Shayne and Jo Take Over the World (Asia)

Homeward bound...cue the Simon and Garfunkle

2007-08-10T04:48:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Well, old friends, this is it. The final blog we'll be writing from Asia. It's hard to believe we've been gone for thirteen months. It feels like only yesterday that Shayne was writing his great blubbering farewell to Canada magnus opus.

We fly from Singapore to Hong Kong and then from there to Vancouver. We'll be traveling for around 17 hours and we'll definitely be in need of some slurpees and donairs upon arrival (Jo's note: Shayne will...I'll settle for some KD).

But enough about us...on to Thailand.

So we last left off in Bangkok and from there we took a midnight bus to the small island of Koh Tao. Koh Tao is famous for diving and not really for its beaches so we weren't expecting much.

Still, as you can see:

It wasn't all that bad.

Awww just like home.

As a little travel advisory if you ever end up on Koh Tao avoid AC Resort at all costs. The place was absolute rubbish. We've stayed at some of the cheaptest, dirtiest places you can imagine (we're talking cockroaches, garbage left all over the place, etc) and yet we'll always remember this as the crappiest place we stayed at in Asia.

The worst part is we paid quite a bit to stay there expecting to have a semi-comfortable place to relax, but from leaving toilet waste in the room for days (you can't flush over here) to yelling at us when we were brazen enough to ask for more toilet paper when we ran out, the place sucked in all ways imaginable. Anyway, just remember: AC RESORT SUCKS.

Thanks for that rant.

Now, on the other hand, Crystal Dive Resort was everything we hoped for. Clean, affordable, full of friendly staff, and they even had HBO.

And check out the bathrooms they have:

That's right, you can sit on the toilet while you enjoy your very own waterfall. They upgraded us to this deluxe suite when our TV broke. Lovely fellows.

We had planned to just snorkel for a few days but after seeing how much fun the divers were having we decided to finally get our scuba licenses.

We got our open water diving licenses and liked it so much we decided to keep going and get our advanced open water licenses and our nitrox certifications. We've now completed nine dives and done night dives, deep water dives, and we even managed to swim with some sharks (a life changing experience to say the least).

Jo on the dive boat with a friend from Belgium.

Our instructor Justin Mayers. Contrary to the picture (it was weird hat day) he was a great great guy and we were really lucky to have him as our instructor. We didn't hold the fact that he was British against him.

Here's some fish that we saw on our dive (photos are courtesy of Justin). He has the photos from the shark dive too and hopefully we'll be able to post them soon. These are buttefly fish, by the way.

More fish: squirrelfish this time.

And yet again...more fish...this time some species of angelfish.

After spending a few weeks in Thailand and falling in love with diving we didn't have enough time or money to continue on to Malayasia, so we made the decision to fly directly to Singapore (truth be told the idea of a 24 hour bus ride wasn't that appealing).

Singapore's like a dream. It's safe, has drinkable water, toilets that flush paper, and is probably the cleanest place we've ever seen (thanks to iron clad laws that involve death and caning).

A good example of its classic British architecture.

A part of modern Singapore's skyline.

Shayne in front of a famous theatre (whose name he's much too lazy to look up).

Jo shopping up a storm in Little India.

This is from Orchard Street which is home to the best shopping in Singapore. Needless to say we looked around for a few minutes and got our sandal wearing, sweat covered, empty walleted butts back to the wrong side of the tracks.

And here you can see a bustling alley in Chinatown.

Well there ya' have it. The final two weeks of our trip in blog format. I'm sure you noticed that the quality of our blogs got less and less as our trip got longer and longer.

Hopefully a few of you stuck around long enough to make it to the end. Anyway, overdrawn goodbyes are nonsense... so

See ya soon.

Cheers

Shayne and Jo

P.S - check back for a few more trip related blogs. Hopefully we'll post once we recover from jetlag.

P.P.S - always dive with the French...words to live by

B to the Kok

2007-08-06T08:22:00.000-07:00

Greetings

We spent the last four days getting our open water diving licenses, and now that we have a minute or two to relax we figured it was time for a blog. We still have about five more dives to do here (we're going for advanced) so we'll do a quick blog on Bangkok and then another one on Koh Tao later.

This is the temple of the Emerald Buddha. We could only get outside shots because the royal family was inside and security was super tight. The plus side is that we did get to see some princes and princesses. Alrighttttttttttttttttt.

They love their King here. They really really do. These giant pictures are everywhere and it's illegal to say anything bad about the guy. I figure Jo will be out in about six months for the joke she made about him and the monkey.

Another photo that was about the size of BC.

We were lucky enough to be in Bangkok on a holiday and caught the royal procession cruising around. From what we were told this was one of the Prince's cars.

This guy reminds me of my inlaws (just kidding Jill) . This guy was similar to the ones we saw in Korean temples only a hell of a lot bigger.

Jo stylin' and profilin' in front of another temple.

We're in Koh Tao for three more days then we're off to Kuala Lumpur then finally Singapore. It's crazy to think our wonderful vacation will soon be over. Stay tuned for a blog about our diving.

Cheers

Shayne and Jo

Angkor what?

2007-07-26T05:52:00.000-07:00

Greetings

We tried several times to update the site in Cambodia but between our 1996 connection speeds and blackouts we could never manage to upload the pictures.

It took us 7 hours to get from Cambodia to Thailand and we were on a bus with no shocks on a dirt road. After that it was another 5 hours or so to get to Bangkok.

Right now we're in Bangkok waiting for another bus to come so I figured I might as well get the Cambodian update out of the way while I still can.

And what a better way to get started then by introducing you to the pride of Cambodia...

They might not have paved roads or proper electrical grids but I'll be damned if they don't have a fine beer. It's pretty famous all across Asia but Angkor beer is a little too bold for my liking. Still, if you get a chance it's worth trying.

Here's a picture of a local funeral service we witnessed. They carry the dead body to a temple and then burn it in front of everyone.

The poverty in Cambodia is really unimaginable.Not even the Philipines or Mexico can compare to anything we saw in Siem Reap. Shacks like these were common up and down the river that was across from our hotel.

Of course the main reason to visit Cambodia is to explore the temples. Here's a shot of a door carving.

Jo relaxing in a water chamber. A few hundred years ago that little guy served as a spout. Pretty nifty stuff.

The temples are slowly fighting nature in a battle that they just won't win. Here's a shot of Jo in front of an example of a tree kicking a temple's ass.

Jo with her new found elephant friend.

Jo, again, taking a much deserved break in a temple.

Finally a shot of yours truly. Another example of nature dominating.

You might recognize this from Tomb Raider the movie.

Another shot of some of the carvings that surround each temple.

The smiling faces of Buddha. The temples are either Hindu or Buddhist. There are no statues of Christ in Cambodia.

This is Ankor Wat, the biggest religous building in the world (take that Harman, hahahah...oh).

When we were exploring the temples I noticed something moving in the jungle and upon exploring we found a city of wild monkies.

This guy must have been the King as he had several underlings that spent the afternoon eating his lice. Look at the size of his giant...

Jo must have been NUTS to climb this staircase.

Here's some proof that men have always been men. Note- the idealized form of the women. Shame on you ancient Cambodian men, shame on you.

Well, we're going to explore Bangkok for a few more hours then we're off to the island of Koh Tao to swim for a week or so.

Hopefully we'll be able to post in a few days.

Cheers

Shayne

From Karsts to Hong Kong

2007-07-22T03:01:00.000-07:00

Greetings,

We're in Cambodia now, but we should update you on our last week in China. On our last day in Yangshuo, I gave in to Shayne's dream of renting a scooter...as long as I didn't have to drive one. Despite my premonitions, we didn't crash, or get crashed into. Here're some pics...

Outside our guesthouse after signing a "stupid tourist" activity waiver.

Shayne, apparently forgetting that he's standing next to a scooter, not a Hog.

A farmer and his cows.

A water buffalo with her geese.

Old stone bridges, rice fields, and karsts...perfect.

Later that day we met up with some of the others in our group to share a local delicacy: snake. We had just about mentally prepared ourselves for what we were about to eat when they brought the sucker out!

Here she is.

And here she is again...tastes like chicken.

After our stay in Yangshuo, we boarded our last overnight train to Hong Kong. I won't miss these...

Sarah modeling the 3-tier bunk beds. They're as cozy as they look.

After a train, a walk through customs, another train, and a taxi, we finally arrived in Hong Kong.

A statue of Bruce Lee along Hong Kong's version of the Walk of Fame.

Shayne and John Woo.

More Shayne...this time with some skyscrapers.

Us at the top of Victoria Peak (now just called "The Peak").

That completes the China series...in a few days we'll post some pics from Cambodia...that is, if Shayne can get over his flu (it's strange...he keeps chirping for some reason).

Until then,
Jo

China...as imagined by non-Chinese

2007-07-18T01:19:00.000-07:00

Greetings,

Since our last blog entry we've moved from one river to another...this time to the Li River in Yangshuo. Visualize the most romantic Chinese rustic scene in your mind, and that's where we are. It's stunningly beautiful, charming, and apart from too many tourists, not too crowded. Here are some of the pictures we took...

An alley in an ancient village along the Li. If you peek in the open doorways, there are still posters of Mao (and sometimes of Lenin and Stalin) plastered on the walls.

Today we took a bike tour through the countryside. The peaks in the background are limestone karst formations, which is what this area is famous for.

More peaks and rice paddies.

Riding down dusty country lanes.

Along the way we had the opportunity to climb one of the karsts. Everyone had a "buddy" follow them up with a case of cold drinks to sell. She fanned us every time we took a break so we bought 3 drinks for completely unreasonable prices.

Shayne and I at the top (almost), with a view through the "moon mountain".

Now really at the top.

It was my birthday, so Shayne secretly ordered a cake for our group lunch in the country. Mmmmm...cake.

Another shot of Shayne on a bike.

We're almost finished our time in China (just Hong Kong left now), but we've gotten to see a lot of the country. Also, apart from the heat and humidity, we've been really lucky with the weather (it is "rainy season" after all). Here's hoping the next 3 weeks in south-east Asia will be as good.

See you in Hong Kong,

Shayne and Jo

The Mighty Yangtze

2007-07-15T06:52:00.000-07:00

Greetings,

We're in Yichang now, having spent 3 days cruising down the third longest river in the world (for those keeping track, the Mississippi was bumped to number 4 in the 1990's). Here's a few of the photos we took along the way...

Our cabin on the "Yangtze Princess". Much better than we'd expected.

The Taoist gods of health in a temple in the City of Ghosts (so named because it's believed that the god of the underworld dwells there...not because it's a ghost town, which is what I thought).

Shayne posing with one of the newer statues in the City of Ghosts. This is one of a series of demons that punish sins...Shayne took to this one right away.

The entrance to the first of the Three Gorges from the west.

It's a house...made all the cooler by the fact that it's in one of the Three Gorges.

Us in the second Gorge.

On the second day we took an excursion down a small tributary, and we spotted this up in the cliff face. If you zoom in you'll see it's a coffin...I guess the wild dogs won't get you all the way up there.

One of the many new towns and cities built along the Yangtze and its tributaries in the past 10 years or so...the townspeople's old houses are either underwater now, or soon will be.

As the river got more shallow we switched to traditional river boats guided by teams of "trackers". For how much work they did paddling us upstream, I'm amazed they were still smiling.

The view from the back.

Back on the ship in the evening we finally made it to the Three Gorges Dam and spent 3 hours going through the boat locks.

On the other side the next morning. Now Shayne can add yet another "world's biggest" to his list. That's the real reason he's smiling.

Next we're off to Yangshuo and the Li River.

Until then,

Jo and Shayne

More Chi to the Na

2007-07-12T07:09:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Well, It's 10:30 PM on Thursday and we finally found a computer that can access blogger.

Unfortunately we have to be back to our boat by 11:00 so this is going to be a short post. The pictures look a little strange on this computer though so we might have to repost later on...anyway...

We spent the last couple days exploring the central city of Chengdu, which is famous for its Tibetan quarter and its pandas.

A shot of one of the older fellows. The place we visited was a breeding grounds and it had around 200 or so pandas.

These guys have the right idea. Their whole life is just sitting, sleeping, eating...repeat. It's a good gig if you can get it.

A group of 10 or so baby pandas. This filled up my daily quota of cuteness and I had to skip the kitten t-shirt factory that the rest of the group visited later in the day.

Jo holding a red panda (looks strangely like the offspring of a raccoon and a panda that had a little too much wine for dinner). It should be noted that mere seconds after this photo was taken it attacked and now Jo has but one eye.

A shot of Jo and I in front of one of the many airplane hanger-like homes of the terracotta warriors.

A closer shot for you viewers at home.

The famous Bell Tower of Xian at night.

Jo and I in front of the massive 70 meter Buddha statue in Leshan. (Jo's note: Shayne can finally say he's seen the biggest of something in the world) (Shayne's note: hooray!)

Jo showing her support for both the Buddha and world peace.

Well, we're off to spend three days exploring the Yangtze so we probably won't be posting for a little while.

Cheers

Shayne

2007-07-08T09:35:00.000-07:00

Greetings,

Well, we're in Xian and we found an internet cafe that allows USB cables. So, here are some pics from Shanghai and today in Xian....

A view of a "nong"...narrow alleys filled to bursting with families living in small, ancient apartments.

The Pearl Tower in Shanghai at night.

Shayne next to Dr. Sun Yat Sen at his former residence in Shanghai...now a museum.

The Yu Yuen Gardens in Shanghai.

More acrobats...the flying guy is about to land on that pole with his crotch.

"The Cage of Death"...this shot only shows three, but they got 5 motorcycles in there!

Now in Xian...walking to the South Gate of the city wall for some sightseeing.

What better way to explore over 13km of wall than by bike?

More bikes and wall.

Shayne carefully guarding his belongings at the market in the Muslim Quarter. We liked this market much better than the ones in Beijing...no one grabs you!

And here's Shayne working on the blog...it looks comfy, but if you had "smell-o-vision" you'd know better. All we can smell is cigarettes...blech.

Okay...that's it for now. Time to go get some shut-eye before the Terra Cotta Warriors tomorrow morning. Woo hoo!!

Cheers,

Shayne and Jo

P.S. We'll add titles to these blog entries when the damn Chinese computers let us. >:(

P.P.S. If you're wondering at the lack of text, it's because this place is filled with cigarette smoke and we're dog tired. :P

2007-07-06T21:32:00.000-07:00

Well, we're just about to leave Shanghai for an overnight train to Xian, and we thought we should post some pictures. The problem is that this internet cafe won't let you plug in USB cables, so we had to pick photos from over the front desk with all the staff looking on. Given the pressure, and the fact that the photos were in thumbnail format, they are few and random. I hope you enjoy, and we'll post more when we have a chance.

We took a walking tour through a "nong", which are old, densely populated areas of Shanghai. We spotted this guy washing up down an alley. Maybe it's an invasion of privacy, but it was too cool of a shot to miss.

Shanghai by night. Not the best picture we took on the boat cruise, but like I said...we were searching through mini-photos over a desk.

Shayne in the Yu-Yuen Garden, a preserved 16th century aristocratic retreat in Old Shanghai.

One shot from the acrobat show. After watching two girls crash in the "trick cycling" segment, both of us were biting our nails during this one.

That's Shanghai in a nutshell. If the internet cafes in Xian are more lax with USBs, then we'll post more in a day or so.

Cheers,

Shayne and Jo

More Beijing

2007-07-03T22:12:00.000-07:00

It's our last day in Beijing, so we thought we'd post some random photos from the past few days. Tonight we board an overnight train for Shanghai. Apparently it's going to be triple-decker bunk bed style, so wish us luck. Anyways, time is short so on to the pictures...

Yes, that is a starfish...and yes, Shayne actually ate it. Tastes like chicken (as all things do).

Ahhhh...the refreshing air of Beijing. Here we are at Tiananmen Square. It holds about a million people, which is good to know if you ever need a place to put a million people.

Jo, Shayne, and the Chairman at the entrance to the Forbidden City.

One of the many halls and palaces within the complex. It really is gigantic, and sadly it does contain a Starbucks (except that there are no signs indicating it, and there are screens on the doors so you can't see in). For those keeping track, no we didn't buy anything.

Detail on the corner of a roof. There are only 3 animals in the procession, meaning this was not an important building (it's now the washroom, strangely enough).

A throne...they have a few here.

Us in a rickshaw touring the hutongs (tightly-packed alleys full of old homes). Sadly thousands of these are being knocked down, so we were fortunate enough to see a few of them.

Riding down the alleys.

The best part of our hutong tour was eating lunch in one of the local's homes. The host was kind enough to wear an undershirt to give us the full athentic experience. But seriously, the food was excellent, and they were really kind. He even showed us his pet grasshopper.

Shayne bargaining at the "Pearl Market", which has a lot more than just pearls on offer. We managed to get a 2GB Kingston memory card for our camera for about 7 bucks. Not bad considering they wanted $50 to start. Here's hoping it works!

Jo in the Temple of Heaven gardens.

If we survive the night, we'll try to update again in Shanghai. Hopefully we'll be lucky again and find an internet cafe right by our hotel.

Cheers,

Shayne and Jo

Where we are

2007-07-03T00:33:00.000-07:00

Greetings

A few people have asked for a list of where we'll be going on our trip around China so we thought we'd just post the itenerary online. It's pretty long so we won't fault you for not reading it. This is for the hardcore fans :)

Itinerary

Day 1-4 Beijing

As group members will arrive at different times there are no arranged activities on Day 1 until our group meeting in the early evening followed by dinner. Please see the notice board in the hotel foyer for details of this meeting.

On day 2 we travel north to the Great Wall. An incredible piece of engineering stretching 6000km westwards along the mountain ridges north of Beijing, it was originally constructed to protect the Chinese empires from the Mongolian 'barbarians' of the north.

Spend the morning of day 3 exploring the vast expanses of Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. Use your free time to shop in the various markets scattered throughout the city, take a tour of the ancient alleyways (hutongs) in Beijing's Old city or visit the Tibetan Monastery.

In the late afternoon of Day 4 board an overnight train to Shanghai.

Day 5-7 Shanghai

After arriving and checking into the hotel, take an orientation walk down one of the city’s most famous streets, Nanjing Road, ending at the Shanghai Museum, one of the best in the country.Explore the city during the free day 6. Temples, markets, gardens and colonial enclaves - the possibilities are endless - are around every corner.

In the afternoon of Day 7, board an overnight train to Xian.

