Thursday, May 15, 2008

Korea take 3

I've finished DJing the 2 dances I came over here for and they both went very nicely. It feels good to unleash my tango passion onto a new community, and it's nice to have a sense of accomplishment after wandering around for a week or so looking, learning, listening, and feeling my way around to try to understand the culture and people I'm interacting with.

A few interesting facts about Seoul:
The tap water is not potable - my hosts store boiled water in this plastic water jug....feels like a camping trip in the middle of a huge city. This blew my mind to be in the middle of one of the world's larger cities, where cutting-edge high tech companies like Samsung, Hyundai, and others are based, but not have potable running water. Consider that many of the eskimo villages in remote regions of Alaska have potable piped water to homes....the priorities seem skewed to me.



A common kitchen tool, also seen at times at restaurants is a pair of scissors. Koreans like to cut up certain dishes with scissors before eating....that was a new one for me.



Hwayi (eating a strawberry) and Hung-Yut



The scene on the other side of the street from our apartment. Peace and quiet is at a premium here. And this is just the little jackhammer. Two buildings up they've had the big guns rolling for days. Ugghhhh.



More of the action outside the apartment. They're either highly skilled or winging it....





Hung-Yut wants to drive a big black car when he grows up...



I took a walk from Apgujeong to Rodeo Street (ultra-hip shopping district) just wandering around taking pictures of the city scenes. It's a lot more mellow in the middle of the day than it is at night...at night it's a hopping place with a bunch of hot guys and gals struttin' their stuff. Here's how it went:



Recycling is the law here (for real), which is good since it seems to me the packaging is a little out of control - I couldn't buy a bell pepper without it being wrapped, individually (!) in plastic.



This one is worth clicking on to get further into the scene...





Some sort of a pipeline cleaning operation....(?)





Click on this and look around - work and action everywhere...



Pretty wild entryway....into an underground shopping center...







Wow, something green and growing...



I walked through a quiet upper-end apartment neighborhood - huge contrast. Lots quieter visually and sonically than the surrounding area.



1 comment:

Eric said...

thanks Dan!
Great city scenes,
Thanks for the email to check this.
Looking foreward to catching up - maybe a ramble next week?