A Lotte World of fun!

Before I totally forget about my trip to Korea, I'd better finish off the last few posts about it. Day 5 of our Seoul adventure and just passing the mid point of our trip, and tossing up what to do next. I wanted to visit the electronic market of Seoul. I had no illusions that it would be anything like Akihabara but I also didn't expect to find what I did. Seoul's electronic market looked like a trash and treasure, or a computer swap meet. Shops bursting at the seems with boxes, electrical cords hanging everywhere. It looks as disorganised as any market in Asia. I did walk through the games area and unfortunately, the electronics were not that much cheaper than Japan. They did have a tonne of pirated DVD's though, which are very scarce in Japan.

Here's John wondering where they would put all these boxes, when they close??? This is a typical street down the electronics market in Seoul. I should also mention that the outdoor markets were similarly disorganised if not more so. There's bags and bags full of clothing and anything else in Dongdaemun and Namdaemun markets.

We did happen to stumble onto a special event while trying to find the electronics market. While wondering through a department store, we heard a huge roar emanating from above. We dismissed this as some weired Korean gimmick. We soldiered on through the shopping centre up to the movies section to see what was showing in Korea. As we approached, we found a small group of people huddled around the entrance to the cinema. Being half interested, we waited for awhile.

Who are these people waiting for??? We knew some sort of famous person was really close, we could sense it in our veins.

After waiting about 10mins and seeing no-one. It finally hit me ... it was staring at me all along. A Giant poster picturing Hong Kong movie superstar "Andy Lau". It must have been him that they were waiting for. This was confirmed by one of the fans that spoke a little English. For those not into the Hong Kong movie scene, Andy has been in films such as the asian mega hit "Infernal Affairs", and the more internationally known "House of Flying Daggers". Andy was in town promoting his latest movie called "Three Kingdoms: Resurrection of the Dragon". The film also starred Hong Kong heaving weight "Sammo Hung", (most famous for being the comedic side-kick to Jackie Chan movies and appearing in pictures on the Mekong Pho restaurant on Swanston Street). It also starred "Maggie Q" (who I just found out is half American and half Vietnamese ... hot, hot), of Mission Impossible 3 and the latest Die Hard movie fame.

So we decided to wait a little longer to have our brush with fame, even if John and Clarence had never heard of Andy, Maggie or Sammo ... they were still giddy with excitement. So after about 30mins of waiting, the moment finally came. The following is a video clip of Andy, briefly showing himself. Don't blink, otherwise you'll miss him. All you Hong Kong movie buffs try not to scream too loud ... Phil, Ha !!!!

If you didn't catch him, watch again and I'll walk you through it. Ok, about 7-8 secs into the clip, you'll see a little head pop out from the left wall (all the movie attendent ladies move aside just before this happens). Andy then steps out, gives a quick wave, points to the cinema ... and that all folks.

Once that was all over and we caught a glimpse of Andy for all of 5secs, we ventured outside to a huge stage set-up. This was the source of the earlier screaming as was where Andy, Maggie and Sammo were giving their media conference.

After our heart rates returned to normal from seeing Andy, we decided to head to the one place that John really wanted to go ... Lotte World! Lotte World is one of two big amusement parks in Seoul and in the Top Ten amusement parks in the world. It is located inside the Lotte World Department store.

Look how happy John is!

For a ransom of 25,000 Won ($25) we gained entry into the park along with all it rides. This is by and far alot cheaper that Universal Studios Japan and any of the Disney Lands in Japan. However, Lotte World, seemed to borrow many things for those above mentioned parks. The picture above for example seems eerily like the Globe from Universal studios. You will see other borrows structures later on.

Once entered, the park looked very much like a kiddies kind of place but there were some rides that were worthwhile.

Some quick snaps with our newly bought Lotte ears!

Gotta have a snap with Lotty and Lorry (between you and me, I think Lorry has a thing for me, but don't tell Lotty).

Then we headed into the rides. Me and Clarence had already smashed each other up in the Dodgem cars, but our first real ride was one called "Desparado". The game was, you sat on mechanical moving horse, while shooting things at the screen in front of you. You had to compete with all the people in the ride. Here"s John and Clarence showing their stuff. Other ride inside the park included the old favourite "Pirate Ship", indoor roller coaster, a Sinbad ride where you went through different areas on a boat, a dinosaur ride (very much like a rip off of Jurassic Park) and a hot air balloon ride around the ceiling as we were to do later on.

At about 5pm, the park had their World Carnival, complete with probably all the foreign people they had in Seoul. Seriously, I didn't see one Korean person in the parade. It was a bit like a moving circus performance. Sort of cool but also a little bit Corny.