Day 8-9 Xi'an

Arrive in Xi'an in the early morning and, after checking into the hotel, take an orientation walk through one of Xi’an’s most fascinating areas – the Muslim Quarter. Tour the lovely and unusual Great Mosque (a wonderfully serene place to escape the hustle and bustle of the city), great souvenir stalls and enjoy some of the best street food in China.

The remaining city walls are a great place to watch the sunset or join the locals for ballroom dancing or tai chi in the early morning. This former imperial capital is also homebase for a day trip to the Terracotta Warriors, situated a short drive out of town (approximately 1 hour). The warriors were re-discovered in 1974, having been buried for over 2000 years. All face east in battle formation, complete with horses and chariots to guard the tomb of the emperor Shi Huang Di.

Day 10-11 Chengdu and Leshan

Chengdu has managed to preserve some of its traditional flavor, so keep a sharp eye out for legendary teahouses and some of the most interesting food in China, including the spicy Sichuan hot pot. Take a full day to explore the teahouses and the streets of Chengdu, get a massage and perhaps sample some of the local specialties. Go to the Sichuan cultural performance - a cultural experience not to be missed.Make an early morning visit to the Giant Panda Reserve to witness the conservation efforts being made to save this adorable endangered species. Continue to Leshan, home to the world's largest outdoor seated Buddha. 'Da Fo' the Buddha is carved into a cliff face and is 71m tall. Return to Chengdu in the evening.

Day 12-14 Three Gorges

Chongqing is a rare sight in China - a city, due to the steep hills, with barely any bicycles!Water levels permitting, board a traditional Chinese boat for a journey through the mighty Yangzi River area. Spend 2 full days on board a basic Chinese-style boat traversing through the Three Gorges en route to Yichang. Along the way take the opportunity to visit some of the many attractions and towns. There is the opportunity to leave the boat to take an early morning trip down a tributary of the Yangzi River.The cabins are clean, twin-share with private toilet and shower facilities, but not luxurious. There is basic Chinese food available in the restaurant on board.

Day 15-16 Yichang and Wuhan

Arrive at the massive Three Gorges Dam in the afternoon and tour the site before continuing to overnight in Yichang.From Wuhan, board the overnight train to Guilin.Day 17-19 YangshuoArrive in Guilin on the morning of day 17 and transfer by public bus (approximately 1½ hours) to the small countryside town of Yangshuo, where the Li River winds its way around thousands of limestone karst mountains. Every turn in the road brings you to another picture-postcard sight. Take a boat ride along the stunning Li River, stop at markets and picturesque villages along the way or observe one of the local traditions: cormorant fishing.

On day 18, take a full-day bike ride through the surrounding countryside with a local guide to gain an insight into rural Chinese life and have a scrumptious lunch in a local farmer's home. Travel back to Guilin in the afternoon by public bus and board an overnight train to Shenzen in the evening of day 19 (approx 14 hours).

Day 20-21 Hong Kong

After an early arrival in Shenzen, cross the border and catch the metro in to the heart of Hong Kong. Prepare for the change of pace as you enjoy your last night's dinner in the most dynamic city in Asia. Explore Stanley Market, shop, eat, go up Victoria Peak or take a harbor cruise.

Whewww that was a mouth full.

Cheers

Shayne

2007-07-02T04:59:00.000-07:00

Greetings from Beijing!

Well, it's day two of our trip and so far we're having a great time. We spent the day climbing the Great Wall, so we thought we'd post some photos.

One cool thing about the group we're traveling with is that instead of taking you to where all the tourists go, they try really hard to get you off the beaten path. So, instead of driving an hour to the most visited section of the Great Wall, we drove 4 and were lucky enough to have a section of the Wall almost to ourselves.

We're going to keep these travel updates pretty short on text, as now we're paying internet cafe fees, so enjoy the photos...

Here it is folks! These are but four of the twelve towers that we explored on this section.

A shot from inside one of those towers. Looks cozy.

Another shot looking to the next tower. The lady sitting there is one of many dozens that try to sell you everything from t-shirts to fans to leather-bound copies of Russian literature.

One of the great things about the section we visited is that is hasn't been heavily restored. A lot of it was crumbling, and we're probably lucky we didn't fall off at one point.

Look at meeeeee!!!!

Here we are celebrating making it to the top with our new friends, Sarah and Chris. We bonded over the fact that he works with "lazers"...have you ever noticed how many jokes you can make about lazers? (Jo's note: well, Shayne made about 436 today, so I imagine quite a few)

Victoryyyyyy!!!! (Note Jo's fabulous "I climbed the Great Wall" t-shirt)

There was a cool option to ride a zip-line on the way down, so of course we had to take it.

A shot of your heroic bloggers.

That's it for now. Tomorrow we see the Forbidden City, etc. For some reason it appears that our website has been blocked, so we can't respond to any comments. Please keep writing them, though, as we can read them in Shayne's email, and we'll respond in Hong Kong.

Cheers,

Shayne and Jo

안녕 친구

2007-06-30T10:03:00.000-07:00

Wow, you're still here?

Welcome to the 100th Shayne and Jo.com post. We're going to celebrate by fleeing the country in a few short hours.

As of yesterday we’ve lived here for over a year. It’s a strange situation. Looking back it seemed as if the year passed by in mere minutes. On the other hand, we can remember nights that felt like days and months that seemed to stretch on for years. There were times where we could see ourselves living in Korea for the rest of our lives and times where we were probably one problem student away from hopping on the next homeward bound plane.

But in the end, the good days far outweighed the crappy ones.

To be completely honest, we now consider coming here to be the best decision we’ve ever made. A lot of you know that coming to Korea wasn’t the first choice for what we wanted do with the past year. But life’s what it is and things have a funny way of changing themselves on you just when you see things going in a completely different direction. So as the cliché goes, we rolled the dice.

Luckily for us it all worked out. We managed to build a really good life in an almost totally alien environment. We pushed ourselves to accept things that bewildered us and seemed to lack any reason, and because of this we ended up falling in love with the place. And along the way we found some direction for our futures, got engaged, booked tickets to see a good chunk of Asia, made a lot of friends, chased down a poor geisha, and learned to read (and speak...in a 3 year old kind of way) Korean.

Not a shabby way to spend a year, if we do say so ourselves.

We're going to keep posting while we're on our trip but they may be few and far between, so we wanted to thank all of you now.

It's been a lot of fun doing this blog and you guys made all the hard work worthwhile.

Talk to you soon.

Shayne and Jo (posting for the last time in Korea)

The Best and Worst of Times...or One Final Word

2007-06-29T19:06:00.000-07:00

Over the past year we’ve thought a lot about our experience here in Korea. And we don’t mean just what we’ve experienced personally, but how we’ve experienced Korea itself. Now, we know that living in another country for merely a year doesn’t qualify us, per se, as expert commentators, but since when has such notions as being “qualified” or “expert” ever stopped us from blabbering on with our opinions before? And so here you have it: the good, the bad, and the downright ugly of Korea.

The Good

Never Down for the Count:

The absolute best thing about Korea is that it’s a fighter. It might not be the strongest fighter in the game but it’s probably the toughest. Japan’s been invading Korea since the 16^th century and while China was never quite as aggressive as the Japanese they certainly took their share of resources (think gold and virgins) from the Koreans over the years. Most people in the west don’t know this, but Japan actually occupied them in 1907 and didn’t leave until the end of the Second World War.

During their stay, the Japanese tried everything they could to destroy Korean culture. They destroyed palaces, banned the use of the Korean language, used forced labour, and even went as far as using Korean women as “comfort women” (a polite word for forced prostitution). Combine this history with their recent civil war, and you think Korea would be like most other countries who shared similar histories - absolutely crippled both economically and spiritually. Yet somehow, against all odds they have prevailed. They have a massive economy (one the world’s biggest), unparalleled pride in their nation, and they even managed to switch from a totalitarian state to a burgeoning democracy. It’s hard not to respect the hell out of that.

Made in Korea:

Korea’s past probably drove it to want to be as independent as possible, because for a country of only fifty million people or so, its economy is a real powerhouse. Most of you probably have numerous Korean products around your house, but you might not know it. If you own anything from Samsung, Hyundai, LG, Daewoo, Kia, or Lotte, it was probably made here. Koreans take a deep pride in producing locally almost everything they need. They produce their own buses, lamps, toys, clothes, computers, cars, chemicals, movies, medicines, alcohol, etc, etc. Almost anything you can think of, they make.

Now, a lot of that is going to change with the recently signed trade agreement with the United States. Still, their desire to produce everything in-house always impressed us. If only they’d produce some Kraft Dinner or donairs : ) The Koreans don’t seem to respond well to foreign businesses rolling in either. Dozens of companies have learned the hard way that if you don’t cater your product to fit Korean needs you will fail here no matter how popular you are back home (the biggest company to make this mistake was Walmart who bombed in Korea and had to sell all of their stores last summer. This is probably another reason to like Korea).

Misc Mumbo Jumbo:

We could go on and on about how kind most Koreans have been to us over the past year. But hopefully you already know that from reading our site. Still, we’d have to be crazy to write a blog about what we liked about this place and not mention its people. Sure there are no limits to the number of crazy old adjumas (married women) who will push you out of the way on the streets or pizza delivery boys who fail to consider your safety as they wiz by at 100 km an hour. But, when push comes to shove most Koreans are helpful, caring people and we have to give them their props. So people of Korea, Kudos to you.

The Bad

Confucius…Oh Confucius

For most people in the west Confucius holds a certain mystique generally contained to fortune cookies and dirty jokes. But here in Korea one finds out what Confucius was really all about, and it ain’t all fun and games.

Korea is the country that, above all others, took Confucianism to heart and never really let go. Its thinking has profoundly shaped the country’s culture. Part of that culture is hierarchy. From school children to company presidents, hierarchy is so intensely important here that we know a Korean woman whose long-time boyfriend dumped her because he attended the much-lauded Seoul University, while she only went to a college, and his parents strongly disapproved (so much so that they would call her and badger her to break up with him).

This sense of hierarchy has led to strong competition throughout society, and coupled with another Confucian tenet that places “study hard” up there with “thou shall not kill”, Korean children are subjected to a work day that would rival 19^th century textile mills…minus the risk of amputated fingers of course. Seriously though, Korean children study for an unreasonable length of time each day. Elementary and middle school students start school at 8 o’clock and then attend one to three private academies until the middle of the evening. High school students (who were lucky enough to make it into an academic high school) start at 8am, eat both lunch and dinner at school, and make it home sometime around 10pm.

What makes the education system here all the worse is that the government and businesses have made academic achievement absolutely paramount to success later in life. Seriously, one bad test score in middle school could domino and make the difference between making a good salary and delivering fried chicken. Second chances are rare. Say what you want about western society, but it’s comforting to know that we could completely mess up our lives now, and later be able to pull up our bootstraps and make a million bucks if we really put our minds to it (how hard could it be? :-D )

“And the walls…came tumbling down…”

For all the success Korea has had in rebuilding since the war and becoming an economic powerhouse, all that drive has had its drawbacks…and nowhere is that more in evidence than in its buildings.

As I read in a book called “The Koreans” (which I highly recommend), Koreans have a big “can do” attitude coupled with a “that’ll do” attitude. This means that buildings are put up as quickly as possible, with many corners cut. In Ulsan, many buildings aren’t that old, but they’re starting to crumble, as tiles fall away revealing shoddy concrete underneath. Inside apartments too, it’s common to see peeling wallpaper, ripping in the corners where it wasn’t set flush to the wall, caved-in tiles set over gaps in the concrete, unleveled surfaces, etc, etc. Our curtains fell down in the bedroom the other week, revealing too-short screws driven into the concrete without anchors. It’s all a little bit shocking for such a modern, industrial country.

Fashion…not likely

For anyone looking for westernized Asian shopping, Korea is not the place to go. Fashion here seems to be stuck somewhere in the 80’s and the mantra is “fancier is better.” Everything from ruffles to bows to sequins to big pictures of Mickey Mouse are all a-okay. For instance, check out these losers:

Anyway, there's a million more nice things we could say about Korea and a few other annoyances that we could mention too. But time is short and we've got packing to do. Hopefully we've shown over the year how much we love this place. It truly is our second home and we're already missing it.

So...as the Koreans say "An-Kung-ee-cass-ayo"

Goodbye

Pop some corn and head for the nearest couch

2007-06-24T06:09:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Because of its small population in relation to China and Japan, the success and shear size of Korea's film industry is rather shocking. To demonstrate just how big the domestic film industry is over here I'll share with you this little piece of trivia: By 2005 Korea became one of only three nations to watch more domestic than imported films in theatres.

Using my own rudimentary math skills I've figured that the average Canadian watches one actual Canadian film in the theatre for every 3,768 American films that he/she watches. So the Korean stat is truly staggering.

Korea's currently in a tight race with China and India to be the cinematic power house of Asia, and Jo and I tried to help it as much as possible this year. We watched a decent number of Korean films this year and remarkably only one was a true dud. Thus, with only 7 days to go I thought it was time to give you a quick briefing of my five favorite Korean films.

Number 5: Tae Guk Gi

What IMDB.COM says:

"In 1950, in South Korea, the shoe-shiner Jin-tae Lee and his eighteen years old student brother Jin-seok Lee form a poor but happy family with their mother, Jin-tae's fiancé Young-shin Kim and her young sisters. Jin-tae and his mother are tough workers, who sacrifice themselves to send Jin-seok to the university. When North Korea invades the South, the family escapes to a relative's house in the country, but along their journey, Jin-seok is forced to join the army to fight in the front, and Jin-tae enlists too to protect his young brother. The commander promises Jin-tae that if he gets a medal he would release his brother, and Jin-tae becomes the braver soldier in the company. Along the bloody war between brothers, the relationship of Jin-seok with his older brother deteriorates leading to a dramatic and tragic end."

What I say:

A good war flick that loses it's focus once or twice but still manages to give the viewer a good kick in the butt. B-Minus

Number 4: City of Violence

What IMDB.COM says:

"Tae-su, a detective fighting organized crime, returns to his hometown for his high school friend Wang-jae's funeral. At the funeral, he meets his old friends Pil-ho, Dong-hwan and Seok-hwan and they reminisce. Suspecting something fishy about Wang-jae's death, Tae-su and Seok-hwan start investigating it each in his own way. Both of their investigations lead to a land development project that Pil-ho is directing and the two embark on a difficult battle."

What I say:

One of the sexiest films ever made. It's the kind of film Tarrantino should be making. Its homage to The Warriors made it even cooler. A

Number 3: Welcome to Dongmakgol

What IMDB.COM says:

"Soldiers from both sides of the Korean divide live among villagers who know nothing of the war"

What I say:

Hmmm... they didn't really say a lot, did they? The film's about soldiers from the North and the South (plus an American for comedy's sake) forced to live together in a small village during the war, and their relationship with each other and the villagers. I highly recommend this film as it manages to combine the brutality of war with comedy in a manner that comes across as both believable and respectful. Solid A

Number 2: The King and the Clown

What IMDB.COM says:

"Two clowns living in the Chosun Dynasty get arrested for staging a play that satirizes the king. They are dragged to the palace and threatened with execution, but are given a chance to save their lives if they can make the king laugh."

What I say:

This is the most critically acclaimed movie on the list and it's supposedly a good glimpse into the Chosun period of Korean history. One of the film's main characters is a very effeminate homosexual male who has a special relationship with the King, which is a rather surprising topic given Korea's overall denial that homosexuality even exists. The best part of the film is its actors, who do a great job with a tricky subject matter. Easy A Plus

Number 1: Gwoemul (or The Host)

What IMD.COM says:

"The film revolves around Park Hee-bong, a man in his late 60s. Park runs a small snack bar on the banks of the Seoul's Han River and lives with his two sons, one daughter and one granddaughter. The Parks seem to lead a quite ordinary and peaceful life, or maybe a tad bit poorer than the average Seoulite. Hee-bong's elder son Gang-du is an immature and incompetent man in his 40s, whose wife left home long ago. Nam-il is the youngest son, an unemployed grumbler, and daughter Nam-joo is an archery medalist and member of the national team. One day, an unidentified mutant suddenly appears from the depths of the Han River and spreads panic and death, and Gang-du's daughter Hyun-seo is carried off by the monster and disappears. All the family members are in a great agony as they have lost someone dearest to them. But as they find out she is still alive, they resolve to save her"

What I say:

Ok, what doesn't this film have? From goofy characters to sea monsters to evil American soldiers, this baby has it all. This will easily join my collection and sit somewhere on the shelf between Return of the Living Dead and Jaws. It's funny, creepy, scary, and very, very stupid. If you love action movies or horrors, you just can't go wrong here. It takes the typical western formula for a science fiction film and combines it with enough Korean humour and creativity to easily beat anything that we've produced in the genre since The Matrix. A Plus

Well, there you have it, five films to help get you started with Korean cinema. Hopefully you'll be able to see at least one or two of them. Quite a few are readily available at your local Video Update or Futureshop.

One last note. I should warn you that Korean humour is a little different than its western cousin and can take a little while to get used to. Most of the films on this list (even the deadly serious ones) contain wacky scenes that might just leave you scratching your head. But hey, if it was the same as back home, what would be the point?

Cheers

Shayne

Fitness: Korean style

2007-06-23T07:56:00.000-07:00

As our year here draws to a close, we decided that it was about time to write a blog about the gym we've been going to all this time. Like most things in Korea, it's similar to gyms back home...but different...so, so different.

The first time we went to the gym, we brought along some gym clothes (as one does), only to find out that only "crazy" people wear their own clothes, and that we were to don special gym uniforms...

Here's Shayne modeling the men's uniform.

And here I am with the women's version.

You may be thinking that these uniforms are extremely ugly. In this we would be in agreement.

Now, Korean gyms are full of all the equipment you'd expect to find: treadmills, stationary bikes, weight machines, etc. But they're also full of many things that you wouldn't expect...

In the above photo, Shayne is demonstrating a fitness craze that's taken Korea by storm: the hula-hoop. Now, this ain't no ordinary hoop. It's heavy and it has hard nubbs all around the inside. I can understand the weight, as it makes it easier to keep the thing rotating, but I can't think of any purpose for the nubbs other than pure punishment. Maybe they're supposed to massage you as you hula, but I felt only pain.

...And another form of punishment is this strange turn-you-upside-down number. This was the first time either of us had tried it, but as we've both witnessed many, many Korean gym-goers using it, we thought there had to be some benefit. The only "benefit" Shayne could derive, however, was a headache from all the blood rushing to his head.

And here I am demonstrating the "Superbelt Massager," another extremely popular "fitness" machine. These things were discredited in the west years ago, but apparently many Koreans still find hope in the holy grail of fitness that is weight-loss without the effort. To be fair, I have seen many people using this to massage sore muscles, but they're in the minority.

