Germany again

If I blogged more frequently, I probably would have such long posts. I don't know...

Back in Germany after 3 years, I find that nothing has changed.  It is still a beautiful place with lots of laid back towns and castles around every corner.  Here in Bavaria it is a little different from the Rhineland.  Not as mountainous where I live “in der Oberpfalz” but I did get to see the Alps, which of course is a lot more hilly. After Korea and Japan where I had good access to things like the shopping, wi-fi, and coffee shops, it has been a little frustrating to be in a one-horse town where groceries are small, wi-fi is either nowhere or at a considerable charge, and the coffee shops close before I get off work. The town is quaint however and it’s castle dates back about 1000 years. Nevertheless I am enjoying it here.  I spent the first weekend with my friends Sherry and Shelley in Bamberg which was relatively unscathed by WWII and has amazing old castles an awesome Cathedral and a great Altstadt (Old City).  It’s many breweries make it hard to sample all the local beers but I did have a great time at a Brauhaus with savory German food and Rauchbier, a smoky dark beer unique to the area and consumed within a few days of brewing, otherwise it goes bad.  At least that’s what they say.  I think they just can’t brew it as fast as they want to drink it and waiting for a beer is unacceptable. The next week we went to Neuschwanstein (Noy-shvan-stine) and Hohenschwangau at the north side of the Alps.  These were castles of Kings Maximillian and Ludwig II.  Neuschwanstein is the one that the Disney Castle was modeled after.  After being rushed through the castle in a fast guided tour and having a beer by the lake we found an elegant restaurant out in the country when we decided to go off road and find some food. The next morning in Stuttgart we wandered around and finally got on a train back to home.  This past weekend Shelley and I went to Munich and got a great room in the Aldstadt, climbed the tower at St. Peter’s Church and watched the Rathaus Glockenspiel do it’s dance at high noon in the drizzling rain. We spent the rest of the afternoon at Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial.  The experience was kind of different than I expected.  There are a few big memorials built on the site to commemorate certain groups of people who were murdered and martyred there.  Much of it seemed almost like a big empty park, but what do you do with a place like this?  It couldn’t be left as it was 67 years ago, it couldn’t be beautified.  Parts were very chilling. First was the entrance where the railroad stopped and people were marched through the gate that reads “Arbeit Macht Frei” (Work Brings Freedom) into the courtyard. The second was the gas chamber, clearly marked “Brausebad” (Shower) next to the crematorium, both fully intact.  The small rooms at either end of the crematorium were morgues where bodies were stacked by the hundreds. Some were even stacked outside against the walls because the morgues were full.  The barracks had been reconstructed and only two are there, although 32 existed at war’s end each having been crammed with up to 2000 people although they were built to house 200. The memorial is not a pleasant place to visit, but seems to have been watered down or minimized somewhat.  They advertise it as the Third Reich Tour, failing to address the holocaust that happened here. 31,000 people died at Dachau, most from disease and starvation and many from execution by shooting, hanging or gassing but it is not called an extermination camp.  Maybe semantics sometimes seem tedious, but sometimes calling it what it is seems more appropriate. After that we definitely need something to lighten us up a little and found a Starbucks WITH free wi-fi and had dinner and weissbier at the Ratskeller under the Rathaus (Old City Hall). I love speaking German, if what I do can actually be called speaking German. And to top it all off it snowed about an inch and continued to flurry til we had to get back on the train to ride home again.  Whew!  It has been a busy 3 weeks.  Work is going well and traveling is going well, I have lost a few pounds, and I am running every day.  Alles ist gut.  Next weekend we plan to spend in Prague.  I am fairly sure that will be a great time. The pictures in order from R-L and Top to Bottom are: Bamberg Cathedral, Streets of Bamberg, Me and the Alps, Neuschwanstein, Dachau entrance, the gate at Dachau, The Rathaus and Glockenspiel at Munich, Alstadt entrance in Munich, and a view of the altstadt in Munich, Me & Weissbier.

