Day 242

Day 242 - 04.07.10

I left when these were mere flowers. I come back and they're already tiny apples.

The Anguk 'hood

Most of my random street photos are on the Diana Mini as I think that those kinds of shots usually come out best on film but here is the street that lead to the small alley I lived on:

There were two middle schools close by and no matter what time I walked up the street there were always students coming and going, it didn't matter that it was barely 6am or already well past 8pm! I do understand that education is seen as a very important thing in Korea but I doubt that making kids stay behind for extra lessons is so wise. Another thing that really surprised me at first is the fact that there aren't street names indicated anywhere nor number plates. For most places I wanted to visit I had a street address but I couldn't use it besides to look up the location on google maps and then locate myself based on surrounding landmarks. I really don't know how people did it to locate themselves before the age of smart phones with location apps. ( I was staying in one of those traditional houses in Seoul ) A thing that really bothered me about most packaged food was the overpackaging. There really is no need to have such a huge cardboard box for a tiny pouch. Actually why do you need the box at all? It seems that most cookies and sweets come wrapped in way too many layers for their own good! I also didn't see many recycling points for things such as bottles. With the heat the number of bottles one can go through is rather impressive! ( some more food and drinks... and eyemasks )

Final photos from Korea!

Thank you, Korea, it has been fun! I've been back to Finland for a day and a half now and it seems that the worst of the jet lag is gone. The weirdest part is that I can clearly remember that some things happened on Friday night, like my mum calling, but I can't remember the details. It's so fuzzy... The flight back was pretty good, I had a tall Finn next to me and those love to steal leg space. Actually it was rather funny because in Korea I don't know if it was because I was a foreigner or because I stank or something but people generally tried to avoid touching me. They didn't mind bumping or anything but if I sat next to them on the metro, they clearly tried to keep their limbs from touching me. On the plane, my Korean neighbour tried her best to leave me room... my Finnish neighbour not so much, our knees became bffs by the end of the flight. I also watched some random Chinese film, The Storm Warrios. The point of the film still eludes me. But damn, did those guys have fancy wigs! Or if those weren't wigs, they have pretty damaged hair. In any case, it was one of those films that really should have just stayed a manga... or been about 15 hours long. Or had some sex scenes in it. Just basically after watching it I was glad I didn't waste "useful" time on that. ( more airport randomness and KicKer ) And that's the final post with photos taken locally in Korea (up until I get the Diana Mini film developed but there are still over a dozen shots to be taken before the film is done). I think in total I've posted over 320 photos in the past two weeks... sorry for the spammage but at least I won't huge back logs as I did with Shanghai. The last post-holiday load of laundry is almost done downstairs, I sent in some work related messages on Friday night, I guess this really means the holidays are over! They restart for a week or so in 26 days though when it's time to move out of Finland. Bah. And I don't even get to go to a single Tour de France stage this year! They're passing way too far from both Marseille and Toulouse for me to make an effort to fly over so a few days.