Blast from the past
Was looking back through some older entries and found a rather long one I'd made back in August that I'd clicked the wrong filter for, meaning nobody saw it. So, I'm reposting it on the vague notion that someone might enjoy it...
Seems lately I've been doing stuff faster than I get around to blogging it. This is good because I'm doing interesting things, but bad in that I now have a backlog and I hate having backlogs. I'm going to let Boryeong sit and wait a little longer and write about the Seoul trip I took this weekend since that's fresher in my memory.
Seoul is the 5th largest city in the world with a population of over 10 million people-about a quarter of the entire country's population. It's a really, really big place and would take a very long time to see an appreciable amount of it. We had a fair go for our three days worth but I'm not sure it even qualified as scratching the surface.
Sam and I talked our companero Chris into coming with us for part of the trip-he had to be back in Busan sunday evening so it was really just an overnighter for him. Chris and Sam had both been there before, which was handy, as they already knew some of the areas in town to hit. The first upon arrival, naturally, was finding a place to stay. We went to the Sinchon area which, in about a 5 square block area, has about 60 motels. We checked around at quite a number of them to compare prices before finally coming to the realization that they all cost a bit more than they used to and ended up settling on the first place that we'd checked. I look at it as having been an hour long sweltering hot walking tour of Sinchon.
The rooms were actually really nice. Everything-lights, air conditioner, TV, and DVD player, was operated by remote control. Since the buttons on the remotes were in Korean this resulted in quite a lot of button
that topic was indeed exhaustively covered, the museum was much broader in scope, encompassing the entire history of war in Korea, starting with pointy rocks.
It moved on through swords, cannons, guns, military life through the ages, wars in Korea through the ages, had special exhibits for each of the countries that were involved in the Korean War, had a lot of the history of the conflict much of which I didn't know, covered Korea's involvement in Vietnam and, in short, was an absolutely massive place with an amazing number of exhibits and it took us almost 4 hours to make our way through it. Some pics:
These are shots of a "turtle boat", so called beacuse of the armored and spiked top.
One of the smaller boats, but more notable due to it actually containing an image of the ever elusive Korean girl. Korean girls, as a rule, are stunningly beautiful but incredibly camera shy, having been known to literally dive out of the way of a camera wielded in their direction.. I have discovered that the best way to capture one on film is to wait until they happen to be standing in front of something that you might reasonably be taking a picture of so that they are caught unawares. These two were posing for a picture at the insistence of their friends.
Essentially an improved version of a pointy rock with a handle.
early arrow technology
more advanced arrow technology
and the logical progression
A really, really big sword.
goofy guy on a horse
This was, I believe, a memorial to the lives lost in war. The picture doesn't nearly do it justice. It's a gigantic stone bowl filled to the brim with water that runs overs the sides. A single sunbeam from a hole in the dome high overhead falls on it and slowly moves across the water throughout the day.
Memorial to those lost in the Korean war. This is only about half of it. The museum also had pictures of the Korean War memorials in every country that was involved.
There was a massive exterior display of tanks, rockets airplanes, helicopters and even boats and submarines. These shots are only a fraction of what was out there.
Part of the exterior War Monument. Between these two statues was a 50 foot tall three pronged stone blade with bas relief carvings all over it. My picture of it was really lousy.
Our original notion for day 2 was to go to the DMZ. Having done zero advance planning for this trip, however, caused me to neglect to bring my passport which turns out to be an essential item to take the DMZ tour. So Sam went off to do that on his own and I headed to Gyeongbokgung. Interestingly, scant hours after Sam was at the DMZ, shots were exchanged across the minefields for the first time in over a year. I am sure that the two events are somehow related.
Gyeongbokgung was the primary royal palace of Korea during the Joseon dynasty. It has alternately been neglected, attacked, rebuilt, sacked, abandoned and burned over the last few thousand years. It's a massive place yet only about a third the size of what it used to be. Throughout the day they have guards marching around ceremonial style to the beat of a massive drum.
They, of course, do the stoic 'ignore everyone around them' routine as kids poke them and try and grab their swords.
