Odd Lines

The last image of the DDR this week. The lines of this structure are fascinating.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Sterile Future

The inside of the DDR is a feast of smooth but oddly angled lines.

I liked the contrast of the bright young autumn tree against the sterile gray of the building itself.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Dongdaemun Entrance

When you look at old science fiction films about the future you often see crowded back streets with power lines everywhere and neon lights blinding you around every corner.

In many ways this is North East Asia today. In Gangnam you get the sanitised sparkly lights, but in the less posh areas you get something that often reminds you of Blade Runner. And then you get Dongdaemun Design Plaza.

In this photo we have the main entrance to the structure, late at night but still well lit.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Passed out and nowhere to go

You don't see them often, and certainly not passed out on a busy through fare like Noksapyeong to Itaewon, but the homeless are all around us in Seoul.

For those interested in helping out, there are various groups in various cities that volunteer their time. In Seoul PLUR provides an way for English speakers to help out. One of their programs that is almost always in need of more people is the Sunday evening Seoul Station project.

If walking the street around Seoul Station is not your sort of thing, then you can always go help at one of the soup kitchens.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

White Flower

Its interesting what happens sometimes when you slam a photo with the editor. This little flower, busy opening into full bloom, was nothing special. fter messing about just to see what would happen, this displayed on my screen.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Hand in Hand

During summer I walked to school quite often. I did so usually when it was raining because that meant I had a very good excuse to walk barefoot.

As I near school I often see mothers with very young children. The area is newly built and mostly populated by younger people getting to the stage where they purchase their first apartments and start having children. Many of the mothers do not work and have the luxury of taking their babies to school every day.

When I took this I was walking behind a family and found the scene of the older sister taking care of her little brother heart warming.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Yongin Line

A new "subway" line opened this year that runs through Yongin and connects Everland with the subway system.

The line runs on elevated rail and is completely automated. Two cars arrive every few minutes to take you on a journey along the edge of a city many people know very little about. Because there are no drivers the have the front and back ends available for windows, so if you are quick you will have a prime photo real estate at either end.

I went there just as summer was winding down. It might have been nice to see in autumn, but I had other things I wanted to do and missed the window of opportunity.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Pulling and Grunting

One of the activities in the music textbook is tap dancing. To make tap dancing shoes students were asked to tape bottle tops to the bottom of their shoes. They all brought their own caps, but some did not have tape to fasten the tops to their shoes.

The teacher provided the students without tape with the green duct tape stuff we have here. The stuff sticks like crazy and is strong as anything. I was not there to see how it worked out, but I’m sure it worked like a charm.

In fact, it seemed to have worked so well that when I came into the classroom before the English lesson, there were still students nearly pulling their own feet off to try and remove the tape from their shoes. It was rather amusing seeing a student on one leg, the other sole up, pulling and grunting at their own shoes.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Rubber Ducky

The Rubber Duck has been making it's way around the world and recently found itsles in Seoul.

The project was conceived by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman. Each country or city that chooses to display a Rubber Duck builds one from scratch and they therefore vary in size. The largest one so far measured 26 × 20 × 32 metres and weighed in at 600kg. Seoul's duck measured in at 16.5 × 19.8 × 16.5 metres. I'm not sure if it weighs the same when it was seriously ill.

From what I can tell the duck was built by Lotte in order to promote their newly opened World Mall. Clues were:

The duck is in the lake that already holds Lotte World, the Lotte owned theme park.

It is on the side of the lake right next to the entrance to the mall.

The pop-up store hosing the associated display was inside the mall itself.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

The DWIT Score

On a Sunday morning at 3:30 am I found myself slowly walking the empty streets of Seoul. I was on my way to Sadang hoping to find a 24 hours restaurant there where I could get food and wait for he first trains to start running. How I came to be there at that time is not really important. It's a silly story that doesn't really have anything to do with anything.

Being 3:30 am it goes without saying that I was tired. When I'm tired I often feel depressed. More specifically, when I'm already in a depressed state my down moods get magnified. Annoyingly, depression makes it difficult to sleep, creating an evil loop that's not easy to get out of.

In this tired and depressed state I often have dirty "What if..." thoughts. "What if I walked in front of a car now? Who would care, if any? Would it be selfish? Would it fix anything? What would it say about me? Maybe now is not the best time because I have to figure out how to make my death be not completely useless for others. My money and scant possessions will have to go to people. What if..."

I don't like these thought. What's to like about them? They don't make me feel better about myself. They do, however, help me make up reasons why I should go on, and think of things to make myself useful/valuable. Many of the things I do, many of my drives, especially when I'm depressed, come from a desire to be better than I am, a desire to not be useless.

While walking I was thinking about ways to measure myself. How will I know when I'm fit enough? And will fit enough be enough to be a better me, to be useful if the shit ever hits the fan and I need to help someone? How will I measure my life progress? What other things can I measure? Will having concrete measurements help me stave off depression? Can I measure these dirty thought I have when I get depressed?

These Dirty "What if..." Thoughts (DWIT), and in particular a way to measure them, came to occupy my mind. How would I go about doing this?

Would it be useful to count every single time I had a suicidal thought? Should it be every single thought, or could I count a sequence withing a short period of time as one instance? Both of these seem like it would take more time than it would be worth.

How about just counting the days that I have these thought? That would be easy enough, and more useful, I think? A mood generally lasts a full day. When the mood lifting event happens during the day then it mostly just helps me to get some sound sleep, which makes me feel much better when morning comes.

But how will this scale work. The count could go up to pretty much any number. What would be the point? Would there be any use of knowing that my DWIT score was 40 versus 8? 8 seems plenty high to inform me that things are not going well? What if I suddenly have a single good day. I would go from a high, bad, score to a low score instantly making it seem like everything is suddenly fine. No, that would not work.