Speaking of massage, here's Shayne enjoying the motorized version of those wooden massagers you buy at the Body Shop. Only in Korea.

Anyways, that's the quick and dirty of it. We hope you've enjoyed your tour of "Emperor Fitness" and we hope to see you again soon.

Until next time,
Jo

EH!!!

2007-06-18T19:43:00.000-07:00

Greetings

When I was growing up I spent a lot of time questioning the existence of a Canadian culture. Like the Yeti or the Sasquatch, the idea of a true Canadian culture was believable but just a little too fantastical to truly get behind. Afterall, a country as young as ours (post colonization, of course) has little in the way of history and nobody ever clamours for "Canadian food". It's true that recently Canadian music has made huge inroads, but in my youth there was Cory Hart and Brian Adams...enough said.

But after spending a year overseas and meeting friends from all over the world, I've come to realise that not only is the Canadian culture real, but it's fantastic. I'm definitely leaving here a lot prouder of Canada than when I came here (which says a lot because I was always patriotic).

To demonstrate my newfound love for all things Canadiana, I thought I would make a list of the things I've come to love this year.

Number 8: Come on in

In television shows nobody ever takes their shoes off upon entering a house or apartment. I always thought that this was to save time or something. I certainly never thought that millions (perhaps billions) of people actually do this every day. But, upon visiting an Australian friend's house I learned that people really do wear shoes in their houses. It seems that this is common behaviour in Australia.

It seems that this is also common in South Africa too, as a friend from there mentioned that they do the same thing. As someone whose mother would introduce them to the business end of a cane if he did such a thing, I still can't wrap my head around the idea. I guess it depends on the weather and geography of a place. But still, here's to you Canada and your clean carpets. Keep up the good work.

Number 7: It's a F^ck*i%g toboggan

If you looked at the above picture and thought "hey, thats a swell looking sled" then please leave the site because we can no longer be friends. I was shocked how many people had no idea what I was talking about when I used the word toboggan last winter. I'm proud to come from a country where people still know what a toboggan is. I know that this is true because every winter Canadian tire publishes fliers advertising both toboggans and sleds. Hooray.

Number 6: This is not a knit hat or knit cap, sock cap or stocking cap, or a watch cap - It's a tuque.

Sigh, much like toboggan the word tuque needs to be exported to the rest of the world. It's a fine word and besides, can you imagine asking "hey where is my stocking cap"? That just sounds wrong.

Number 5: "tee"? NEVERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

This is something that I have struggled with all year but try it out. Please say the following words aloud:

Thirty
Forty
Fifty

If you pronounced them just as they are written then you're probably not Canadian. It seems to be a Canadian thing to say "thir-dy, for-dy, fif-dy" and so on and so on. For some reason Canadians prefer to add a 'D' sound to the end of their numbers. I tried to avoid doing this when I was teaching the children as most native English speakers don't seem to do it. It was hard for me though. I would clench my teeth and shake as I forced myself to say "twen-ty, thir-ty", etc etc. Somedays I would run home just so I could scream " FIF-DYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY".

I don't know if this is common all over Canada or in any other English speaking countries, but from the sites I've read it definitely appears to be a Canadian phenomenon.

Number 4: Yeah, I said it...chesterfield.

Dictionary.com defines a chesterfield as:

"Chiefly Canadian. Any large sofa or couch."

To me chesterfield was just another name for a couch. I had no idea that it was a Canadian concept until a few months ago. I was eating lunch with some people from Australia and Bengladesh, when I told a story about how I had seen a couch in the middle of the road. Of course, I used the word "chesterfield" instead of couch and the blank stares I got back were priceless. At first I thought everyone was surprised because I was wasting their time with such a boring story. But alas, the stares were because they had absolutely no idea what a chesterfield was.

Another fine example of Canadian culture - the chesterfield.

Number 3: Degrassi High Baby

This show is to Canada what the Kangaroo is to Australia or what the hairy highland cow is to Scotland. Simply put, nothing truly encapsulates Canada like Degrassi High. I swear that when I meet non-Canadians for the first time they always bring this show up. It always goes like this:

"So, you're from Canada? How about that Degrassi? Now that was a great show."

No kidding, it's always like that. People from all over the world know about Arthur and Wheels and Snake. In fact, a friend from Australia watched the show in Sex Ed. Yep, it's true, what the Australians know about sex they learned from Joey Jeremiah.

If that doesn't make you proud to be Canadian, nothing will.

Number 2: What I'd give for a box of KD

I'm extremely proud of how much Jo and I became accustomed to Korean food. We eat it all the time and we truly love almost all of it (we'll never love that nasty spinebone soup). But despite our newfound relationship with Korean food, we never lost our cravings for Kraft Dinner. When I went home for that week in November I brought a suitcase of it back and we've been rationing it ever since.

Our love for the cheesy goodness that is Macaroni and Cheese seems to puzzle most of our friends. Upon studying the matter further, I've learned that Canada consumes more Kraft Dinner than any other country, and that lots of people from other counties either don't like it or have never even tried it.

So tonight celebrate Canada by having a bowl. Mmmm cheesy goodness.

Number 1: This land is my land, this land is your land (everyone hug now)

The word multicultural is old hat to my generation. It's something we take for granted and accept as an absolute societal norm. Few of us can imagine living in a country that isn't filled with a wide variety of ethnicities and cultures.

Being in Korea has really made me appreciate what Canada has to offer in this area. I know that we aren't alone with this, but seeing what the complete opposite is like has given me a newfound sense of pride in the diverse nature of Canada.

Canada is home to people from all over the world and the fact that we don't have one recognizable culture and instead have dozens (if not hundreds) of different ones, is what makes us great.

Still, as my list has proven, we do have a lot in common. So everybody join together...

"Kumbaya my lord, kumbaya
Kumbaya my lord, kumbaya
Kumbaya my lord, kumbaya
Oh lord, kumbaya"

Cheers

Shayne

One more temple for the road

2007-06-17T09:08:00.001-07:00

Recently (well, actually not recently...it's just taken us a while to get to this one), our boss, Mrs. An took us to one of the more famous temples in Korea, just outside Ulsan: Tongdosa Temple. It was originally built in the 14th century, but many parts were rebuilt in the 19th century.

The best part of the temple by far was its grounds: peaceful, big ancient trees, a babbling brook, and even a picture-perfect stone bridge:

I would have put up the shot with us on the bridge, but these folks look better, what with the parasol and all.

Going during the lead-up to Buddha's Birthday as we did, the temple was adorned with hundreds of lanterns. I wish we were there at night to see this walk-way lit-up:

As you may remember from our previous temple blogs, our favourite parts of Korean temples are the gatehouses, with their huge statues of the Heavenly Kings. This temple did not disappoint (although it was in dire need of a good dusting), and included this particularly amusing display:

I don't know what he did, but me'thinks he's going to be a toad in the next life.

Anyways, like other old Korean temples, Tongdosa had its share of colourful buildings. Following are some of the better shots to amuse and delight...

The bell-house.

A monk a'praying and a'chanting.

A view of the grounds from the shade.

Me taking a sip from the temple fountain.

Us in a beautifully laid-out courtyard.

Mrs. An learnin' Shayne a thing 'r two.

Another shot of the grounds...this time in the sun. ;-)

Now, as they were gearing up for Buddha's birthday and all, we expected to see some celebratory preparations...and we were not disappointed:

Of course, we didn't expect Buddha's birthday to be sponsored by Samsung, but then again, nothing surprises us anymore...sigh.

As we were leaving the temple, Mrs. An gave us a nice surprise: She bought us a roof tile, which we could write a message on, and which would be used the next time they roofed one of the temple buildings. Now, with our luck, this will turn out to be the public washrooms, but we'll never know the difference so it matters not. Anyways, it was a really nice gesture.

Here we are committing our message for all eternity...or until the white ink gets worn off by the elements...or until they replace the roof again...

Anyways, it was a good day, and now I think we've seen enough Korean temples to satisfy us for a lifetime. Perhaps you too, good reader, feel the same. No more temples, I promise...until we get to China.

Until next time,
Jo

Before Disneyland there was King Rock

2007-06-13T06:20:00.001-07:00

Greetings

We said goodbye to our good friends Tim and Emily tonight. Hopefully you remember them from the numerous blogs in which they made guest appearances. They were definitely two of the nicest people we met this year and saying goodbye to them made our own looming farewell feel so much more real. I can't believe we have less than three weeks left.

Anyway, before I start blubbering all over my keyboard I suppose I'd better start this blog.

About 15 minutes from our house sits this great little park that's home to one of Ulsan's most scenic of sites. The locals refer to it as King Rock (Jo's note: apparently some ancient king turned into a dragon and buried himself under it) and although it's made a few guest appearances, it's never had its own blog (it was featured in the typhoon blog and the one with my dad). So I figured there's no time like the present to change that.

Here's the view from the hill at the beginning of the park. It shows Ilsan Beach which is much more beautiful in the picture than in real life (think too many "beachy" smells and too many nearby petro-chemical plants):

The park also includes a world class amusement park. According to ourreviewssuck.com it's rivaled only by Disneyland and Magic Mountain.

Somehow we managed to get a photo that didn't include any of the wild masses clambering to ride.

A few minutes later we had the same luck with their pirate ship:

My stomach gets queasy just looking at that beast.

Of course, what amusement park would be complete without accompanying culinary delights?

Ahh boiled corn, roasted larvae, chestnuts, and french fries. Haha, actually the fries are really yummy.

Here's a photo of me about to test my luck at the ancient Korean game of throwing darts at balloons:

And here's a shot a few minutes later where I defied all odds and managed to pop a balloon with each of my five darts (those of you who knew me in high school should know that such a thing would have been impossible mere years ago):

As you can see I was awarded with a seashell wind chime for my troubles, complete with neon pink and blue shells.

It only took a few seconds to realise that we had little use for a neon pink and blue wind chime, so Jo decided to sacrifice it to the tree Gods (Jo's note: I wanted to throw it in a trashcan, but Shayne insisted someone might see it and actually want it).

Anyway, the cornerstone of the park is a series of jagged rocks that jut out into the ocean and a nifty bridge that connects them to the mainland.

You can see this here:

and here:
and here:

What makes the place even cooler is that in the surrounding waters you can watch old grandmothers dive for clams and other sea treats.

Here you can see a couple of the grandmothers (Korean name is Har-a-mony) admiring their catch:
It's pretty inspiring to watch aged 60-plus women free-dive for clams. It certainly makes me all the more lazy when I choose to not watch TV when I discover the remote is out of my reach.

Another cool thing about the area is the sheer number of fisherman that you can see at any given time. Some of them go to great lengths to fish (as you remember one poor sap even braved the typhoon waters to do so).

I really liked this photo for some reason:

Anyway, in retrospect we probably should have gone to the park more often as it's so close and it really is a nice change from the bustling city atmosphere that surrounds our apartment. But what can ya do?

Hope this finds all of you well. You should expect a flurry of posts as we try and finish everything off before we leave.

Cheers

Shayne

A Crazy Little Town Called Pohang

2007-06-09T05:11:00.000-07:00

Last Wednesday Shayne and I had a day off, and we decided to spend it visiting the other industrial capital of Korea: Pohang.

Pohang is about an hour or so north of Ulsan and is home to POSCO, the world's third-largest steel producer. Hmmm, world's largest ship builder, and world's third-largest steel producer: For such a small nation, Korea knows how to get it done.

Here's a view of POSCO in all its glory. There's a lot more to it, but due to the lack of both a panoramic lens and permission to enter the actual grounds, this is the best we could do.

Another view of POSCO from the outside. Apparently it's "Clean and Green". Well, if the sign says so, I'm sure it's true.

What we did have access to was the grounds of the head office, where we stumbled across a gem far better than a stinky smelter...

A tribute to rival the statuary of Rome, I should think.

Here's a better view. Note the godly magnificence of the steel workers. Frankly, this looks more like a throw-back to the days of the USSR, than something you'd find in capitalist-friendly Korea.

Anyways, on the way back across the bridge from the steel-works, we came across a group of young girls settled down for a picnic. How nice...

Not quite the pastoral scene you had in mind, eh? What possessed these girls to select this spot, I will never know.

And here they are closer up. Coke, cell phones, and what appears to be a bottle of soju. Ahh, now I know why they're under the bridge. I don't know what's wrong with the girl on the right...she's probably discovered that soju does not, in fact, taste good.

Onward and upward. Our next stop was Jukdo Market, a traditional market in the center of town. To spice this entry up with some cultural interest, I've included a few pics for your viewing pleasure...

A typical scene in any busy Korean market.

A display of ginseng.

Kimchi: would you expect anything else?

Something I will miss: one of many stalls selling grains, beans, lentils, etc.

After a few hours of hiking around the city in the hot sun, we decided to treat ourselves to lunch at TGIF's. Nope, no Korean food for us that day. I only bring this up because I wanted to show you the comically-small desert included in the lunch special...sigh, 14,000 Won doesn't buy you what it once did:

Well, that's it for Pohang. I hope once again we've satisfied your desire for insider Korean knowledge and know-how. I think we've all come away from this experience a little richer.

Until next time,
Jo

Not Allowed to Grammatically

2007-06-04T08:30:00.001-07:00

Greetings

As anyone who has ever spent five minutes in Asia knows, the poor English language is as misunderstood as that geeky kid from the Wonder Years (who by the way isn't, nor ever was, Marilyn Manson). Everywhere you look English is being abused in some manner. Whether it's signs, t-shirts, awnings, or newspapers, there's enough things to fix to keep an Army of English majors busy for a lifetime (of course if you did that who would man the stations at McDonalds?).

I figure that as more and more people learn English this will all change. So I figured I better post a blog highlighting some of my favorite mistakes/oddities before that happens.

Check out the top line in this mini billboard:

Good old Mr. Pizza. Now that I know they specifically make Pizza just for women I feel a little left out. I wonder what special ingredients are included for our female friends? A fellow expat swears that he once saw a Mr. Pizza sign that included the standard "made for women" line plus something about breasts but I can neither confirm nor deny this.

Zoom in and read the last sentence in this advertisement for Ulsan pears that we saw at the airport.

Not only are Ulsan pears delicious, but they also "relieve thirst after drinking alcohol by promoting urination". Two words...utterly fantastic.

I wonder how they "promote" urination. Do you really need to promote urination anyway? It's not the sort of thing where one says "You know I was really thinking of giving urination up but then the pears...man the pears changed everything".

Forget discount stores. Discaunt stoa's are the way of the future. This sign is right outside of our building and it's made me laugh everyday for the past 11 months. That's probably a sign of my immaturity but then so is my giant collection of GI-Joes . The sign is made even better when you try and pronounce it in a Dracula-like voice. Go on, try it. You know you want to.

One thing that's really common in Korea is placing pictures of the animals they serve outside of restaurants. If it's a pork restaurant then there's a picture of a pig and so on and so on.

This one in particular caught my fancy because the damn pig's so cute. If anything it made me want to give up pork. The best part is how they put the pig over top of pictures of his innards. Something's just wrong about that.

Another big thing over here is the complete lack of copyright protection. So many brands are ripped off everywhere you look, that it would take hundreds of blogs to document them all.

This one's my favorite though. For anyone who remembers the greatness that was 711's fried Chester Chicken this is for you. Mmmm chester fried chicken. Alas, this poor knockoff has no potato wedges or anything that's akin to it's namesake.

This is from a previous post but come on "power internet praza". That's just gold.

Hmmm a hygiene washingtonologist, eh? I googled this term to see if it does exist in some form and all I found was a few online Korean dictionary links. Well, here's hoping that none of you ever have to see a hygiene washingtonologist or a hygiene newyorkonologist for that matter.

This is a special one. If you don't get it then just keep on reading.

One of my favorite television shows back home is the Biggest Loser. A great show where overweight people compete against each other to lose weight. I was thrilled when I found out they carried it in Korea. I was even more thrilled to find out it's called:

Man, the Korean's don't hold anything back. They tell you how they feel. That's great. They simply call the show "Fat". You should see what they call the Roseanne Show, ouch.

This one made the cut just to further demonstrate how far places go to rip off name brands. You might recognize the sign's layout from its better know home at Baskin Robins. What made this place truly special is not only did they rip off Baskin Robins, but if you look closely at the photo you'll see that they openly use Dairy Queen's logo, name, and menu. Of course nothing tasted the same but who's counting.

We saw this beauty at Costco:

"To make your family happy please try the heart-warming delicacy of Shilla Myunggua. Our efforts on little details will help you create a peaceful harmonious family life and share pleasant conversations".

Damn, I think my bread needs to start pulling its own weight a little more if this loaf can do all of that.

Nuff said.

God bless the Koreans and their openness about drinking:

"Broth to chase a hangover". They make broth to do everything these days.

Hmm not really sure what they are selling in this one, but I bet it's not legal:

Poor, poor exploited pigs.

Here's something you wouldn't see back home:

You see lots of offensive signs like this all over the place.

Read that and tell me it doesn't make you want to go and buy a bra right away.

Ok, like the bread before, this ice cream can really do it all. Check it out:

"Baskin-Robbins is for everyone. It crosses every social boundary, breaks down social distinctions. It draws people together into a common experience. And Baskin Robbins products are among the few that are enhanced when enjoyed in the company of family and friends."

Look, if your ice cream isn't crossing social boundaries and breaking down social distinctions I think you really ought to consider changing brands. The world doesn't need third world debt relief, it just needs more Baskin Robins.

Another classic:

"Look officer, I'm telling you the truth. At no time did I elderly!"

I found this one yesterday at the supermarket:

What kid doesn't dream about playing Spam Jenga? Come on, are you telling me you wouldn't want this? Spam and Jenga, together at last.

Well there ya have it. A few of my favorite English mishaps and otherwise unusual language follies. If this didn't convince you to thoroughly investigate that Japanese symbol you want tattooed on your butt, nothing will. If Asian writing is as messed up back home as its English relative is over here, then there's a lot of stupid Canadians walking around with symbols that mean god only knows what.

On that happy note I'm out.

Cheers

Shayne

Gwangju Bound

2007-05-28T05:07:00.000-07:00

As promised to you 3 or 4 weeks ago, last weekend Shayne and I finally made the trek out to Jeollanamdo (a province in Korea's south-western corner), to Korea's most famous student protest city: Gwangju. Being that Gwangju is 5-6 hours away and that the things we wanted to see were far apart, we decided to rent a car for the weekend. Rent one we did and on Saturday morning we were on our way.