The main gate. Traditionally, only the king is allowed to pass through the center arch. The busy streets of Seoul are on the other side. Entering through the gate you come to a massive courtyard across from an even bigger gate:
And yes that's another, smaller gate through the inner gate. Beyond that was the main palace structure:
Seems lately I've been doing stuff faster than I get around to blogging it. This is good because I'm doing interesting things, but bad in that I now have a backlog and I hate having backlogs. I'm going to let Boryeong sit and wait a little longer and write about the Seoul trip I took this weekend since that's fresher in my memory.
Seoul is the 5th largest city in the world with a population of over 10 million people-about a quarter of the entire country's population. It's a really, really big place and would take a very long time to see an appreciable amount of it. We had a fair go for our three days worth but I'm not sure it even qualified as scratching the surface.
Sam and I talked our companero Chris into coming with us for part of the trip-he had to be back in Busan sunday evening so it was really just an overnighter for him. Chris and Sam had both been there before, which was handy, as they already knew some of the areas in town to hit. The first upon arrival, naturally, was finding a place to stay. We went to the Sinchon area which, in about a 5 square block area, has about 60 motels. We checked around at quite a number of them to compare prices before finally coming to the realization that they all cost a bit more than they used to and ended up settling on the first place that we'd checked. I look at it as having been an hour long sweltering hot walking tour of Sinchon.
The rooms were actually really nice. Everything-lights, air conditioner, TV, and DVD player, was operated by remote control. Since the buttons on the remotes were in Korean this resulted in quite a lot of button
that topic was indeed exhaustively covered, the museum was much broader in scope, encompassing the entire history of war in Korea, starting with pointy rocks.
It moved on through swords, cannons, guns, military life through the ages, wars in Korea through the ages, had special exhibits for each of the countries that were involved in the Korean War, had a lot of the history of the conflict much of which I didn't know, covered Korea's involvement in Vietnam and, in short, was an absolutely massive place with an amazing number of exhibits and it took us almost 4 hours to make our way through it. Some pics:
These are shots of a "turtle boat", so called beacuse of the armored and spiked top.
One of the smaller boats, but more notable due to it actually containing an image of the ever elusive Korean girl. Korean girls, as a rule, are stunningly beautiful but incredibly camera shy, having been known to literally dive out of the way of a camera wielded in their direction.. I have discovered that the best way to capture one on film is to wait until they happen to be standing in front of something that you might reasonably be taking a picture of so that they are caught unawares. These two were posing for a picture at the insistence of their friends.
Essentially an improved version of a pointy rock with a handle.
early arrow technology
more advanced arrow technology
and the logical progression
A really, really big sword.
goofy guy on a horse
This was, I believe, a memorial to the lives lost in war. The picture doesn't nearly do it justice. It's a gigantic stone bowl filled to the brim with water that runs overs the sides. A single sunbeam from a hole in the dome high overhead falls on it and slowly moves across the water throughout the day.
Memorial to those lost in the Korean war. This is only about half of it. The museum also had pictures of the Korean War memorials in every country that was involved.
There was a massive exterior display of tanks, rockets airplanes, helicopters and even boats and submarines. These shots are only a fraction of what was out there.
Part of the exterior War Monument. Between these two statues was a 50 foot tall three pronged stone blade with bas relief carvings all over it. My picture of it was really lousy.
Our original notion for day 2 was to go to the DMZ. Having done zero advance planning for this trip, however, caused me to neglect to bring my passport which turns out to be an essential item to take the DMZ tour. So Sam went off to do that on his own and I headed to Gyeongbokgung. Interestingly, scant hours after Sam was at the DMZ, shots were exchanged across the minefields for the first time in over a year. I am sure that the two events are somehow related.
Gyeongbokgung was the primary royal palace of Korea during the Joseon dynasty. It has alternately been neglected, attacked, rebuilt, sacked, abandoned and burned over the last few thousand years. It's a massive place yet only about a third the size of what it used to be. Throughout the day they have guards marching around ceremonial style to the beat of a massive drum.
They, of course, do the stoic 'ignore everyone around them' routine as kids poke them and try and grab their swords.
The main gate. Traditionally, only the king is allowed to pass through the center arch. The busy streets of Seoul are on the other side. Entering through the gate you come to a massive courtyard across from an even bigger gate:
And yes that's another, smaller gate through the inner gate. Beyond that was the main palace structure: