LostSeouls: Because otherwise I wouldn't remember a frigging thing
20 December
I fly back to England today, so the weekend just gone was my last
before Christmas. Friday night was spent in the various bars of Hongdae
(my New Year's Resolution by the way: no more Hongdae)- Cam, Saejin and
a load of SaeJin's mates came and went, leaving me, Shelly and Rich.
Just as it looked like the night was coming to an end (at around
3am), we realised that Rich had never been to a Korean karoake- well
that couldn't be allowed to continue so it was straight off to the posh
noraebang with us.
After the first hour, we were still having a blast- so went off to the
reception to book another hour, when that was finished we hit the place
for another hour- having to move rooms because they were closing one
part of the building. Then after that was finished we sat around for
about 20 minutes just singing into the microphones, trying to remember
the words to "You Can't Touch This" and stuff - it was a lot of fun.
Saturday I was a little bit late showing up for the big Christmas
party. Although I'd arranged to go to Lotte World, the outside part was
closed so due to the freezing weather, so all of the indoor rides had
huge queues- oh and also I was still only semi-conscious. I did make it
to Jamsil eventually to meet up with the whole gang- we had a few
beers, took a group Christmas photo, and grabbed cabs back to Tinpan
Alley where the night descended into the usual melee.
Sunday I went to the orphanage to give my group their presents (see
Dec 15). The games I'd brought were in constant rotation from one
console to the next and after a flurry of
"Very thank you teacher!!"
I was a bit of a spare wheel so left the lads to it, and went
outside to hang out with the younger kids playing in the freezing cold
outside.
And that is basically, another year in Korea! Merry Christmas, or as
they say over here- "Merry
Curistmasuh!"
p.s. I always promise to update from the UK, but it ain't easy from there
for various reasons (most of them being Guinness)- so let's just say
that anything you get out of me in the next few weeks is a bonus OK?
18 December
16 December
Two things you see in the back of taxis:
1. Adverts for scary fortune tellers
I love how there's a huge choice of them in the one advert;
"Hmm, now am I looking for a
down-to-earth guy in a suit, or the fruitcake lady wearing a lace hood
whose name means 'Fairy Nymph'?"
Hint- it doesn't matter,
they'll all charge you 2,000 won a minute to say you've got a lot on
your mind but a change is coming soon
2. FREE CHEWING GUM!!
but just try getting some money out of the box on the top- the hole
is way too narrow to get your fingers in.
Gameboy update: I'm sorted! Details in yesterday's comments
15 December
Couldn't think of anything to write about yesterday and it made me
think about whether I shouldn't hang up my bloggers hat (it's like a
top hat but shorter). Then I see this guy wearing something a Brazilian
favela dweller would refuse to wear whilst painting their shack
and I can't help but share it.
Last night I tried to do some Christmas shopping for the kids at the
orphanage- they want a "Hand game" (meaning a Gameboy or something
similar) but it turns out there are about 8 kinds of Gameboy ranging
from cheap as chips to dead expensive and, having apparently turned
into my Dad, I had no idea what the difference between them all was.
I spent a very frustrating hour talking to various vendors who had a
couple of 'Gameboy Color's- well I need five the same, so he'd go
running off to all of the other guys in the market trying to track down
some more...then come back with four. Another guy would have three
'Gambeboy Advance' and he'd go running off and..well you get the
message.
Anyway it turns out that you can play most of the games whichever
one you pick so I'm going back to get a mixed bag of models, the kids
can knife-fight to the death to see who gets whichever one is deemed
the coolest. Ho ho ho.
13 December
After the weekends shameful behaviour I think my sleep patterns are
back to normal now, went to bed at a
reasonable time last night and woke up 20 minutes before my alarm
clock.
I mean yes, I had wet
the bed, but I'm pretty sure I would've woken up naturally anyway.
In celebration of being back to my classy best (today I'm wearing a
black roll neck jumper with slacks, like a 60s jazz musician) here are
some photos I took when Doc and I went to the Korean National Cemetery
last weekend.
This huge National Memorial park is dedicated to soldiers who died
in the Korean war, and other nationals of note- it's an incredible
place, there are huge statues, tanks, artillery guns and planes,
dramatic scenery and, well, loads and loads of graves.
