So here we are, sunday, finally spent the day wandering the downtown on saturday. In my wandering, I have found that I am TERRIBLE at riding the subway here. My first trip culminated with losing my subway ticket, so I couldn't get out. Then on my second, well, that ticket wouldn't LET me out. Ugh! Both times I resolved it, but that is just too much.
Anyway, beyond my subway fun, I wandered out of the subway and immediately into a park/shrine/palace. What amazing luck, I didn't plan it, it just happened to be there! So anyway, the Jongmyo and Changgyeonggung areas were beautiful, and some of the intricate painting of the inside of the palaces/shrines, unbelievable. With my wanderings in the blinding noon-time sunlight, I realize that it is fricking cold. I mean, I am no stranger to the cold by any stretch of the imagination, but for what I was doing, walking all over, in the sun, it is fricking cold. I actually had to stop and warm up, don't remember the last time I did that. On top of some mountain in the snow, but here, wow!
So in my wanderings, I checked out an awesome "engineered" stream right in the heart of downtown, it was awesome for sure. There were some great buildings and architecture downtown. Really, the only ugly buildings were the embassies, and the US one especially, more police and prison buses than I have ever seen in a one block area, where were they in the WTO riots? After that, wandered south and came upon a truly heartbreaking scene. Some of you may know, but the #1 national treasure/landmark was burned by an arsonist here only days ago. What was I am sure an amazing example of Korean craftsmanship and culture, GONE. I feel for them, its very sad, imagine if the Lincoln Memorial was demo'ed by someone who lost there farm to a new freeway? It would cause as much or more outrage, so I feel horrible for their loss, I heard it was renovated in the 1990's so there may be extensive pictures and plans so they be able to restore it. It was mostly walled off so it was not a distraction to the spectacular drivers here, but has a viewing platform that is just packed.
On to lighter notes...Julie, I am especially directing this to you, there are a lot of highly fashionable women here and wear all of the "cute" shoes you would love. There are some extremely high-end boutiques here. Downtown the Lotte had Rolex and everything else well out of my price range so I ran away in the hopes I wouldn't knock over a display and have to pay! There really are a lot of malls, mostly underground, and goodness they have a lot of crap, I don't know how this stuff sells, more flea market than mall I suppose. No good stuff found yet for anyone. Not even shot glasses, WTF, junk everywhere, just not THAT junk. Hmmm?
Well, I have also learned that none of ANYTHING that is cool to eat at, drink at, or see is on the main drag. That is the site of many starbucks, and more outback steakhouses than the ENTIRE US. The alleys, that is where the cool food is, the cool bars are, and in the wrong areas, the ladies of the night. But seriously, pretty fun areas. I found at the pub last night that Koreans, or maybe just that establishment, not fans of rap. Weird? Lots of jazz clubs though. Maybe a blues club exists.
Today consisted of me finding out I cannot move out of my room to a more modest one without losing all my company discounts, so I am stuck for 14 days, then I can move. Seriously! Why would I make that up? So, after lingering at breakfast with some coworkers for most of the morning, I decided to hitch a ride over to near work and do some of this, and get stuff ready for the sprint through the work week. Well...there is a Canadian bar that ex-pats hang at. So why not check that out, I mean its sunday at noon here, that means the 7pm PST Hockey Night in Canada game is starting, right? Well, yes it is, but NO its not here. Why? Well, it turns out the entertainment system is dying a slow death, so they hope to have it fixed monday or tuesday here. DAMMIT!!! I guess I will have to keep watching stupid soccer or golf if I wanna see sports, LAME!!! Although...I might be able to borrow some gear from the gang there and play some puck with them, that sounds AWESOME!
Other than that, I updated the photo album with more pics, sorry, no organization yet, some other time, but there actually are some Seoul sights now. Talk to ya'll later.
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