The great thing about road-tripping in Korea is the ample amenities provided on the highways. Every 30 kilometres or so, there's a rest stop. They have these in Canada too, except that they're little more than a place to rest and an outhouse. In Korea, on the other hand, they're full-service: gas station, gift shops, well-maintained washrooms, and a plethora of food options. We decided to skip the deep-fried hotdogs and giant dumplings, though, and went with a simple bowl of udon, which you can witness Shayne enjoying yourself above (Shayne's note: Why eat just one noodle at a time when you can stuff your face instead?).

After experiencing only one traffic jam in Deagu, we made it to Gwangju in good time and in relatively one piece. I say "relatively" because we took what we thought was the right exit into the city center, only to find a dead-end construction site and no way out except to go back up the exit with hazards blinking and our tails between our legs. I suppose we should have guessed by the pylons lined up along the exit, but it's not entirely our fault due to the highway worker who waved us on instead of indicating that we might want to turn back onto the highway. Then again, I'm sure that plenty of foreign couples in rent-a-cars have business on a exit closed for construction. Douchebag.

Anyways. We were pretty impressed by the city itself. Most Korean cities look fairly similar, but Gwangju has an almost European feel. By that I mean that it has a nice riverfront with nice bridges and fountains, and the downtown city streets are filled with art. Here's a few shots to help you visualize...

This piece is entitled "man coming out of shower". Note his confused expression as he discovers a strange naked man squatting on his bathroom floor.

This one's called "Pensive girl standing in tree house". She seems to be ignoring Mr. Feathers, who's just there for a visit and maybe some birdseed.

Okay, now this one is deep. It's called "Crazy monster man". I'm not quite sure how this thing survives, considering it has no brains in any of its four heads, and virtually no internal organs.

Well, I hope you enjoyed my insightful commentary on Gwangju's many and diverse statuary. I think I should go into Art History or write a book or something...I seem to have a knack for these things.

After wandering through the downtown core, we made it to the small riverside that runs through the city. There's really not much to say about it other than it was a pleasant walk, so I'll add more pics...

One of the coolest bridges along the river. This one is for pedestrians only and is the coolest suspension bridge I've ever seen (Shayne's note - That's cool that you find it so cool).

Further down the river we tried out a simpler version of the pedestrian bridge: stepping stones. They really go for variety in Gwangju.

We also decided to take in Gwangju's National Museum. To be honest, the exhibits were a little ho-hum, but it's housed in a beautiful building:

The next day we took in some sights outside of the city. The first stop was the May 18th Memorial Cemetery. I guess I should give some background information here, as I'd never heard of the "1980 Massacre" until I arrived in Korea.

After a coup in December '79, there were student protests all over Korea in the spring of 1980. In response, General Chun Doo-Hwan declared martial law, and on May 18th soldiers brutally murdered dozens of student protesters (with bayonets, no less) in Gwangju. Thousands of citizens soon joined the students and formed civil militias (looting weapons from police stations and armories), eventually forcing the army out of the city. This event sowed the seeds of democratic change in Korea, leading to the severing of military control over the presidency.

Here I am at the entrance to the Memorial Cemetery. Most of those killed during the 1980 Massacre have been re-buried here, and all those who participated in the uprising may be buried here when they die.

The above two photos are of a relief depicting the events of May 1980.

The cemetery itself.

Me looking at the photos of those who died.

I took a photo of this grave because the girl was only 15 when she died in the fighting.

What was remarkable about this place was that even though it was incredibly somber (especially the memorial hall with photos of all who died), there was a certain element of celebration for the successes that came out of the tragedy. I think the city of Gwangju is really proud of its citizens for standing up for justice and democracy. It definitely shows with the care that went into this memorial.

After the memorial we headed further into Jeollanamdo to a famous green tea plantation in Boseong. At first the trip was easy, given the frequency of English signage at every junction. Then, just after a sign indicated that the plantation was only 7 km away, the English signage ended and many, many intersections followed. Luckily for us we learned how to read Korean and we know the Korean word for "tea", otherwise we would've been hooped. Anyways, we made it there (eventually), along with about 10,000 other Korean day-trippers.

Here we are half-way up the hillside overlooking row after row of terraced tea bushes. They really are green.

After sweating it on the tea hills, we headed for some lunch. Befitting such a place, everything they offered included green tea in some form. We ordered bibimbap with green tea rice and jajangmyun (black "Chinese" noodles) with green tea noodles:

The bibimbap was okay, and the jajangmyun tasted like Chef Boyardee ravioli. But this meal was more about the experience.

Well, that was our trip to Gwangju. We made it back to Ulsan without incident and encountering (again) only one traffic jam...although this one was far longer and more frustrating. Anyways, I hope you enjoyed the condensed version of Gwangju and area sans the six hours either way it took to get there.

Until next time,
Jo

Teachers Kick Ass

2007-05-18T18:11:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Last Wednesday marked what is arguably the most important day on the Korean calendar, Teacher's Day. Who doesn't love a day that celebrates the hardest working people on the peninsula? I waited months for this day knowing that it would bring with it a wealth of presents for Jo and I to bask in.

That's right Teacher's Day is all about students giving gifts to their teachers. At one point Jo and I were considering buying a money counter incase the gifts amounted to too much for little old us to take care of.

Alas, our dreams of retiring early were not meant to be. It seems that over the years certain bad apple parents have ruined this holy day by using it as a chance to bribe teachers into giving their children good grades (the horror, the horror).

In response many schools have cracked down on Teacher's Day and even gone as far as banning all gifts. Our school didn't ban gifts but the celebration was definitely toned down from the old glory days.

But, while we might not be driving around in our new convertible or admiring how crisp David Hasselhof looks on our new Plasma TV, our students didn't forget about us entirely.

But enough of my ramblings let's get to the gifts shall we.

This one was a bit of a surprise for two reasons. First, it's a gift of breath mints. What is that supposed to signify? Hmmm, I suppose I'll be brushing my teeth more often.

And second, they are made by Amway. That's right, there's a Korean Amway. Those guys really are everywhere.

Here's a matching notepad set for Jo and I. The Dolls look a little creepy but it was a pretty practical gift that we now use to record all of our deep thoughts (insert your own joke here).

One of my favorite students gave me this lovely bouquet of flowers. It might be the first time I've ever been given flowers. The best part was when I pretended to eat one of them and told him that that's what we do with flowers back in Canada. He walked back to his desk mumbling something about Canada and barbarians.

I think I've gotten socks on every Korean holiday. Not much to say about these other than that one of you should be expecting them for Christmas this year.

One student gave me a bottle of iced tea. I'm pretty sure that she forgot it was teacher's day and just gave me something out of her lunch box. That being said she's only 8 so it stands as a good gift.

Hmmm another surprising gift. A brother and sister duo gave me this lovely package of facemasks. I was a bit taken aback by the package and simply thanked them as I dreamed about racing home after work and applying an acorn scented facemask. Awww, goodtimes.

In Korea, a high percentage of cocoa seems to be a sign of high quality with candy bars. This 99 percent bar was probably quite pricey. They are imported from Japan and whenever a student brings one in they are a cause for commotion as everybody wants to sample the delicacy.

Unfortunately you bakers in the audience can probably see where this is going. After a certain point high percentages of cocoa taste pretty nasty. By the time it hits 90 percent or above you're basically eating dirt. I think I'll just sell this one on the monkeybar black-market during recess.

You might be wondering where Jo's gifts are. Well, sadly Jo teaches mostly teenagers and we all know how much they love to buy gifts for their teachers. That seems to be the same no matter where you are in the world.

But she did get this lovely gift.

My personal favorite was the part where she says " Thanks to I'm good at the english". It really was a sweet gift and one of the few things we'll be keeping when we leave.

I got this letter from one of my favorite students Young Do (pronounced -dough). It really was touching and reminded me of how good this job can be some days. I might not be cut out to be a teacher for the rest of my life but the profession definitely has its moments.

Well folks, we saved the best for last. Jo's adult class presented her with gifts for both of us. They are definitely the most "Korean" presents that we received on Teacher's Day.

Wait for it....wait....wait....wait....Here ya' go.

Awww, the classic Korean couple T-shirt. In this case, with matching Mickey Mouse's covered in glitter. Don't we look hot.

Happy belated Teacher's Day everyone.

Cheers

Shayne

It's Tongdo Fantastic!

2007-05-13T07:05:00.000-07:00

Last weekend, in an act of totally unanticipated generosity, our boss, Mrs. An, took us to a nearby amusement park about an hour outside of Ulsan. Given that we document just about anything outside of our normal routine on this site, here's a quick overview and review of our day at Tongdo Fantasia.

Hmmm....remind you of somewhere? As you can tell from the above photo, Korean amusement parks definitely have a western feel. I think I would have preferred a make-believe Korean temple, but I suppose a fairytale castle will have to do.

And what amusement park would be complete without their very own costumed characters roaming about? These ones are definitely the cutest ones we've ever come across - if it's one thing the Koreans do well, it's cute.

For those of you who know Shayne well, it'll come as no shock that the above ride was one of our first stops. This is the biggest coaster the park had to offer (out of 2, if you don't count the kiddy-coasters), and it was surprisingly good. It had 5 corkscrew rotations, 2 loop d' loops, and a drop through a narrow cave opening that had even Shayne ducking his head. Now if it can scare Shayne, you know it's a good ride.

We considered taking this "coaster" for a spin, but decided to save our workouts for the gym. I mean, who's ever heard of a coaster you have to peddle yourself?

Shayne and Mrs. An on one of the tamer thrill rides.

After all the excitement, we decided to kick it down a notch and indulge Shayne in a long-time dream...to paddle a duck boat. As you can imagine, Shayne's fairly easy to please.

Us covering up our anxiety with smiles, and hoping the 9 year old girl in the other boat doesn't drop our new camera into the lake.

Mrs. An had enough excitement after one trip around the lake, so she jumped out to take a picture and let Shayne paddle to his heart's content.

Next we checked out the local house of horrors - always good for a laugh if not for a scream. This one did not disappoint.

Spooky.

After all that we were getting pretty tired and decided to call it a day. Well, to be honest I was getting tired - Shayne was hankering for another few laps in the duck boats, but I wasn't having any of it. I run a tight ship.

On the way out we did get to enjoy one more (and totally random) diversion: a Michael Jackson impersonator. Poor guy - he seems more into his performance than his onlookers. I guess the Koreans don't appreciate 80's throwbacks as much one would have thought...or not thought...does anyone think about these things?

Anyways, overall I'd have to give Tongdo Fantasia a 7 out of 10, as far as Korean theme parks go - mainly because it had a decent rollercoaster. So, if you ever find yourself in Yansang with nothing to do, check it out. ;-)

Until next time,
Jo

Canada? What is this Canada you speak of?

2007-05-10T17:51:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Our boss added another banner to the front of the school so I thought I would share it with you. However, this banner is slightly different than the others and has since become my favourite.

(Thanks to my own little Vanna for holding the banner up)

How cool is that? Not only am I the star of the new "Let's Learn How to Cook Campaign" but I was also digitally edited so I appear to be holding a flower in my hand. The wonders of technology never cease to amaze me.

Our boss has changed the schedule so that every Friday is now a "special day" and one of these days is a cooking class. Jo and I get to teach the Korean children how to make Korean/western food. The best part about this setup is that we have had to master cooking certain Korean foods in order to teach the children how to make them. I look forward to making all of you a spicy bowl of Dok-bogi upon my return.

One downside to the new banner is that somehow I was caught wearing the same red sweater that I was wearing in the other two banners. It's slightly embarrassing and I think that the locals believe my small wardrobe to be an indicator of mass poverty in Canada. In fact, the last I heard the Ulsan Lions' club was starting a fundraiser to collect old sweaters to send to Canada. It seems that my limited closet has started an international incident. On the plus side, many of you reading this shall receive your new sweaters in the mail any day now.

Anyway, I wanted to let you all know what the future holds for us as everyone's always asking when we'll be coming back. Jo and I finish our contract here on the 29th of June and right after that we'll be leaving for China. Then after three weeks of exploring the land of Kung Pow Chicken and Panda's we'll be off to Hong Kong, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia (plus Borneo), and Singapore. Good times indeed.

And after all that we'll be landing in Canada sometime in the middle of August. We're both really excited about that even though it's surprising how fast this year's gone. There's so much we're going to miss about Korea.

And on that note of beautiful tranquility I will leave you with this moment of Zen.

(random picture of Malaysia...not to be intended as me bragging...well maybe a little)

Cheers

Shayne

Who put this kimchi in my burger?

2007-05-04T20:19:00.000-07:00

Greetings

A couple posts back we provided a glimpse into a Korean McDonalds and now it's time for Shayne and Jo to look at a homegrown fast food joint, Lotteria.

Well, actually, according to Wikipedia "the company first established itself on February 1972 in Japan but currently Lotteria in South Korea is more popular than it is in Japan".

So "tomatoes, tomatoes". We'll consider it a Korean establishment as most Koreans seem to.

You might recognize our friend Soon Tae (from both of the Seoul blogs) and think "gee, their friend from Seoul visited them". But you'd be wrong. We took these photos when we were in Seoul and are only now getting around to posting them. Anyway, on with the show.

Lotteria is the most popular fast food restaurant in Korea beating even the impenetrable McDonalds.

It did this by introducing lines of Koreanized fast foods such as Kimchi Burgers and Rice patties.

Here ya go...a nice shot of the menu.

If you zoom in you can see such items as :

the herb porkcutlet
the squid burger
the teri burger (Jo's note: ???)
the rice bulgogi burger
and of course, everyone's favorite, the classic Mega Big Paprika

This was actually our first time visiting a Lotteria and did it in part to be adventurous but also to document the trip for you, our beloved readers (all two of you).

That being said we were pretty excited and went a little crazy with the ordering.

A shot of Jo and Soon Tae pondering their options.

Jo went with the Bulgogi Burger (to compare it to the one she tried at McDonalds) and I went with the Mega Big Paprika. We also ordered a few other things to truly experience the pleasure of Lotteria.

The food looks normal enough at this stage.

A shot of my Mega Big Paprika. It was big enough, but unfortunately I don't remember what paprika tastes like well enough to fully know if the burger lived up to its name or not. It could have been closer to a Big Fennel or a Big Tarragon for all I know. Overall I'd give it 4 dried squids out of a possible 5.

Next up was Jo's bulgogi burger. I think that there must be something about bulgogi that just doesn't translate well to fast food. It looks about as good as it tasted. Overall, another big let down. Jo gives it 2.5 dried squids. (Jo's note: it was much better than the McDonalds variety...in that it tasted like beef.)

Ah, who doesn't love a good squid ring? These were actually pretty tame but they were definitely delicious. (Jo's note: they tasted exactly like Cap'n Highliner) I was hoping they would come with the heads still attached or even alive...but no such luck. 4 Dried Squids.

I don't actually remember what Soon Tae was eating, but this is a great photo so I had to include it.

But dear readers, we saved the best for last. The next photo really captures what Lotteria is all about.

A strange hybrid of Korean and American goodness all rolled into one.

Yes, don't adjust your monitors. You are seeing that image correctly. That's a kimchi-filled patty on a rice bun. Really, there's no bun. There's just rice pounded together to form what looks like a bun. It's quirky but it's original. And ya gotta' love that.

It actually tasted really good too and we ate it on top of our own meals. Which either speaks to how good it was or how big of pigs we are. I'll leave that for you to decide. 5 dried Squids.

Bravo Lotteria, Bravo.

Well... there you have it. A little taste of Korean/Japanese fastfood goodness.

Cheers

Shayne

Heart and Seoul

2007-04-30T08:07:00.000-07:00

Greetings,

Last weekend we continued on with our series of weekend trips by heading off for another visit to Seoul. On Friday evening we took an over-night bus and arrived at 3am. The reason for this was simple: we had booked a tour starting Saturday at 7am, and had no choice but to endure the dreaded red-eye.

We booked our hostel and specifically chose one that had a 24-hour reception. When we arrived in Seoul we got our cabbie to call the hostel for directions (there's no such thing as a simple address in Korea), but there was no answer. This really should have been an indicator of things to come, but being eternal optimists, we pressed ahead and told the driver to go to the subway station nearest our hostel.

(Read in voice of Rod Serling) Imagine a place so removed from reality, where rules cease to exist, and commonsense takes a backseat to the unexpected. Ladies and gentlemen, you have entered the Twilight Zone...do do do do do do do do do do do do...

Anyways, unfortunately for us, instead of arriving to a 24-hour reception, we arrived to a darkened doorstep with nary a hotel worker in sight. What we did find was an old Korean woman asleep on the floor of what appeared to be a living room. After unintentionally waking her up, she in turn woke up the "front desk" guy (except there was no desk in sight), who apparently had no idea why we were there. After trying to overcharge us he showed us to our room and provided the quote of the weekend by responding to our query "bedding? what is this bedding?" True story. To help you avoid this situation should you find yourself in Seoul, we've provided a pictorial review of Happy Road Guesthouse....

Moving on...the main reason for coming to Seoul was to see the DMZ (the heavily-guarded border between North and South Korea). Our tour set out from the city at 7am and we arrived at the US military base just south of the border an hour or so later.

Here we are receiving an informative power-point presentation from a US soldier - the main purpose of which was to make sure none of us dumb tourists started World War 3.

After signing a form stating that we didn't hold the US Army liable for any injuries or deaths due to skirmishes, kidnapping, or random tourist beatings, and after affixing our nifty visitor badges, we set off down the road to the JSA (Joint Security Area). For those who don't know, the JSA is the area on the border where the two sides come to have talks, and was the location of the 1953 armistice agreement.

Now, we joke around on this blog, but this was actually pretty heavy. Our soldier-come-tour guide reiterated about 20 times that we were not to point or make gestures of any kind, or to fall out of formation while walking, or the tour would be immediately cancelled. Apparently the North videotapes everything they can see from their side of the JSA, and it's fairly serious if they catch tourists from the South doing anything that could be construed as "communicating" with the North. Needless to say, a fair amount of stress followed as we both realised that we just love pointing to stuff (especially Shayne as this is his signature move).

Here we are about 20 metres from the border. The building on the other side is in North Korea. The blue buildings in the foreground straddle the border and are used for joint talks.

You just gotta love digital zoom. Here's probably the best shot of a North Korean we're going to get without going into Pyongyang. In his left hand you can just make out the binoculars he was peering at us with only moments before. (Jo's note: I really wanted to point at this guy!)

This is the concrete divide that marks the actual border within the JSA. You'll note that this shot was taken from the north. Yes, we made it to North Korea - we were only 5 feet inside, but it definitely counts.