How about counting days without dirty thoughts, but only for a 7 day rolling period? That would mean a high score, 7, would be good, and a low score bad. It would also allow for useful in between scores. 0 would be a real WTF score. 1 would not be much better, but it would allow me to say "See, you had a decent day there. Things are not that bad, are they?" A score of 6, on the other hand, is really good, but it still immediately says "Hey, buddy! Be careful. Relax. Take a deep breath and concentrate on important things in life." Being a rolling score this 6 would then be around for a week to remind me to stay focused.

But what do I do with this score? Do I post it on Facebook? What would be the point of that? "DWIQ score for today: 5. Please pity me."

Can I use this to create an achievement hunting game? "Achievement Forty Seven! 40 days of 7. Here, have a Bingsu!"

Can I make pretty charts with it? That will keep my mind occupied and away from the dirty thoughts?

Do I paste it up against my wall? I mean, I already know how I feel, right, but seeing a 6 for a week might help me focus. And seeing the fluctuations for everything other than 6 and 7 might cheer me up, or slap me awake.

I just don't know.

Old Men, Much Fun

We were doing a city tour of Incheon, not recommended, and we saw a game going on at the small pitch next to the Emigration Museum.

Sport might not be very organised at school level, but after people leave school, there is nothing to stop them organising it for themselves. And organise the do, until the die of old age.

The old ballie in the back must be 98 years old, or maybe 60, but that is not stopping him and what looks like other retired men from entering a tournament.

Maybe they don't fly in for tackles, but they sure take it seriously, while not forgetting that it is still supposed to be fun.

Image taken with a Canon 650D fitted with a Sigma 18-250mm lens, edited in Adobe Lightroom.

Markings on the Path

I have no idea what this is supposed to be, it was there and looked interesting.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Fishing the Han

Over weekends, and possibly during the week, you will see scenes similar to this one dotting the Han River.

The long walk from Donjak Station to Yeouinara will lead you along the Han. As you walk you will be passed by groups of cyclists. Some speed by on snazzy road bikes. Some are just out for a ride on their own bikes in normal clothes. Even the lost soul on a rented jalopy may pass you.

Just off the bike road you will see encounter men, usually sitting alone and well away from any other human. They all have about four fishing lines cast into the river connected to fishing poles, leaning on special stands. Most of the men are just sitting there, doing nothing. They don't read. They don't listen to the radio. They don't play on their phones. They just sit and wait.

I can't help but think that doing this, once you get past all the thought that will inevitably run through their minds and when that chaos settles down, then this will be a great form of meditation. I'd really like to try it some time.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Better Days of Fishing

Korea is one of the world's major fishing countries, but I suspect that is not due to boats like this.

This small fishing boat at Eulwangni Beach near Incheon has seen better days. I'm no expert on what vessels should look like, but somehow I feel that the rust there is not a good thing and not a sight of a prosperous fisherman.

I've never lived near the sea and have very little knowledge of the life of small scale fishing men and women. I have, however, always thought that it's not an easy life. From my sporadic encounters it looks like these men and women are forever living on the edge where failure means going to bed hungry and exhausted.

The life of those who must provide food for themselves and others can be hard. We in the cities really don’t appreciate them or their hard work.

Image taken with a Canon 650D fitted with a Sigma 18-250mm lens, edited in Adobe Lightroom.

Basement Price

Amazingly people are still trying to sell these shirts.

These were the cheap shirts sold to the general public for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. At the time they were about W30,000. As the months passed people still tried to sell them, most notably in areas where tourists hang out.

Four years later and despite a new shirt for the 2014 World Cup, they are still trying to sell these. Best of all, this photo was taken AFTER Korea was knocked out of the 2014 tournament.

Does anyone at all buy these anymore, even at that price?

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Gwanghwamunian Summers

The new revamped version of Gwanghwamun features a water fountain much larger than the one at City Hall.

On warm days you will find fully clothed children, soaked to the bone within the fountain. Some scream. Some run. Others stand. A few stand and watch with caution, trying to decide if they should venture into the wet unknown before them.

And with the children come parents who are divided between those who are doing their best to get no less than 79 out of focus photos, and those who watch with eagle eyes just in case someone slips and hits their little golden lamb.

You can always count on it that there will be some people in Seoul willing to use every opportunity they can to enjoy the what the city has to offer, even if it is not the same way as the person right next to them.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

An Opinion Shared

There wasn’t much going on in the City Hall to Gwanghwamun area when I went past there last weekend.

There was just the usual mix of Falun Gong promoters, or activists, I’m not sure which and odd meeting for who knows what. The only notable visuals were the yellow ribbons at City Hall that are still up, months after the Sowal ferry accident and the children playing in the water at Gwanghwamun.

But then there was a lone little lorry with this large poster on it’s back doors. There was not one nearby saying or doing anything anything. From the look of things it was a park and leave job.

Whatever it was supposed to be, it was funny and well worth the photo.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Chit-chat

Taking the motorcycle to Big Bird took me through parts of Suwon that I’ve never seem. Granted, I don’t know much about Suwon anyway.

The route marked out on the map at one point took me to through the semi back streets. This is rarely a problem for me, because side and back streets tend to be much more interesting anyway.

On one of the intersections someone had painted a few murals/graffiti pieces. The others seemed to be more what we would generally call artistic, but this one was a bit, well, whatever it was.

There were other things I saw that I would like to go back and photograph, but for now this will be all.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Unwitnessed Dedication

I’ve mentioned before that Korean football is not well attended. There is another example.

Suwon City is currently playing in the Seoul World cup stadium while their own older stadium is being renovated. Also known as Big Bird, it is the home off the much larger Suwon Samsung Bluewings. being an FC Seoul supporter I know this stadium mostly through my my visits on derby days when 20,000 people is considered low.

But when you visit to watch a second tier match you can't expect to get those numbers. I’d say 2,000 spectators would be a good day for Suwon City. It doesn't matter though. Players are used to this and still try their hardest, like a good sportsman should, to beat the team that are in front of them.

I hope to see them at their own stadium some day, because it is just not the same here when the Chickenwings aren't hosting FC Seoul.