On three sides of the memorial park there is a mountain / huge hill,
and
although around sunset we saw a lot of hikers coming down from the
mountain, there seems to be a wall going around the top of it. My best
guess is that this is in place to stop people coming into the Cemetery
late at night and smashing up the graves (some former Presidents are
buried
here so it's always a possibility), but there is a chacne it's there
for
Wolverines and other creatures of the night.
A stream runs through the grounds, and a pretty heavy snowfall the
day before we went made everything look like a (slightly macabre)
Christmas card scene. The sunlight was perfect too, me and Doc couldn't
believe there weren't more people around.
Strangely though, throughout
the park there are speakers, which pipe out a kind of sad sounding
classical music, like the soundtrack to a movie, to me the only
possible
logic behind doing this is that people coming to visit
the grave of a loved one might not be feeling quite sad
enough, so it's best to lay on a few tunes just to really tug at the
heart strings.
The weather, as you can probably tell, was pretty damn cold and my
camera froze up before we got to a building in the centre of the
complex which was a kind of shrine with a list of all of the people
buried there. If you look at the third photo, the huge number "22"
tells you which plot you're in, and the shrine in the centre showed a
list of who was buried in which plot, row, and column so you didn't
spend all day reading gravestones before finding who you were looking
for.
Dotted around next to the various lists of names in this building
were flowers, and photos of young men in army uniforms, graduation
robes, or childhood snapshots. Putting a face to some of the names, was
pretty sobering, especially as in front of one photo a middle-aged guy
was bowing and leaving shots of soju and snacks in tribute to whoever
it was he'd lost.
For the record then, if I die taking a bullet for Lee Hyo-Ri and
am buried as a Korean National Hero, the photo above is the one I'd
like to be placed
next to my name. I think it's great, looks like I'm either composing a
heartbreaking ode
to the futility of war, or trying to remember where I left my keys.
12 December
Well it turns out that jetlag is contagious- Rich my (mate from
England who's over here for a few weeks) gave it to me, and on Saturday
I woke up at a new record 9:30pm. Not sure exactly what time I went to
bed, but I'm guessing I must have had at least 15 hours sleep, which
I'm pretty sure is not normal.
Friday night started off quite pleasantly, a few beers in Itaewon
with Emily, Heidi and Bo-Heon. They had to be up early on Saturday so
me and Rich went on our own to Bricx and met Tim. Tim thought it would
be a good idea to drink a few shots of tequilla, which obviously set
the night on a bit of a downward spiral. Polly's Kettle House, Soho,
Spy Bar, then back to mine to drink whatever was left in the house and
talk to my brother about the World Cup draw.
Hey I've just thought, maybe the chicken sticks we bought on the
street were laced with knockout drops!
Finally getting myself together on Saturday, I met up with Rich and
we jumped in a cab to Hongdae, first stop: noodle heaven at the
Japanese ramen shop.
I was feeling decidedly shaky whilst eating, and had a feeling this
might not be the last time I see those particular noodles.
Sure enough, as soon as we get a few metres out of the door of the
restaurant, I'm hunched over a gutter calling for some guy called
"Ralph"- with steam rising from the still-warm noodles on the ground.
There are no photos of this, my moment of shame (which I guess is
the advantage of being the guy who holds the camera) but I can assure
you it was not a pretty sight.
Met Rachel-Lynn and (Candian) Shelly with there workmate Peter in
Tinpan Alley, then on further exploring found that (English) Shelly and
Tim were also in there- everyone was more drunk than me, and before I
knew what was what, there were folks dancing on the tables, a couple
practically shagging in front of us, and two Korean guys trying
manfully to stand up, put their coats on, and leave the bar after
splitting an entire bottle of Tequilla.
It was all a bit much for my delicate head, I was pleased to go to
Liquid where sitting around talking quietly was the order of the day.
No club, and not much drinking- oh I was a shadow of my true self, let
me tell you.
9 December
My buddy Rich is in Seoul on business, installing a tiny Scale of
Justice called a 'Mass Spectrometer' in the government prosecution
services building.
Because he's so incredibly flash he's staying in the
Millenium Hilton Hotel where I went to meet him last night, and let me
tell you, if you thought Christmas was a bit half-hearted in Korea, you
haven't been to the Millenium Hilton.
The lobby features a 20 foot rotating Christmas tree, half of the
staff are dressed up like Jolly Old Saint Nick, and there's an
International Santa convention display...