Here's one of the South's soldiers, staring down the North (but only when tours are about). He's half-way behind the building (to make himself less of a target), and he's in the taekwondo stance with dark sunglasses to intimidate the enemy. Forget the enemy, we were intimidated! Note the bottom of his pant legs - they're filled with ball bearings from the days when the North outnumbered the South, so that they would sound like a larger fighting force.

Here's a self-portrait of us in North Korea. It counts I tells ya!

Here's Jo trying not to laugh (Jo's note: nervous laughter), imitating the Korean soldier. It looks like fun, but this was just after instructions that this guy will "put you to the ground" if you so much as brush past him, or try to move behind him. Also a little nerve-racking is the door behind him - which is the actual reason he's there. This door leads to North Korea and at various times the North's army has tried to come in while a tour was going on. No incidents this time though.

After leaving the border site, we headed for a look-out station, where we could get some good pictures of the North. We could tell which side was North Korea because the hills were completely barren, while the South's hills were covered in trees. Apparently there's a wee bit of a fuel shortage up north, and the wood has long-since been harvested for cooking and heating. Sad.

Here's a shot of "Propaganda Village" as dubbed by the South. This may well be the tallest flagpole in the world and the flag alone weighs 600 pounds. Apparently the buildings below are unoccupied...it did appear a little ghost town-like.

This is the Bridge of No Return, where the POWs were swapped after the armistice. Apparently the POWs were lined up and told to go to whatever side they wanted, but that they could never go back....hence the name.

After a visit to the gift shop (there's always a gift shop - even at the most hostile border in the world!), we headed out of the base to check out the "3rd Infiltration Tunnel", a tunnel the South discovered the North digging towards Seoul in the 70's.

Unfortunately they didn't allow any photos to be taken inside, so you'll have to make do with this shot of the entrance and a little imagination. It was really long, dark, and tunnel-like if that helps.

After getting back to the city, we found another (way better) hostel and gave our friend, Soon Tae, a call (you'll remember him from such blog entries as our first trip to Seoul). We met after dinner and headed off in search of a place to relax with some beer and to catch-up with each other.

We rejected this option - one of a series of tents serving copious amounts of seafood to hungry patrons. The stall-keeper didn't want her picture taken, but as you can see her customers were more than happy to oblige.

We eventually found just the right pub (after rejecting a few more for being a little too fashionable...we were in jeans and hoodies, after all). Here's Shayne and Soon Tae enjoying a tall, cold one.

The next day Soon Tae joined us again, and we set off to check out some more sights within the city limits. Not on the itinerary was this public work-out area, a common-place sight in all Korean parks.

Here's Soon Tae putting Chuck Norris out of a job: it's a lean, mean, workout machine.

Here's Jo demonstrating the poor man's elliptical.

Well, after that brief interlude of levity, on to more heavy stuff: Seodamun Prison (pronounced suh-day-moon).

Before going past the front gate, we should give a little backgrounder. In 1910 Japan officially annexed Korea, and they were soon building prisons to hold the growing dissident movement. What can't be said with enough sobriety is that the Japanese occupiers held political prisoners in brutal conditions and tortured them regularly. Seodamun prison has now been turned into a museum to pay tribute to those who stood up for their country's freedom and paid the ultimate price.

The prison was chilling even in its design. The wards radiate from a central area so they can all be observed at the same time. Here's Shayne and Soon Tae exploring one of them. During the height of the occupation, the cells on either side would have been packed so tightly with prisoners that they had to take sleeping shifts due to lack of space. In the summer, the evaporated breath and sweat in the air was so heavy that prisoners could barely see each other.

Here we are in one of the solitary confinement cells. These would have been totally dark when someone was in them.

Here's a shot of the outside of the prison building.

On the edge of the property we discovered this watch tower that appears untouched since the 1945 surrender.

I don't think we can say enough about this place and how disturbing it was. It really brought to life for us conditions under the Japanese occupation - something we had never even heard about before coming to Korea.

After the prison, we headed over to the War Museum...apparently we couldn't get enough of the heavy history lessons this weekend. Here's a couple of the cooler exhibits...

A Korean warrior's outfit.

A five-barreled gun.

Shayne and I taking 5.

After taking in some military history, we moved on to the Korean War exhibit.

This is probably one of the only pieces of modern art that we've come across that makes sense. It's a tear-drop made up of dog tags, wrapped in barbed wire.

Around the main Korean War room, there are exhibits for each of the countries that participated in the war. Here's the one for Canada - yup, looks just like us.

After 2 hours wandering around the museum we were a little stir-crazy. We headed outside to the gallery of military equipment, and Shayne and Soon Tae demonstrated their manliness. The only difference between the two of them is that Soon Tae has likely actually trained on one of these, and Shayne has likely used one in a video game (all Korean men do 2 years of military service).

Well, that's our trip - and likely our last one - to Seoul. Now we feel like we know the city a lot better - and we were really happy that Soon Tae was in town to hang out again.

Tune in next time for our trip to Gwangju - sight of the 1980 massacre of protestors - and find out why it is that Shayne and Jo just can't get enough of the heavy stuff.

Cheers,
Shayne and Jo

Wanna' Bang?

2007-04-21T22:36:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Well, we've been busy crossing things off our to-do list and today we have a real doozy for you (yes, a doozy. Who doesn't love a good doozy?).

The Koreans truly love their rooms (bang, in Korean). You can find singing rooms, board game rooms, study rooms, hang out rooms, hook up rooms, and even bobbing for apple rooms (well, okay, I made that last one up. But it would be cool). They also love DVD rooms, which as of last week, we've finally experienced.

DVD rooms are simple and they're basically a cross between a movie theatre and your living room. You rent a video and then you watch it in one of the provided rooms (complete with a big screen, surround sound, and a lot of privacy...wink, wink).

In fact, DVD rooms have become a sort of underground love spot, if you will, for young couples in Korea. Most young people here live at home and under the watchful eye of Ma and Pa, so these rooms have turned into a refuge of privacy in this over-populated country.

Anyway, on with the story.

Here's a shot of the outside of the DVD room (the building is about ten minutes from our place):

K1 DVD Bang was the lucky establishment we finally decided to try out. It's located right above the "sexy bar". But that's a different blog for a different day.

But before we could go inside we had to walk the gauntlet of yummy vendors.

Mmmm boiled corn, silkworm pupae, and chestnuts...together at last.

After getting our fill of street food we made the climb to the DVD room.

That's shot of the selection. While slightly smaller than a Blockbuster video store back home the choices weren't bad overall. It had a nice mix of Korean, English, and greasy Russian porn titles. For those of you keeping track we went with 'Babel'.

Here's a shot of the long walk to our room:

The odd lighting makes you feel like you're on a spaceship or in a really bad horror movie.

The set-up in the room was actually pretty sweet. A large screen, nice speakers, and a faux leather bed/couch (with an easy-clean wipe-down surface).

See what I mean? That's pretty cool.

Notice the blackened windows? I just hope our disinfection of the furniture before sitting on it went far enough. Just kidding, the place was pretty clean.

There, ya have it. The big screen in all its glory.

The idea of a DVD room is pretty good. I can see the attraction they hold and would definitely be interested in using one again.

The only problem is that they end up costing more than an actual trip to the cinema.

But for an 18 year-old Korean I suppose that's a small price to pay for two hours sans mom and dad.

Cheers

Shayne

Has anybody seen my Big Extra?

2007-04-12T20:56:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Jo and I made a long list of all the famous Korean sites and establishments that we want to visit before we leave and this week I'm proud to present to you with a real gem.

Korean cuisine is world renowned, and perhaps no place further epitomizes that than the traditional Korean hamburger joint "Mec Doh Nal De".

Or as we westerners would say:

Ah yes, who doesn't love a trip to good old McDonalds? Oddly enough until the other day we hadn't yet visited a McDonalds in Korea. But we figured that we might as well visit one and see how they compare to back home. McDonalds is famous for offering the same menu choices worldwide, but they usually contain some sort of strange local contraptions as well. Once in Maine I almost ordered a lobster burger but chickened-out at the last second.

Anyway, I was hoping to find a Kimchi burger or maybe a dog burger but alas, fate was not smiling upon me.

For the most part the menu was "same-same" (as the children would say). Sure there were a few local items but nothing that made me slap my face and say "well, slap my face and call me charlie - look at that!"

Jo was a little more daring than I and decided to try some local fare. She ordered a Bulgogi burger which directly translates into "fire meat" burger. Bulgogi is amazing and one of our favorite Korean foods, so we were a little skeptical about how the McDonalds version would stack up.

Here you see our food. Can you spot the odd man out yet?

My favorite item to eat at McDonalds (and probably the only thing I actually like) is the Big Extra. I don't know if they still sell these back home as I haven't been to a McDonalds in quite a while, but they definitely don't here. They do, however, sell something called the "Big Tasty". It sounded similar to the Big Extra (and a lot like those movies HBO shows late at night), so I decided to order one and give it a try.

As you can tell the "Big Tasty" is mammoth-sized. This bad boy was probably the biggest fast food burger I've ever seen. I think it would even beat that Monster Carls Junior used to sell. (Jo's note: hmmm, sound familiar? The biggest one Shayne's ever seen.)

Unfortunately it was nothing like the Big Extra and contained lots of strange items. It had salsa? Who wants salsa on a McDonalds Burger? I just want some secret sauce (a little miracle whip left in the sun) and a few grams of lettuce and tomatoes, that's it.

Jo's Bulgogi burger left a lot to be desired too. Aside from the fact that it looked like ass, tasted like ass, and smelled like ass, it was also pretty damn small. They managed to ruin bulgogi, sweet sweet bulgogi.

I shall never forgive them.

If you paid close attention to our tray you would have noticed the following:

Corn...in a cup...with a fork.

Yes, for only a dollar you too could have some corn in a cup with mayonnaise and carrot chunks.

Hmmm, best to avoid if you find yourself in a Korean McDonalds.

I wanted to include one action shot of my giant burger, so here ya go:

I don't know if it was the size of the burger or my rapidly advancing old age but I just couldn't finish the sucker.

I'm ashamed of myself. I'm half the man I used to be (quite literally, in fact).

Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this rare look at such an exotic Korean restaurant.

Next time I'll just stick to my Kimchi and rice.

Cheers

Shayne

From Busan, With Love

2007-04-08T20:06:00.000-07:00

Now that the weather's warmed up, and we're beginning to feel the pressure of our impending departure date, Shayne and I are off to see Korea on a series of weekend trips. Our first stop: a second look at Busan, Korea's 2nd largest city.

A view of our hotel at night. Don't be fooled by its ultra-classy exterior, because this is what is known as a "love motel". These joints are strewn across all Korean cities, and if the name isn't enough of a clue, they are where otherwise respectable Koreans meet for clandestine rendezvous, wink - wink. Shayne and I had to check one out.

Check out this bad boy! Yes, that's faux red leather...and it's round!!

Shayne was most impressed by the remote...allowing the patron to control everything from the comfort of bed... from the air conditioning, to the lights, to the tv...yes, even the tv.

Anyways, after checking into the hotel, it was time to go check out the "public" side of Busan. Here I am at Haeundai Beach, perhaps Korea's most famous. Even with the chilly weather, there were scads of beach-goers. In August you can barely see the sand.

I guess the beach is also popular with gulls...no doubt encouraged by naive but well-meaning people like these having fun hand-feeding them french fries. Admittedly I wish I had something to offer them too. heehee!

Here's Shayne with a view of the boardwalk.

Next it was off to the acclaimed Busan Aquarium, handily located right on the beach. We're suckers for a good aquarium.

We took this picture just because he looked grumpy (Shayne's note - that and it looks just like my old man).

No, these freakish spider crabs aren't starring in the latest sci-fi horror flick, they're on the menu at your local Korean eatery. Not this guy, though...he's going to live out his days looking at humans through the tank-glass...and maybe eating that mangled-looking starfish to the left (do they eat those?).

Next was the jellyfish exhibit, which was wickedly lit-up with various-coloured lights. These guys were majestic, slowly moving through the tank with 6-foot tentacle trails flowing behind (Shayne's note - This really is one of the coolest photos we've ever taken. Props to Jo).

By far the coolest thing in the aquarium was the giant, walk-through shark tank. Here's Shayne looking up at a stingray swimming above him. It was quite amusing watching little kids shriek when Jaws slowly swam up to them.

After all the fun of the aquarium, we thought we'd take it down a notch...or twenty...and visit the UN Korean War Cemetery. Apparently it's the only UN-run cemetery in the world.

Here's the front gate.

There's not too many graves here, as most of the Americans were repatriated to the States some time ago. But it's still enough to give one pause. Over 500 Canadians died in the Korean war, many of which were our age or younger. (Shayne's note - It was truly a sobering experience to see how many people died in the war over here).

Here's the Canadian monument....to be lighthearted for a moment, it seems that we really do look friendly everywhere. Seriously though - an American monument would probably have a few stolid GIs, but we put a soldier surrounded by children. It was a really touching monument.

Here I am looking at some of the names on the Wall of Remembrance. It's always a shocking reminder to see all the names before you...just going on and on and on.

Well, after paying our respects, we headed across the city to Beomeosa Temple (Buh-muh-sa), one of the largest in Korea.

I've gotta say that my favourite parts of Korean temples are the gatehouses. They always have these cool, colourful statues inside. I have yet to educate myself as to their exact purpose, but it seems that the original architects poured all of their creative spirit into these particular sections of the temples. But at Beomeosa, I was in for a double-delight....these guys!....

"Smeagol led the nice waygookins to the gates. Orcs always watches. Orcs never gone."

"Nasty tricksy waygookins...I hates them!"

"But waygookins always kind to Smeagol."

"Kills them! Kills them!!"

Anyways.....here I am in front of what Shayne thinks must be the oldest stone pagoda in the world (Shayne's note - who's to say that it isn't. Ehhh? who's to say?).

Here's a modern touch to the stone lantern that would make Al Gore proud. God bless compact-fluorescent light bulbs.

Cherry blossoms, old world temple buildings, and mountains...postcard perfect.

And what you would expect to find at a temple most...monks! Thankfully, these guys were friendly and happy to have me take their picture.

Here's Shayne standing next to the man he'd like to be. It's hard crushing someone's dreams.

After two days of sightseeing, we headed back to the bus station to catch a ride home. Before going, though, we spotted a crowd of older Korean men playing Chang-gi (Korean chess). It is with this image that we leave you...

Until next time,

Jo

China Wind Blowing Through My Seoul

2007-04-04T18:28:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Since moving here last summer we've been waiting patiently for spring time to arrive. Being of fan of all things Kurosawa I've been dying to actually see his beloved cherry blossoms in person. For those of you that don't know, Japan and Korea are full of cherry trees that fill the streets with beautiful rows of white clouds every spring.

We've been enjoying their presence for the past couple weeks and figured that it was about time to document it on the blog. We set out to do just that the other day but unfortunately fate was not upon smiling on us. Ladies and gentleman, please meet hwangsa:

That lovely photo is one that I borrowed from Google and it depicts the hwangsa winds as seen in China. Every year giant waves of sand get picked up by the wind in the deserts of Mongolia and China and crash down upon East Asia. The yellow sand/dust even makes it to South Korea and gives the country a fresh coat of disgustingness each year. Lately they've been smacking Ulsan around and as a result our pics of the trees look less than stellar. Not only do the dust winds make it hard to breath, destroy vegetation, and dirty up the place, but it seems that they also ruin beautiful shots of trees.

But alas, on with the blog.

In a moment of insanity Jo and I decided to walk up a 6km hill that leads to a small ocean community (think Malibu minus all of the rich white people). Here's a shot of the tree corned road on the way up:

Even though the weather's terrible, and the skies are full of dust, you can still get a feel for how beautiful the trees looked.

Here's a random shot of a cherry tree (it would probably look better if it was ilumuniated by sunshine rather than dust clouds, but what can ya do?)

This next shot turned out pretty well. It was our first time experimenting with our camera's macro options.

A great shot of Jo surounded by cherry trees and rose bushes:

They've planted tonnes of rose bushes on the hill and it makes for a really nice contrast in colours with the cherry trees.

This is probably my favorite shot as it shows just how dominant these wonderful trees are. They fully surround both the road and the car.

Ulsan's such a comercial/industrial city that it's nice to see nature fighting back a little.

This shot shows a local farm lined by the trees:

The trees really are everywhere and our pictures don't do their beauty justice. I'm hoping that we'll be able to get out there and grab some more photos of them before they wither away for another year.

Our time here is slowly running out and we still have so much to see. We're trying to plan a small trip for every weekend we have left so you can expect some interesting blogs in the near future.

Anyway, hope this finds all of you well.

Cheers

Shayne

Another one bites the dust.

2007-03-30T22:14:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Sadly I have to report that we still haven't managed to find a cure for cancer or an end to the world's poverty, but we did manage to finish another Star Trek series. That's right baby, we came, we saw, and saw, and saw again, and conquered the beast that is known only as Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

After 130 hours, or if you prefer 5.4 days, we've finally finished watching every episode of the show and we did so following the consecutive order that they were originally broadcast in. I know to many of you this makes us sound like we're even bigger nerds than you thought before, but in our defense Star Trek really is that damn good. Nobody is more surprised about this than I. Before coming to Ulsan I had never watched an episode of Deep Space Nine and wouldn't have known Captain Sisko from Quark (shame on you if you still don't know the difference).

It must be something in the Korean water that leads people to have a Star Trek epiphany.

(Ahhh, the family. I don't care what Todd thinks, Avery is a fine actor)

I just checked and we posted the last blog about Star Trek on the 11th of January. That means we watched all of Deep Space Nine in less than three months. A monumental task if I do say so myself. Combine that with the 133 hours we spent on Star Trek: The Next Generation and you really get one of those "dear god, how I've wasted my life" moments.

Now, to answer the question you're all dying to know, "what show did we like better"? We're a split house on the matter. Jo's remains a bigger fan of Next Gen but I think I have to go with Deep Space Nine. It had better character development, cooler storylines, better enemies, and a shape shifter. You just can't beat shape shifters.

That being said I think we're done with television for a while. It's time to get some reading done before we head home. Anyone have any good Star Trek novels they can send me?

Cheers

Shayne

Brad Pitt Eat Your Heart Out

2007-03-27T05:52:00.000-07:00

Greetings

When Jo and I stepped off the plane last summer we were transformed from regular people into superstars. No really...it's true.

One minute we were Joe and Jane average and the next we were bigger than life, or at least we became D-list celebrities (like the guy from the Karate Kid).

You see, Korea is still a fairly isolated country and the number of non-native citizens living here is remarkably low in comparison to most other industrialised countries. Because of this, we are noticed wherever we go. You might say we stand out like sore thumbs, or bad kimchi (bada bing, bada boom).

