He looks Chinee!

DFM is back in Korea. This time for roughly five months. Keep abreast of the adventures on The Kindergarten Cop's sister site: The Korean Cop.

Episode 5: In Which DFM Acts Korean And Subsequently Gets Himself Into Trouble But Also Has An Adventure

I awoke today with a knocking at my door.  Actually, it was a knocking on the door of the next room over, which is so close to me that the sound entered my room too.  When I looked at the clock though, it was 9:00 AM.  Hurray! I've finally adapted to the time difference.

Today I had my first experience with washing laundry in Korea.  They have a nice washer, but no dryer at my place.  Instead I am to hang my clothes up in my room on a rod above my bed.  There is a fan like you'd find in a bathroom with a shower to suck the moisture out, but it isn't very powerful and for some reason (perhaps because of the fan) my room smelt like someone  had been smoking in it, for the rest of the day.

I went out to buy some cereal for breakfast the  next morning and decided to stop back in to see Mr. Choi and get a pre-paid long-distance/local calling card.  The card he sold me had the best rates on it, but on my way back home I found the exact same card in some back-alley shop for three dollars less.  Mr. Choi is ripping me off!  Actually, it's not his fault, he works for a major mobile service provider, SK Telecom, which sets the prices I'm sure.  I see the shops all over the place and they specialize in high-end phones.  LG Telecom (a rival service) didn't even offer pre-paid phones or cards, so I guess they're not too worried about cheap travelers who don't want to spend money.  Mr. Choi is very kind and helpful though (go figure), and gives me great personal service so it's not all bad.

It was about 5:30 PM now, so I went out to catch the "Yellow #3" bus to the base of Namsan Park in the center of Seoul.  I just missed my bus by seconds though, and some Korean in very poor English (better than my Korean though) tried to offer my help.  "Is-uh there anything-uh I can help-uh you with-uh?"  We eventually worked out that the Yellow #3 bus was the only bus going to the Park, and that it would be around again in half an hour.  Having adopted the Korean motto of life (bali bali, or "hurry hurry") I couldn't wait half an hour, so I set off on a trek to find Namsam Park on my own... on foot.

I headed off around the corner to where I knew I could see Namsan Tower,   John had taken me this way on my second day here, but before I could make it to the end of the block no less than five different shop keepers tried to sell me a custom made suit or pair of shoes.  (Remember what I said about Itaewon being a pushy tourist trap?)  I wish I had brought my camera back when John had taken me because the view was spectacular then.  Today however, it was either very foggy or very smoggy, or both, because the view was awful (and the air quality wasn't the best either).  I wasn't sure where I was going exactly, but I could see the tower and decided to start walking in that general direction.  The closer I got, the better I could see how many roof tops were between me and the tower... a lot.

Eventually I found this sign post.  The Korean hangul at the top reads "Nam-san gong-wan" which, as you'd expect from the sign, means Namsan Park.  I headed down the street to the right like the sign said, but next time I will definitely take the street to the left and stick to the main roads.  Keep reading, you'll see why.

I snaked in and out of buildings and down side streets until I came to one of those pedestrian overpasses where I was stunned by this massive church way up on a hill overlooking the city.  This church is visible from almost every neighbourhood near my place (unless you have a large building in the way... which is most of them) and apart from Namsan tower, elevation wise it is the highest building I've found so far.

I passed a driving range in the middle of a residential area (they're all over the place; you can see them by the massive green net tents used to keep the balls inside).  It was kind of funny because the cars were parked underneath the netting, and the people were basically hitting golf balls at their cars.  I should have taken a picture.

I kept going and thought I was getting close but wound up stuck in an apartment building complex.

This cute little girl playing around in the apartment buildings wanted to try out her small amount of English on me, and asked me my name.  A boy, who I assume was her brother, was playing with her and they both took turns asking me questions.  It felt like being in an ESL class.  "Where are you from?  What is your name?  How old are you?"  I asked them how I could get to Namsan tower.  They pointed at the tower looming over our heads (yes, I know that's Namsan Tower.  I want to get there!).  I asked again in a slightly different manner.  "A car," was the response I got from the boy.  "Ann-yo" I replied and pointed at my feet and mimed a walking movement.  "WALK!" The girl squealed in delight and mimed my marching movement with me.  I just laughed and took a picture of her. (Annyeo means "no," and is not to be confused with annyoeng, which sounds similar but means "hello"... I've already made that mistake before.) 

