Day 5 Fri 7/31
Part 1: The DMZ- demilitarized zone
Today Maggie and I went to the DMZ, demilitarized zone between North and South Korea. Because North Korea is a communist country, no travel is allowed and no one is allowed out of the country. There are four different bridges for the DMZ, but we only went to the third one because it was the closest to Seoul, where we got on our tour bus. Our tour guide was Clara, a cute girl from Seoul with braces who was about 20, accompanied by a man in front of us who acted as a second tour guide because he had just been to the war museum and clearly wanted to talk about it. In 1953, the demilitarized zone was established, but South Korea actually never signed off on it, so it's really an agreement between North Korea and the United Nations. We started at the JSA, joint security area, where we saw a PowerPoint about the history and random facts, shown by two US soldiers. There is a freedom village in the DMZ, that doesn't belong to North or South Korea and is constantly protected (home to a few lucky wealthy people who don't have to pay taxes to either country). We went to the line and saw the ROK (South Korean) soldiers standing guard against North Korea. There was one North Korean man on the opposite side of the line holding the fort down checking out the tour group with binoculars. We were able to go into a conference room and cross over into North Korea, where we got good pictures officially standing in North Korea. We also went to site seeing areas to get a view of North Korea from a distance and take pictures, but at a strictly enforced distance. On the tour, we also got to go down to one of the tunnels South Korea found that North Korea was trying to dig through the South for attack. We put on helmets and got to walk 2 kilometers at an 11 degree decline (ouch to the knees) to see through to the North's side of the cave. Luckily, we wore helmets, because I banged my head on the top of the tunnel at least twenty times. People over here are just shorter than the average American. The DMZ was something I will probably never get to do again.
On the ride back from the DMZ, we stopped at a train station that was worldly important. If South Korea and North Korea reunite, people would have access all around Europe and Asia through the connecting railroads. While we were sitting in chairs in the station talking to each other, a Korean visitor from another tour bus came up and stood as close as he could to Maggie without touching her. While I'm sitting there staring thinking what the h are you doing, Maggie and I turn to see people taking a picture of him (us). Yes, this forty something Koan man was trying to snap himself into a picture with us, people with blonde hair. Weird. We got up and posed for a picture with him. He was ecstatic. Afterwards, Maggie got another photo request, funny Koreans.
Part 2: The Day in Seoul
We got done with the DMZ tour around 3:30, then Maggie showed me some of the popular parts of Seoul. First, we went to Myeong-dong that was a lot like the heart of Madrid. The city had streets packed with people and popular stores, all three stories high. There was a ZARA and Forever 21, but we weren't able to buy much, because there is just no room to jam more stuff in a tiny backpack. After the light shopping, we went to see the palace, which happened to be closed, but I saw it and got a picture outside to document it. The last part of town Maggie showed me was Insa-Dong, that was an outdoor street filled with souvenirs and old restaurants. We walked around a lot of the little stores and checked out the cute Korean souvenirs for sale, like chop sticks and graphic socks. We finished the day with a trip to the PC bang, which was the computer room where you pay a little bit of money for a computer, with Internet access. The Koreans love their video games, so you can imagine it was a packed house, Friday night at the PC bang.
Friday, August 31, 2012
Thursday, August 30, 2012
South Korea - day 4
Day 4 Thurs 7/30
The jet lag really hit me today. I feel like I could sleep all day. Maggie dragged me out of bed at noon to go to lunch with her bosses. We went to a Korean restaurant and took off our shoes when we entered the restaurant. We sat on not so comfy sitting place mats and wore eating aprons. We ate duck that we cooked in front of us and wrapped it in lettuce. I learned that in Korea they calculate age differently then us. When you are born, you are born at year 1 and at the Chinese new year everybody ages a year. In Korea I am actually 23 instead of 21. For desert we had coffee with a creamer in it that was extremely hot. We took the rest of Maggie's stuff to be mailed home to the post office and went by her friends English academy to pick up the a phone to use for the trip. In the afternoon Maggie talked me into going to the jimjilbang, which was an experience to say the least. A jimjilbang is a place where Koreans hang out and it has about everything you could possibly need. When you go in, you pay eight dollars and are given a towel, a locker key, and some pajamas. As you enter the locker room, you find naked Korean women. Everywhere. The locker room was similar to one you'd find at la fitness and from there, you can go two directions. The first choice you have is to enter a room to the left that has lots of pools, showers, areas to sit and wash yourself, and benches for body scrub services. The second option is to go the hallway on the right, and go to the communal area where the guys and girls are together. First, we joined the naked Koreans and went in the pool room. Being totally nude in front of dozens of people is really something that does not come naturally. I was very hesitant to the thought of it, but once you get there and everyone is naked, you'd be the odd man out to keep clothes on. So we showered, went in all the different pools, bathed ourselves in public, and just hung out nude. Interesting right. We bought shampoo, conditioner, and body scrub to use to wash. Before we left the room, we decided to cap off the experience with a body scrub. It felt really good, but it was a little interesting having someone move you around and scrub you down butt naked. Afterwards, we put on our pajamas and went into the guys and girls section. There was a restaurant, many different sauna rooms, a workout center, a kids area, and a sleep room. We tried out all the equipment in the workout room. The saunas were pretty cool. They were all at different temperatures, from hot to cold, with different aromas to take in as you sat in them. The last sauna was hot and made of flooring of hard metal balls, which were relaxing as you laid/rolled on them. We got pictures in it. For dinner, we enjoyed a good American pasta from Outback steakhouse. Maggie wanted to go back to her school to say goodbye to her Tuesday/Thursday students so we did that and she told all five classes about her banker that told her this morning, "I hope to meet you again before we both die" haha, they loved it. We went to a cafe to find wifi after the visit and are getting up early in the morning to go to the DMZ.
The jet lag really hit me today. I feel like I could sleep all day. Maggie dragged me out of bed at noon to go to lunch with her bosses. We went to a Korean restaurant and took off our shoes when we entered the restaurant. We sat on not so comfy sitting place mats and wore eating aprons. We ate duck that we cooked in front of us and wrapped it in lettuce. I learned that in Korea they calculate age differently then us. When you are born, you are born at year 1 and at the Chinese new year everybody ages a year. In Korea I am actually 23 instead of 21. For desert we had coffee with a creamer in it that was extremely hot. We took the rest of Maggie's stuff to be mailed home to the post office and went by her friends English academy to pick up the a phone to use for the trip. In the afternoon Maggie talked me into going to the jimjilbang, which was an experience to say the least. A jimjilbang is a place where Koreans hang out and it has about everything you could possibly need. When you go in, you pay eight dollars and are given a towel, a locker key, and some pajamas. As you enter the locker room, you find naked Korean women. Everywhere. The locker room was similar to one you'd find at la fitness and from there, you can go two directions. The first choice you have is to enter a room to the left that has lots of pools, showers, areas to sit and wash yourself, and benches for body scrub services. The second option is to go the hallway on the right, and go to the communal area where the guys and girls are together. First, we joined the naked Koreans and went in the pool room. Being totally nude in front of dozens of people is really something that does not come naturally. I was very hesitant to the thought of it, but once you get there and everyone is naked, you'd be the odd man out to keep clothes on. So we showered, went in all the different pools, bathed ourselves in public, and just hung out nude. Interesting right. We bought shampoo, conditioner, and body scrub to use to wash. Before we left the room, we decided to cap off the experience with a body scrub. It felt really good, but it was a little interesting having someone move you around and scrub you down butt naked. Afterwards, we put on our pajamas and went into the guys and girls section. There was a restaurant, many different sauna rooms, a workout center, a kids area, and a sleep room. We tried out all the equipment in the workout room. The saunas were pretty cool. They were all at different temperatures, from hot to cold, with different aromas to take in as you sat in them. The last sauna was hot and made of flooring of hard metal balls, which were relaxing as you laid/rolled on them. We got pictures in it. For dinner, we enjoyed a good American pasta from Outback steakhouse. Maggie wanted to go back to her school to say goodbye to her Tuesday/Thursday students so we did that and she told all five classes about her banker that told her this morning, "I hope to meet you again before we both die" haha, they loved it. We went to a cafe to find wifi after the visit and are getting up early in the morning to go to the DMZ.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
South Korea - days 2&3
Day 2 Tues. 7/28
I have arrived, luckily. Through the typhoon that is supposed to be hitting any time this week, it was a miracle that the plane landed. It was a super rough landing. I got to the airport around 7, exchanged currency, got through customs and luggage, and got on the train to Gimpo. Unfortunately, when I finally got in touch with Maggie, she was at Incheon, so I waited at the train station for about an hour for her to come back and meet me. Asia reminds me a lot of Madrid, in the way the streets are set up and the way the streets look. After car, plane, train, and bus, I finally made it to my sister's apartment. It was pretty exciting, because I hadn't seen Maggie in a year. Around 11 Maggie took me to my first Korean meal, her favorite, Korean BBQ. It was pretty cool because we had a grill in the middle of our table and cooked our own pork. I tried kimchi for the first time, which was a little spicy, but tasty. Maggie's coworker Sam came and ate with us for the end of the meal. It was fun to meet her first friend. Sometimes I forget to think about her friends since she's in Korea. We went home and got to sleep around 12:30.