I may have been here too long to tell now, but wouldn't 'blacking
up' the Santas from Papua New Guinea and Kenya be considered a little
odd in the West?
Great display anyway, the nativity scene really reminded me of a
crisp Christmas morning mass back in Armthorpe. The smell of the
incense, the sound of the carols, the desperately wanting it all to be
over so I can go back and play with my Tomy Shark Attack. I absolutely
love Christmas by the way, so expect more of this kind of stuff in the
coming weeks.
8 December
China- last few pics
After having to stop every 20 minutes to let me take photos, the
taxi driver laughed his head off when I gave him a slip of paper with
the address of a camera shop on it. The area where he dropped me off
was pretty much your typical high street- McDonalds at the top, Pizza
Hut at the bottom, department stores and jewellry shops all of the way
down. One thing I didn't understand though was that outside the main
bank, dodgy guys were changing money- from what to what I don't know-
is there a weird black market US Dollar thing going on?
Anyhoo there wasn't much I wanted to buy and the gale blowing in
from the seafront was kicking up loads of dust so I was glad to get
back to the hotel where I saw Walter and Patrick. We had a couple of
beers, talked about football for a while (when Americans meet
strangers, what the hell do they find to talk about?) and the
stereotypes that Dutch people are tight with money, Belgians are
stupid, and Englishfolk can't walk into a bar without smashing it up
(all only partially true by the way), then went for dinner.
All in all Qingdao had the feeling of an out-of-season seaside town.
There were things to see and do, but with no sun shining on the beach
it was kind of dreary in places. Living in Korea you don't see many
people begging, and when they do it's normally very passive. In Qingdao
I was approached by women with rosy cheeks and infants on their back,
and toothelss old couples wearing shabby blue work uniforms and caps.
I'm sure they, along with all of the people on the street hawking
cutlery, buddhist beads, cab rides and restaurant seats, will make a
lot more money when the Olympic sailing events are held in Qingdao as
part of Beijing 2008. About the only local products that prised the
money from my tightly shut wallet was the good old Tsingtao beer.
7 December
"Anyong! My name is Mr Oh, I run a printing shop near Gwanghwamun
and last week a very handsome young man asked me to print for him a
calendar of such magnificence I have barely been able to sleep since!
"Over the course of 12 months, the calendar he had me produce
depicts a sumptious visual smorgasboard of Korea, the likes of
which I have never seen before.
Some say that it is only through an outsider's eyes that we can glimpse
the true soul of a nation, and this being the case, James is the man
whose lens lays our nation bare.
"It was an honour for me to print this calendar, and I did so on the
finest glossy A4 paper, ring
bound at the top, and at the lowest possible price (which was certainly
a lot cheaper than those robbing ba***rds at Kinko's quoted him).
"However, due to a limited print run of 20- we are still talking
15,000 won, plus postage and however much a brown envelope costs.
"James acknowledges that this is not exactly the bargain of the
century, but what the hell, it's not like he's making a profit, just
offloading the spares he expects to have left over since his friends
and family are getting pretty sick of this endless 'Hey, look what I made now!'
nonsense.
"Anyone wishing to get one of these little beauties, should send
James an email to his usual address- in the unlikely event of them
running out, the emails he receives first will scoop the bounty! (Or I
suppose he'll get some more printed)
"Please excuse my english, she is not so good. Wihiya!"
6 December
When I asked about tour buses to Laoshan, it looked as though I'd
have to wait around for ages and then be driven to various "factory
tours" where people would try and sell me stuff. Much simpler to just
hire a taxi for 300 RMB (less than 40 US dollars, about 20 quid) who
would then drive me there, wait until I'd done my tourist thing, then
run me back into town.
As we made our way out of the city it because pretty obvious that
the taxi in front of us were heading in the same direction, and that if
I could easily have shared a cab with the two european looking fellas
with savings all round.
As we cleared the new high rise hotels and demolition sites
(presumably buildings being cleared to build more high-rise hotels) we
started to drive along a coastal road over looking a lovely seascape.
Feeling a bit cheeky, I asked the cabbie to pull over and let me take a
few snaps. What the hell I thought, I was probably paying this guy well
over the odds anyway. The guys in the other cab had the same thought
(i.e. they ripped me off) and I found out they were Walter and Patrick
from Holland and Belgium.