The apartment complex had a massive play area which absolutely blew me away.  You can see from the accompanying video that there is room for an entire soccer field in the area, and I'm standing under shaded bleachers.  It all must be very nice for the residents of the complex.  But then again, unlike where I live the city planners in Seoul actually think about their citizens when constructing buildings/neighbourhoods.  If you listen carefully you can hear the golf balls being whacked from the nearby driving range, at the beginning of the video clip.

Just on the other side of the apartment buildings I could actually see the entrance to the park, but there was a locked gate between me and the street.  I could have jumped the fence, but didn't want to do anything to offend the locals.

So, back I went down the severely sloped street to Namsan Tunnel 3.  This tunnel heads right through to Namsan Park (where I wanted to go), but is closed to pedestrians.  The problem was that  I couldn't find a way to get to the other side of the road.  There was no overpass/walkway that I could see (this one I'm standing on to get this overhead shot is to cross a different road right beside it), and there is no crosswalk on the street.  In fact there is a sign that says no crossing.

There was however this beautiful park, which was shockingly situated right beside the major road you just saw.  (Look, you can see the road through the trees!)  These parks are all over Seoul and are one of my favourite things about Korea (besides the Seoul subway).

Then I found it.  I had spent five minutes contemplating a jay-walk across the free way and admiring the park, when all that time this tunnel was right behind me.  Under the road I went.

On the other side I promptly took another wrong road and got stuck in the same position that I was in on the other side of the road when I was in the apartment complex, but one block over.  Back down I went.... again.

Eventually I ran into a building I thought looked kind of familiar.  I thought about it for a second and then I remembered something Nelson had told me the day before when we were taking the bus back from the mountain and he had pointed out that we were in Haebangchon.  Wouldn't you know it?  I was exactly in the same street that I had first explored on my first day here.  I found the side street where I had stayed and snapped this picture of my first night place.

Success!  After an hour of taking wrong turns I had finally found the entrance to Namsan Park.  What a great feeling.  Now I only had to hike up the mountain.

Right at the top of that first ramp there was an amazing workout park.  There were no fewer than three of these parks on my side of the mountain alone.  I'm not sure how many there are in the park in total, let alone the city, but they're very popular with Koreans on their early morning exercise outings (or so I've read).  In the top picture you can see two barbells on stands (about 25-30 lbs a piece including the bar), a set of parallel bars, three separate heights of pull-up bars, a slanted and flat bench with handles at the top for doing leg raises, and these crazy devices where you hold onto bars and stand on a turntable and twist your hips to work your abdominal muscles.  You may not see it all because my picture is bad, but they're there, trust me.

In the second picture there are some more twisty plates, some even lower pull-up bars, a spring-loaded see-saw/teeter-totter, and these therapeutic back massagers (they're the blue things way at the back).  There are also some more dips bars and even more pull-up bars and a bench press station along with badminton courts.  I couldn't get any decent pictures of these though because at this exact moment the sun went down and all of my pictures looked awful after this.

I headed off into the dusk up the mountain.  There were all sorts of trails and I had a blast trying to figure out the most direct path to the top.  I spent some time trying to get a good picture of a small stream, but to no avail as the light was just too poor.  Then I looked up through the trees and... wow!

I had taken shots of the tower earlier, but the smog made the view less than perfect.  This was the first time I'd seen the tower with its lights on, and the base was aglow with a bright aura (the picture doesn't do it justice).  Renewed with vigour I dashed up the rest of the way.

N Marks the spot.  Namsan Tower is now officially called N Seoul Tower, but all the Koreans I know or have met still just refer to it as Namsan Tower.  This is a view of the tower from its base, at the top of the mountain.  At the top there is the obligatory restaurant and an observatory tower.  I didn't go up though because it costs money, and... well we've already covered how cheap I am.

Beside the tower is this beautiful pagoda.  I watched the weapons demonstration the day before from up there on top of the steps (the demonstration occurred where I was standing when I took this picture).

