FINAL IMP

i am writing this from manga kissa, in fukuoka. spending night during my transfer (icn>fuk>ams>prg) back home. fukuoka airport closes in 22:30 on daily basis, haha.

manga kissa = pc cafe with sleeping "facilities"

nevertheless, this post should sum up the 4 month-long stay in s korea/university

few more notices not only from campus life:

identically with other southeast asian countries, korea also suffers from tetraphobia, result of which, in civil elevators you can find letter "f" instead of number 4
the reason for this precaution is almost the same pronunciation of words "four" and "death" in these countries...

fatal combo

one more dictation from dormitory office:

and this actually happened - they moved out at least one student due to the snoring. you should have yourself tested ;p

many cars, especially at campus have these stiff-foam stickers as door damage protection.

ad food: spicy!!!!! i consider myself tolerant and open minded gourmand, but even after the entire stay i was not able to get to used to the chilli content

chinese dish

however, tastewise, korean cuisine is great, (also chinese which was prepared often) and traditional korean cuisine is healthy and light as well.

kimchi making event in campus

sample dormitory dish below:

notice the rice and kimchi (typically fermented cabbage with chilli - traditional sour and spicy side dish), these two components was part of every, every dinner and breakfast...that made the mornings somewhat difficult to enjoy for europeans.

only water is accompanying every meal

one of the favourite street food is this warm soft dessert with sweet red bean filling! 

expected chocolate for the first bite

and this is how we rolled....four boyz in dha room

final week i visited korean war momorial, which is very complex and contentful museum with superdesigned exhibitions... and outside park

there i also crashed into armystyle wedding :-O

thanks america:

near seoul city centre there is standing renovated "south" gate.... i think it is great to maintain piece of history in modern times and metropolis

i suppose japanese were very hungry to conquer the capital

ad culture - i visited amazing performance in nanta theatre - fusion of dance, percussions, singing, cooking and of course comedy! only a few words had been used...but i laughed a looooot, they even put me on the stage to do real soup degustation! :-O

i received physical copy of photo with myself

seoul subway is supersmart and well-organised. every station can help you navigate yourself, each station is shown and explained using 3D scheme with exits.

city environment also brings homeless people using underground passages as shelters...good night sleep in cardboard boxes

and right above street people modern gangnam district is spreading along with numbers of skyscrapers:

neiiiiigh

i found final exams fairly easy, maybe i had not to demanding courses/professors..but generally i understand that english courses for internationals have a little bended requirements or maybe grading. we will see when results come.

just helping archi student out 

about language - to learn hangul is easy, transcription from/to roman letters is not difficult task...what uses up your memory is meaning of korean words and pronunciation, it is doable by listening and pairing words with their equivalents...at the end of the day it is the same with any other language :)

raging during baseballing

sabotaging group photo of random guys - my favourite sport in korea :D

in general i feel positive about korea....
when i look back i see koreans like one big family - all the nation. i observed this kind of bond in buses, school, restaurants, stores...
i like how warmly they behave one to another.

final selfie with my great buddy

moreover, in korean culture, age segregation is crucial, that also is the reason why "how old are you?" is one of the top3 questions.
even among similarly-aged friends or colleagues is clearly stated who has to bow to whom. or who has to pour drink to whom.
it is common that elder people are respected.

elder people - homecoming souvenier

as major drawback (and surprise, too) i see mediocre english speaking skills among young people, even on academic grounds...
for this powerful asian economic it was a shocker. (or i suppose some have the language skills as well as slight speaking block)
one way or another, group works and communication in general was just interesting enough ;)

now i am at home¨

--no more to come

farewell korea!