It's more than just being stared at though. A lot of people approach us in order to practice their English on a couple of waygookins. It's pretty common to have someone walk up to us and say "hello" (usually it's children but adults do it every now and then too). In fact, it probably happens around 5 to 10 times per day. We'll just be walking and people will shout out "hello". The funny thing is 90 percent of the time when we respond they giggle and run away (usually the adults don't run away, it's more of a slow walk backwards).

We joke around that we're quasi-celebrities over here but somedays it can be a wee bit much. Once we were walking home and having what you might call a minor disagreement (it was more like Jo was bringing me up to speed on what I had done wrong), and a man walked over and tried to converse with us. We're still not sure if he was trying to help or practise the latest vocabulary from his English conversation class, for he asked us "are you serious?" repeatedly. Unfortunately we were not in the teaching mood, and he got a different lesson instead: don't get in between two angry Canadians. It turns out we were serious.

Some foreigners find it diffuicult to get used to all of the attention and come to loathe it over time. But other than when I'm having a really bad day I generally enjoy the attention. Somedays it's fun to mess around a little too. Like this coversation I had the other day:

Random child on the street: HELLO (they always yell)
Me: Hello
Random child on the street: HELLO
Me: Why yes, I do find most Marxists to be pedantic and full of postualtions
Random child on the street: HELLO

And there ya have it, a typical conversation one can have on any given day. It can be theraputic.

The place where we receive the most attention is in front of our place of work. Aside from all our students milling about, there's also a giant elementary school across the street where we're known by most of the students. Of course, our infamy is made worse by the advertisements our boss has outside of the academy. Check these out:

A nice shot of Jo and I from an English camp:

Here it is closer up:

And another great shot from a Speech Contest:

And again, closer up:

I suppose we should enjoy our fame because I predict that in a few more years it'll all be gone. As Korea expands its trading partners and opens the door to more foreigners, being different will stop being such a big deal.

One day English teachers will be as popular here as they are back home (ranked somewhere between Kevin Federline and the fat guy from Mad TV).

But hey, between now and then, I'm going to keep on enjoying my celebrity status.

Cheers

Shayne

Forget Letterman...It's time for the Korean Top Ten

2007-03-19T19:12:00.000-07:00

Greetings

Being a major fan of the Top Ten list I thought that it was time for us at Shayne and Jo to bust out a new one. At first I contemplated doing a top ten list of why Deep Space Nine was underrated, or the top ten costumes to wear at a Star Trek convention, but in the end I settled upon this:

11 Things You Probably Don't Know About Korea

Sure it's not really a top ten list in the scientific sense but who's keeping track. So here ya go, 11 mostly mundane things that you probably don't know about the land of the morning calm.

#11 - Leave your checkmarks at the airport

Although it may seem shocking, the checkmark is about as popular over here as Kim Jong Il. The Koreans have instead embraced the circle as a means of indicating a job well done. I remember the puzzled look of a child last summer when I placed a check beside his work. At first he thought it was some sort of mysterious Canadian symbol and stared at it in utter amazement. For my part, I just assumed that it was the first time in his 7 year academic history that he had actually gotten something right (he ate a lot of paste, so it wouldn't have been that crazy).

#10 - Thumbtacks? What Thumbtacks?

As you can see from the picture above, the term "concrete jungle" applies nicely to Korea. In my time here I think I've seen drywall or wood less than ten times. Concrete is everywhere and as such most household walls are simply decorated with wallpaper. When we wanted to spruce up our place we had to resort to taping things to the walls, as we had no access to the tools needed to use nails and thumbtacks are useless. But it's ok because our Superman poster looks badass with the taped corners.

#09 - Japan won't be coming for dinner anytime soon.

Before we moved here I knew that Japan and Korea had a few issues to work out but I was pretty ignorant about how deep the actual problems ran. I'll save you the full history lesson but Japan annexed Korea as a colony in 1910 and then ruled over them for 35 years. During that time they didn't allow the Koreans to speak their own language in schools or businesses, or to learn about Korean history. In short, they worked pretty hard to obliterate Korean culture.

The Japanese also placed thousands of Koreans into forced labour and military conscription. But what probably stands out the most for modern Koreans is the fact that the Japanese also used hundred of thousands of Korean women as "comfort women". To make matters worse (if that's possible) the Japanese have tried to cover a lot of these things up and still haven't properly apologized to these women or given them any sort of financial remuneration.

As you can imagine the Koreans harbour a few feelings of resentment about all of this. I've seen it firsthand several times in my classes. More than once I've asked students what they want to be when they grow up and heard in response that they want to be soldiers so they can kill the Japanese. Students candidly talk about how they hate the Japanese, and last year when a film came out about Japan sinking into the ocean a lot of our students were really excited about that prospect.

This issue could fill a dozen blog entries, but I'll conclude this short section on it by saying that I think it will be a long time until the wounds are healed and these Asian neighbours become good friends again.

Anyway,on we go...

#08 - There's Crime Here?...Where?

When I first told family and friends that I was moving to South Korea you would have thought that I had said Somolia or Iraq instead, from the way they reacted. Some people were worried that I would be killed or that I would have to fight off robbers everyday on my way to work. Their worries always made me laugh but once I moved here I realized just how funny those fears truly were.

I don't think I've ever felt safer in a place than I usually do here. The threat of crime seems so minimal that sometimes you think you're living in a Norman Rockwell painting (albeit one with lots of kimchi and Koreans).

A lot of kids here don't even have to lock their bikes up (to be fair theft does happen, just nowhere near as much as back home). Here's a stat I found online that shows the low rate of robbery in Korea:

Robbery/Violent Theft per 100,000:
Spain 169.85
United States 169.02
France 144.10
Taiwan 14.35
South Korea 11.74
Japan 2.71

That's just theft, but from what I've found most serious crimes are lower here than in the western world. So for anyone who's ever worried about us in Korea....save the worrying for when we return home....No really...Rutland can be a tough hood to live in.

#07 - Swastikas are Hella Popular.

Coming from a place where the only people who wear swastikas are the chair throwers on Jerry Springer, I was a little taken aback when I moved here and saw one on every corner. They usually indicate a religious place but a lot of people have them on their cars or windows as well.

The version embraced here has nothing to do with Nazis but instead is a Buddhist symbol that basically means "well being" (if you look closely they are actually pretty different anyway).

Still though, being a westerner it takes a little while to get used to seeing them everywhere. There's probably over 50 in our neighborhood alone. Hopefully the one Jo had tattooed on her forehead doesn't cause any problems back home.

#06 - When in Doubt, Add an E.

My friend Jason and I used to joke that you could speak Spanish simply by adding an "O" to the end of word. In Korea it's the letter "E" that holds that honour.

In Konglish (the mixture of English and Korean spoken widely in Korea) words aren't proper unless an E sound is added.

For instance:

Beach becomes Beachie

Church becomes churchie

Finish becomes finish-ie

And so on and so on. So the next time you need to speak Korean in a pinch just drop a few E's and you'll be fine.

#05 - They're a trusting bunch.

We've actually mentioned this one a few times so hopefully some of you were paying attention. In Korea when you get delivery the restaurant brings the food in real plates and bowls. When you finish the food you simply leave the plates on your steps or front door and voila, it's picked up the next day. When I first moved here I just assumed that Koreans hated their plates and would just toss them out as soon as they were finished with them. It was like the scene in "The Jerk" as I sat puzzled on the curb exclaiming "it's the plates...they hate the plates".

Being Canadian this whole practice seems marvelously bizarre to me. I wonder what would happen if someone refused to give back the bowls or even better, what would happen if someone were to rise ubber-early and go through the entire neighborhood stealing plate after plate. It might set the entire Korean economy into a state of shock.

This is definitely something that wouldn't work back home.

#04 - Their Sinks Kickass....But They Sure Smell.

Every sink in Korea must contain a sink trap, it's the law under section 32, article 5, line 3.

Well, I don't know if it's the law or not but it does seem that every house has one. They're actually pretty useful and make cleaning the sink a lot easier than back home. Except, of course, that for lazy people like us it often means that food sits rotting in them for weeks on end.

The sinks also don't have those wonderful U-shaped devices that we have back home. Those lovely little fellows help keep out gasses and funky smells from traveling into your house via the drain. For some reason they never caught on over here. So if any young entrepreneurs are reading this...there's the way to make your billions, plumbing supplies in Korea.

#03 - Western Food Sucks

For some reason the dish above is the epitome of western cuisine. It's called Dang-gus and is a combination of fried pork and a creamy BBQ type sauce. I'm not sure where Koreans got the idea that we enjoy this dish, or if it's just some sort of archetype for western food, but most Koreans seem shocked when they find out that not only do I not like it, but that I've never seen it back home or anywhere in North America for that matter.

I suppose that's what it's like for the Chinese who try "Chinese" food in Canada and discover Chop Suey, etc, for the first time.

#02 - Public Drinking is A-OK

You may be wondering why I chose this photo to convey that drinking in public is acceptable but look closely and you'll see why. That brown stoop/table thingy in the middle of the sidewalk is a familiar sight in Korea. It's a drinking platform and most corner stores and Ma 'n Pa pubs have one out front.

Imagine back home if you could walk into 711, buy a case of Molson Canadian, and then sit outside drinking it on a provided platform. Well, that's the reality over here. What's more, is that that even being completely gooned in public is ok. We see people (usually men) walking drunk through the streets practically every other day. It's just not a big deal over here. That's largely due to lax laws and the fact that Korean culture holds drinking very dearly.

My advice for anyone reading this is to never get into a drinking contest with a Korean. They can usually more than hold their own in such matters.

And finally...

#01 - Squatters have rights

You see little community-type gardens like this all over the place. Even in downtown areas or industrial hubs it's not uncommon to see small gardens between buildings.

I found out that it's because squatters have rights in Korea. If someone owns a plot of land but isn't using it for anything (ie building on it) then it's ok for someone to farm on it. In fact, not only is it ok but it appears that the landowner has no legal recourse to remove the person unless they begin building on the land. It's an interesting concept that has certainly added a lot of needed green space in Korea.

Anyway, there ya have it, eleven facts about Korea. Sure some were a little useless (the sink traps etc..) but don't you feel that much smarter knowing so much more about this great country?

It was kind of a long post but I figured I owed you guys something decent after the small number of posts lately.

Anyway,

Cheers

Shayne

It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighbourhood

2007-03-12T19:22:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday was a beautiful sunny (if chilly) day, so Shayne and I thought we'd finally get off our butts and take some pictures of our neighbourhood. Grab a seat and get some popcorn, because this whirlwind tour's gonna change your life. ...But if it doesn't do that, it might at least keep you remotely interested for about 5 minutes of your day.

We begin our tour at our front door, looking up our driveway to the street (our's is the pink building on the left). Note the scooters on the right...one of the more popular ways of getting around Ulsan's narrow streets.

Now, I think it would get pretty boring showing you our neighbourhood frame-by-frame, so instead I'm going to show you what you would typically see walking around...

A typical house, with a typical Hyundai car (very typical actually...they barely drive anything else here in Ulsan).

A typical pile of melamine take-out dishes waiting to be picked up again (we thought this was a good alternative to styrofoam, although I doubt it would work in Canada.). You see these little piles everywhere.

A typical street (note the narrowness), with a lady wearing a typical face mask. The face masks deserve their own post one day.

A typical corner store. There's one on every corner...no, really. (Shayne's note - If only they sold slurpees....sweet sweet slurpees)

A typical fortune teller's shop, complete with welcoming swastikas. If you want to have your fortune told Korea's the place to be. There's probably five or six of these places in our small neighborhood alone.

A typical bus.

Okay...this is starting to get a little ridiculous. Anyways, on our walk-about we came across some other, maybe not so typical things too.

Like these little fellas. Yes, they were as soft and fluffy as they look. Shayne refused to pet them, as he fears that all unknown dogs are rabid. I'm willing to take my chances though. (Shayne's note - Can you blame me? Look at those things; they're one growl away from starring in the sequel to CUJO)

And here's another sight you see every once in a while: boys playing video games outside of a convenience store. They have plenty of arcades around town, but these mini-numbers seem to be popular too. Not quite sure what the other kid's doing. I should note that the "quarter" machines are only ten cents over here. It really is one of the many financial perks of living in Korea.

Up by the temple (see last July's blog entries), there's a well that many, many locals use for drinking water. Apparently it's clean (unlike tap water), and some think it has medicinal qualities. There's always a few cars parked here with their owners filling up water tanks.

On our walk, we also took the opportunity to go to parts hitherto unexplored. Namely, the science college up the hill from our neighbourhood.

(The street view.)

From appearances, you might think this was a prestigious university, but most people we've talked to consider this college second-rate. I think it looks better than most Canadian institutions, though.

Here's another shot of the "first classroom building". Looks like a courthouse or a legislature.

I've included this picture at the request of Shayne. Apparently it looks just like something at UBC-Okanagan.

One of the benefits of hiking all the way up to the college is the view from the top. Here's Dong-Gu, Ulsan in all of its glory. You can just make out the shipyard in the distance. Note the apartment buildings...there are many.

I thought it would be fitting to throw in a shot of our place at the end...just to draw the whole theme of the walking tour to a close. Our place is the fourth one up at the end. For all those who will never make it out for a visit to see all this first-hand, there you have it.

Until we meet again,
Jo

Paradise Found

2007-03-05T10:36:00.000-08:00

Paradise [par-uh-dahys] noun: (1) a place of extreme beauty, delight, or happiness; (2) a state of supreme happiness; bliss; (3) seven days on Boracay Island.

Well, after three days of recovering from sunburns, coral wounds, and a few too many margaritas, we're finally ready to post about Boracay. Because this post includes almost 30 photos, we're going to keep it text-light, in the hope that the majority of you will make it to the end!

Two Fridays ago we boarded the midnight train to Georgia....err, I mean the midnight bus to Seoul (doesn't quite have the same ring to it, methinks), and a mere 15 hours later we were boarding this....

Half boat, half spider...all Filipino. The ferries between Panay and Boracay islands are like a catamaran's second counsin-twice removed. There's about 50 of them tangled at the Caticlan port at any given time, and they leave about every 5 minutes.

(View from the ferry, with Boracay in the distance.)

No this isn't a snapshot from the wild jungles of Africa...it's our hotel. We don't usually give free plugs, but if any of you ever make it to Boracay, we definitely recommend Dave's Straw Hat Inn. It's located on the quieter end of the beach, has a super-friendly staff, and it's surrounded by lush tropical gardens.

Boracay has a lot of lizards and we were lucky enough to have quite a few of them visit us. They eat flies and spiders and look pretty cute (which is a lot more than most house guests can claim).

But enough about the hotel and lizards - we know what you want to see. Ladies and gentlemen, without further ado, we bring you the white sand beaches of Boracay...

(It sure beats Ilsan Beachee.)

(This is where we spent the majority of our trip.)

(Another view up the beach. It stretches just over four kilometres.)

(Jo enjoying the swimming pool-clear water.)

("Beachfront Path" which is littered with dozens of restaurants, shops, and hundreds of vendors. This is a quieter section, though.)

After a few days of lazing on the beach, we were ready for some exciting activities. Thankfully, that feeling passed and we went horse-back riding instead.

It was Jo's first time on a horse, and as such they gave her a half-dead pony circa the 1980's. Not included in this photo is Jo's adolescent lead, who trotted (okay, let's face it, he strolled) alongside Old Smokey for the whole hour and a half. Good God, that horse was slower than a pair of Christian high school sweethearts.

Shayne, on the other hand, was given "Dirty Red", a bad mamajama if there ever was one. He outpaced Old Smokie by enough that the only view Jo ever had on the trip was Dirty Red's ass. (Shayne's note: if you're wondering why I'm wearing trackpants, it's because the stable owners made me, not because I've reverted back to the grade 10 me.)

Strangely enough, when we got to the top of Boracay's highest peak, we were greeted by monkeys. We can't tell what they're doing, but it looks like they're having fun doing it...especially the one on the bottom.

(A view of the island. That is all.)

Humans can't live on lounging and horse-back riding alone; they need boat cruises and snorkeling as well. And dammit, we weren't going to miss out on either. The next day we signed up for an all-day snorkeling cruise that took us all around the island.

(El Capitano holding on for dear life.)

(The happy couple. And in the front, the two of us. Mwa-wa-wa-waaaa.)

(One of the cuter vendors on the far end of the island. This pic cost us a fair few pesos, so you'd better enjoy it.)

(Filipino boys flipping off of our boat as we docked for lunch.)

(A photo of us enjoying our favourite evening pastime: drinking San Miguel and listening to local music.)

Of course, the problem with too many San Miguels is you wake up the next morning a few thousand pesos poorer and with one of these on your shoulder...

(Surprise Mom!)

That first cruise made us long for the open seas once more, and so we found ourselves a sexy boat captain with his very own sailboat (balangay) for hire.

(Kickin' back on the high seas: the captain and some other guy.)

(A beautiful photo that Jo managed to capture without dropping the camera overboard.)

(As testament to our budget cruise - and Shayne's manliness - he helped the captain push the boat back ashore after the trip.)

(Coming soon to a Corona ad near you.)

Well, the worst part about this trip was that it had to end. But at least we left in style....

(No doors, no windows, no seatbelts, no problem.)

(Rush hour in Boracay.)

(Shayne in the back of the taxi-trike, guarding our suitcase full of seashells. Good old Shayne.)

It's a bit out of sequence, but we couldn't think of a better image to leave you with. Here's the sunset on Boracay, taken by Shayne...

Cheers,
Shayne and Jo

Boracay, Boracay, Boracay

2007-02-23T02:56:00.000-08:00

Greetings

By the time you read this we'll be on our way. In only a few short hours we'll be catching a red-eye bus to Seoul, where we'll wait for about three hours until leaving for the sunny Philippines.

Essentially, we'll be going from this:

To this:

(artist's rendition of a tropical paradise. )

Wellllllllll, I'd love to stay and blog all day but somebody has to sunbathe and drink margaritas all day, and it might as well be me.

We'll try and update from Boracay but I'm not sure how easy that will be. If not, see you in nine days.

Cheers

Shayne (and Jo)

Having fun in all the right places

2007-02-20T06:48:00.000-08:00

Now that the weather's warmed up a little bit, Shayne and I have decided to get back on track exploring our city. This week we got a few extra days off due to Lunar New Year, so we called our new friends, Jared and Elia, and headed off across the city to visit the famed Ulsan Grand Park.