Stranded in Tokyo (almost)

It’s hard to believe I have already been back at home for 3 weeks and a few days.  I really  enjoyed my time in Misawa and even the cold, snowy weather kind of grew on me.  Trying to learn to speak a little if not read a little Japanese was a lot of fun and after having spent 5 months of the past year in Japan, I thot I was getting a handle on it.  Bowing, grunting agreement and learning the 4 idiomatic ways of saying thank you were starting to feel natural.  



Dennis and Fran

Short story time: I know it is expensive to get around in Tokyo, in fact the cost of living there is very high, but I decided to go off on a little adventure on my last day in Japan.  My flight arrived at Haneda Airport on time at 1115 on Sunday morning having taken in a spectacular view of Mt Fuji.  That was impressive in itself since Misawa had a lot of snow on the ground and the night before I left the sky had dumped about 6 inches of fresh powder on the area.  That morning the wind was kicking at about 15-20 miles per hour and it was still snowing, making visibility poor. Still, Japan Airlines arrived at Misawa on time and left on time with an extensive ground team plowing, 

Lawson's: The greatese Convenience Store EVER

washing and de-icing everything.  I digress.  So with 8 hours to kill before my next flight I went to visit Fran and Dennis in Shibuya, about a 30 minute ride.  I stored my luggage at the airport and bought a round trip bus ticket to Shibya and reserved my seat on the shuttle to Narita Airport, about a 70 minute ride from Haneda.  I figured I had a couple of hours to hang out with them and then I could easily make it back and get on the long flight home, all for about $25. Without going into all the small details, it turn out the bus from Shibuya (for 

Ramen House on an Icy Night

which, remember? I had a roundtrip ticket) stopped running after the last drop off which I was on.  I waited and waited a little more before I asked a cop when the bus would arrive, feeling a bit nervous because in Japan the buses and trains are perfectly timed.  Now would miss my shuttle to Narita Airport.  He told me to go wait at the bus stop and the bus would come.  I waited and waited and even rechecked the bus times on the schedule which indicated the bus was now 20 minutes late but another one would be along in a few minutes.  More waiting…until a concerned citizen wanting to practice his English asked me what I was waiting for.  When I told him he translated the bus schedule to me which clearly stated in bold and highlighted words that bus service stops on Sundays and holidays after 12 noon. So much for my Survival Japanese lessons. So I quickly located a taxi attendant who I asked in bad Japanese if any taxis would take a credit card, since I only had a small amount of cash.  He smiled and said yes and I got in the cab to the airport letting the driver know that I was running late because of the bus thing.  I watched in despair as the meter clicked and clicked and the driver engaged me in light conversation mostly in Japanese about Japanese food, where did I stay, did I see Fujisan etc, none of which lightened my mood. When the meter finally stopped clicking it settled at $128.00 for the one way 30 minute ride. Fortunately tipping is not done in Japan or dude would have just been SOL.  So I changed my reserved seat on the shuttle which left in 10 minutes, picked up my luggage and made it to Narita with an hour and a half to spare.  I felt deflated and mentally worn out but then, being a brilliant therapist, reframed my thinking to embrace the idea that I have the opportunity to do things like this.  Even if it means stranded in Tokyo or London, a car accident in Turkey, lost in Seoul or Paris, earthquakes or volcanoes, I’ve still had the most amazing past few years. 

Now I get to brush up on my German language skills a little, start relearning customs and basic phrases like when to say “Auf Wiedersehen” and when to say “Chus.” Since I expect to only be able to go shopping on the economy, I will have to learn how to read “decaffeinated” and “non-fat” in German. My life is soooo challenging.

Oirase Gorge



Snow sculture at Towada

thoughts on The War With America

(By the way, the photo is of Shinjuku and it appears the lights are definitely on.) 