On the leisurely 40 minute drive to the mountain I got my cab driver
to stop a few different times- once for a huge temple at the side of
the road (no idea what it was) and once when I saw a bunch of fishing
boats that looked like they were about to crumble into dust. My driver
was a nice guy in his 40s who looked like he'd been sleeping in his
clothes for the past week. He basically thought I was a complete
mentalist for taking photos of old women fishing and random rocks-
whilst I thought he should probably zip up his fly and not adjust the
radio whilst holding his mobile phone in the other hand and driving
with this knees- we got on pretty well though.
When we arrived at the mountain, he dropped me off a small tea house
where a woman selling over-priced green tea (and clearly giving a
commission to the cab driver) poured out a few cups of cha
grown in the grounds of the local temple. As I was negotiating my
purchase another guy showed up who was an english guide to the temple.
This was basically the pattern for the whole trip- every time I stayed
in one place for more than a minute, someone would come up and try and
either sell me something, or take me to a place where someone else
would try and sell me something. For a communist country, these folks
have got the hustle down to an art form.
As the guide took me to the entrance of the temple, Walter and
Patrick showed up, clutching souvenirs hustled to them by their
cheerful lady driver. The guys worked for a shipping company and were
kicking back on their free day after a safety conference at Qingdao
port- we decided to join up and make a little tour group for the guide
who was urging us on.
English is pretty much my first language (after Jive), and I'm well
used to interpreting asian accents- but for Walter and Patrick, the
guide was pretty much a random syllable generator who got in the way of
their photos. He showed us around the Taoist temple and told us (well,
me) the various practices to observe. Basically Taoism seems to be a
collection of mad superstitions, when you walked through a temple
doorway men had to use their left foot first, to gain good fortune
there was a pond where you had to gently place a coin so that it would
float, there was a lucky tree to pat three times and gods of various
flavours to pray to depending on what you wanted out of life.
In one room there was a statue where men could pray for the heavens
to send them a wife. I thought about it but..
Although there was probably more to see in the area (the cable car
to the top of the mountain was closed, but there was a waterfall and
hiking paths), it had started to rain a little, and the cab driver was
eager to drive me to a restaurant where there owner had given him a
backhander, so I left my europals and headed back into town.
(more photos later)
5 December
"Ch-ch-ch-ch-China! Turn and face
China, (ch-ch-chinaaaa!)" David Bowie- 'China Girl'
Qingdao is a port city just a hop skip and a jump (1hr 40 mins) away
from Korea. I flew over on Friday night just after finishing work, and
boy were my arms tired (sorry).
Before this trip I'd been to Hong Kong and Shanghai, but Qingdao was
nothing like either- I've read there are a couple of million people in
the city, but most of them must have been on holiday since it really
didn't seem like a particularly bustling place to me. The taxi ride
from the airport was a bit of an eye-opener, we went past 8,000
(approx.) factories, mostly making cars and car parts, saw a lot of
spit and sawdust restaurants next to neon-lit Korean nightclubs (lots
of Koreans travel there for business or golf), couples travelling to
work on one bicycle wearing military style workers uniforms, and a team
of guys digging up the road using shovels and pickaxes.
It was long way from the ritz of either Shanghai or Hong Kong, the
two Chinese(ish) places I'd previously been to.
At the hotel I asked one of the guys on the door how to get to
downtown and he pointed me in the direction of a row of restaurants 10
minutes walk away. Qingdao is on the coast, so seafood was the order of
the day and when I eventually picked a restaurant, it was set up with a
couple of rows of fish tanks at the entrance.
Each tank held a kind of fish or crustacean whose life was about to
come to a very tasty end- I call it 'Death roe'.
Facing the tanks was a table of vegetable dishes to choose from, and
behind that were a bunch of Chinese guys staring at me and making me
self-concious.
The food was excellent, and in fact I went back to the same area the
next day for another feast. I realise endless photos of food aren't
everybody's thing- but here's a quick look at some of the bizarre
nonsense I ate over the course of two days (hover cursor over it to see
an explanation, click and pick "all sizes" for a closer look).
It's hard to pick what was my favourite thing because most of it was
so, so good. But the low points were definitely when I a whole chilli
pepper, nearly exploded, then spent the next five minutes trying to rub
the burning pain off my tongue with a paper napkin, and tasting the
flesh of a crazy sea urchin covered in spikes and cooked with egg and
tomato to find that it tasted like...egg and tomato.