Image taken with a Samsung Galaxy S4, edited with Snapseed.

Where Humens Do Their Things

Some Friday Afternoon Konglish for you.

In this case not really Konglish, just bad spelling, on a poster, in an area where most people who visit Seoul will walk at some point.

This was the poster for the exhibit at the Sejeong Art Center in Gwanghwamun. The Korean 사람 means Person or Human, so I'm quite confident that is what they were going for. Amazing how one letter can make a word look so odd.

No, if only I could get my own spelling to function properly.

Baby steps to courtesy

It doesn't always work, but they try.

This was a sign on the floor at a subway station in Seoul. It was pointing at a narrow escalator, and a similar sigh with a fit man was pointing to the wide stairs. I'm guessing they're trying to say that preference to use the escalator should be given to frail folk.

I've no idea if this works though. Most people in Seoul, indeed in Korea, are very much in their own bubbles where nothing exist that they don't want to pay immediate attention to. They will not notice you right next to them until they literally trip over our feet and they will certainly not notice a sign like this that is not physically shoved in their faces.

I've noticed that the subways are trying to teach people general courtesy though, so maybe this will eventually become common sense.

Even when you get of the train

Creative reuse of materials can be a beautiful thing.

Fine, maybe beautiful is a bit of a stretch, but this is still very cool. What we have here is something they did in the now renovated City Hall Station in Seoul, which, I must say, is much better to walk in than used to be.

I didn't see it at first, but then my friend pointed it out to me. The seat in the image is in the waiting area outside the public toilets. It's an old subway car seat. Nice, huh? They didn't recycle it in the break-it-down-and-make-something-new way, but basically kept it as is and just reused it.

It's nice when small things like this can bring pleasure or interest.

Out of place relaxation

Sometimes when you mix every day things in Korea you get odd sights.

This little bar/coffee shop is not exactly usual for Korea, but its shiny new look would fit right into many parts of Seoul, like Myeongdon, Gangnam, or most of the university areas. What makes it stand out here is that it is inside Namdaemun market.

Namdaemun Market, like most markets in Korea, does not strive to be pretty. It strives to be efficient at making money, cheaply and with hard work. It's filled with locals looking for something specific, tourist who get in the way as they stand, and stare and vendors watching people walk by, hoping for some patronage. It is not exactly a place where you expect to see something that looks like it belongs on a beach in, I don't know, Spain.

This idea is actually very interesting and space efficient. It would be interesting to see if it takes of.

The Sequence of Events

Today's post will have more than just one photo. More than two, even. Today's post has a series of photos that are not easy to separate.

Last weekend I went to Hwaseong City to watch Hwaseong FC play Seoul United. It was a very one sided game and the goal in this sequence, just 4 minutes in, was a sign of things to come.

With the initial back and forth that you find in almost all games, the ball eventually made its way towards the general are of the Seoul United goal.

The Seoul player either missed the ball, or decided to let it bounce before playing it. Either way, the ball passed him to start off a sequence of small events that would end in a goal for Hwaseong.

Seeing the ball pass his last defender, the Seoul keeper decided to come forward to collect the ball. Whether or not that was the correct decision is for you to decide.

Unfortunately for everyone Seoul Side, the Hwaseong player read the situation quicker than either the defender or keeper did and was fast on the reaction trigger.

He was around his defender before said defender knew what was happening, and put the softest of touches on the ball to knock it out of the path of the onrushing keeper.

All that was left to do was to keep his cool and send the ball rolling towards the wide open goal.

And roll it did. Slowly, but surely.

Rolling, with not a single player around to change the outcome.

Rolling, over the line.

Rolling, all the way into the back of the net to score the first goal of the match. The first of seven, in fact, six of which would go in for Hawseong.

All the world's this stage.

The as yet small 5th grade class taking their work outside to enjoy the lovely weather.

It's nice to see someone using the little stage out near the front of the school because until this I've never seen anyone on it. It’s the perfect size for a small group of students to do whatever needs to be done and there is just the right amount of seating for everyone to have a good view.

I wonder if we can create a decent activity that will require students to take the stage. Doing it in autumn would be great, just after the worst of the heat breaks, and before the nip in the air arrives. That should give me a good 2 day window to work with, I think.

Internet search for “short play ideas” activated…

We will eat you out.

"Bank with us. We are more than just cunning linguists."

A poster on the subway was advertising a bank, I think. I honestly didn't have enough time to see everything because it was my stop and I had to get off or get trampled. The photo was taken in the seconds I had before people started moving, hence the blur.

The poster had 4 or 5 girls, I don’t remember, sitting on each other’s necks. I’m guessing it’s some sort of K-Pop group, because marketing here seems almost incapable of functioning without the use of a celebrity, major or minor. The girl at the bottom is making what I guess is one of her normal “cute” poses. Unfortunately that cure pose just does not have the non-meaning to everyone on the train.

Interesting how an innocent gesture can mean something completely different to someone else.

Conformity is for the weak!

Being in a larger city area I naturally have access to better public training facilities. Being public, everyone else had access to the same facilities.

Gunpo’s public sports stadium had a nice artificial turf pitch and a small all seater stand. I’m not sure of the details, but I think you can rent it for your own football games. When I went to watch my school’s girls play dodgeball about a week ago I took a moment to photograph this casual game in progress.

The shirts were probably the best part. There seemed to be no standard. You could have your name in Roman or Hangeul. You didn't even have to use your real name. And if the names were not flexible enough, you seemed you were allowed basically any number you wanted. My favourite was the less than full number 0.9, closely followed by the giant number 109.

I might have to rethink my number for Touch Rugby. Maybe change from 42 to 3.14.




     

Korea 0 - 1 Tunisia

A couple of weeks back I was invited to the Korea vs. Tunisia match. The seats weren't great, but they were free and it was the first time I'd sat in that area.