Every now and then I have one of those moments when I am struck by revelation of a truth that is so obvious, that I wonder why it never occurred to me before, and I get them a few times a year.  I guess you just have to get to a point where you are open to the possibility, however remote, of not knowing everything. I spent MLK weekend in Tokyo for the second time in a month.  I knew I couldn’t really afford it, and then got a wicked flu on Thursday night (hotel and train already paid for and not refundable). I know that sometimes stuff just happens and I have to go and look for the lesson and the joy in it, despite the din created to distract me. So I went with a change of underwear, plenty of medication, a box of tissues, and a pocketful o cash for a couple of bowls of steaming hot soba. I gradually felt better through the night and the next day, then on Sunday night, as Sumo wrestlers strolled in the dusk, and as chanting and temple incense filled the cool evening air, I found myself entering Edo-Tokyo Museum looking at artifacts that have survived countless fires, earthquakes and wars, yet which contain substantial history within a relatively small space. I meandered through dark corridors and lighted models until I came to the corner of my epiphany.  It was the ‘War with America’ section.  I became suddenly very aware of my obvious Americanness looking at filmstrips of the burning of Tokyo, the mountains of bodies, the people in the smoldering streets and written and recorded accounts of some of the hundreds of thousands of men, women and children, whose homes and cities were targeted and destroyed by American bombers, in an effort to crush the spirit of the Japanese people.  Looking at artifact after artifact I could not avoid the gaze of small Japanese faces looking up at me from the behind a father’s leg or a mother’s winter coat draped across her arm. I knew they were staring because I looked different from their norm but I couldn’t help but feel a little as if I might bear some guilt for looking like the enemy portrayed in the photographs.  I approached the photos of the surrender of the Empire of Japan to General MacArthur aboard the USS Missouri.  The video of that moment is striking alone but watching it among a crowd of people who look at this moment in history from the opposite vantage point is a bit humbling.  My epiphany was this.  No matter which side you are on, the story is the same.  The enemy doesn’t value human life.  The enemy is ignorant.  The enemy is evil and capable of doing unspeakable things to our people. We can’t let that happen to our people. I wonder why wise men have filled thousands of pages trying to explain and understand war, yet never resolve the conflict. It is never, never what it seems, regardless of how right we are.

