I haven’t got the E-Mail address of many, mostly because the schedule was super-tight and there was just not enough time for relaxed conversations. I’ve been surfing around facebook and found a few, I’ll probably find a couple more.

It has been such a great experience to be in these international and intercultural groups of young people. For example today, going to E-Mart for some food and then just sitting in front of it with 5 other people — from 4 continents. It really feels like we know each other a lot longer than just a couple of days. A couple of fabulous days.

Yesterday at Noraebang again, great crazy fun! It’s hard to imagine how much fun that can be! There are places with entire floors dedicated to karaoke, with rooms with flat-screens and microphones and huge selections of songs. You have a personal waiter who brings drinks and food, and it’s immensely popular in Korea, as well as Japan and many other parts of Asia. And I gotta say, it really is a lot of fun!

Really busy right now — going to sleep at around 3am, waking up at 7 again. Need more coffee now…

Heute werden noch einige andere Teilnehmer vom SGC eintrudeln, und um 6 (in 1.5 Stunden) gehen wir gemeinsam was essen und zu Noraebang (Karaoke), einer Koreanischen Spezialitaet

Bin schon recht gespannt wie die naechsten Tage so werden… auch schon ein bissl aufgeregt. Sehs aber eher locker und freu mich schon. Hier gibts leider kein WiFi, surfen geht ueber ein paar lokale Computer mit IE6

Koennte sein dass ich deswegen die naechsten Tage nicht viel zum schreiben komme, und erst am Sonntag wenn ich wieder nach Seoul fahre ein Update kommt.

PS: Jetzt ist mir auch klar warum das neue Motel in Seoul nur 25.000 Won gekostet hat: Lichtschalter am anderen Ende vom Raum, kein Satellitenfernsehen, nur ne ganz duenne Decke, und vor allem kein Waschbecken im Badezimmer. Aber wer braucht schon den ganzen Luxus

Bin schon recht gespannt auf morgen — Ich fahr nach Daejeon und werd dann die ersten Leute vom Kongress treffen. Hab die letzen Tage nicht allzuviel mit anderen Leuten gequatscht — wird sicher erfrischend.

Heute war ich in Electroland (und mir ist jetzt klar warum das so heißt): Das sind mindestens 3 ganze Shopping-Centers nur voller Elektro-Zeugs!!! Tausende Shops wirklich, und die ganzen Straßen rundherum sind aucht voller kleiner Läden. hab aber nichts gefunden was ich wirklich brauchen könnte; werd mir vmtl. ein Keyboard mitnehmen bevor ich nach Ö zurück fliege. Hätt mich schon recht aufs E-Sport Stadium gefreut, und habs nach einigem suchen auch gefunden — aber da war leider grad kein event.

Aah, gestern ist mir der Firefox beim bilder upload abgekackt und ich hab keine Ahnung wie ich die 40 Bilder oder so jetzt reinkriege. Egal, kommt spaeter nach!

Yesterday I’ve been mostly walking around Itaewon, getting to know the streets, and finding my way to some food and coffee. It’s quite interesting that Korea seems to have a very strong coffee culture. You can find coffee shops at every corner, with nice blends and a wide range of varieties (me drinking cappuccino most of the time, which is a bit different than the Austrian one: It’s a shot of strong coffee with loads of steamed milk on top — 1:5 or so).

Today I decided to stay in Seoul for at least another day or two, and that I want to see a bit of the city. So today at my morning Cappuccino I read the Wikipedia entry on Seoul again and made a list of things to do. Btw: Having my netbook with me is great — it’s light and perfect to surf and write mails. Also the Korean power plugs are exactly the same as ours, so I can just plug my laptop in at the terrace of this Coffe Shop (Tom n Toms Coffee).

I thought the National Museum of Korea could be a nice place to see, and decided to spend the afternoon there. Taking the subway was a really funny experience — no foreigners at all! But it was quite easy to navigate around as I have a subway map, knew where I needed to go, and finally the subways display the basic infos in English as well. The subway stations are huuuge. Many times as big as in Vienna. There are more than 10 million people living in Seoul and I’ve read that the subway is one of the most busy in the whole world. It sure didn’t feel this way — probably because I took it during working hours. They are quite cheap too — 1.000 Won (~ 60 cents) was the fee (it depends on how far you travel). The vending machines can switch to english and give out a RFID card (adding 500 Won deposit fee which you get back at exiting the subway).