First things that struck me what that the Tunisian players were all white. Yes, I know Tunisians are white, but even as a white African I always forget that North Africa is not actually populated by Negroids. I've been to Tunisia. Why is this still new to me?

The match itself was rather uneventful and if this game, along with the other World Cup warm up games are anything to go by, then Korea will be lucky to get even a single win in Brazil. Of Korea’s 5 games just before the world cup, they lost for and somehow managed to beat Greece. Oh well.

There are still many weeks left before FC Seoul will have a home game, so it will be a while before I get to return here.

Hwaseong Sports Complex

Hwaseong FC was playing Seoul United in Korea’s Challengers League and that seemed like a perfect opportunity to go see Hwaseong Sports Complex, the new very high tech looking structure in Hwaseong City.

The complex is a large, expensive looks business with the football pitch and athletics track taking centre stage. As I've mentioned recently, this 35,000 seated stadium is very rarely used and you have to wonder why it was even built. I can see a city of about 550,000 people filling it easily, IF they had a serious team and an interest in football that surpasses even Seoul or Suwon.

I’m glad to say that they only football team that plays in the complex does not play in that massive stadium, but on the practice pitch with artificial turf. The 3000 odd seater stand next to that pitch is perfect for small crowds, like the 300 or so people that might turn up for a Saturday match.

This photo is real, but the way. I took it with my phone from the 15th floor of an apartment building just across the road. The structure itself and Snapseed created the computer graphics effect.

Ghosts in the Stadiums

Korea has many stadium and the list of those that I've visited is slowly growing.

The first image is of Anyang stadium, last Friday, where I saw one of the most remarkable goals I will ever see live at a game. A player lobbed the ball over the out of position keeper, all the way from inside his own half. The stadium can hold just over 17,000 and because of it’s size it means that Anyang has the highest percentage average attendance in it’s league (Almost everyone was sitting on the stand where I took the photo from). Stadiums of 20,000 or lower make sense in Korea.

The second image is if Icheon City Stadium, located in the middle of nowhere with only an amateur team in residence. The most they are likely to get to enter their 25,000 seater stadium is 200 comatose fans. This for a city with only 200,000 people. And they are not alone. Gangneung, a city on the East coast, has about the same population and a stadium for 35,000 people. Hwaseong Stadium is a hyper modern 35,000 seater with only an amature team to keep it company.

Currently only 4 teams in the whole country has an average of more than 10,000 people per game, and only one goes over 20,000, so you have to wonder what they were thinking when they built on these ghost stadiums. (Sometimes they get to hold internationals, but that is once in a blue moon. )

Man Toilets

This is a Man Toilet! Aaaaaaaarg!

No boys allowed. Certainly no girls allowed! Only real men come in here. Men with beards, carrying pints of beer, while eating flame grilled sausage. And they don’t wash their hands when they come out. Only girls and girly boys wash their hands after handling their large...urinary devices. Aaaaaarg!

This is the sign inside the Compact Smarty City [Centre] in Sondo, Incheon. If you’re ever in the area, suggest giving that particular building a miss. The 5D film, as the stupid name would suggest, is very unimpressive. At least there is an information centre right next door.

Excuse me. I must get back to doing man stuff.

Impromptu Masks

Our school had a fire demonstration.

I'm not sure if this is normal for elementary schools, but this is our second fired drill in less than two years. Will we be having one of those ever year? This was not the norm at my middle school. If this will become the standard then Korea has come a long way. Of course, it might be part of the backlash of the recent ferry disaster in which the general blase attitude towards safety in this country was exposed in the worse possible way.

In this image we see the Kindergartners holding their hands over their noses. I suppose it was in response to a bit of smoke from the demo fire blowing their way. I'm also guessing the teacher is trying to teach them to cover their inhalation holes to keep out the dirty stuff. It is a great start, but later they will have taught that holding their hands there will not actually do anything, and that they will need to get wet cloths to filter out the smoke. If they are not taught that then they will grow up thinking this is good enough, and then teach this to the next generation of little humans.

At least fun was had and the children actually learned something.

Pancoat

A few of my students are walking around wearing t-shits with really cute characters on them, but until a few days ago I had no idea where they bought them.

Turns out they buy them from a shop called Pancoat. It seems to be a Korean company originating in Busan. The currency is in USD, but most of the models on the site look very Korean and apparently it became famous here because a few celebrities wore some of their stuff. I saw one girl wear this the other day. I don't know she thought she was wearing, but let's hope no celebrity gets caught with it on.

Korea and it's obsession with celebrities... Walking down the street you'll notice that almost every brand uses an actor or singer on their posters to promote their product. It's so prevalent that I believe it when people tell me that advertising is what earns K-Pop entertainers most of their income. You can see why companies use them though. It's estimated that a product will sell as much as 40% better when it's associated with a celebrity.

Anyway, don't you just love the way these shirts here are packed, without a celebrity next to it?

Dreary Sunshine

The seasons come and go, dragging the cycles of blooming flowers along with it.

Most flowers in Korea seem to be really short lived. Cherry blossoms for example, start sprouting slowly. Then, as if by some sort of magical agreement, all the trees burst forth together, blooming for all they’re worth. Before a week is out though, they start fading, almost as fast as an Olympic pace setter.

These little rays of sunshine recently bloomed next to the train tracks. In the thickest strip next to Gwanak Station, I captured this patch. I’d planned to take photos from the station platform with my larger camera, but the view was just not what I had hoped for. The phone, however, did a decent job of capturing the bit of beauty on an otherwise dreary commute into Seoul.

Too bad they will have vanished in a week or two.

The New: Rice Burgers

There is a newish kind of food in town and it's called a rice burger.

According to the posters and menu images it's supposed to be two nice disks formed with rice with your selected filling inside. It's a burger in which rice replaces bread. Easy peasy.

In practice the, thing, you receive resembles the item on the menu in the same way McDonalds burgers resemble the images on McDonalds menus. It basically just ends up being something like a warmed up triangle kimbab, but with the seaweed wrap removed.