Creesmahs and New Year in Japan

Since my last blog I have spent Christmas weekend in Tokyo with my friends Fran and Dennis and Dennis’ niece and her friend.  I made some new friends (welcome Stephen to my friend list) that weekend as well.  After a nice Italian meal in a French bistro in Shibuya (Tokyo district) on Christmas Eve we wandered around for awhile mesmerized by the 50 Motorcycle Santas who kept popping up around Shibuya and Shinjuku (also Tokyo).  The streets were full of people celebrating Christmas by dancing in the streets in festive moods all shouting “Merry Creesmahs!” I am still amazed at how Japanese girls can dress in so little in the middle of winter; of course it was only in the 30’s at night so I guess there was really no call for a coat. Adding to the excitement was the house party in Shinjuku followed by a “rest of the nighter” dancing and celebrating at the Rock Bar complete with dancing on the bar and everybody wishing everybody a Merry “Creesmahs!” We rounded it all off with a banquet at Burger King and went to bed.  On Christmas day we went out for Christmas sushi and a trip to the Tokyo Tower.  Then I got back on my bullet train for a 300 kph, 4 hour trip back to the north where there was plenty of ice and snow.  Christmas is a festive time in Japan, but nothing, I heard, compared to New Year’s Eve.  I learned about some exciting events and traditions such as people going to shrines and burning their good luck tokens from the past year in bonfires and getting new ones for the new year.  Lanterns would be lit and the bells of the temples would ring in the new year.  I thot that sounded fun and decided to go to Aomori City, about 39 km from here, a seaport town that reportedly gets more snow per capita (whatever that means) than any other small city (whatever that means) on earth. Determined to conquer my fear of driving on ice and snow covered back country roads in high winds, I set out with my fearless colleague Holly for Aomori on Saturday morning with extra blankets and “Hot Hands” just in case we slid off the road and had to spend a couple of days in a snow bank half submerged in a rice patty at the bottom of a ravine.  Holly kept saying “hey look at that” or “Garry, let’s stop here” while I was praying and struggling to keep the car on the road.  Turns out her fearlessness has more to do with obliviousness to the incredible danger than with actual boldness.  Anyway we made it to Aomori and prepared for the events slated for our traditional Japanese new year celebration.  Now, Aomori had just received over 3 feet of fresh snowfall so finding my way around with Holly as my directionally-challenged (that would have been good to know before I put her in charge of the map reading) navigator was challenging since the roadsides bore 10- foot high walls of snow.  Everything was in Japanese (can you believe it?) including the name of the Hotel which was blatantly obvious on the front of the building.  After driving around for an hour trying to match the Kanji and Hiragana to what might be on a hotel or street sign, and after asking and receiving directions from Lawson’s convenience store (British owned, but no English) in Japanese – (YAY for me!) we found it and even though only 6 people in Aomori speak any English, we found the Tourist Information Center where one such person worked.  Long story short the lady informed us that the happening party was to be on board the ship “Hakkoda Maru” complete with alcohol, food and fireworks and it was free! So after exploring a Shinto Shrine and wandering around the icy streets and 10 foot walls of snow and ice, and having a nice kare dinner at another hotel (our hotel’s 3 restaurants were closed for the holiday as were 90% of the businesses in town) Holly and I went to see the two bands playing 80’s American pop which included a blond guy with a tamborine and a skinny girl in a kimono slapping a mean bass guitar.  There was also a Don Ho looking guy with an electric keyboard laying down some sultry sounds. The food varied from a cold bento to hot ramen and the Sapporo Beer was 6 bucks a glass, but we stuck it out and saw the new year in with a bang and some nice fireworks over Aomori Bay. Thanks to Holly clever conversation and a lots of laughs, the evening was a hit. The next day we went to an awesome little museum named for and featuring the internationally acclaimed local block print artist Munakata Shiko and then somehow found the giant Daibutsu (Big Buddha) and temple out in the country after careening down a bouncy alley with 6 foot drops off to the sides of the iced over and heavily rutted, one car wide trail. It was almost as fun driving as Turkey, especially with the rubberneckers standing in the road smoking cigarettes and laughing hysterically as I tried to negotiate my way around them and toward my destination. We walked around and rang the giant bell then headed for home…and made the 39 km in only 2 hours!  It snows here all day and all night with enough melt-off to give the roads a nice glaze in the morning and as I sit and write we have about 8 inches built up since yesterday.  Supposed to snow again tonight.  I think I will have my fill by the time I leave here in 6 weeks. pictures are top down and left to right:  Me Fran and Dennis,MotoSantas, Mt Fuji (never gets old), Me and the Rock Bar Bunch,Aomori Pagoda and Daibutsu, Lantern, very helpful sign, the last existing Bob's Big Boy, Shrine and me and the Holly Lama!

