Can you get my back? (Wednesday, August 8)

Today I went to a jimjilbang (steam room) in my neighbourhood.  I don't have any pictures, of course, because what you would see is a room full of naked females of all ages moving between hot and dry saunas and the various baths: warm bath, hot bath, cold bath, very cold bath (2°C), and massage bath.  You would also see all the stations where you scrub yourself down or, better yet, have someone else scrub you down.  And yes, that would be ALL of you down.


Instead, I will leave you with another body image to think about.

An ad for plastic surgery on the side of a bus.

Knock knock (Tuesday, August 6)

Yesterday I also went on an organized outing to Bukchon Village, an area of traditional (hanok) homes in Seoul.  I was fascinated by the doors.

Bathroom nuances (Monday, August 5)

Today was a regular work day so I thought I would share some of my observations from various bathrooms I have visited.

Stationary blue bar soap provided next to the sink.

Unique individual pictures on each bathroom stall door that light up when the stall is occupied.

Lost in translation on the toilet paper dispenser.

Random shots (Sunday, August 4)

Today I went back to Namdaemun Market to get a few last deals.

Artword featured in the downtown area.

From my observations, South Korea is a very homogenous society, in everything from food to car colours (featured July 16).

Buses at one of the huge road-side travel stop centres which feature food kiosks, restaurants, toilets and convenience stores.  These buses highlight the two vehicle makers that dominate the road, Hyundai and Kia.

Jeonju road trip (Saturday, August 2)

I went on a road trip to the city of Jeonju.  The drive was about 3 hours south of Seoul.  One of my colleagues arranged for us to travel there on a free shuttle for foreigners.

This is the Hanok village (village of traditional houses) that is now an area with many restaurants, coffee shops, souvenir shops and museums.

This building housed the archives at the Gyeonggi Palace.

Be prepared! Rain is always a possibility!

The view from inside Ediya Coffee shop.

We arrived back in Seoul about 900pm when the Koreans are just coming alive.

A view of Cheonggyecheon which runs nearly 6km through the centre of Seoul.

A view from North Korea (Friday, August 2)

Today I went on an all-day tour to the DMZ (demilitarized zone).

This was our first look at North Korea from the Dora Observatory.  You had to take photos at a distance behind a yellow line plus it was very foggy.

We also visited the 3rd tunnel that the North Koreans had made for infiltrating South Korea.  It was discovered in 1978.  I have no pictures of this as we were not allowed to take a single thing with us on the underground monorail (descending 73m) or on the walk through the underground tunnel.


As a joint venture North and South Korea agreed to build a railway line connecting the counties in 2004.

I am at Dorosan train station where trains ran empty (testing purposes) to Pyongyang for 1 year; none have run since.

Our last stop was the Joint Security Area (JSA).  While the above attractions are quite heavily patronized by tourists, the JSA is not.  The JSA is the most forward location in the DMZ.  In order to visit the JSA I had to sign a Declaration of my understanding that death was a possible result of my visit.

The blue buildings are all United Nations Command (UNC) buildings.  The Military Demarcation LIne (MDL; border) runs through the middle of the buildings, left to right.  So the building you see in the distance is in North Korea.

This is the MDL as seen by me while I am standing in North Korea.

Insadong tea house (Thursday, August 1)

Earlier in the trip a group of us went to a traditional Korean tea house in the area of Insadong.

I would never have found the tea house on my own as the area was a maze of narrow streets.

Because it was so hot outside, we were treated to a cold/iced tea of roasted grains.
(It tasted like Ryvita flatbreads to me!)

Two of my fellow professors at DKU, both from the United States.