It is not horrible, but not worth the money. (I still have to try other restaurants, though.)

Ansan Station Market

After a disappointing outing to a non-existent racing event, I decided on a late lunch at Ansan Station Market. I had to go past there to get home, so why not use the opportunity, right?

I'm not sure what the rest of Ansan is like, but the market area at the station is a hub for peoples from all around the Eastern part of the Asian continent. It is known for vendors who sell food and wares from the home countries of the various people milling about, as well as a large collection of non-Korean restaurants that cater largely to the nationals from these same countries.


I ended up having a meal at what I think was a Vietnamese restaurant, tasty, before making my way slowly through the market back towards the station.

Something that strikes me every time I’m in a place like this is the meat on display. It's never at safe temperatures, and it's always displayed in ways that would make many a Westerner shiver in disgust.


Any idea why they thought it a good idea to display the pic’s head like this? That is indeed the tongue, if you were wondering.


The next image is of dog meat. I have no moral qualms about eating dog meat. I understand that many people see dogs only as a pets, but for a few hundred million people the very idea of eating beef is disgusting and immoral. Strange that we somehow rationalise that as something of no concern. What does bother me is how they animals are killed. People who eat the meat tend to be older folk, and they are often of the more superstitions, uninformed types out there. They still believe that by beating the animal before you kill it, you improve the taste. Apparently it has something to do with the adrenalin. This is, of course, a rubbish theory.

There are markets in Korea that sell dog meat. I have never been to one, but I have heard stories. Carcasses on top of the cages of live animals. The smell of burnt off hair that hangs in the air. And the cries of dogs being tortured before they are killed.


I have never actually seen dog meat being sold in a market though. Not in Korea, or any of the other Asian countries that are known to eat it. And I can assure you that I have been into many markets to see what they look like.

Not everything at Ansan Station Market was disgusting though. Most of the food and wares were rather normal to my eyes, although I can’t say anything about the taste :)

Songdo, Incheon

The Incheon Free Economic Zone is located just South of Incheon proper. It is being developed to encourage international businesses to come to Korean by offering large tax breaks, subsidies and estate support. Development started in the mid 2000s and the final phase is planned to end in 2020.

Songdo International Business District, Songdo-dong, Songdo International City, Songdo New City, or just Songdo, is one of three districts inside the IFEZ. It’s impressive looking, with wide straight streets, modern building and clean surroundings. I’ve been here a few times before, but every time over a weekend. One thing that strikes me every time was how quiet it is there. It always feels like there's nothing happening there, like the only people there are curious visitors from other parts of the Gyeonggi-do. It is possible that weekdays are busier, but I've not been there during the week, so I can't be sure.

I went there a last weekend for the street racing that was mentioned in 10Mag, but there was no racing. Turns out it was canceled, because, you know, we are still being subjected to forced mourning over the sinking of the Saewol ferry. Let me just leave my opinion at that. I thought that since I was there already I might as well take a few photographs.

First up is a view over the canal running through Central Park.




Just out of view of the first photo, there are these two buildings. I haven't yet found any information on them though. They are interesting because no matter where you stand, some part of the building looks warped. This angle at which I took this photo shows the strangest view.




The Tri-Bowl Multiplex Cultural Center is a structure that is not easy to miss. Apparently there is art from the 1969 -1990 inside, but I was not able to go in. It might be because it was a Sunday. The only information I could find says that it is closed on Mondays only.






The North-East Asia Trade Tower, is apparently the worlds most expensive real estate development in the IFEZ. Well now. Why throw the word “world” in there when you are only talking about developments in Incheon. This is like saying the computer in my apartment is the worlds most expensive computer in my apartment. It means nothing, really.

A more meaningful piece of information is that it is 68 floors high, currently the highest building in Korea.



The race has been rescheduled to a bit later and I will try to get to it then to get an image or two.

Smart Cube Beam Thing

I was looking for a yeast to make Makgeolli with and thought I would try and see what 11st.co.kr would give up as a result. Instead of looking for the yeast, I saw this on the front page


It is an interesting little device and I can see it having some use, even if that us is extremely limited .

The fun part about the device was not the video though, or imagining a possible use to justify that price. Instead it was the images on the promotion page they use to show possible uses After watching the video I had a look at the images on the site that they use to show some of the possibilities.

Really? We’re going camping, and instead of taking a tablet or a decent projector, I’m going to run my phone dry on this? Never mind that we will have to hunch over the phone anyway just to hear the sounds.

Those children watching on the wall… just look at that terrible photoshop insertion of the product.

The man and his son sit in a huge arse room with a huge arse LCD TV and they go with a projector and bad sound? Yea, that is the way to use technology effectively.

The people go for a picnic on the Han river and they just happen to bring a big white screen, somthing, along to project the news, or whatever that is, onto the screen. Are they really the desperate for news?

The boy watching on the ceiling is nice though, but somehow I think he will quickly swap over to the phone itself when he realises that he has to hold the projector still the whole time. Since getting him to actually sleep in his bed is not a problem, why not spend a little bit more and buy him a tablet rather than this really limited use projector? THAT will keep him nice and awake at night.

Oh, and let’s not forget the completely stupid insertion of an unrelated pretty girl into the image above the two pricing options

Here be raccoons! (-like creatures)

Last night, while out in the park getting some exercise, I saw the strangest of things.

Out of the bushes just in front of me came something the size of a medium dog, or a very large cat. It was furry and round as anything and was making a line straight for a cat that is saw on the other side of a small bridge bridge.

My first reactions was “Man, that is one fat and furry cat!” but then I noticed it’s legs. They were covered in short fur and were very thin compared to the rest of the furball. Furry cats have furry legs as well and fat cats look fat all over. They don’t have skinny little legs.

Looking a bit closer to decided that I was looking at a raccoon. I had a good 30 seconds to look at it and I was fairly sure. A raccoon! This was my first time ever to see a raccoon! Only problem was that I had never heard of raccoons in Korea.