Food is pretty cheap in China (Lostseouls:
first with the obvious) a meal like this with beers and rice
costs about 10 US dollars per person.
After the meal on Friday night I walked around looking for, well-
first of all a bar with any westerners in it, then when I didn't find
that I settled for a bar with anyone at all in it.
When I didn't find that, I decided to just settle for any bar, then
when that fell through I searched for a shop that sold whiskey, then
when that wasn't happening a shop that sold something other than
Chinese firewater, before finally abandoning all hope I found the way
back to the hotel.
On the way back to the hotel I got talking to a local guy who was
studying hotel management at Qingdao university- who confirmed that I
hadn't missed the downtown area, the strip of restaurants was the downtown area, and that
the main attraction in the area, was the mountain a short drive away
called Laoshan. So I turned in early and woke up at the crack of 9:30am
to set off for the mountain...
2 December
Last night, despite feeling like someone had taken my batteries out
and stuffed my head full of cotton wool, I had a quick errand to run
near Gwanghwamun (more on that another day). Coming out of the subway
station I could smell smoke, and on the steps going up to street level
were scores of policemen decked out in riot gear.
It turns out that a hundreds of angry farmers had blocked off the
street for a protesting over some rice quotas or something. I've tried
to read up on the subject but frankly it's dull, and let's not kid
ourselves that anyone comes here looking for insights into Korean
current affairs.
These kinds of protests regularly happen in Jong-no (and Myeong-dong
and Seoul Station and City Hall etc. etc.)- my buddy SaeJin used to be
one of the Police conscripts that had to stand there for hours, waiting
to see if anything would kick off.
When I was there it didn't seem like much was going on, a few speeches,
a bit of flag waving- I mean who can get excited about
"What
do we want?"
"The annulment of a proposed increase
in the rice import quota in return for a 10-year grace period before an
open market system!"
"When do we want it?"
"Now!"
However it seems as though I'd already missed the action- here's a
photo I took at Gwanghwamun at around 19:30
and here's the same area several hours earlier when the police turned
the water canons on
(stolen from Korea Times website)
No wonder everyone was crowded around bonfires.
1 December
In honour of the season of advent that is now upon us (December for
any hell-bound heathens) I nearly started a very exciting "On the first day of Christmas.." feature today that would have
shown had a great Korean item
to buy every day from now till the 25th.
Some of the stuff would be the kind of thing you'd really like to own,
some would have really made you think about
the issues of the day and some would have been good old "Hey look!
Asian people have different stuff!!" fodder. Basically it would
have been a
barnstormer.
However, I thought about it, and realised there was a lot of work
involved, so instead, here are some people stood outside a shop window.
If you like, we can pretend they're looking at Christmas food.
Around The World
On 80 Quid Helen
has just finished a round the world trip- I suggest you go and read all
about it.
Gingermark
everyone's seen gingers- some people have even spoken to them, but have
you ever actually read what they think? You can here
Rory's What Not To Do
In Australia, after leaving the East coast, Rory is trying to
integrate back into normal society. Well, Australia anyway.
Wyatt is an American
who can understand Korean well enough to explain the quirkier parts of
K-pop culture to the rest of us mouthbreathers, and also loads of those
chinese squiggles.
I would call Seoulstyle
a blog, but it's more like pages from Korean Vogue. Find out where
girls like Liza are going to as they whisk past you in a flash car.
My good buddy Rachel
Lynn's site cute kids, boundless enthusiasm and more photos than
me. YES!
Oregon farm boy turned Juicy Girl expert American Mark
Chaz
Banglang is not his real name however all his 'my girl done me
wrong' stories are true!
Shawn's
blog. He's in China doing/writing about new stuff, but all the
archives are still a great way to learn about living in the RoK.
Shawn has also written a book!
Joel is an
ex-door knocker for the Mormons, and yet somehow is still cool
Fat Custard
It's amazing how much good stuff there is on the Internet, and not all
of it is porn. Download the magazine you find here and you'll LOL or
I'll give you your money back. ProperTop
Quality Northern (English) Internet humour 'webzine'. Citizen Erased
Great alternative music site with a busy message board Beer In The
Evening
Pubs, pubs, pubs, england's greatest asset catologued and reviewed. Richard Massey
One of my best friends went missing from New York City, Christmas 2003.
I miss you mate.