I enjoyed the subway ride and made my way to the museum (pictures below). It has a huge space in front of it where people hang out and relax. I checked my money and briefly thought if I really should afford it, but then i noticed: the entry was free (!), and I got my free ticket. The museum is huge and is very well organized. I saw a lot of ancient artwork, pagodes, sculptures, asian fine art and other things. It was interesting to wander around for an hour or two, and then I made my way back to Itaewon.

A really interesting thing I’ve noticed (and didn’t expect) is that many Koreans actually have dogs! You see them pretty much at the same frequency as you do in Vienna — small ones and big ones. I like that a lot

The sidewalks around here are really wide — 4 meters or so, and it’s normal for bicycles to ride on them as well. What I noticed as well is that I haven’t really seen many Koreans with overweight, and with my prejudices I also expected Korean people to be small on average — which turned out to be not so true as in India for example. Most people are around 1.60 or 1.70m, but there are actually quite a few people (mostly male) which are like 1.90m. I don’t feel large at all

Interestingly, my phone cannot connect to any service around here. Most Koreans seem to have very advanced mobile phones, mostly with touch screen and large displays (QVGA). And they watch a lot of TV on those — as I noticed in the subway. According to Wikipedia, “Seoul is the only city in the world featuring DMB, a digital mobile TV technology and WiBro, a wireless high-speed mobile internet service, as well as a 100Mbps fibre-optic broadband network, which is being upgraded to 1Gbps by 2012.”

The checkout time at my Motel is 12:00, which means if I haven’t got a plan where to go, I’ll probably stay a day or two more in Seoul. On Wednesday I will move to Daejeon, with the Congress starting Thursday morning. I look forward to it and am already quite excited.

Again, I sure wish I had brought a package of Manitou tobacco; I hate this filter cigarettes and am just about to finish my first package of Dunhill…

One last thing for now: Korean food seems to include _a lot_ of meat, mostly chicken. I’ve been eating Indian food today and yesterday But of course, if I find it, I’ll try some vegetarian Korean food as well!

The first two are from yesterday evening, just about where I sit right now. The others are from today, around the main streets in Itaewon.

Right in the center of Seoul, in the District Itaewon. It looks like this is the main center for tourists and foreigners; many people from Europe and the US on the streets.

At the Airport of Seoul just after landing, I met Myeonghun Ji, a Korean guy who came with the same flight from 10 days in Spain. He lives outside town and gave me a quick crash course on the train and bus system and helped me check my ticket. That made things quite a lot easier for me — and he suggested I go to Itaewon and explore the city from there.

The little bit I’ve seen from Seoul is really crazy — it feels very Western and still very Asian. An interesting mix — a bit like Vienna and New Delhi combined in one place. The Korean people I’ve met so far are super friendly and the streets are filled with scents of spices and Asian food, with Western coffee shops, clothing shops and restaurants just about everywhere. I’ve not eaten yet, but I’m sure going to try a lot of Korean food…

The airplane arrived after a long 11 hour flight, on which I actually managed to (not too comfortable) sleep around 6 hours. It wasn’t that bad at all, except that I got a severe, jabbing headache both times the airplane descended. This really sucks, but I don’t know what to do agains it, except biting on my tongue for the 30 minutes or so. Luckily the headache disappeared right after landing. Btw: Having pre-ordering vegetarian food on the airplane resulted in me being served before all regular meals were handed out — nice (although the food was typical plane-quality).

After arriving at around 8 am local time (1 am Vienna time), I was quite tired and made my way to the center and tried to find a Hostel/Motel/Guesthouse before I would be too tired to do anything. So I took the first one I found, which is quite expensive (50.000 Won (~ 40 €) for the first day, 40.000 for all next ones). Well, at least I found a place to stay and will keep my eyes open for cheaper places to stay. After I put my bags in the room, I went out to explore the streets — and just around the corner I was greeted by prostitutes and two fights between drunken people — “where did I land here” I thought.. But actually this is quite a nice area.

I strolled around a bit, drank a coffee, and then went back to sleep for a couple of hours. Now it’s like 6pm and I start to relax a bit more (was a little stressed of the city right after arrival). Don’t know if I stay longer in Seoul or make my way somewhere outside (to the Sea maybe?). I’ve got to delete the SD card on my digicam, then I can post photos as well the next time!

PS: I really should have brought a package of Manitou tabacco — couldn’t find a tobacco anywhere here and the people keep telling me they don’t roll there own cigarettes… Now I’m smoking “Dunhill Midnight”, and I don’t really like them (or any filter cigarettes)

PPS: The weather is pretty much the same as in Austria right now — fall’ish (warm in the sun, chilly in the evening).

Love,
Chris