Koreans have a love-hate relationship with dogs.  One hand they eat them, but on the other hand they're quite worried about their well-being.  Apparently there is a big problem with abandoned dogs in Korea because I have seen lots of website ads asking for donations to help lost/abandoned dog societies (or maybe Koreans just care more about lost dogs than Canadians do).  These pictures show the latest idea being showcased by the Tower.  A Korean furniture designer feels that dogs want to be with humans, and s/he has built this chair that allows the dog to sleep under you while you work/rest so that it will always be around its master/friend.  The idea (explained in the accompanying placard) is that if the human master can see how much the dog wants to be around him/her, then he/she will not abandon the dog.  I love how Koreans always boil things down to black/white solutions.

All around the top of the mountain are these flying/floating wire mesh figures of humans performing different feats.  There are bright lights being shone directly on them to make them glow like they do.

Ah yes, the famous BE&CH of Love.  Here you see the slanted benches I wrote about in Episode 4, and the locks attached to the fence.  Each lock has a message written on it (I assume it's the wish).  There are literally thousands of these locks around the entire "beach."

By this time it was getting quite late and so I figured it was time to head back home so that I could go climbing.  When I first arrived at the top, I saw the Yellow #3 bus just leaving.  When I started to head back I saw it just leaving again!  Second time I had just missed it.  I couldn't believe it.  I started to run back home, but by this time my legs had turned to mush and it was far too dark to safely make my way back down the side of a mountain.  I turned around and decided to wait it out since it was a nice night anyways, and this would probably be much faster in the end.

It turns out my entire journey was unnecessary (but still fun), because the next bus came fifteen minutes later.  How could I possibly think that a bus could take 30 minutes to come around again in Seoul?  There's no way the Seoulites could wait that long for anything.

The bus drove past Namdaemun market, and a library and some other neat sites that I promised myself I would visit again sometime.  This was the first time I had taken a Seoul bus by myself and I was quite proud of the "achievement."

In Seoul there is a device called a "T-Money card."  You pre-load money on the card (I may have talked about this already, I'm not sure) and use it as your bus ticket each time you ride.  You get a discount on a regualr ticket if you use it, and unlike with a normal Seoul bus ticket you can use your T-Money card as a transfer.  On the way back out of the bus you scan the card again and it will give you 30 minutes to get on your next bus/subway for free.  That meant I had 30 minutes to get home, eat, and get back on the subway to go climbing (I also had to hurry before the gym closed).

This is my bottomless supply of rice I keep talking about (you can see the bottom here, but it will get filled up, don't worry).  Usually I'd have kimbap, but no time for that, so I used my can of "hot pepper tuna" that John urged me to buy my first day here.  It was amazing.  Made me choke when I had it on its own, but with the rice it was Biblicly good.  I am definitely taking some of this hot pepper tuna back home with me to Canada when I'm done here.

The climbing gym was very busy tonight (just as "Yoon" had promised).  There were two main groups as far as I could tell.  One was a "climbing school" that "Yoon" was running and contained a bunch of raw beginners being  worked into a sweating heap of worn out flesh by Yoon and his non-stop rotation of climbing and calisthenics.  The other group were a bunch of climbers in their forties who were busy working each other to death on some made up problems.  This older group invited me over to join them and would point out challenges for me to complete.  I was worried that I wouldn't be able to keep up and would embarrass myself, but it turned out I was the most experienced climber there (besides "Yoon").  I easily dispatched most of the problems they set out for me (I had been climbing twice as long as most of them), and each time I did I was met with an uproarious round of applause from the other climbers.  It actually started to get embarrassing and I had a lot of practice saying "kam-sa-hap-nida" which means "thank-you" and bowing.  Everyone was very friendly and some of them tried to talk to me in what little English they posessed.  

After climbing I asked "Yoon" if there were going to be any competitions at the gym.  He said that he holds competitions every three months, and that the next competition would be the last Friday of this month.  I plan to swim with sharks on the Saturday, so if I can get my high-speed train ticket (bali bali) for Saturday morning I should be able to compete and still make it to Pusan for the shark scuba adventure.

I still plan to climb at this gym about once a week because its been so welcoming to me, but I need to say "ann-yo-hee keh-say-yo" to Astroman and find out what the other gyms in Seoul are like.

Episode 2: In Which DFM Tries To Get Away From Foreigners Only To Wind Up In The Middle Of Them

I woke up early again on Day 2, because I hadn't yet broken in the internal clock to Korean time.  I thought 4:30 might be a bit too early to go out exploring, so I waited until 6:00 AM to get up.  My hosts were already preparing for a big day at work and were busy making breakfast.  I did not yet own any food, but my hosts let me use some bread.  There was no butter or even a toaster, so I fried up some toast in a big pot.  I sat down to enjoy my fried bread, but was thankfully offered some scrambled eggs and milk to go with it.  Naturally I accepted since the only thing DFM likes more than food... is free food.