三沢市からこんにちは

Normally, I don’t wait this long to post about my current events, but this has been a very different kind of assignment.  I am back in Japan, but this time I am light years away from the metropolitan Tokyo area.  It almost feels like I am on vacation in West Tennessee sometimes, of course with exceptions.  Two exceptions are that everybody speaks Japanese and all the signs are in Japanese. Lots of nice restaurants and one particularly spectacular Chinese one where I order my food off a menu for 15 to 30 bucks instead of paying $7.99 to graze a buffet. I heard there is a MacuDonodo in town but I have not seen it yet. The Christmas spirit abounds here in this Shinto and Buddhist land.  There are loudspeakers in the streets of Misawa-shi that are playing Christmas Carols, everyone wishing everyone a Merry Christmas, Christmas decorations everywhere, and snow abounds making the whole thing feel a little “It’s A Wonderful Life” – ish. In fact, I think tonight I will walk around town tonite and shoot a little video just to prove it.  It snowed the week before Thanksgiving here and both days required brushing about 4 inches of snow off of cars, so apparently that means it will be a particularly snowy winter.  We've had snow a lot and it's snowing right now with about 6 inches of ground cover. The good thing so far is that the snow melts down during the day even with below freezing temps keeping it manageable for walking and driving.  The bad thing is that melt-off makes everything a sheet of ice, not good for my colleague Holly who busted her rump Thursday and ended up in the ER alongside of the string of people with sprains and assorted falling-on-the-ice injuries.  I am not going to make any remarks about that (and SO many come to mind) so as not to put a falling-down curse on myself.  Gotta avoid the evil eye, you know. There are some interesting places around here though.  Shipwreck Beach (aptly named) has tons of sea glass and supposedly glass fishing floats which drift ashore and people find them as genuine treasure, so I have been and will return to hopefully find an intact glass ball. A trip to Iwate Prefecture to the caves was cool, and a nice change of pace.  I saw a lot of recovery and damage from the tsunami.  Still there are piles of rubble which sadly includes homes, clothes, appliances and the remnants of so many lives lost in that disaster.  I am going to volunteer at an orphanage off base whose census has exploded with children whose parents were killed in March.  I think I can resist bringing home a handful of kids; I have my list of why it’s impossible ready.  I am going train-riding today to Hachinohe which is about 30-45 minutes south of here. Here are a few photos that I have taken so far, top down: Cutesy sign forbidding dumping of trash (cutesy, childlike and fun is very typical); rubbish and reconstruction in a tsunami affected area; a nice little park; a shrine on the beach for people to honor or pray for their pets; Shipwreck Beach.