(Starting off with high hopes)

The park was built a few years ago with millions in city money, and is chock-full of games, fun and amusements. We intended to get the most out of our day...and our $2.50 in parking fees.

Here's Elia trying out the first thing we came across: a (very) small climbing wall next to what seemed to be a roller-skating fun course. We just walked along the fun course (being without roller-skates), and Elia mastered the peaks. (Shayne's note - for those of you out of the loop, a roller-skating fun course is Jo speak for a roller-skating track.) (Shayne's note part Deux - Who still uses the term rollerskating anyway?)

Ahh...just in case you weren't sure who sponsored the park, here's a giant, cabbage-rimmed clock to remind you: SK, "Korea's number one mobile communications company." And in case you were wondering, the time is correct.

Further on we discovered a serene lake, replete with a windmill. Perfect for romantic walks by couples in matching outfits.

On the other side of the lake we discovered something very cool. A huge area devoted to various outdoor games. There was Throw the Darts into the Bucket, Whip the Top, and what game area would be complete without...

...a row of mini teeter-totters - perfect for launching your date or child onto the mats so kindly provided.

But that stuff was all small-time. As we got deeper into the giant park, we discovered diversions that made our whole trip worthwhile.

Behold, the nylon sledding hill. For only 4,000 won (4 bucks, or so) you can slide down this hill as many times as you like. Of course, most people were better drivers than me. Somehow I just couldn't steer the damn thing.

...I guess that's why they have these handy inflated bumpers. Sigh...one more foolish foreigner feuling the myth that white people can't drive.

Take a close look at the above photo. This is by far the coolest thing I've ever seen in a public park. It's a mini roadway! And it has functioning traffic lights, crosswalk signals, a tunnel, and even a pedestrian overpass. Where were these when I was a child?

Look, the little guy is actually obeying the red light - sooo cute!

They even have a mini parking lot!

Anyways, the childhood fun didn't end there. Further along was this strange rubberised rope castle. That was okay, but the big money was next door. Check this out...

It's a freakin' trampoline mountain! I was born too late and on the wrong continent.

Anyway, we only made it about half-way into the park before our stomachs started crying out for some lunch. Unfortunately in all the planning, they didn't create any "fun" activities for adults....like a pub or something. So we heading back out of the park in search for something to eat. We came across this....

No, your eyes aren't playing tricks with you. It's a creepy white guy taking a crap...in a clothing store's shop window. I have no explanations.

Well, that was our day, such as it was. I'd like to end off with some incredibly insightful message, but I just don't have one. The dude on the toilet wiped all my insightfulness clean away...ba dum bum. Have a good one.

Jo

The Second Happiest Place on Earth

2007-02-11T07:14:00.000-08:00

Greetings,

As our time slowly winds down here we've been working our way through a list of must do's. Although the list is still really long we managed to scratch one more item off the other day:

The Lotte Wheel.

The giant ferris wheel is one of the largest landmarks in Ulsan and probably the only landmark that's well known (relatively speaking, of course) outside of the city limits.

There isn't much information available on Old Lotte, but she was built sometime in the 1990's and she sits around 520 feet tall. She's also on top of a Lotte Department Store that has some great Mongolian food, but that's a different blog for a different day.

Some of our more astute readers might remember seeing her in a few other posts. But for those of you who don't remember the wheel at all, prepare yourselves.

Ah, there she is in all her glory. It's kind of like when the giant gates open in Jurassic Park and you get to see the dinosaurs for the first time.

I'm not sure why it took us so long to visit such a famous landmark, especially since we love amusement parks so much. I guess the allure of ferris wheels (even giant ones) just isn't that strong.

But it was worth going just to see the great signs they had. Like this one that warns you against committing such serious infractions as: eating food, running, and being elderly.

I have to admit that once I found out that I wasn't allowed to elderly, a lot of the attraction was lost for me.

But things went from bad to worse when I read the next warning sign.

Imagine having the nerve to tell us not to romp. I'll romp as much as I want and wherever I want to. No man, woman, or ferris wheel will take away my right to romp.

Aside from some humorous signs the wheel also provided some great views of the city.

Well, at least it offered some views. The Ulsan sky line is definitely still developing. But hey, we learned that we live near mountains - who knew?

We also learned what we already knew, that driving in Korea makes about as much sense as voting for the BC liberals (Ba dum bum boom).

Look at that picture. There are three lanes on the top of the picture that are turning left into two lanes on the bottom of the picture that are turning right. It's like a game of twister, but with cars. That's not that bad of a scene either. I wish we could have gotten a rush hour photo.

The busses have a little more order but not much. In the time that were watching there must have been two or three jams where every driver thought they had the right of way. I was hoping for a little bus rage, but alas it wasn't to be.

Ahh, such a happy couple. You should note the existence of my manly beard. It's taken about 24 years to grow, but it was worth the wait.

Being so high up gave us another unique view of the city. A view of the beautiful scenery to the south.

Ahh, who doesn't love the smell of a good petro-chemical plant in the morning? It's hard to see through all the pollution but there's at least twenty-five smoke stacks pumping out god knows what into the air. Make sure that you right-click and look at an enlarged view of that photo. That picture only represents probably a tenth of what this city has to offer.

Well, there ya have it. A quick blog about one of the city's fine attractions. Scratch one more off of our list.

But remember, wherever you go and whatever you do...

Big brother's always watching you:

Cheers

Shayne

I'll tell you where you can stick that test!!!

2007-02-07T08:56:00.000-08:00

Greetings

When I moved here I made the solemn promise to avoid hospitals and doctors as much as humanly possible. Some days it’s a battle to communicate effectively enough to have water brought to our table so I didn’t want to be in a situation where I had to scramble to learn the Korean for “no, no, no reattach that at once”.

I had to break my vow a few months ago when I was forced to visit a local clinic to receive my final hepatitis vaccination. To say that the place was dirty would be an epic understatement. It wasn’t just that the waiting room was untidy or that the Doctor had some mustard on his tie from lunch. The place looked like it hadn’t ever been cleaned. There was dirt on the floors, mildew on the windows, and the walls were water stained. I was scared that the doctor would give me the shot and then spit some vodka (or soju) on the spot afterwards and start laughing like a banshee.

I’m sure that I just picked a bad clinic and that the Korean health industry is fine overall. Still, my experience, plus the stories I hear from our boss about how eating ground reindeer antlers and giant mountain snails are standard practice in traditional medicine, made me a tad hesitant to receive any further medical services while in Korea.

But alas, after missing two days of work, with a brutal cough and a fever, I was forced to visit another doctor. This time I skipped the local scene and went to one of Ulsan’s biggest hospitals, which is known for having a “foreigner’s clinic”. As per my usual luck the entire episode was one giant debacle after another.

To start with, man do the Koreans love bureaucracy. First, we had to navigate our way through the reception area. Back home most hospitals have a small reception area with a few nurses to help register patients. In Korea they have an army of receptionists lined up from one side of the building to another. There were probably over 15 or so receptionists typing away at their computers registering dozens and dozens of people every few minutes. After using some sign language, a few grunts, and drawing some scenes with stickmen, we were finally registered and sent on our way to the “foreigner’s” clinic.

It turns out the “foreigner’s” clinic is just two rooms staffed with the poor saps who probably speak the most English of anyone on the payroll. Everyone was very kind to us but communicating was still a rather difficult task. I wrongly assumed that with a title like “foreigner’s clinic” that there would be people who spoke English, my bad.

Anyway, after being weighed, and having my belly slapped ala the Goonies, I finally got in to see the Doctor. Dear god…The Doctor. I opened to the door to this:

Well, actually it was more like this:

The Doctor must have been all of twenty years old. I have baby blankets that look older than he did. If his age wasn’t enough to worry me he hardly spoke English and didn’t seem trained enough to handle the medical nature of my visit, a cough. No lie at all, when I mentioned the possibility of bronchitis he googled it to see what it was (using the Korean version). This doctor might has well have shouted out “Hello Everybody”, for all the confidence I had in him at that point.

But yet, it somehow got even worse (as it always does). He suddenly became scared that I had Tuberculosis and needed an X-ray right away. I’ve been struck with some strange inflictions over the years but TB? I only had a cough. I’m surprised he didn’t want to test me for cancer or maybe even tourettes or something.

I begrudgingly made my way for x-rays only to discover that I had to go back to the reception area to get an X-ray pass. When I finally got to the X-ray area I was confronted by one large room where the waiting area was inside the actual X-ray taking room. I’m not an expert but in Canada when you get one done the technician actually leaves the room and generally you are covered by a lead vest. Here, not only does the technician stay in the room, but so do the six or seven other people who are next in line. I’m sure that at this point there are either no children in my future, or that I’m going to awake tomorrow with green skin and super powers.

I was happy to notice that the actual X-ray machine was made by Canon (a fine corporation that made both my digital camera and my printer). Of course, mid X-ray I remembered that my digital camera stopped working one day and would only flash “Error-18” over and over again whenever I used it. Suddenly I was full of fear that the X-ray machine would break down mid shot and the technician would start screaming “Error 18” over and over again as my insides melted down my leg.

After losing the ability to be a father I then went back to the doctor’s office where I was cleared of both TB and tourettes, but diagnosed with Bronchitis (surprise, surprise). He then told me I needed some antibiotics and told me to go back to reception. It seems that in Korea doctors aren’t given the authority of a prescription pad. The fine people in reception then gave me a piece of paper to give to the pharmacist (which, of course, they charged me twenty cents for) and sent me on my way.

It turns out there really is no pharmacist on site, only a different kind of reception area where they take the paper given to you by the first reception area, which the doctor ordered, and then toss you out to find a REAL pharmacy somewhere outside of the actual hospital (phew, that was a mouthful).

For those of you keeping track my day looked like this:

From the Reception, to the “Foreigner’s clinic”, then back to Reception area, then off to the X-ray clinic, then back to the "Foreigner’s clinic ",then off to Reception area again, then to the Fake Pharmacy, and then finally off to the Real pharmacy

God bless bureaucracy. Anyway, it might have taken three hours, a few X-rays and the better part of my sanity, but eventually I got the antibiotics, and isn’t that what really matters?

If you lasted through this beast of a post, good work.

Cheers

Shayne

P.S – Thanks to anyone who followed my advice. It looks like it was a good day on the 7th.

Odo, I don't think we're in Victoria anymore

2007-02-01T04:36:00.000-08:00

When Shayne and I were preparing to come to Korea we talked a lot about culture shock. I guess we thought that if we somehow steeled ourselves against it, that we'd be fine. But to tell the truth we really had no idea what culture shock was. We thought that it would be merely finding the differences between cultures strange and annoying... but if we were just open-minded we could overcome it. This was not how it was, and this was not how it happened.

In fact, we didn't even experience anything overly uncomfortable until a couple of weeks into our stay. Before then we were too wonderstruck and disorientated. It happened when we decided to wander away from the confines of our apartment and find something to eat...but not knowing what. An hour later we had poked our heads into a dozen different strange restaurants but were still no closer to a meal. Everything smelled bad, or looked strange, and we couldn't read the menus. We just stood in the middle of the sidewalk wallowing in indecision, and begging God for a White Spot to fall out of the sky. We ended up eating fiery-hot kimchi stew, and hating ourselves for not staying at home. And that was just the first time it happened.

Anyways, the point is that culture shock isn't some general thought or feeling, and it isn't predictable. It comes up and smacks you in the back of the head at 2 days, 2 weeks, or 2 months with feelings of frustration, alienation, and resentment. That being said, we've found some ways to deal with it, and although we are by no means experts on the subject, we have 7 months in a foreign culture and a captive audience so I think that's qualification enough. Here are our five easy steps to culture shock recovery:

1. Learn to love the food
When we first came to Korea the food looked strange and smelled even stranger. Thankfully, due to a boss who introduced us to a wide variety of Korean cuisine, and our willingness to try it, we've come to love (almost) every Korean dish we've tried. This has made the single biggest difference in overcoming culture shock here. How can you long for home when the food is so good?

But how did we bridge the gap between aversion to appetite? First, we were determined to learn to appreciate kimchi. Being the number one Korean food, how could we not? So, every time it was served we ate at least one bite. At first it was unpleasant, but now we can't get enough. In fact, we just polished off a 1 litre container of the stuff (donated by a student's mother) in under two days. Shayne's even talking about learning to make the stuff! We have seen the light.

(It's smelly, spicy, and strangely addictive.)

Second, we agreed to try everything once...except dog meat. That means that even when the side dish looked like something scooped out of the sink trap, we tried it; even when the soup smelled like feet, we tried it; and even when we were faced with a styrofoam cup full of boiled pupae, we tried it. Are we heroes? No. Do we need breathmints? Maybe. But what we did do was discover some of our new favourite meals in the process.

2. Know the rules - when in Rome and all that crap
Nothing will lead to embarrassment and frustration more than doing the wrong thing at the wrong time and having a dozen Korean faces looking at you in disapproval. Even though we have a bit of diplomatic immunity as foreigners, it's still pretty uncomfortable. So, we've done our best to observe carefully and to ask a lot of questions, so that we can avoid these situations altogether.

Probably the best example of this is driving. Apart from basic rules like stopping at red lights, speed limits and not crashing into other cars or people, driving is very different over here. It's the unwritten driving culture that's the most different. Back home you would be concerned if someone didn't have their lights on after dark, but here if they're turned off when someone's stopped at an intersection, it's usually on purpose as a courtesy to on-coming traffic. Back home if someone cut you off, passed you on the left to turn right (when you're also turning right onto the same road), or honked at you incessantly to get by when you're no way in the wrong, it would probably eat at you all day. Here, this is normal and expected. Also, back home you have stop signs. Here, you don't. Anyways, driving sounds really hectic and stressful, and at first it is. All I can say is after two months of driving around town, I've learned to become super-defensive and super-aggre...ahem...assertive, and I've been all the happier for it.

My point is, I could have spent the past two months insisting upon driving according to the North American driving culture, and flipped out every time someone did something "dangerous" or "aggressive" but I would have been a lot more stressed out. Sometimes we just need to chill out and follow someone else's rules.

3. Read up on the culture - Confucius say...
Okay, now this one should be obvious, but to be honest it's one we didn't pay much attention to at first. One of our biggest annoyances when we first arrived was how strangers treated each other...which is badly. Pushing someone aside, cutting in line (especially in the women's washroom!), and generally being discourteous (to North American standards) is all standard practice here. Now, we could have gotten used to it except for the fact that Koreans are some of the kindest, most helpful people once you actually talk to them. It was all very confusing and frustrating...until we learned a little bit more about our new friend Confucius. Of all Asia, Korea has embraced Confucianism the strongest. And one of the main facets of Confucianism is hierarchy. Hence stranger behavior; if someone doesn't know you, they don't know where you sit on the hierarchy, and therefore, you don't exist....ergo, no politeness necessary. Voila! Strange stranger behavior problem solved! And with one "aniyo haseyo" you enter existence and that cold Korean exterior melts into pure sunshine.

(The man who influenced millions.)

Anyways, apart from explaining away the mean woman in the grocery store, learning about this has helped us at work too. Employer-employee relations are very different here; they're very similar to a strict Korean family: our boss is the benevolent father (or mother in our case), and we are the dutiful children. Not that I would recommend this set-up back home, but it has eased the stress of some work issues, once we realised the cultural motives behind them.

4. Move past grunting and sign language

Learn the language. It seems so simple, and yet deludes so many. You'd be amazed at how many people spend a year or more here and don't get much past "hello" and "thank you." But, as you might imagine, learning survival-level Korean has gone a long way in helping us integrate as much as two whities in an all-Korean neighbourhood can do.

5. Create a safe haven
No matter how much you integrate, just like Odo you'll have to revert back to your gelatinous state every 16 hours. There, now both Shayne and I have outed ourselves as shameless Trekkies. Anyways, my point is that one of the things keeping us sane over here is the ability to "go back to Canada" once in a while. Our apartment's the main base of operations with North American food, books, music and TV shows. It's like a mini version of Canada.We even have a room that keeps trying to separate from the rest of the house.

We also indulge, every so often, in a good night of venting with other ex-pats about the cultural idiosyncrasies we don't yet understand and the things we miss about home. Just like a vacation from work, it all helps take the strain off. .

(The man himself.)

Well, there you have it. All the wisdom that two young Canadians living in a foreign land can muster. Even more so than the strange cities, temples, and various Korean oddities, I think the most interesting experience so far has been watching ourselves adapt to a new culture. It's been really difficult at times, and totally not what we expected, but perhaps the most enriching experience we'll take away from this year.

Take care everyone,
Jo

Crank the Eddie Money, because "we've got two tickets to paradise"

2007-01-27T18:26:00.000-08:00

Greetings

After teaching over 1500 classes in the last seven months, Jo and I have become, as the French say, burned out (word!!).

So we figured that we had two options: We could either run away and join a hippy compound somewhere in Australia (I heard that Melbourne is full of hippies) or we could take a vacation. Jo's never really cared for the smell of patchouli, and I still have that lifelong attachment to my protestant work ethic, so we decided that we would make poor hippies.

In other words, we needed a vacation and we needed one fast. Having done several non-touristy vacations we decided that we needed to spend a week just being tourists, relaxing and doing absolutely nothing at all.

So without further adieu ladies and gentlemen let me introduce you to our destination:

Sweet, sweet Boracay. Located an hour or so below Manila the small island of Boracay is a tropical paradise right in the Philippines. The island is less than ten miles across at any point, and so far it has fought off the majority of American chain stores that you see everywhere else in Asia.

We leave on the 24th of February and don't come back until the 3rd of March.

Neither of us have ever done a vacation where we didn't have to carry a big backpack or sleep in a crappy hostel, or some hotel where the fear of waking up without a kidney was a reality.

This time we're doing it right and plan to live it up.

We're going to do some snorkeling, horseback riding, jet skiing, parasailing, swimming, and maybe get dropped off at a deserted beach for a day. That is if Jo can convince me she won't go all Jack on my ass and turn me into the island's "Piggy" (thanks to M. Fischer for that lovely literary reference).

For the purposes of the blog I asked the staff at Shayne and Jo to create an image of what I will look like when I'm riding a horse on the beaches of Boracay. So here ya go:

Hmmm, they did a really good job capturing my likeness.

Well 27 days to go, and I still have to get into beach shape.

Wish me luck.

Cheers

Shayne

Quick, Lock the Doors! - Part 2

2007-01-21T17:53:00.000-08:00

Greetings

Just like with The Empire Strikes Back or The Godfather Part II, the sequel is here, and it kicks ass.

That's right ladies and gentleman, it's the moment you've all been waiting for: Part Deux of the life changing story of the time my Dad and his girlfriend, Dawn, came to visit us in Ulsan.