And I was right. There aren't raccoons in Korea. There are, however, Raccoon Dogs. These animals are part of the dog family of and is, interestingly, one of the earliest species to evolve from the common ancestor of all dogs.

It is called the Raccoon Dog because, you guessed it, it looks like a raccoon. No surprise that I thought i was looking at a raccoon then, is it. It is native to East Asia, although is was imported to Eastern Europe for it’s fur.

Its not often that you see interesting, and actual wild life in a densely populated and highly developed country like Korea. Who says working out in the park does not pay off?

Reaching for new heights

Two boys were monkeying around on the pull up bars. Heavens know why pull up bar even exist at school because no one would ever use then if it were not for days like these.

The little dudes here decided that they wanted to reach the cross bars, which for a first graders is often very high. The boy in white, being taller, was aiming for the higher of the two bars. He had the correct idea despite being amusingly unsuccessful. The boy in blue had a similar idea, except that his ambitions were lower and more appropriate to his size.








On a side note. It's so sad when I see children in situations like this stuck wearing shoes. People from countries with cold weather tend to wear shoe outside every day of their lives from the moment they can walk. Children from warm countries like you have in most of Africa rarely need to wear shoes until they go to high school . I myself didn't wear shoes, even to school, until I went to high school at thirteen years of age.

"But they will injure themselves" Trust me, they are not nearly as fragile as you think and they will very quickly learn to LOOK WHERE THEY ARE GOING instead of taking it for granted that there is something to protect them from their own negligence.

Winter done. Summer fun.

With winter an almost distant memory, outdoor activities during and after school are in full swing. The first graders have an after school football training session which they can join. In these photos you can see them playing. For the most part things go well, except that the students who are larger and further along in their physical development tend to dominate/intimidate the smaller less coordinated ones.




With children of this age even periods of no action is interesting to watch. The ball, as it does in football, went out and resulted in a goal kick. Goal kicks are defensive kicks and should mean nothing more than the defenders pushing up with the goalie kicking the ball towards them. However, at this level even a talk as simple as this needs some serious organisation, and with organisation I mean getting the children to actually look at the stationary ball for more than 2 seconds.

Some students, however, have absolutely no interest in the game. Their interest levels are so low that sticking their fingers into the ground is apparently more interesting. I caught Bobo, not his actual name, here doing it on more than one occasion. (To be fair, one of the photos is not of him, but I'm going to pretend it was him, for story sake.)




When the ball eventually came his way it was a sight to behold. The goalie kicked the ball impressively high and far. It looped straight towards Bobo. Hearing everyone scream at him he pulled his finger out of the ground, turned tail and started running towards his own goal. The ball landed right next to him bouncing high into the air. Only a second or two after the bounce, with other students catching up, did he even bother to look in the direction of the ball. It is the precise moment of him looking that I managed to capture here.

The rest of the game, when the ball came to close for him to completely ignore everything, he would run alongside the ball or crowd, just far enough to not actually have to do anything.

He was not the only one with little interest in the game. His friend, Dumbo here, not his real name, was a little more social, and sometimes got involved, but it never took much for him to be distracted from play.




So easy was it to distract him that when he saw me with he camera, the game was completely forgotten and he came running towards me swinging his arms in the funniest of ways. It is so easy to love the first graders (as long as I don't have to teach them)

Be Prepared for Acion

This is going to be a year of even more sport than last year and hopefully it will be accompanied by some great accidental photographs.

Through the latter part of last year's K-League football season I started attending FC Seoul games. Getting there, even during the week, is so much easier now that I have a subway line close to me.

Towards the end of the year I also accidentally discovered the ice hockey and the basketball teams. With the realisation that there is so much sport around me I even managed to get myself to a volleyball game.

For this coming year I'm intending to see as much as I can while still not overdoing it. I now have a season ticket for FC Seoul which will save me a fair bit of money over the course of the year. Tickets are all that expensive to begin with, mind. When winter comes I will also get an ice hockey season ticket with a nice reserved seat.

I also got to know many the useful streams of information regarding the various leagues and sports. Now I even know the schedule for the the amateur and women’s football leagues. I'll be trying to visit a few of those when FC Seoul are not playing at home, and if there isn't something else that might need my more immediate attention.

Let’s not forget the rugby and cricket from back home to glance at from time to time, as well as the upcoming Football World Cup. Then the times are right I will be stream that or if I can, downloading it.

Exciting times ahead, sport fans.

Another day in Paradise

It was one of those days.

On Friday evening I received a confusing. This was not Friday afternoon at school, but in the evening, when I was already at home. The message informed me that my after school classes for 1st and 2nd grader would start on Monday. Maybe.

We had discussed these classes before and it was suppose to start next week, not this week past. I understood it to be two classes, one for the nooby 1st graders whom I've never met, and one for the 2nd graders. Not really a problem, except that I have no idea what their levels are, and I don’t have a printer/copier or anything to get ready for this class just after lunch. Oh, yes, there was also that bit of fun information. The class would start straight after lunch.

In the mean time we have other classes that need prep time. Sure, the prep time is not that long, but it is still time I can’t spent getting ready for this new class that I didn't really know about. It was still OK, because I kind of knew what I wanted to do.

While doing my early morning printing and copying for the regular classes, the after school coordinator/teacher came to me saying that there would be not the normal 20, but 25 little ones who barely understand English, and that I was still teaching them alone. Okay then.

After my first regular class I started working on a song with a print-out in order to at least get a productive first lesson together. I would be able to use it with both groups and maybe get an idea of what levels I would be dealing with. I sent the thing to my co-teacher, herself very busy, to check the Korean I used.

While working on the worksheet the Vice called me and handed me a handful of paper slips with names, student numbers and telephone numbers on them, along with a empty list that I had to fill out with the information on the slips. These were the pieces of paper used to sign up for my class. Well then, there goes 15 minutes of the 40 I had to prepare (and still needed to talk to my co-teacher about the translations).