동대문, 한우, 그리고 긴 밤

I have become a little bit spoiled I suppose. I had Loren in Seoul to hang out with and show me around, introducing me to new people and experiences. Before that, in Tokyo there were the Anzai’s and Fran and Dennis. Now thinking ahead to Misawa, I don’t know what I am going to do. Maybe just go back to old fashioned way of meeting people. I have been fortunate though. It’s pretty cool to have friends all over the world, especially the ones I have. This was my last real weekend in Korea and although a little sad, and despite the torrential rains, I managed to have a great time. After a very wet Friday, I thought it was going to clear up, but after meeting Ann
and Francie for coffee in Myeongdong, the skies started to darken and it was like 6 p.m. at noon. The skies let us wander around for awhile shopping and having fun but when we finally stopped in a tea shop, the bottom fell out and it rained hard. We quick-walked across the street to a café and drank more coffee, stalling there as long as we could. We decided (for some reason) to take a taxi to Dongdaemun and walked in ankle deep water to the street corner. Apparently we were the last three people waiting for the last available taxi in Seoul, because we waited and waited dangling our hands out everytime we saw a taxi coming. Finally, the last available taxi in Seoul showed up, and took us out of what was now a river, formerly a major street, and dropped us off into another river a few miles down the road. We were just glad to have a warm and dry ride. So, umbrellas up and wet from the waist down, we careened and collided with other umbrella-armed citizens for a short eternity until after having not stopped and not spoken a word, Ann finally stopped and said what we were all thinking: “This is ridiculous!” We decided that food was in order so we slushed on in silence and soaking wet. The restaurant we found was a quaint looking place in an alley and on arrival the owner met us at the door stating, “Only beef!” like three times. I was trying to contain my hunger because I was going to dinner with Loren in a couple of hours, but the guy simply didn’t want to allow me to not eat a full meal. I kept saying two and pointing to Ann and Francie and counting them for him. As if he thought I was an idiot and didn’t know how to count myself, he repeated one two, three, emphasizing that I was number three. He even translated it into Korean for me, hana, tul, set, as if that would clear it up. Finally, I gave in, weary of yet another circular conversation. At that point I would have eaten leaves and grass. This is not a sea story but, this is no shit: the servers brought out grass soup, and a pile of leaves. Then assorted other things and a big pile of beef. We looked at each other helplessly because we really had no idea what to do with this stuff. Then the owner person brought a bucket of fiery coals and put them in the middle of the table with a grill on top. We still kind of looked at each other for a minute and the servers, I guess, felt sorry for us and proceeded to show us how to place the beef, mushrooms and garlic on the grill, mix up other stuff, put it on a leaf and then add the cooked meat, wrap it up in a neat little bundle and eat it. It was sooooo good. Feeling empowered by this great knowledge we ate a hot meal and warmed ourselves by the fire. After a hearty meal we decided that slopping along in a foot of water in single file, not speaking a word to eat other and shivering from the cold was not a great way to spend the remaining hours of the day and said our goodbyes. I went to Loren’s house, purged and went out for another steak dinner. Would you believe it was exactly the same meal as I had just eaten? The difference was that the beef was Hanu or Hanwoo beef, raised in Korea and considered a Korean cultural icon, is so tasty, tender and succulent. We ate again and I enjoyed it immensely, but I did confess to Loren about my earlier meal. Apparently in Korean restaurants, you can eat, drink, smoke, burp and fart, but it is not proper to say, “wow this tastes just like Kobe beef (Japanese beef).” Everybody stopped talking and dropped their metal chopsticks with a loud collective crash. Quickly realizing I had created yet another cultural snafu (in a long line of many), I added, “but sooooo much better!” Everyone resumed their meal but kept an eye on me. After dinner and another good purge, we hit the road, met up with Hunter, Sang Yeop, and a gathering entourage for a night on the town with So-Maek, Karaoke, and, yes, another meal at around 2 a.m. Fortunately the ongoing rain drove away many of the sugar plums for fear of melting, so we had the streets to ourselves, finally wrapping it all up at 5 a.m. What a great finale for my Seoul experience! After a few more days of work I pass the torch to a new MFLC and head back to the city for a final night before catching a flight outta here on Monday. Again, I like Korea very much and hope to come back, maybe at Christmas. We shall see. My pictures are Ann and Francie, Sandy and her Happy KORever coffee cup, an Ice Cream Corn stand, and Karma performers in Insadong.