My hosts were going to come back later to move me to my new home, so I decided to pass the day by exploring my new city.  I found out later that my neighbourhood was called Haebangchon.  Apparently many foreigners live here, and this is the location of the American military base in Seoul.  My street was very steep and it was a real workout to go up and down the street (even harder on the way down because you had to fight to keep control).  Also, this street contained no sidewalks so pedestrians had to walk along the side of the road and this made passing lampposts very dangerous.  At the bottom of the street are a large number of big pots that I think are used to make kimchi in.  They're stacked up three high and the pots stretch for 20 or 30 yards down the side of the road near the American Yongsan military base.

(I leave my place and the first car I see has a Calvin pissing decal on its fuel door... unbelievable.  I guess you can find rednecks everywhere.)

(With Korea's insane emphasis on status, it's no surprise that I would find one of these elite high priced playschools, but I did not expect to find one on the first day.)

(I did not take this picture, I lifted it from the blog Nicole in Seoul, but these are the exact pots to which I was just referring.)

I stepped in to a small corner store and picked up a packet of milk chocolates in a size that you would typically find at a movie theatre, but the price was roughly only $1.25.  On the package it contained the English slogan "let's have time to enjoy chocolate with the flavour of milk."  While the Engrish is not as bad as in Japan, it's still funny when you find it.

(Speaking of Engrish, here's a Korean proverb for you:  "Don't throw anything in a urinal because that is your conscience.")

At 9:30 AM my host came back home on a short break from her new job driving school buses and took me in a cab to my new place.  Cab drivers are the second scariest part of Seoul and this one tried to back up the wrong way on a major street.  Other cab drivers tend to view traffic lights as merely a "suggestion."

My new place is called e-taewon house, located in Itaewon.  It's referred to on the card as a "bed & breakfast," but is much different to the bed and breakfasts I'm used to.  This place is more like a University dorm room.  There are long hallways filled with broom closets.  Customers stay in the broom closets.  While there isn't enough room to fit a chair in beside my bed, perks include the ridiculously low price of $180/mo, free laundry (detergent provided), a TV with cable in your room, high speed Internet use, and all the rice and kimchi you can eat... and then some.  The Korean word for this type of B&B is a gosiwon.  Gosiwon is pronounced "koshy-won" and when said quickly sounds like "cushy one."  

My previous host/landlord kept referring to my new place as "taking me to the 'cushy one'" and so I had trouble figuring out how there could be any free spots in such a "comfortable," cheap room.  Gosiwon is an important word here in Korea, because every Korean seems to understand exactly what it means and it allows me to answer the question "where do you live" in only one word: either Itaewon, or gosiwon.  The nods/sighs of approval at these answers make me feel like I know how to speak Korean and give me confidence.

Some downsides to my new gosiwon include a common bathroom/shower located right next to the entrance and a sink without plumbing.  The water from the tap runs down a plastic tube and spills out onto the floor (all bathroom floors in Korea seem to have a drain in the middle of them).  This makes brushing your teeth an adventure, because anything you spit into the sink will then run onto your feet if you're not careful.  The water for the shower is very warm and the shower head produces a decent amount of water pressure though, so it's not all bad.

After moving my stuff in I decided to explore my new new surroundings.  It turns out that Itaewon is one giant tourist trap.  While there are a lot of nice restaurants/bars/stores etc. which cater to Westerners, it is also quite overpriced.  Being a foreigner it is even worse, since I was later told that many of the less reputable shop owners have two prices: the real price, and then the price for white people.  As an example, I purchased a prepaid mobile phone from a small store and was given the cheapest phone.  The phone was $60, which seems rather cheap compared to what phones cost in Canada, but some friends I met later told me that I can buy prepaid phones in other parts of Seoul for only $30.  I will sell my phone back afterwards and recoup some of the initial cost, but I did learn a lesson that it always pays to take a local along with you when you shop in Seoul.

An interesting fact about mobile phones in Korea is that no foreign phones can be used in Korea, and no Korean phone can be used overseas.  For some reason all phone service providers run on a different system (I'm not sure how phones work, but foreigners I've met tell me that this is true).

