Photo Dump

I've been to Seoul. Now everyone can quit being shocked that I haven't been.

This post will be mostly pictures with my explanations. I think they are in chronological order, so I'll get to the Seoul adventure later into this post. Enjoy!

Every Friday we have a "Closing Ceremony" for the students' last activity at EV, and last week's group was huge. This picture is a crappy self-shot of three girls who loved every male teacher they met. It is funny how often they tell teachers that they are beautiful (for women) and handsome (for men), even the boy students. It does wonders for self esteem.

After work on Friday I went with 3 other teachers to a burger joint that literally gives around 10 fries with an order. TEN FRIES! I was warned about it, so I wasn't shocked, but I still felt a bit sad. After dinner we wandered around the shopping center and there was a Lego store! If Chewbacca is in FAO Schwartz Toy Store in NYC, and a Clone Trooper is in Paju, I can only wonder where the rest of the cast is.

Darth Vader here is only about 18 inches tall, but the whole display was pretty fun.

Seoul Tower! I don't even know what it is, but it is famous. This was taken just before we went into the Porta-ghetto Road market streets. Just before this we had been to an English bookstore (yay!) and eaten at Burger King (double yay!). I got cheap ice cream that made the day wonderful.

Proof I was there:

The next couple of pictures were taken in the market place. Besides the constant aroma of smoke and sewer, it was a fun, though crowded, place.

Fans are ridiculously expensive here! These were around 45 dollars!

I think these were all coin purses or pencil cases. There were so many!

Lots of glasses places. I wondered if they did eye exams there too...

For every glasses store, there were 10 bag shops. They like to barter about prices too.

Proof that I went to the place:

A bag full of tiny bears. I don't know what they were for...maybe last-minute crappy Christmas things for the neighbors?

I don't know what this building is but it was tall and big.

A goodies stand on the street.

The subway system was wonderful - very clean and spacious. Adam and Chelsea and I did all our adventures together in Seoul.

Me! My legs are the color of my pants. Well, more light, actually.

Back in Paju, I went grocery shopping. The next two pictures were snapped in the Noodle Isle.

The front gate to EV has a replica Stonehenge. I guess the Druids spoke English too?

This is the sun setting over North Korea. It was really pretty.

These next few pictures were just this last Monday. The weather was perfect! I wish all days felt that way!
This is part of the concert hall. Some days I catch a glance of the hunch-backed bell ringer in there.

This is looking up a deserted Market Street.

Our students played dodge ball outside Monday afternoon, and they were having so much fun. The weather, as I said earlier, was perfect.

Another picture of the Concert Hall.

This big green metal roof thing looks cool, and though it doesn't really provide any shelter, it casts cool shadows.

And what would a week be like without some sort of film crew? This one was very small, only one truck (behind the trees) came for this shoot.

Here is the film set - It's in a currently unused building, and it happened to be right there facing the dodge ball game. I wonder how many rogue balls bounced off the windows? The light inside that room is not from a window, it's the artificial set lights. They were really bright.

And there they are, the worth-sharing pictures from the  last few days. If you read this blog and have comments, I'd love to have them!

Stay tuned for my soon-to-be next post because in it you'll hear all about how I was randomly asked to be in an actual for-real photo shoot today. Until then....