This is another one of those things that Lotte World had borrowed from other trademarks. Seems very similar to the Disney Castle, don't you think. Anyway, the park also had an outside bit which was where most of the adult rides seemed to be. Unfortunately, we didn't get to go on many as it was now dusk and many of the Korean youth had taken advantage of the cheaper night tickets, so lines were now very long. This plus a combination of John being scared of dying and Clarence being ... well just scared. So they had some big roller coasters outside, a ride free fall ride (which we did go on) and others I have forgotten, check their website.

Back inside, our final ride was to go on the hot air balloons around the inside of the park. The air balloons actually ran on tracks on the ceiling, so there was not hot air involved. Still pretty cool to see all the park.

And yes, there was also an ice-skating rink ... however, I wasn't sure if it was part of Lotte world or the shopping centre.

For the big finale to the night, Lotte World put on their famous light and fire show. The light show was a bit crap but the fire bit was good. Watch and enjoy!

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On another note, apparently Ashikaga was rocked by two big earthquakes last night. I think I felt one of them. Maybe I'm getting so attuned to them, that they no longer phase me anymore. Anyway, I always know an earthquake has hit because my model robots have all fallen over. Enough about my geekiness.

Next up, my final post about Korea ... which will cover the DMZ and War museum.

Introducing the New Ichu kids

Not soon after fare welling the 3rd graders, are we back to welcome the new ichi nensei students (1st graders). This occurred last week. The setting was the gym again, the red vinyl was laid out, chairs were set, microphones tested, flowers arranged, speeches rehearsed and the teachers were in the best dress. The "Entrance Ceremony" as they called it, almost rivalled the farewell ceremony for the departing students. Again, a great effort which makes it special for the new students. Something that is so far from what happens in Australia.

Doesn't the microphone look pretty!

No, it's not de ja vu ... it's the same setting as the farewell ceremony but I assure you this is a different occasion.

Pretty flowers.

More flowers.

I think I have an obsession with taking pictures of flowers now.

We welcomed 35 new students to Ichu this school year. This was the 1-1 class. So they got to walk the red vinyl carpet. I wonder if I get to walk the red vinyl when I leave. The kids entered looking small, nervous and unsure of what to expect. Questions of "Will I like the school?", "Will I make new friends", swirling in their heads. All the while mindful of doing the right things and not falling over. Of course, not having been at the school before, they had no chance to rehearse where they were meant to walk and who they are meant to bow too. The kids had to be coached in their classrooms before coming out.

The 1-2 class with one of our new teachers as their homeroom teacher.

My new Kocho sensei (principal) in the bow tie and my Kyoto sensei (vice-principal) next to him.

Introducing the new Ichi nen sei class of 2008/2009.

After the ceremony, they sauntered to their new classrooms and then proceeded to be given their fat stack of textbooks.

Damn, that's a lot of books.

Since last week, I had a few classes with the new students and they seem pretty cool so far, although very quiet. They are so raw to English that some of them don't even know the alphabet. So our first few lessons are to teach them the alphabet and how to write them. Excellent time to mould these young minds and bend them the way that I want them .... whoa hahaha. Now having zoning for Chu gakko (Junior high school), there are inevitably siblings that attend the school. I've spotted a few new students that are splitting images of their older siblings that I have taught. It's amazing really!

And after all was said and done. All the teachers were given sakura tea. Interesting taste actually, it's really salty as the sakura is fermented. Don't know if its my favourite tea, but certainly interesting to try.

Sakura and Hanami's

Deviating from my Korean adventures for a moment. I wanted to post some pictures of the elusive Japanese Sakura (Cherry blossoms) and famed Hanami ( flower viewing and drinking under the cherry blossoms). Be warned there are a lot of Sakura pictures and you may be blossomed out by the end. So this blog will basically be lots of pictures and me finding out how to use more of my camera's functions.


First are the Sakura around Ashikaga and where many people gather to do their Hanami (flower viewing) and drinking. There are also normally festivals complete with food stores selling your typical Japanese fare like Yakisoba, takoyaki, yakitori, corn dogs (that's right), fairy floss (or cotton candy as the Americans call it - we decided to give it the international name of Sugar cloud), toffee strawberries and apples ... alright, maybe not all Japanese fare.

It was my first time experiencing the Sakura phenomenon, and I must say that it was very cool. Some people contemplate their own mortality at this time as the Sakura only lasts for about 1-2 weeks, before falling off and being replaced by green leaves.

The festival stores.

There were also a performance of Taiko by some kids. Watch the clip.

Me and my supervisor. He organised a get-together with his mates and all the ALT's were invited on a sunny Saturday afternoon. We sat under the Sakura and drank for the next six hours. Good times.

Hanami at night is called Yozakura (night sakura) and paper lanterns are hung to illuminate the blossoms for people.