I also learned that white tourists are every bit as annoying in Seoul, as Asian tourists are annoying in Banff, etc.  While Asian tourists often make an attempt to learn English before they come, most Western tourists don't make the same effort.  Ironically, I myself know very little Korean, and am also white.  My brother always says I'm  grumpy old man, and now apparently I'm a grumpy old, racist man who thinks he's Korean.

Motorcycles in Seoul are as bad as cabbies.  Whereas cabbies will ignore stop lights when they feel they are unnecessary, scooter couriers will ignore all the rules of the road.  I've seen them traveling on the wrong side of the road, down the center of two lanes, and even on the sidewalk.  Bikes on the sidewalk can be scary back home, but they're nothing compared to a scooter traveling 40 km/hr right at you.  A friend I met this day told me that the motorcycle/scooter couriers are very dangerous (even by Seoul driving standards) and that they are quite poor and have no insurance.  I wasn't sure how to process that information or relate to it exactly, but it seemed important enough for him to feel he needed to tell me so I"m telling you.

Of course not all Western stereotypes of Seoul were accurate.  Looking down from the top of a hill the air is hazy, but on the street it actually feels quite clean.  In Alberta I have to take a shower after I go out walking because of all the dust in the air, but here the air smells and tastes fresh even during rush hour (although the Chemistry accident in Grade 12 that burnt my nostrils and caused me to lose my sense of smell may have something to do with that).  I referred to an article in the LA Times last episode which said Westerners are stereotyped as sexual deviants and considered unfit to date Korean women (it's like we're the new negro, except real black people still have it worse in Korea too, according to the article).  I asked my new friend if I would be discriminated against if I were to date a Korean.  "As long as she's over 13, it doesn't matter" he replied.  Further proof that you must always think critically when you read judgements about a group of people.

(Here's a stereotype about Asians that is true:  They have weird taste in cartoons.  This is the actual sign for the police station in Itaewon.)

Heading off the major tourist streets and into some of the scarier back roads put me on guard, but I had nothing to worry about.  Seoul in general and Korea specifically are very safe for tourists I've found, and apart from the crazy motorcyclists who rip up and down the back alleys without warning, there's nothing to worry about and the food is great.  I bought four massive dumpling looking objects for $2.25 from a man sitting in the back of his truck.  They were absolutely delicou, but I could only finish two of them, and I had to save the other two for breakfast the next morning.  I also bought 6 mandarin oranges for $1.25.  I had planned to go home but then turned down an even smaller side alley and made the Itaewon cardinal sin: I looked at a shop owners product for more than half a second.  That was it, I was reeled in with her smooth talking sales pitch.  By this time I had learned how to walk away (I promptly lost $14 in the first store I entered this day), but I was intrigued by the price of $2.00 for what looks like a chicken kabob. (In case you hadn't figured it out I'm making a rough conversion from Korean Won to Canadian dollars here.  Americans, you're on your own.)  

I have since tried to figure out the Korean name for this dish, but no one has been able to tell me.  All I know is that chicken is called dalk in Korean (pronounced "dock"), and that dalk kabobs are cheap, spicy, and delicious.  They're also available almost everywhere and are made by skilled street vendors for less than the price of a coffee in Alberta.  The spicy sauce burns your lips and makes you lose your appetite too, so one is often enough, which is a bonus for an old miser like myself.

With my new-found side street treasures, I hurried on home to eat up and ensure that I did not spend anymore money.  While sitting in my broom closet I did some research on Itaewon and found accounts of travelers who had run into the Russian mafia.  According to the account I read, four or so surly looking men will attempt very strongly to persuade you to enter their club for an exotic poll dance and more.  Once inside you will be brought food you did not order (or perhaps just billed for food you did not order), and will be given a sub par poll dance and then forced to watch while the dancers flirt with the Russian men.  Leaving without paying is of course not an option for those wishing to keep their knee caps.  Since I generally tire myself out in the afternoon I get to skip the evening madness that is the 24 hour city of Seoul, so I don't run into the mafia too often.  I did however ask around to inquire if this was common and was told that there definitely was a mafia presence on my street.  I wasn't scared, but my old man Korean racism kicked in and I felt the Russian mafia should not be allowed to operate on my street since their behaviour is lacks class and I find the accent less than soothing.  If I'm going to be robbed, I prefer to be robbed by the sweet sounding Italian mafia who might kiss me before they put a horse's head in my bed.  Yes, that's much better.