SEOUL & DMZ

on 1st of december lady winter came to seoul and brought below zero temperatures and snow,
however following weekend it was sunny.
inha university actually is located in the town of incheon in metropolitan area, from dorms to the capital's city centre it still takes roughly 100 mins by sub

soo this was my first real visit of seoul

admiral reaching higher than high-rises

walking from the city hall towards the gyeongbokgung palace complex you reach the statue of great admiral yi sun-shin who won several naval battles even when outnumbered in 16th century during japanese invasion

few yards further sits king sejong the great - the inventor of korean alphabet hangul which was presented in 15th century by king stating following:

"Because the speech of this country is different from that of China, it [the spoken language] does not match the [Chinese] letters. Therefore, even if the ignorant want to communicate, many of them in the end cannot state their concerns. Saddened by this, I have [had] 28 letters newly made. It is my wish that all the people may easily learn these letters and that [they] be convenient for daily use."

hangul is clean, logical and easy to learn

consequently i reached the gate of gyeongbokgung, i admire the guards for standing 3 hrs in freezing temperatures (in those boots) until changing of the guard happens

louis vuitton

mighty entrance to the entrance

there is still place to chill in seoul:

from tales of chinese zodiac:

jazz jackrabbit's grandpa

history vs. modern

later  i headed to colossal street markets of namdaemun and dongdaemun --i will go back shopping, there i was overwhelmed by everything, well, they sell everything, i forgot to take a picture

that's how we do in da kitchen yo

after i aimed to get to my airbnb accommodation in itaewon, on the way over the namsan park again

historically, itaewon was residential district of american expats, later english teachers, now it is welcoming international district for everyone to enjoy nightlife, it is famous for hooker hill and gay clubs which are not that much warmly accepted elsewhere. sorry, i do not have any photo of a hooker

multi purpose exhibitions halls on the han river

the banpo bridge below has led lights and water fountain show, there are 380 nozzles on each side to shoot totally 190 tons of water per a minute (source (kr))
to be lighten up by led lights to create rainbow effect (picture google this: Banpodaegyo rainbow)

one of the 27 bridges to cross the river in seoul

but it did not operate because it was like vladivostok real feel temperatures, duh

i finished the evening with supertasty kebap 

--

next morning

from seoul station i took dmz train towards the north - demilitarized zone is cirka 4km wide buffer zone on the borders where both koreas agreed not to place any military facilities/equipment

flower power

this hippie cheerful train with stickers saying "love peace Harmony" was gonna take us to place which could be  possible the ground zero for the third world war.......

near the borders, on the imjingang stop our passports had been checked in order to continue

from here it is only 209 km to dpkr's capital

afterwards we proceeded slowly through last railway bridge, the vicinity of railtrack was isolated by barb wired fence-- from speakers you could hear the theme song from superfamous korean war movie Taegukgi: The Brotherhood of War (btw, personally strongly recommended, it has very emotive story).
and also instrumental composition Heart asks pleasure first. All these influences together gave varied and noticeable feelings.

in a few minutes, we finished the ride in the last stop of south korea dorasan, which is at the same time considered as the first stop towards the north.

there is created something called peace park - does this looks peaceful in your eyes? :D

below, one of many unification symbols - generally, south korean aim is to unify the counties, they are same people, same language, same ancestors, common heritage. but after korean war nonsesual political ideologies brought different development and it hinders the unification

we boarded shuttle bus to take us to the 3rd infiltration tunnel. it was discovered in 1978 - north koreans claimed it was just a coal mine...it is also called tunnel of aggression and it is believed that north koreans wanted to utilize it for direct land assault of the seoul

you descend through steep bored walkway and after hundred of meters you reach the actual tunnel

just part of the tunnel is publicly accessible and it is blocked to separate from dpkr

 in the tunnel you can even celebrate x mas with razor wire

put both koreas together

monuments of war - conserved

and final stop was dorasan observatory

paradoxically, what i found the most exciting, was just observing the northern countryside....

not only to see 160m high dpkr's flagpole with 270kg(!) flag on the top...

to show their power, dpkr built it to overtake south korean "only" 98m high flagpole 

and finally north korea :D

everyone returned alive, soooo mission accomplished... ;)