The next set of Sakura are those around my school. While the kids were still on spring break, I took the liberty one afternoon and taking pictures of all the cherry blossoms around my school. You get the sensation of how amazing nature is by walking around the sakura and appreciating their beauty.

I take this path to get to school everyday. It was especially cool riding through here while the blossoms were in full bloom. Now, the blossoms have all fallen off and leaves are sprouting.

These trees are all planted around the baseball field at my school.

Here's ones looking through the sakura at my school.

The final set of sakura is when I visited Tokyo as I heard the sakura around the palace was exceptionally beautiful. There was also all sorts of festivals going on in the area around the palace and the nearby temple. They even had a kebab man there ... yeah!

This is the moat around the palace where people can row boats about.

As you can see, lots of the sakura petals had fallen into the water, so many people wanted to paddle their little row boats around. The line to have a paddle was ridiculously long, once again, reiterating that the Japanese love lines.

I'm pretty happy with this picture. I thought it was pretty cool.

After a long day of Sakura watching, it was time to down a long 1 litre beer! Mmmmm

A taste of home in Seoul

Day 3 in Korea was set to be spent looking at old stuff from the flea market in Dongdaemun. Especially special because John loves old things, the more dust the better. First stop was a stroll through a nearby food market, Chungbu Market, right by our hotel. Chungbu market is one of those typical outdoor markets you find all over Asia. Its where the local folk would go and do their shopping and there would not be a tin can or western advertising hoard anywhere to be seen. So the market was stock with many dried herbs, vegetables, fish (dried and fresh), nuts, grains, cereals (no coco pops).

Let's take a stroll down the Chungbu market.

Take a closer look at the bags to the top right. See lots of eyes and mouths. Yep, their fish head, giant bags full of them. Mmmmm

Endless sea of dried fish!

Any for some fresh sting-ray. And to the right, some fish tied up so they don't get away. Those slippery little suckers.

The pyramid known as silk worm city

Ginseng alcohol is also very popular in Korea

Look! We found Mina our email friend. She's aged a bit since the last we saw of her. (In-house joke for ALT's working with the New Crown Textbook). We even got her to do the peace sign, how cool was that.

The trusty Lonely Planet Guide (although according to a recent report not so trusty), suggesting visiting the flea market that was situated in a Stadium right next to Dongdaemun stadium. My initial thoughts walking through was that it reminded me of the Queen Victoria Market, as there seemed to be a great deal of new stuff, clothes, electrical junk, etc (unfortunately, there was no spanish donut van or jam donut van). But after walking the first section, we then came to junk town, and boy, was there lots of junk.

On the way to the market, we encountered many of these little book stores. If they ever all fell in, that little old dude would not make it.

Entrance to the Flea market. John's getting so excited!!!

Here's one of the piles of junk. There could be a pot of gold under here and no one would ever know. Incidentally, everything on this pile is for sale!

On the way out of the flea market, John was approached by an old Korean dude, who had a little grasp of English. I mean, why else would you approach a white foreigner. He proceeded to ask John a series of questions, and then after finding that John was an American, started chanting "Korea number 1, America number 2". This was amusing in the beginning, but then when he would not leave us alone, it became annoying. He turned his attention to Clarence and gave him a big hello slap to the back. He then started talking Korean with me. After telling him that I wasn't Korean, he tried to kick me. That was really the signal to get away from this cooky little man. We devised a plan to run from him, as we were younger and almost sure that we were faster. The plan worked and we were rid of him, hazaaa!

A quick bowl of Bibimbap (stone bowl full of rice, vegetables and egg) and then it was off to Seodaemun Prison.

Seodaemun Prison was where the Japanese kept and tortured all the rebel Koreans that would not obey the Japanese Regime. The sites around the prison itself weren't so impressive, however the Koreans have gone to great lengths to re-created the torture that the Japanese inflicted on them during their occupation. There were many cells where you could see mannequins delivering various types of torture methods including sticking a needles under finger nails, water torture, small box torture, and when they ran out of inventive ways to torture, raping and beatings were always handy.

These were the main prison blocks.

I hear there are plenty of vacancies here.

Clarence being judged for his crimes. This was cool actually, presumably, Korean rebels got trialed here and when found guilty they would be dropped through a trap door that the chair was on. So the simulation was only a small drop, but enough to give you a jolt.

This was one of the memorials to honour those who lost their lives fighting for a free Korea.

We decided to visit the largest shopping centre in Korea in the evening, COEX Mall as it was known. The mall was pretty much the same as many big shopping centres back home, many shops, large foodcourts, large cinemas. Things that we don't have include an Aquarium, a Kimchi museum and a game area used to film video gaming competitions which is regularly broadcast on Korean television. No joke, we found a channel on Korean TV that constantly show geeks playing ... wait for it ... "Star Craft" against each other. I hate that game, although John took great delight in watching it. Anyway some of these strange areas in the mall was closed so we strolled outside to the nearby casino.