Now let's see....where were we? Ah yes...

Our boss Mrs. Ann generously offered to take the four of us on a tour of the nearby city Gyeongju.

We're pretty thankful to have such a nice boss, because without her my Dad and Dawn would have basically just seen Ulsan, and well, there's only so much time you can spend touring oil refineries and car plants.

Gyeongju was the capital of the ancient Silla dynasty and is home to many of Korea's biggest temples, ruins, and oddly enough theme parks.

It's also home to many a stone pagoda as the following picture proves.

Yep, that's one fine looking pagoda.

Here's a shot of Jo and I outside the Bulguksa temple, which was built in 528 AD and was once the most important Buddhist temple in Korea. Now-a-days it's mostly for tourist purposes but there are still a few monks running around.

Unfortunately the temple's treasures are long gone as Korea's been ransacked more times than a 711 in Detroit. Still, it was cool to visit something so old.

Here's our boss and her friend standing in front of one of the main inner temples. It's still active and both Jo and I managed to get inside to be blessed.

I prayed for world peace as that's always a good choice and it felt wrong to make my usual prayer for millions of dollars in unmarked bills in such a holy place.

The temple also has several colourful statues that serve as guards and as entertainment.

This badass is in charge of protecting the place from intruders (hmm, in retrospect I guess he should have probably been fired).

This dude just chills and plays music all day. It was interesting to see that hippies have been around a lot longer than the 1960's.

After exploring the temple, we set off to see the Seokguram Grotto in the Korean mountains.

Our boss and her friend wisely waited in the car as we made the 30-minute trek through the freezing cold to see a statue tucked away in a cave.

It was actually pretty cool but the experience was so miserable that the adventure lost most of its allure. At one point along the way I started to even doubt that there was a statue, and that it was just a joke they played on foreigners stupid enough to get tricked into climbing the mountain in the middle of winter.

But alas, the statue was real, and it was mind-blowingly fantastic. Double alas, they didn't allow photos so you will have to settle for this gem of pops and me on the hillside.

After the mountainside exploration our boss took us to a neighboring folk village. Folk villages are preserved (or in some cases simulated) villages that are designed to let people see how traditional Koreans lived. They even pay farmers and artisans to live in them for added realism.

The one we went to was pretty deserted and for the most part it was kind of broken down. The good part, though, was it was real. This was some rich dude's house back in the 1700's.

This particular building really shined some light on why the Big Bad Wolf was always so damn successful against that poor first little pig.

Seeing this ye-olde outhouse taught me that there is something out there worse than squat toilets. Jo tried to use it but thankfully I stopped her before we embarked on our first international incident.

From the folk village we made our way to a recently created holy ground (it's only ten years old) called the Ten Thousand Buddhas temple.

If you zoom in on this picture you can see that there's a lot more than just ten thousand Buddhas. Each one has a name engraved on it (and you can get one too, for a nominal fee of course) and brings the person good luck and fortune year-round.

Nothing too special here other than if you zoom in you will see that each little Buddha has a hand-made toque. Something of note is that although everything appears to be made of gold, it's all just plastic.

The temple is sort of a Disneyland of Buddhism if you will. It was definitely the most kitschy temple we've visited in Asia so far.

Thankfully alongside the plastic statues they also offered prayer chairs.

I'm thinking of trying to broker a deal with Ikea to sell these fellows back in Canada. Who wouldn't want to sit on the hand of god while they slurp up their meatloaf and potatoes each night?

Dad and I beside one of the few hundred 10 feet tall Buddhas. Try to image the same thing but with 100's of plastic Jesus Christ statues. I'm not sure if it would work. Although they probably have something like that in the States somewhere (likely Florida).

This is inside the temple where people go to pray. I wanted to climb up and see if that statue was plastic too, but common sense and the fear of a few dozen monks chasing me won out. The large crystal balls in the background were pretty neat. I kept expecting to see a gypsy walk over and rub them the whole time we were there.

Of course the true star of the temple is the massive statue that rests on the hillside beside it.

Beautiful isn't it? (And yes, it's not plastic ... or so we think.)

Here's a photo of Buddha with Dawn, or Dawn with Buddha, depending how you look at things.

We spent the majority of the day exploring Gyeongju and area, and it was one of the coolest experiences we've had in Korea.

We were really lucky to have a boss who's not only nice but really supportive and helpful. One of our friends has been waiting for 5 months for their boss to call a repair man for them, and ours not only acted as tour guide when my dad visited, but insisted on paying for everything.

Goodtimes.

Of course, no visit to Korea would be complete with out a visit to your local friendly noreabang.

How we talked my dad into going I'll never know, but we did and it was fantastic.

Here's your loyal scribe belting out a little Jerry Lee Lewis.

But here's the photo that has since become the prized treasure of my collection:

My father warbling out "Hey Jude" while Dawn tries her best to help him. Haha, now there's a sentence that I never thought I would type.

They were here for a week but it felt like only a few hours. It was so great having family around that it really reminded us how much we miss everyone at home. I never dreamt that I would travel around Korea with my Dad.

Dad and Dawn are now in China and we're back to just working and counting the days until our next vacation.

Goodtimes indeed.

Cheers

Shayne

Quick, lock the doors! - Part 1

2007-01-15T05:17:00.000-08:00

Greetings

Since moving here we've probably had about five or six people express interest in coming out to visit us. But as the months rolled on, the interest faded (maybe it was the lack of excitement in our blogs, or maybe our friends just suck) and our poor guest room sat empty month after month.

So when my Dad first said that he was going to come and spend some time with us in Korea we didn't hold our breath. But imagine our shock, when not only did he and his partner, Dawn, buy plane tickets, but they actually showed up in Ulsan last week. They were on their way to China (so he could meet her parents - gulp) but managed to fit a week with us into their schedule.

As soon as we picked them up from the train station we headed for a little taste of Koreana: The divinity known as Bulgogi.

You can't see much from this picture, but bulgogi is marinated beef that is cooked with vegetables and served with kimchi and countless other strange red-coloured side dishes. I should note that we really put these two through the wringer while they were here. We somehow talked them into trying the following Korean foods:

Silk worm pupae
Fish cakes stuffed with red beans
Spicy rice cakes covered in seaweed
Potato and mustard pizza
Rice balls stuffed with god only knows what, by god only knows who

They were definitely good sports and got the most out of their Korean experience as possible. In fact, Dad only retreated to McDonalds once during the whole trip. He said he only went there to see how it compared to back home, but I'm not sure if I believe him.

Here's a photo of Jo, Dad, and Dawn standing in front of a statue that's besides our work. It seems that the man was the first principal of the school and is remembered by a giant fear-imposing statue. Oddly enough, the school just opened a few years ago.

Alright, maybe I made that up. The statue is actually of a war hero who helped push out the Japanese during one of the hundreds of times they invaded.

Dad was pretty interested to see where we worked but unfortunately the trip didn't end well.

Within minutes dad was back to where he spent the majority of his time at school: the corner.

We took Dad and Dawn to that fish market we blogged about a few weeks ago, and not too much had changed since we last visited. However, there was one new addition to the market.

The return of what the foreigners in Korea so cleverly refer to as "sea pe@is#s" (this is a PG rated blog).

If you zoom in on the picture you can see why they earned that great name. Oddly enough, if you pick them up they actually shoot out liquid. I could probably make a lot of good jokes at this point, but I won't (see Mom, you did raise a gentleman).

Being so close to the ocean, the four of us spent a lot of time exploring Ulsan's coastline during their visit. Here's a nice shot on the cliffs by the spot where we shot that typhoon blog in the summer.

Thankfully things were a little calmer when we went back this time.

Hey how did this shot of Robert Redford and Brad Pitt sneak into the blog?

Although we've been here for over six months, Dad and Dawn managed to do something on their first day that we've never been able to do. They woke up early enough to see the sunrise.

It's almost enough to make a man wake up early every day to enjoy the beautiful view. Almost, but not quite. I think I'll keep with my policy of never waking up before noon.

Here's a shot of Dawn in front of a small temple by our place. The signs in the background advertise a Richard Gere seminar that's coming up.

This next shot's of Dad at the same temple standing beside what appears to be a collection of Buddhist action figures.

The whole thing just seems strange to me. I was half expecting to see a Darth Vader figurine tucked in there somewhere.

Having some people to show around forced us to get off our lazy butts, stop watching Star Trek, and go out and try some new things. And try new things we did.

We managed to stumble across a board game room. Board game rooms are a geek's dream come true: A giant room with dozens of tables and hundreds of games to choose from. All for the low price of two dollars per hour.

It was difficult to pick between Monkeys in a Barrel, Monopoly, or Uno. As you can see we settled on playing some Uno, and I'm saddened to report that I was the only one who didn't win. Damn Uno, it's a stupid game anyway.

If you're wondering why I' m holding a giant plastic mallet, it's because that's what you hit the loser with each round. I have no idea why that is, or who thought of it, but what a great rule!!!

We need to use more plastic hammers back home. It could probably solve a lot of our problems.

Here's Dad enjoying his win:

This post is already too long so I' m going to have to split it into two sections. The next post will cover the trip we took to Gyeoung-ju (which is one of the cultural capitals of Korea) and our trip to a norae bang.

Sooooooooooooo?

Will Dad and Dawn ever speak to us after we talked them into eating silk worms?
Will I ever win at Uno?
Will Dad and Dawn come to love our little Ulsan, or will the 200-plus smoke-spewing factories scare them off?

Tune in later this week for the answer to all of these questions and the shocking conclusion to our tale.

Cheers

Shayne

Coming out of the closet

2007-01-11T04:54:00.000-08:00

Greetings

My father and his partner are in Korea for the next week so posting will be pretty sparse until they're gone. That being said it's late at night and everyone's asleep so I thought I would post a short anecdote about our life over here.

Right before we left for Asia my friend Jason gave Jo and I a whole slew (yes, a slew) of DVDs that included (among other things) every season of Star Trek: The Next Generation (ST:TNG). Before receiving the DVDs I had probably only seen ST:TNG handful of times and wouldn't have been able to tell you the difference between a Klingon and a Romulan (haha, I was so naive).

But upon moving here and finding out that the Koreans don't care much for English movies, we were forced to drop our one-movie-a-week addiction that we had back in Canada and take up Star Trek instead.

It's hard for me to admit this but...yes...Korea has turned us into Trekkies. We don't own any costumes (yet) and we haven't been to a convention (yet), but I can tell you who played the Doctor in the second season (Diana Muldaur) or who was the only person to play themselves in the series (Stephen Hawking).

(Our new family)

Since August 1st Joanna and I have watched every single episode of ST:TNG. That's right, all 178 episodes and all seven years' worth.

My rudimentary math skills show me that we've wasted over 178 hours on the show or 7.25 days. Damn, that's a lot of time when you look at it that way. It seems to me that I guess we could have used our time better. We could have...

...spent the seven days trying to cure cancer. Or at the very least we could have spent the seven days trying to find a cure for kimchi breath.

Of course, we also could have...

...built the world's biggest lobster in our backward. Who doesn't love a big lobster?

No really, who?

Come on tell me!

Please, just tell me!

Alright, alright. I can see that you're not gonna crack.

Anyway, we may have spent the last six months watching every single episode of ST:TNG (in order too) but I have no regrets. You know why?

Because of this:

Or as the Koreans say Gu-nyoung (just because).

Because I'm a Trekkie and I'm proud.

God bless Star Trek.

Cheers

Shayne

P.S - This post is dedicated to Jason Harman who made this whole thing possible.

Full many a flow'r is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the PC Room air.

2007-01-07T06:24:00.000-08:00

The time has come, my friends, to take you on a journey. A journey to a place patronized by 99.99% of the young male Korean population. This is a place found on every street corner in every self-respecting, over-crowded city in Korea: it is the PC Room.

We begin our adventure three minutes from our apartment, across the street from our favourite kimbap haunt. There were actually two to choose from, but this looked by far the nicer option. I mean, look how much money they put into that signage.

Despite the dominance of this PC Room's signs, the actual business was on the third floor - on the "Power Internet Praza!" No, that's not a spelling mistake (on my part) - this place just really means business. And with all the power references and the crazy-cool binary overlays, we were expecting something extra-special.

You can't get much more special than black lighting and gothic thrones. Well actually, as my lungs began to sputter and contract the second I walked through the wall of cigarette smoke, I thought some air ventilation might have been pretty special too.

Now, you'll have to use your imagination a bit, as we had to be a bit sneaky taking pictures of the place (we decided to forgo asking permission...I mean, they might have said "no"). But just multiply the scene above by twenty and you pretty much have the place wrapped up. And it was literally full of young men (most of them chain-smoking) playing World of War Craft. We walked around, too, just to see if anyone was doing something more important, like typing up a business briefing or putting the finishing touches on their thesis, but no one was. They were all pretty much controlling elves or blowing up things. That and developing some serious cancer cells.

Ahh, the snack aisle. What PC Room would be complete without the wall of ramien and other nutrient-free delights? And we tried one of the more unusual, just for a kick...

It's a cheese cookie! We tried it, and it yes, it really is a cheese cookie. Imagine your average cookie with some Kraft cheese powder mixed in. Kraft should really get on this train. Toot toot!

Ramien, not the cheese cookie, is the real staple here though. Through our extensive research interviewing an appropriate cross-section of young Korean males, we've discovered that the youth spend countless hours in these rooms living off cup-o'-ramien. Okay, we only really talked to one guy. But he spends a lot of time in PC Rooms and not much time doing anything else, so we thought he was fairly reliable.

It's sad really. The number of young men that waste their lives in places like this one is staggering. With every slurp of ramien, this place sucks the souls and ambitions of countless young Koreans, who if it weren't for these great lands of electronic escape, might do something with their lives. It reminds me of Thomas Gray's musings in "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard", and with my own version of which, I leave you:

Here rests his head upon the PC Room berth,
A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown.
Fair Science frown'd not on his humble birth,
And Indolence mark'd him for her own.

Until next time,
Jo

Here's to Today, Better Than Yesterday

2007-01-01T21:27:00.000-08:00

Greetings

Remember when you were a kid and you would wait all week for your favourite TV show to come on, but instead of finding a new escapade about uncle Phil and little Will you would be greeted by the dastardly clip show. Surely you remember the clip show? A whopping thirty minutes of recycled clips that producers pull out whenever they are too lazy to actually create a new episode. Who doesn't love a good montage?

Anyway, on that note I present to you our version of the clip show: Shayne and Jo's favourite moments of 2006.

Moment #5 : Shayne's Graduation

Now admittedly this has more to do with Shayne than Jo, but we had some extra space and figured why not. Besides after 5 (cough, maybe 6, cough) years, $15,000 in student loans, and hundreds of half-assed assignments, it was a major accomplishment. Or at least that's what Shayne says when he brags about having a degree in Sociology and an almost completed minor in Womens' Studies.

Moment #4 : Sasquatch Festival

(photos are courtesy of www.truthandart.blogspot.com)

For those of you who might not be familiar with it, Sasquatch is a three day music festival in Washington that takes place every summer. It's one of the last great festivals that hasn't gone to hell (Lollapalooza we're looking at you). We only went to one of the three days, but on the day we went the following acts played:

Ben Harper
The Shins
The Tragically Hip
Iron and Wine
Neko Case
The Flaming Lips
Sam Roberts
Plus about twenty more bands

If the concert had gone as planned it might not have made our list. Although the music was great and we were there with some good friends, it's what happened during the show that made it truly memorable. During Neko Case's set a massive hailstorm hit down and was so bad they actually stopped the show for about thirty minutes. We were wearing shorts and the hail really gave us a beating. Thankfully we found cover under the umbrella of a helpful American who sold us some space for a mere twenty dollars.

Once the hail stopped and the rest of the show continued we found ourselves with the dilemma of being soaking wet and with no where dry to sit. Thankfully for us the Flaming lips felt sorry for the thousands of people in attendance and put on such a good show that we forgot how miserable we were. We did learn a valuable lesson though, and will be bringing garbage bags (which make nifty rain jackets in a pinch) to every concert we attend in the future.

Moment #3 : Visiting Japan

Before this trip the closest we had come to experiencing Japanese culture was eating at Ozekis' in Kelowna. So we were both pretty excited to visit the land of the rising sun and it definitely didn't let us down. From riding the bullet trains up and down the coast to riding rollercoasters at the Tokyo Dome, we definitely jam-packed the seven days that we were there. We probably don't have to say much about the trip as many of you probably remember the short novel we wrote about it back in August. The Japan trip still stands as our longest blog entry and with how longwinded Shayne is, that says a lot.

Of course we would be fools if we didn't include this gem of a picture in the best of 2006 blog:

Ahh yeah. Who can forget her? I imagine that she hasn't forgotten us either. The poor girl probably still has nightmares about the foreigners who chased her for 5 blocks. This picture is the probably the coolest one we've taken since coming to Asia and will one day hold a top position on our mantle.

Moment #2 : Moving to Korea

Until last month this would have been the number one most memorable moment of 2006. How could it not be? We left behind our families and friends and moved ten thousand km away to a strange land full of strange food and even stranger people.

Thankfully for us it was one of the best decisions we have ever made. We have come to really like life in Korea and now think of it as our home away from home.

Moving here was especially life changing for Shayne who somehow managed to stay at home until the ripe old age of 23. Imagine his surprise when he moved into his own place for the first time and realized that magical elves didn't do all of the cleaning and that someone actually had to dust and wash the floors.

Living here has given us the opportunity to experience firsthand a new culture and to appreciate how other people live. It's also given us the opportunity to do this:

Moment #1 : Getting engaged

A year ago we both had a few doubts about spending the rest of our lives together. But if there's one thing that we've learned from living in Korea, it's that if we can survive being together for 18 hours a day in a small apartment with no car to leave in, we can survive anything.

Since most of you have asked us this question at one point or another let us answer it on here so that everyone can see. We still have no plans for the wedding and probably won't for a little while. It's a combination of being lazy, scared, and broke. :)

But we will definitely be waiting until we got back home until we get married.

Well, what else can we say about 2006? It started out pretty crappy but ended up being one of the (if not the) best years of our lives. Here's hoping that all of you had an equally good year and that 2007 finds all of us a little healthier and a little wiser.

Cheers

Shayne and Jo

P.S - For the one or two of you who might care about such things Shayne presents his...

...Best CDs of 2006 list

5) Tragically Hip - World Container
4) Neko Case - Fox confessor brings the flood
3)Chris Cornell- Live in Sweden
2) Todd Snider - The Devil you Know
1) Dixie Chicks - Taking the Long Way