While talking to my Co I realised that my class would not be 2 classes of 40 minutes, as normal, but one class of 90, which I’m allowed to break up with a break. So, I get about 20 minute to prepare a 90 minute class for students I have never seen? Whatever, my Co helped me and we quickly banged out the translation before heading to get some food.

I breathed in my lunch to give me extra time to get the print-out ready. Finished, initiated the printing and headed upstairs to get the results. Nothing. I walked back down to my office and saw a message saying the document didn't print. Sigh. I initiated it again, walked upstairs, and noticed an error message on the printer. I think it needed new toner, but I didn't have time to worry. I ran down, again, and sent the command to another printer. By the time I was done with all this I was already 15 minutes late.

At class I was greeted with the news that the After School Classroom does not have a computer or screen to play the song on. Oh, really? At least we were able to move to another classroom.

Needles to say the class was generally a big flop, but at least I was allowed to fill the second half with an English movie.

Generally my school is pretty good with arranging things like this, but I'm thinking is a service that parents are paying for, and said parents might have been asking why it hadn't started yet, maybe even getting demanding. That might also be why I had a parent greet me while trying to get the print-outs done and helpfully pointing out that I need to be in the classroom.

Now I'm ready for this Monday, and I hope to make a decent run of it. (I never got the books I requested for this class, but The poor women is so overworked at the moment that I don't even want to ask her what happened to the order.)

With me luck

Chopper Parents

I captured this image at on the first day of the school year. You can see parents crowding outside a 2nd grade classroom, peeking inside.



I’m sure many will have similar reactions to mine. My mind was crying: “Sheez, people! Just back the hell off!”

When I posted the image on Facebook, someone mentioned that helicopter parent are increasing in the US, but that they have nothing on Korea.

A helicopter parent is a parent who figuratively hover over their child and get involved in basically every part of their lives, most notably their education. You would think this is bad, but the alternative is much worse.

Research shows that parental involvement in education is the number one factor in a child’s success in school. Not his socio-economic background. Not her IQ. Not their teachers. Parental involvement is the number one indicator.

When parent are concerned with and get involved in the education of their children, then those children tend to be successful in school.

These parent in the image might be taking it a bit too far, but they might be forgiven if we consider that these might be their eldest and possibly only children. Traditionally parents take immense pride in what the eldest does, and if it is the only child they often treat him or her like gold because there might never be another chance to experience that particular moment.

Not the way we wanted it.

The second game against the Eagles last night when as expected. Unfortunately it did not go as hoped for.

Anyang Halla gave a good showing, but it was nothing like the Tuesday night. They were competent in defense, and decent in attack, but the hunger from the night before just didn’t seem to be there. The whole game seemed much slower and, dare I say, relaxed. Even the Eagles seemed content to sit back a bit to see how things would develop.

Throughout the game both sides were threatening to score, but until the third period it seemed like a stalemate. This would be good for Halla, but it was not to be. The Eagles exploded and the game ended four goals too two in their favour.

A lot will be riding no how the Eagles perform in Goyang this weekend and I am eagerly awaiting the results on my phone

A joy to experience.

Last night was a game to behold!

Anyang has this really annoying habit of starting each period really well. They swarm the opposition, apply crazy pressure, and maybe even score a well deserved goal, but then the second half of the period rolls around and they seem to lose interest.

There was none of that nonsense last night. Anyang came out in their normal beast mode and scored early. With 10 minutes gone I was expecting them to fizzle like usual, but they stayed in beast mode. Oji managed to score a Power Play goal to even the score, but beast mode did not fizzle.

They came out for the second period and put produced another 20 minutes of beast mode hockey. Anyang was dominating pretty much every part of the game and made a team that is supposed to be much better than them look quite ordinary.

Third period was more of the same. They were skating hard, scrapping for every loose puck and put pressure on where ever they saw the opportunity. Oji being as good as they are managed to pull back a goal every time, but none came easily. The third period ended 3 all and the game went into overtime.

Shhhhh! So close. We were less than 2 minutes away from victory.

Sadly Oji managed to start overtime dominating the way you would expect from the runaway league leaders and scored a goal about 90 seconds in.

Anyang will receive one league point for losing in overtime. If we can get away with another point tonight then we will have done better than I think most people would have believed.

Anyang vs Goyang

The Asia League Hockey season is nearing the end and there is a fight on for the last play-off spot between two Korean teams, Anyang Halla (Go Blue!) and High 1 from Goyang.

Both teams have 61 league points, but Anyang have played one more game. The good news is that Anyang’s last three games are all at home. The bad news is that two of those games are against Oji Eagles from Japan. The Eagles have been running away with the league this year and it is not inconceivable that Anyang could lose one or even both of those games.

The Eagles are on the road in Korea now, so High 1 will also host them twice. I dare say High 1’s expectations of those games will be similar to those of Anyang. The season for these two teams might well be decided by how they deal with the Eagles.

High 1’s last home game will be against the Korean military, Sangmu. Sangmu has done really well this season and are sitting in a comfortable second place. They are also good enough to beat High 1 on High 1’s own ice. That means that there is a possibility, all be it small, that High 1 could lose all three of their home games.

Anyang’s last home game, and High 1’s second last game, will see the two teams facing each other. The play-off fate of both teams could came down to that 60 minutes on the ice. Exiting!

If all goes to plan then I will be at Anyang’s last game, wearing my blue and sipping my coffee is silent, anxious support. I might even be required to go do spectator duty the next day all the way over on the other side of Seoul, cheering for Sangmu and waving a blue flag.

Standings before today’s match:

Oji Eagles - 36 played, 30 won, 98 points
Sangmu - 41 played, 22 won, 78 points
Nipon Paper Cranes - 38 played, 19 won, 66 points
Anyang Halla - 39 played, 17 won, 61 points
High 1 - 38 played, 17 won, 61 points
Tohoku Free Blades - 40 played, 17 won, 59 points
Nikko Icebucks - 38 played, 14 won, 45 points
China Dragons - 42 played, 0 won, 0 points

The Dragons went a third year with not a single point.