Lanterns, Conversations and Dobongsan

Columbus Day weekend was another good one. A lot of milestones here. I went Saturday to the Jinju Lantern Festival in South South Korea. Loren called me with the idea Friday night and he told me his friend Hunter was coming too. So after my 2 hour commute to Loren’s apartment we got on a bus to travel another 4 ½ hours. The festival had millions of lights and at least a thousand lanterns all along the river banks and floating in the river. All sorts and sizes in so much detail that it was hard to imagine the hours that went into making one. We put paper pieces on a lantern, ate rotisserie chicken from the back of a truck that tasted awesome but would probably not meet USDA and OSHA standards. The lady brought it to our table and proceeded to rip it apart with her hands causing juice and steam to go everywhere, gave us chopsticks and a roll of toilet paper. That and the cigarette hanging out of her mouth and the whooping cough gave me pause but I was starving. After we ate and had a beverage, we shot roman candles off the bridge, walked the city wall, ate some interesting chewy candy and set about finding a place to sleep since it was 11 o’clock and we were homeless in Jinju. Well, nothing was available and after “Bang isoyo”-ing every hotel we could find, we opted to go to another town close-by where, rumor had it, there were rooms available. So at 1230 a.m. we checked in at the charming Diamond Hotel in Sacheon, a real love hotel! For a cheap price we got our room and went out for Soju, beer and the most interesting fruit plate I have ever seen with food I have no idea what they were or how to explain them. There was watermelon and grapes so at least something was recognizable. I learned you can drink Soju from little shot glasses or you can mix it with beer and as it turns out, it will make you sing with conviction at a norebang and dance on a rooftop at 4 in the morning. Who knew? Soju and Maekju (beer) is So-maek. The things I learn. Got up this morning to hike up Dobongsan, a cool granite mountain where you can climb up and stand on the cold, naked and windy peak and see for miles and miles. My cohort Sandy went too making for good conversation on the long and sometimes grueling climb. It had rocks to clamber over, steps built in at some spots, and ropes to pull yourself up on the steep or slick spots. I did obtain a major life threatening injury when my foot slipped while rappelling off the top and cracked into the cliff face. Maybe not life threatening but it did hurt especially since I had a long return to the bottom of the hill ahead, but it looked cool and made people gasp when they saw me slip and then crash into the wall. Through this flooding experience, I think I am cured of my debilitating fear of falling. I felt a little heroic. We got back into town as night fell and were very happy we weren’t still trying to make our way in the dark. So I bought a puffy coat, a couple of gimbaps for dinner and some maekju and came back to the hacienda. The guy at the front desk asked what I did today and I told him and made the awful mistake of adding that my legs felt like rubber bands. He responded, “you broke them?’; “No I just climbed Dobongsan”; “So your legs feel bad?”; “Yes, they are tired”: “Oh really, Why”; I just climbed Dobongsan”; “ So you are feeling tired?” “AAAAAHHHHHH!” I think he was messing with me, but I can’t be sure…damn language barrier has been my downfall in Korea. I feel sad to be leaving, but having a normal conversation will be refreshing.

The DMZ and some lighter stuff

I have a new phrase in Korean!  It’s a phrase I try to learn in every language right after, “It’s all good” and “Hello”.  “I don’t speak Korean” is “Nanen Hangugmal mot hamnida”.  Translating is a challenge so I have to Romanize it to remember phrases. I don’t have a Korean keyboard option but I am trying to learn to read it.  It is really not so hard.  I actually read a sign today to find out where we were and figured it out!  Problem was that even though I read it I still had no idea where we were.  I went to the DMZ yesterday, and no matter what they say on the news, it wasn’t my fault. I followed the instructions to the T and didn’t talk to, gesture toward, make eye contact with or break anything on the list of rules toward the KPA soldiers.  What had happened was, while I was standing there on the North Korea side of the zone taking pictures of the soldiers per se and of South Korea, my glasses slipped down a little so I pushed them back up with my finger.  Apparently the use of my middle finger for glasses pushing was misconstrued as a threat.  Can you believe it?  Well to make matters worse a gnat flew into my eye and I blinked that one eye right into the surveillance camera and that got everybody’s attention!  Fortunately South Korea was not too far to run back across, but those Northerners, in my estimation, are wa-a-a-ay too uptight.  Needless to say I am no longer welcome in North Korea.  That’s okay though because their attitude sucks anyway.  After I get back home, I might just send their leader a bottle of Jack Daniels, a handful of Xanax and a  friendly card telling him to chill the heck out. The South Korean (ROK) and American soldiers, were awesome to watch.  They did not flinch a muscle and were very disciplined and professional.  I had to sign wavers that said blah blah… death or injury… hostile territory… hold harmless in the event of… blah blah. In spite of the wavers though I felt very safe and well guarded.  My hat’s off not only to the brave US troops who guard that tense border, but also to the ROK soldiers who stand their post staring the enemy in the eye from a distance of only 2-3 meters.  The position they stand in is called ROK Ready and they look it; that’s a modified Taekwondo stance.  A black belt in martial arts, mainly Taekwondo, is one of the requirements for this job. Well after all that I needed something to eat and took off to a little restaurant for some more of that awesome SamYeTang (Ginseng Chicken Soup) and soju followed by a long walk in a steady rain the one time I didn’t take my umbrella, capping off a great day. Today I had planned to go to one of those doctor fish pedicure places and have the rough spots nibbled off my feet by miniature piranhas, but as it turns out I couldn’t get a recommendation to good one. Most of the people I talked to, both American and Korean, convinced me that any place around here is probably not very sanitary and therefore not a very good idea.  Maybe in Seoul or Daegu they said.  Maybe I will pass.  Thing is that here it costs less than a beer and in the States it costs a little more than an iPad.  So I went shopping and walking instead and found a red shirt and a great hat that says boldly across the front REEP. That made my day!  Hopefully next weekend will be something to write about too.  I am spending it in Seoul (not for a fish pedicure)…again. So far it’s been worth it everytime.
These pictures in order from top to bottom, right to left are The DMZ conference room with North Koreans pointing and signaling to us (note the ROK Ready stance, one with only half of his body exposed beyond the wall), a KPA soldier standing outside the window behind a ROK soldier, Paradise/Propoganda Village (a mock village set up to "show" the South Koreans the beauty of living in the north with their 600 pound, 160 meter high flag which cannot wave except in typhoon winds.  The village is empty buildings without floors or walls.  The flag was erected because they were mad when South Korea erected a flag 100 meters tall), me and some statues at a park outside the 3rd tunnel dug by the North in an effort to penetrate into the South, my new hat!, and me playing too close

