakers in the direction of S. Korea to tell them how great it is and that they should defect! Not that any S. Koreans other than the army actually live within earshot anyway!

Spot the blonde...

I thought it was about time to show that we have been doing the cultural thing as well as spotting unusual fish (they're sea cucumbers I've been reliably informed - still not even vaguely tempted to eat one!). So, the first photo is a spot the blonde competition outside the ancient Korean palace called Changdeokgung which is my kind of place, being the Palace of Illustrious Virtue. Very interesting to see all the glamorous Korean ladies tottering around in their high heels and skirts around the uneven paving and grit pathways, but it is important to look ones best on every occasion in Seoul. Apparently.

The palace and grounds were pretty amazing though, built originally in the 15th century but having been burnt down and rebuilt most centuries as various people invaded (mostly the Japanese!). Probably very disrespectful of me to say that the roof gables reminded me of gypsy caravan type paintings...?

Offence of the week: Stu and I decided to venture to a local restaurant on Sunday night, and to try the posh looking Japanese restaurant round the corner (ok, not entirely local Korean cuisine). After being shown to a rather posh room (with paper sliding doors) and having had a cup of green tea, we discoved after lots of pointing, gesticulating, chirades and bad Korean, that it only served Seafood, most of which was live or at best raw. So we then had to get up and leave. We offered to pay for our tea but they were having none of it. It doesn't take a cultural expert to figure out that this is probably not the done thing in Korea. Oops.

Embarrassment of the week: I ran out of cash so was trying to establish whether our local supermarket took Visa cards or not before I actually did my shop and got to the checkout, so I was loitering at the end of the checkout feebly waving my Visa card around to try to communicate this point. Unfortunately, before I could come up with suitable gestures/Korean/preventative measures, the cashier whipped my card out of my hand and swiped it to pay for somebody else's shopping, to the great surprise of both me and the customer involved. It was particularly embarrassing for all involved as all the lady was buying was some panty liners to which everyone's eyes in the queue were immediately drawn towards, to see what the commotion was about. After much apologising, signing for payment, unsigning for payment I was free to scurry off into the shop. It's quite hard to be inconspicious and blend in when you are the only blonde in a 10 mile radius though. Spot the wierd blonde who tries to pay for other people's shopping. Oops.

Luckily we have found an Irish bar that to make us feel like at home. I'm not totally convinced of the authenticity of the outfits or the staff though...

Tough competition...

How are we suppose to compete in Noraebang against this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oCTkwpSgnY

Why I don't eat fish...

Having got over robo-crabs, I wandered over to have a look at some crates of live fish at the side of the road and had a bit of a surprise when I saw these beauties... and they were moving about. Absolutely no idea what they are called over here, but am open to any suggestions anyone might have?!

Stu and I hit our local nightlife on Friday night in Gangnam Gu, and discoved a heady mix of glamourous cocktails and complete nerds, one of which is my new best friend... and going back to fish, I was delighted when they brought us a complementary snack of strips of dried fish which they then set fire to. The result was something that was crispy as you put it in your mouth, but as it got wet would get more like salty, fishy strips of rubber. Incredibly effective method of getting you to down your cocktail.


Comedy work moment of the week: having an off the record work chat with Duck Ki the manager out here in a small, windowless office and being plunged into complete darkness with "I want to break free" blaring out from nowhere due to the policy of trying to get people out of the office at 6pm on a Friday by making it impossible to keep working! Brilliant policy!

I should tell them that if they simply build an overcrowded, overpriced bar with not enough seating and call it the North Star it will be far more effective at emptying the office on a Friday night.

I'm so happy...

... what an absolutely ridiculous grin. I'm smiling so much my face may actually split.

My place or yours?!

Thought a few pics of my place might be interesting... especially as we were invited to hold a house warming party at our apartments. Was in a bit of a dilemma as to what food to serve as it is well known that the Korean's don't like cheese (except in their Karaoke). Well, if I've got to eat fermented, pickled cabbage then it's only fair to offer curdled milk really... managed to find some Camembert, and also did some pasta in a red wine and tomato sauce, backed up with a few Korean delicacies... and... they loved it! Or at least they all politely ate it, but there was also a definite case of a few of the team really tucking into the pasta, so I think I got away with it.


Result of the day: a local who I have not had lunch with before said that I use chopsticks very well, if not better than him, and I don't actually think he was being sarcastic as I had perfomed admirably over lunch, without firing anything across the table or dropping anything down myself or anyone else.

It does of course help enormously over here that slurping is expected and celebrated and that you just pile as much as you can into your mouth whenever you can. Apologies in advance to anyone who has to eat with me when I first return to the UK, although there is one bonus, I have considerably speeded up eating over here... if I like it, I am so delighted I shovel it down, and if I don't, I find the best way to deal with it is to shovel it down! Managed to avoid eating whelks last night, but felt obliged to eat the fish eggs... mmm mmm.

Offence of the week: luckily not actually me, but Stuart mentioned that we were planning a tour to the DMZ (de-militarised zone /border between North Korea and South Korea). Not really a place they like talking about, or consider a particularly appealing tourist area. I can see their point... a day spent with a bunch of US squaddies is probably worse than a large portion of Gimchi.

It's a hardy's life...

Well would you believe it, my nearest shop is an off licence selling not only a large selection of wine (some of it even at a reasonable price) but cheese too! I am ver ver pleeessdd..

Warning of the week: you don't want to go catching crabs out here, they're Robo-crabs...

So far, Soju.... 5th Nov 2006

It's now Sunday, and I have survived my first few days and a weekend in Seoul and am really impressed with the place so far.

It's far more Westernised than I thought, and has a Starbucks every 50 yards. There are literally 9 of them if you walk for 15 mins away from here.

I have a nice, if small studio apartment which has the advantage of being able to make your dinner without having to get out of your bed, more or less. Does have a huge TV though and is about 3 mins walk from work so really can't complain, and we are staying in an area which is the equivalent of Bank, so it's pretty posh for Seoul round here.

So far, the food has been pretty good, and if desperate, there is always rice or noodles to cling to(although this is somewhat tricky to do with metal chopsticks!) . Unfortunately, the national food of Gimchi (pickled, fermented cabbage with garlic and chilli) is even worse than I could have imagined - and our fridges absolutely reek of the stuff, so have had to cover the fridge in coffee granules in an attempt to get rid of the smell.

High points so far have been the Seoul Tower where this picture was taken from (it's really, really high - ha ha), Noraebang (Korean Karaoke) which was hilarious - have never heard Dancing Queen so brilliantly murdered and I was even able to accompany with a tambourine, and watching some really good live music in Itaewon, the foreigners area of nightlife. Oh, and seeing Matt having to wear an apron to prevent noodle spillage which looked like a B&Q uniform as pictured.



The reference to Soju is the spirit they drink here in vast quantities... have had to drink every night since arriving so far with the exception of Sunday.

As I am bound to offend someone every week, I thought I would have an offence of the week spot... This week's is a battle between:

1. Asking the Marketing Director if he could sing.
He looked at me in a horrifed way and said of course (everyone sings here - talent is gauged on volume rather than tone I suspect)
2. Us telling every Korean we met how excited we are to be visiting Korea as we thought that it would be polite, whereas it translates as being excited in a rather different way. Oh good.

Thought of the week:
If J-walking is illegal, why is it ok to drive motorbikes and cars (oh yes!) on pavements?!