Day 3 Wed. 7/29
Woke up around 10. Went to another good Korean meal and ate bulgogi, a soup with beef and rice and egg noodles in it. After, we walked through the outdoor market, which was cool, but smelled pretty fishy. Around 12:40 we went to 7/11 and gave some of her students parents some "giveaways", then she showed me the school, and I went on another so successful jog up a mountain at the end of her road. I went back to her place, showered, then went to visit her at school. The kids were very cute. She taught seven classes, all at different levels. Six of the classes were more intermediate and the last class was advanced, called Chung dahm. The kids all looked shocked when I walked into the room, which was fun, but in a lot of the classes, I felt like I was repeating a lot. For one of her classes, she left to go to a meeting, and I got to teach the class for twenty minutes, which I loved. She finished up at her English academy at 10 and we went to eat with a lot of Maggie's friends afterwards. One of her best friends, Kayti, also finished up her teaching in Korea this semester and it was a pretty sad goodbye. Sam was also there tonight, along with some of her other good friends, Carla, Brynn, Joseph, Alex, and Sam. There were about twenty of us, and we ate another Korean dish. It was a lot of rice and seaweed, mixed with some Korean noodles. There was also some delicious pork served with it and we got beer with it as well. Afterwards, we went and sat on some non flowing fountain stairs overlooking the highways with her friends. It was really pretty and a good time for Maggie's last night with all friends and my introduction to her friends. It started raining a little bit and we moved under the wooden shelter nearby. It was really fun and everyone said their final goodbyes. I really like her friends, they were from all over, a lot from different states. All of them were really funny and outgoing, what else to expect from people willing to teach English in Korea. We took a ten minute cab ride home with Sam, back to Maggie's apartment around 4:00 am. Overall, would say it was a great first night out in Korea.
I have arrived, luckily. Through the typhoon that is supposed to be hitting any time this week, it was a miracle that the plane landed. It was a super rough landing. I got to the airport around 7, exchanged currency, got through customs and luggage, and got on the train to Gimpo. Unfortunately, when I finally got in touch with Maggie, she was at Incheon, so I waited at the train station for about an hour for her to come back and meet me. Asia reminds me a lot of Madrid, in the way the streets are set up and the way the streets look. After car, plane, train, and bus, I finally made it to my sister's apartment. It was pretty exciting, because I hadn't seen Maggie in a year. Around 11 Maggie took me to my first Korean meal, her favorite, Korean BBQ. It was pretty cool because we had a grill in the middle of our table and cooked our own pork. I tried kimchi for the first time, which was a little spicy, but tasty. Maggie's coworker Sam came and ate with us for the end of the meal. It was fun to meet her first friend. Sometimes I forget to think about her friends since she's in Korea. We went home and got to sleep around 12:30.
Day 3 Wed. 7/29
Woke up around 10. Went to another good Korean meal and ate bulgogi, a soup with beef and rice and egg noodles in it. After, we walked through the outdoor market, which was cool, but smelled pretty fishy. Around 12:40 we went to 7/11 and gave some of her students parents some "giveaways", then she showed me the school, and I went on another so successful jog up a mountain at the end of her road. I went back to her place, showered, then went to visit her at school. The kids were very cute. She taught seven classes, all at different levels. Six of the classes were more intermediate and the last class was advanced, called Chung dahm. The kids all looked shocked when I walked into the room, which was fun, but in a lot of the classes, I felt like I was repeating a lot. For one of her classes, she left to go to a meeting, and I got to teach the class for twenty minutes, which I loved. She finished up at her English academy at 10 and we went to eat with a lot of Maggie's friends afterwards. One of her best friends, Kayti, also finished up her teaching in Korea this semester and it was a pretty sad goodbye. Sam was also there tonight, along with some of her other good friends, Carla, Brynn, Joseph, Alex, and Sam. There were about twenty of us, and we ate another Korean dish. It was a lot of rice and seaweed, mixed with some Korean noodles. There was also some delicious pork served with it and we got beer with it as well. Afterwards, we went and sat on some non flowing fountain stairs overlooking the highways with her friends. It was really pretty and a good time for Maggie's last night with all friends and my introduction to her friends. It started raining a little bit and we moved under the wooden shelter nearby. It was really fun and everyone said their final goodbyes. I really like her friends, they were from all over, a lot from different states. All of them were really funny and outgoing, what else to expect from people willing to teach English in Korea. We took a ten minute cab ride home with Sam, back to Maggie's apartment around 4:00 am. Overall, would say it was a great first night out in Korea.
Sunday, August 26, 2012
Asia - 2012 begins
Day 1 8/27/12 - I'm beginning my next world travels around Asia for 3 months with my sister. We'll be living in backpacks and sleeping in hostels for the most of the trip. The trip has just begun. I'm sitting in the Atl airport waiting to catch my flight to San Francisco where I have a connecting flight to Korea to meet up with Maggie, since she has been teaching over there for a year. SO EXCITED!!
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