(You might have to look closely, but this gas station has no pumps.  Instead, the nozzles hang down from the signs up above and can be pulled down with a small rope/chain attached to the handles.)

(I guess no one told the Koreans what Athlete's Foot means in North America.  Or perhaps they just don't know who John Madden is? ...Boom!)

Episode 1: In Which DFM Explores A World Only Hundreds Of Thousands Of Canadians Have Explored Before, But Perhaps Does It In A Unique Way

Welcome to the first blog post of a roughly 63 part series here on The Kindergarten Cop called "The Korean Cop: DFM goes to Korea."  For the next 60 some-odd days I will be living in Korea and will upload detailed reports of my experience to this site for your "make enjoyment time pleasure with read excitement."  Let's begin.

On Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009 I phoned a taxi company to book a cab for the following morning at 8:00 AM.  I was diligent in setting my alarm, but not in getting to sleep on time.  Excitement kept me up (as did studying the hangeul - Korean alphabet) and as a result my weak wrist watch alarm did not wake me up.  A friend with whom I was staying did wake me up though, and I was lucky that he did because at that time it was 7:40 AM.  I rushed myself out of bed, washed my face, ate my breakfast and packed my bags all in a record 15 minutes.  However, in the rush I did not actually pack my towel which I had "thoughtfully" left in the washroom for my anticipated 6:30 AM shower.

By 7:55 I was at the front door waiting for the taxi.  However, there had been a mix up at the dispatch center and the operator had entered the wrong address for me.  So, at 8:15 AM I started to get worried and phoned the cab company to straighten things out.  A cab finally did arrive at 8:35 and rushed me to the airport.

Things started out with a quick flight to the Vancouver airport.  The trip would have been fine except the loudest, most annoying woman I've heard in at least a week (which is a long time not to hear a loud, annoying woman) just had to be sitting behind me.  It wouldn't have matteredwhere she was sitting though, because I heard other people talk about her afterwards and they had been sitting nowhere near her.  "WOW, NO SNOW IN VANCOUVER!  WOW! A BABY!  WOW! MY SEATBELT CLICKS!!"  All trip long she just couldn't shut up (I added the "wows," but the grating on your nerves was all her).  The only thing that kept me sane was the fact that Air Canada had wisely included an episode of the best show in the world, Top Gear, in its in flight entertainment package.  So, I plugged in my earphones and cranked up the sweet sounds of Jeremy Clarkson offending just about everybody and let the stress die away.  (see: The Tall One, The Short One, and The Other One)

In Vancouver I met up with a Korean in the airport named Choi Young Tae (Choi is pronounced "Chway" in Korea).  We talked for a while until I remembered that I needed to get some over-priced Canadiana trinkets from the Duty Free shop as gifts for any Korean friends I might meet along the way (every Korean person I've befriended in Canada has given me a gift, so I thought I'd return the favour).

I got on the plane and had my first realization that I was heading to a different world.  The first woman I sat down by didn't understand any English.  I thought, "DFM, you're not in Kansas anymore buddy."  Then another woman stole my seat when I stood up, and I was about to say something until I noticed that I had actualy been in the wrong row.  I moved back a seat and met Woo Seong-Bum (Jeff).  Jeff had studied English in Calgary and we were able to share many stories of life in Alberta.  Jeff also helped me shore up my Korean reading skills a bit which was greatly appreciated.  I'm not a pro, I'm not even good, but I can read about half the symbols now if I have enough time, and that's usually enough to figure out the names of subway stations, etc.  Unfortunately, even though I can read the words doesn't mean I understand them.  I have a very limited vocabulary which I will immediately start improving.

There was a funny story with Jeff.  I asked him how my accent was and he said I sounded Japanese.  I responded "oh great, that's doubly bad.  Now I'm not only a drug-using pedophile, but I'm a drug-using pedophile who wants to take over your country.  Old Korean men are going to love me!"  Jeff laughed quite hard at that one.

I was also told that the Internet here is lightning fast.  But so far I'm not noticing anything spectacular.  Files download on my computer faster than they would in Alberta, but not as fast as the guy living next door to me (his Internet is 1 000 times faster on any given day: 1 GB/s vs. 1MB/s on a good day for me).