Yep, Seven Luck Casino. As with Japan, gambling is illegal in Korea. However, they've built a Casino to cater for their foreign tourists. So basically, no locals are allowed in the Casino unless their working and guests had to show their passports to get in. It was one floor, not very full, a few blackjack tables, roulette, pai-gow. Your normal gambling fare ... no poker though, which I was very disappointed about.

After the Casino, the boys thought that I had to have a taste of home and ushered me into the "Outback Steakhouse" across the street from the Casino. These Australian themed restaurants are populated all over America, Japan and Korea. I wondered why, there wasn't one in Australia and the answer is that its an American owned restaurant chain.

Notice how happy I am to be in the outback!

I ordered me a big steak after going months without a decent one. I wasn't disappointed with the size either, but for the prices we were paying, they should have been big. This steak here set me back about $35.

Then there was dessert. This was aptly name "The Chocolate Thunder from Down Under". The top was a marsh mellow type thing, followed by vanilla ice cream all sitting on a big piece of hedgehog and drizzled with chocolate sauce. To say it was rich would be an under-statement.

With our bellies content, we were going to explore the night life Seoul. There are only two main areas in Seoul where there is a concentration of clubs. The foreigner-plague area of Itaewon (we didn't really want to be surrounded by foreigners, plus it is a pretty shady part of town too - with famous landmark called Hookers Hill). The other is in the University area of Hongdae (Hongik University). This is where we wanted to be, so we put on our dancing shoes and headed off. We went into a club that was packed to the rafters. You could hardly move and would be standing shoulder to shoulder with all the other patrons. Non the less, the music was good (hip-hop) and we made the most of the situation. We ventured into another club later in the night, not so crowded, but the atmosphere was not as good. This club was also hip-hop and the patrons had come so often that they had they own dance moves to some songs. Strange indeed! It was about 5am when we made it back to our hotel for some deserved rest.

Day 4 in Seoul was drizzly and cold, perfect for nursing any hangover's from the previous night. However, not wanting to waste a day in Seoul, I wanted to venture out and Clarence was man enough to join me. John would continue to sleep like a hibernating bear and probably watch more Star craft TV.

I wanted to go and find a free Samulnori concert (traditional Korean folk dance and music). We tried but failed, the rain must have put off the dancers. We ended up around the Lotte World mall which has amongst many of its attractions, Lotte World and a folk museum. On a side note, the Lotte company seems to be the biggest corporation in Korea. They have a fast chain called Lotteria (which is also in Japan), several shopping malls, and several hotels. We didn't want to spoil John's fun and enter Lotte World without him and he has been raving on about it a long. So the folk museum was interesting in itself. We somewhere went in through the back entrance and realised that we never paid ... oh well.

There were many models of ancient Korean life. This was one of the Gyeongbokgung Palace and the many court people.

They also had life-size models depicting how it was to live during those times.

Finally, I had to get my name painted in Korean. It was really cool watching as he attached a dragon and a tiger to my name in Korean.

Korean BBQ was another one of those things on our list that we had to tick off. So, we headed back to the hotel, collected John and headed out to a nearby restaurant.

This place had a picture of a cow, so safe to say that they had beef and it was full of people, which is always a good sign for good food.

We proceeded inside and the waitress basically ordered for us and then cooked our beef for us. We must had looked really incompetent or she was scared that we would damage the equipment or ourselves. Here's the spread.

This beef soup with clear noodles was awesome. It was the closest tasting thing to Pho Bo (beef) I've had since coming to Japan.

We took a quick snap with our new adoptive mum before we headed off.

Next was the Myeongdong shopping district and a visit to the famous Myeongdong Cathedral. But on our way we encountered one of the more enjoyable and entertaining parts of our trip. It was some guys selling an ancient type royal sweets called Kkultarae. The making of these sweets was especially enjoyable. Here's a clip have fun watching.

Here's a closer look of what these royal courts cakes looked like. And believe me, they are dericious ... mmmm

A snap with the funniest Koreans we met.

Myeongdong Cathedral was on top of a hill in Seoul and is the first Roman Catholic Church built in the Republic of Korea. As it was Easter Sunday many people were just finishing their service. Unfortunately the front of the Cathedral was under some renovation at this time and we didn't get to see the real Cathedral in all its glory. Its funny, but I never thought Korea was a big Catholic nation, but after seeing all the bright red neon crosses from the top of Korea, my mind was changed. About 30% of Korea's population is apparently Catholic/Christian.

Inside the Cathedral

A new inovation in churches. Plama TV's so that everyone can see the service, even if your stuck behind a pillar.