The DMZ

Alright, back to cranking out some posts! Remember when my family came to Korea to visit after New Years Day this year? Well this is from then.

One highlight of the time my family spent together in Korea was our trip to the Demilitarized Zone, or DMZ between North and South Korea. I think most people are somewhat familiar with the Korean war where the country was split in two, possibly from watching MASH or something. Anyway, now they are the somewhat volatile neighbors to the North of us. Luckily, we have this barrier called the DMZ which is heavily guarded by both sides so that no one will go through.

We went on a Saturday, and had to wake up bright and early to get on a subway and ride to the USO in Seoul. From the USO it was another bus ride since the DMZ is North of Seoul. Once we arrived at the DMZ we got a tour guide who was a US soldier stationed in Korea. He was pretty funny but one time he forgot to tell us when it was OK to take pictures so we missed some photo opportunities.

The photo taking was somewhat limited, there were only a few areas we could photograph without having our cameras confiscated. One of those was the room where they showed us a nice informational powerpoint presentation. I made the most of it, I guess. Here is a picture of our tour guide and another guy:

So this one shows a map of the actual demilitarized zone, as you can see located a little bit above and a little bit below the 38th parallel.

We were told some pretty good stories about incidents that happened around the DMZ that I don't remember so clearly anymore. I think there was a story about the south side chopping down a tree which somehow provoked a firefight between both sides. Sorry I don't remember much of the details. My favorite part was talking about how the both sides are determined to build a flagpole taller than the other side, no matter how ridiculous it gets. This one shows the South Korean flag is reaching 109 meters, while the North Korean flag is nearly twice as high:

Next was a pretty cool part where they brought us to this building where outside is a little trailer where the North and South hold meetings, if there are any. We had to wait inside of the building and some cool looking South Korean soldiers strolled by:

So then we walked outside and saw the North Korean side. I took this picture of their side, and you can see a real North Korean solder over there:

Some of the rules we had to follow were strange. For one thing we couldn't turn around and take a picture of the side of the building facing North Korea. I don't really know why. We also couldn't make any kind of hand gesture or pointing toward the North Korean side or it might provoke them or else they will monitor it and use it as propoganda for their side about how stupid Americans are or something. I accidentally pointed at the other side without thinking when I was talking to my Mom and was quickly scolded by the tour guide.

Here are some South Korean soldiers. I like these uniforms because they all have cool helmets, sunglasses, and these thick jackets to make them look really ripped. As you can see, there is a solder standing half-behind the blue building. Apparently this is to protect his heart if they were to take a shot at them:

This is inside of the board room. This table in front of the Korean soldier is on the exact border between the North and South, so when I took this picture I was technically in North Korea. Hurray!

From inside I spotted these North Korean solders with some kind of a device they were looking through. Possibly a camera or something, but its obvious that they were up to no good:

After that building there was a stop where we got to look at some land that is on the border, which wasn't too exciting. The next stop was lunch, and then we got to see a tunnel. The North Koreans had some really long tunnels that were all headed into South Korea for the purpose of invasion or spying or something. The Southies found four of them so far, and we got to go visit one and go inside of it and everything. Unfortunately, photography was not allowed.

The tunnels were really cool, though, although very damp and murky. Also they were very short. The ramp down was long, somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 meters down, which wasn't so bad on the way down. To walk to the barrier that blocked us, we had to go under a really short ceiling most of the way. It's not good for your back if you are really tall, and it probably hurt your back even if you are about 5'7" or so. I definitely couldn't imagine carrying my battle supplies all the way through that tunnel.

We did get to take some photos of the outside area of the tunnels. Here's a nice photo of a family trying to push these giant half-spheres together as a symbol of the North and South reuniting.

After departing the tunnel, our last stop was a train station. It's the North most train station in South Korea, put right near the border. If North Korea's borders were open, then South Korea's train system could potentially connect all the way through into China, Russia, and then all of the European rail systems. Unfortunately, North Korea will not have this. I though it was cool how this is a gate to Pyeongyang, although not functional:

I liked the train station for one because they had a stamp that said North Korea on it that I stamped into my passport. Not exactly legal, but it's really cool looking. They also sold North Korean beer and soju there. One strange thing is the beer and soju from North Korea is far superior to anything in the South. In South Korea both the beer and soju just taste really mass produced and horrible, while the North Korean beer is German style and good and the soju has a real flavor to it.

Anyway, it was a great day and I recommend the USO DMZ tour if you are ever in Korea.

A Bug and a Bum

I was walking into a park on Monday where I like to sit and read, and I witnessed a few interesting occurrences. This park, located near city hall, feels at least slightly secluded from the city thanks to a nice cover of trees.

First, when I walked in I heard this very loud sound that was like a 'WEEEE WEEEE WEEEE WAAAAAAAAA' with the 'WAAAAAAA' decreasing in frequency. It took me a few seconds to realize that these were bugs making this sound. I looked around for bugs, well, mostly listened around, and spotted one on a light post. I watched it as it made this 'weeeee' noise, incredibly loud, then flew away.

The bugs look to be about 1.5 to 2" long. I did manage to snap a few pictures:

Does anyone know what these creatures are? They just make this incredibly loud sound that I can sometimes hear in the morning outside my window.

I should mention, I also caught another interesting sight. I found a man passed out on a park bench with a giant bottle of soju next to him. It was noon, mind you. Actually, this isn't completely uncommon.

A Crazy July 4th

This post is definitely prompted by my friend Hyun-Joon, from Korea, who told me to post about the bad parts of Korea.

Saturday, July 4th, I was walking around town on an exploration voyage. My trip took me though my local neighborhoods, including the market which is very close, and then into the Bus Termeener (get it?). While walking through I was looking at the various shops, but then noticed a large group of people crowded around two. They were two men, I estimated one to be about 40 and one to be about 50, in a heated argument. Suddenly, the younger man lurches forward and shoves the old dude in the chest. His glasses fly off, fall to the ground, and break. The younger man then hurriedly walked out the nearest exit, while the older man composed himself and chased after. Ridiculous. I did not follow.

Flash forward to later than evening, when I am hanging out with foreigner friends. We are walking from dinner to Dan's apartment, and we pass a man, drunk and muttering. As we pass, he notices us, and starts yelling. My thought is that he noticed one of our group members was black, and obviously all five of us were not Korean. He then drunkenly yelled at us, as I looked back repeatedly. I wasn't sure what he was on about since I don't speak his language (especially not a slurred version) so I kept leering back at him which probably made him more angry.

So this guy actually starts walking after us. I wasn't even slightly worried about my safety, as there were three men in the group, each easily much larger than this guy. My only worry was that I didn't want to have to lay this dude out on the pavement. He kept walking after us. We kept walking, trying to ignore him as he kept following us, probably for a block. By that time, he started to slow down, at my last look he was at about zombie pace. Anyway, this situation passed with no harm.

I was talking with a friend Lisa from the UK, and her response to the bus terminal incident is that they probably had way too much Soju. Soju is this Korean rice liquor which can be very alcoholic. It's very common for Korean businessmen, etc., to get liquored up with business associates. Soju is also consumed at many meals.

Anyway, the 4th ended well, we all went to Dan's apartment and ate cake with jello and played hot dice. I was super tired so I went to bed about 11. Happy ending to a weird day.