Down with Gary

We finally killed Gary!

Garosh Hellscream is the final Raid Boss of the World of Warcraft, Mists of Pandaria expansion. You go about killing him by assembling a team of 10 to 25 players, entering an instance and throwing stuff at him, stabbing him and generally just doing stuff to make him really angry.

Our guild have had problems all of this expansion because we just haven't been able to get a full, stable team going. About halfway through the expansion a new function and difficulty level came out that allows us to group up with players from other servers. This allows us to now create a regular raiding schedule and kill stuff the way we all like.

A problem with this new system is that you tend to have about 40% of the group be players you have never played before. Usually experienced players fit right in, but some player are just really bad or can’t handle dying all the time, so they suddenly come up with excuses and have to leave early, leaving us sitting around waiting for an replacement player.

On Monday a another new player joined our group. He seemed to be pretty experience and said he was doing this on his extra character. He knew all the fights and had finished everything on a higher level already. This turned out to be very useful when we came to the aforementioned Gary.

See, Gary have been a wall to beat our heads against for a long time now. I don’t have the numbers, but believe me when I tell you we died many times to this a***hole and haven't managed to get even close to killing him.

The new guy in the group mentioned that he had a possible new strategy for us to try. Right of the bat the new strategy felt good (as long as he was talking us through it) and we went further than we had gone to date. Unfortunately the evening was drawing to a close and people needed to leave.

Last night, after all the resets, we made it all the way to Gary again. We finished the previous two bosses in quick time and thus had enough time to kick some Hellscream butt. 90 minutes and many deaths later we were still not victorious, but we had shown some impressive progress.

Time was up and one or two people left, but apart from them no one said anything about quitting. With an unspoken agreement, we continued. Each pull brought us a little closer. We even made it to 1% once. One attempt started really well until one of the healers disconnected. With another attempt one of our top damage dealers had the same problem.

I must note that we had to change to a strategy with only two healer, and believe me when I tell you it was stressful. With only two healers you have a limited amount of “Oh S***!” buttons you can use, and the number of priority decisions don't just become more, but also more difficult. Add to that the fact that I play a healing class that is not exactly good at bringing people back to life. I’m good at stopping the death and then I have to hope and pray the other healer manages to get the health back up. There are some big trust relationships going in all directions. One mistake can cause the whole raid to fail, and while I’m staring at everyone’s health bars, I still have to make sure I move to the right place at the right time and don't take damage that can avoided.

On the very last pull, the on which our raid leader said: “This is the last attempt, even if he lives with one single health point,” we managed to get him down. 4 hours of hell and we did it!

The life of Dhells is now complete, until next week, when I Gary is alive again.

All for the small price of...

When I went to my new dentist I told him to do a check-up and fix whatever he needed to fix. I also asked him make me a new guard for my mouth, because I grind my teeth when I sleep.

He went on to explain that the guard would be expensive (whatever, I need the thing) and that it would take a few weeks to make because I would need to come back for a fitting and then for check-ups. Again, whatever. Let’s do this.

After fixing my cavities we finally started making the guard yesterday, and was it a process. No one has ever been so thorough when making me a guard.

He started by checking my jaw alignment. Apparently my jaw position and bite position is not the same. He thinks this might be because of the abrasion I already have on my teeth, but since I am not experiencing any pain he decided to use the my bite position for making the guard.

Then he took 4 separate measure and prints. First he took a print of where my teeth met. While this plate was in my mouth, he used it to measure the exact alignment is compared to my ears and nose. Weird, but OK. If it works and will give me a better guard, then why would I complain?

After that came the usual molds of my teeth, but again, something new. First he used a silicone gun to coat my teeth with a warm gel, after which he placed the mold cup and whatever is in it on my mouth.

Next week I have to go back for a fitting, and after wearing it for a week I have to go back again to check everything is still OK. At least all of this is included in the nasty price of 500,000 won. It is expensive, but for the same price previous dentists hardly even spoke to me. They just slapped the stuff in my mouth to make the mold and a few days later I was given my guard. Done. Good Bye.

Blizzard, I love you.

On Sunday evening I received this SMS:

“내일 대설예보! 대중교통을 이용하시고 차량운행시 각별히 주의하세요! [삼성화재]”

Bing Translator says:

“Heavy snow forecast for tomorrow! Please use public transport vehicle: careful! [Samsung fire]”

Who sent me this? Is this a general public service? Is this my credit card company? is this my insurance company? Is this my my phone maker? Am I too reliant on Samsung?

Monday morning rolls around and there was snow. Enough to prevent me from using my motorcycle. The weather forecast suggested that there might be a bit more in the afternoon, so Black Betty had to stay at home. I had to put on my good boots on and brave the snow.

The day was rather uneventful until I went to the dentist. On the way little bits of white started to come down and while inside the dentist’s office a full on blizzard hit us. It was the kind where the wind changed directing all the time to blows small annoying sticky, really cold bits of stuff into every hole in your cold armour clothes.

At least this kind of weather makes for some amazing surreal scenes. The white stuff was sticking to trees and the bus passed a few patches where the trees were white from top to bottom, on all sides. Add to this the eerie grey light from the approaching dusk and the whole scene was rather creepy.

Unfortunately I didn't have my SLR with me and the setting sun meant I didn't have time to go fetch it after getting off the bus. Here are some photo from my phone take with my phone though.











This morning the road outside my apartment was completely iced up, so I had to walk again. Near school I took an alternative route across the athletics track. The area was still completely snowed over, but one dedicated women was walking around the track ignoring the snow like a true Ajuma in the making. Some way behind her was her little dog.

The dog was following her, but not crossing the field to get to her faster. Nope, this one was staying on the track the whole way, never veering from the path it’s owner was laying down. Animals!

(Also, I played with the editing software native to the phone.)