추석 weekend

So I was thinking a few days ago how the time goes by so fast and I had a moment of feeling sad that my time here will come to an end. I didn’t let it bother me for more than a few minutes because there is so much yet to do while I am still here. This weekend is the beginning of the Korean holiday of Chuseok (that’s phonetic or something; it’s pronounced Chew-Sock). The holiday actually is Monday and Tuesday, and we Americans get the day off on Monday. A sweet 3-day weekend twice in a row. I went into Seoul again on Saturday and visited Gyeongbokgung. ‘Gung’ means palace so I didn’t say it twice, although it would have saved the space of my explanation if I had, but since I am not paying for this space, 괜찮아요. Translating from English to Korean language is tough because a lot doesn’t translate perfectly and all of our colloquialisms get seriously lost in translation. Back to the point: The palace area was HUGE with big pavilions and buildings and a museum scattered across a large landscape in downtown Seoul.  I wandered from there to an area called Insadong which was rife with nice shops mixed with souvenir shops and craft kiosks.  It was also very crowded but not as much as the tourist targeted Namdaemun Market. Such a throng! I met up with my new awesome friend SangYeop and went to the N Seoul Tower.  The N is kind of a mystery thing although it stands for Namsan which is the name of the hill it stands on.  We got there after sunset so it was all lit up and by the time we went up to the observation deck the city was all lit up in all directions. Amazing to see the sprawl of such a big city, bigger even than Pensacola; over 10 million in the city proper and over 24 million in the greater metro area. For reference purposes Pensacola has about 53K. Seoul is about 20 times the population of Atlanta and is bigger than New York and Tokyo by a couple million each. We ate a side street diner and then had beers after wandering the labyrinthine alleys.  I still don’t have a good grip on the chopsticks here (pun intended) because they are metal so when they are wet it is kind of hard to pick stuff up, especially if it is also wet.  I look drunk trying to eat with them falling out of my hands, dropping food in my lap and poking myself in the eye, but fortunately I had a deft artisan of metal chopstick manipulation who coached me and kept me from hurting myself. The next day I went to the Korean War Memorial which is a pretty impressive and expansive museum of Korean War history (not just the one the USA was involved in). After coffee and market exploration, I finally forced myself onto the train to my homestead an hour back upstream. Despite the overcast sky and the extensive walking, it was a great weekend.  Today I chill, iron clothes for the workweek and spend a little me-time reading and vegging out, thinking about life, love and renaissance and looking forward to my next adventure to the DMZ and the doctor fish.