On the plane I was given a form to fill out for immigration purposes.  Unlike many nations where you declare which items you are bringing into the country, etc, in Korea they give you a simple yes/no questionnaire.  Actual examples of questions from the questionnaire include "are you bringing radioactive weapons into the country?"  Or, "are you bringing child pornography into the country?" (I made sure to point that one out to Jeff to emphasize my earlier point.)  At the end of it all I had to sign on a line under the statement "I agree that I have made a truthful and correct statement."  I admit that it seems like a less-than-perfect security system, but it sure makes it easier for the travelers.  America take note:  I did not have to show my passport 3 times in a row before leaving Customs/Immigration.  Nor was I subjected to any other degrading security checks like having a drug dog check my bag twice while some angry woman yelled at me (I saw it happen to a man in Minneapolis, of course the dog didn't find anything because these checks are mostly for show anyways).  I handed over my form with its "truthful and correct statement," had my passport stamped without annoying questions about my purpose for entering the country (I had already written it down on the form), and was sent off to terrorize the country and rape its women.

A quick note about the movies on the flight.  I swear Air Canada pick the worst Hollywood movies it can find to show.  I happened to watch The Day The Earth Stood Still (the new version).  If you haven't seen it, don't bother, but if you have seen it then you'll know that Keeanu Reeves plays an unemotional alien sent to Earth in human form to warn humans that they need to change their ways or face destruction.  Would you believe that Reeves is such a bad actor that he managed to mess up a mono-emoting character?  Unbelievable!  To be fair, I did get to watch The Secret Lives of Bees, with Queen Latifah, and that film is superb.

After passing through immigration I needed to catch a bus from the airport into the city.  I had no idea how to get my ticket (I was just going to walk on the bus), but Choi Young-Tae from the Vancouver airport showed me where the ticket booth was and helped me buy the appropriate ticket and find the appropriate stop/bus.

The "limousine bus"was amazing.  It had leather, first class wide seats that fully reclined and had their own ottoman (like a La-Z-Boy) and miles of leg room, and a flat screen TV at the front.  The driver was amazing and could weave in and out of three lanes of traffic like he was driving a scooter instead of a coach liner, but he did not speak any English and so I was lucky to have an English speaking Korean sitting near me who translated for me and helped me get to the proper subway station.

The subway stations in Seoul are also amazing.  They're wide, clean, and quite an adventure to find your way to the right platform and get on the right train.  One thing about Seoul that I noticed right away (besides the notable absence of an old urine smell) is that anyone will try to sell you anything at any time.  There was actually a man squatting down on the floor trying to sell a collection of DVDs to passer-byes.

After exiting the right station at the right exit, I had to walk over to Indigo Restaurant (a Korean owned "hip" cafe that tries to recreate a Western atmosphere by playing a collection of Oldies and '80s pop songs while employing hipster Korean males who wear girls' clothes (so, the same as North American hipsters essentially).  I actually quite enjoyed the restaurant even if $4.00 for a slice of carrot cake did seem a bit steep and the owners were very nice and kept me company by talking to me until my landlords came (by this time I was glad to have some English conversation again).  Actually, both the prices and the atmosphere reminded me of the cafe MandDFM and I used to frequent when I was in Canada (see: The Coffee Shop Story).

I was at Indigo Restaurant to meet my landlords who would then take me to the place I had rented.  When they came though, they told me that there had been a mix-up and my place had been given away to someone else.  Things turned out alright fortunately, as they let me stay at their place for the night and then took me to a cheaper, more convenient place the next morning.

When I got back to their place it struck me at just how much a premium space is.  I'm sure that if you have the money you can get large homes, but let's just say that for the majority of Koreans the term "living room" is a foreign phrase.

When I was finally able to take a real shower (my first in two days), I then noticed that I had forgotten to pack a towel.  My landlord let me borrow one of her towels though, so again it worked out alright.  However, you can see from the picture that Koreans have a much different definition of bath towel than do North Americans or even Europeans.

(That is a sub-standard sized pillow on top of a Korean bath towel.  The left edges in the picture are lined up even with each other.  Notice that while the towel is perhaps 5 inches longer than the pillow, it is much more narrow.  Let's just say, "don't forget your house coat" when going for a shower in Korea, because you definitely aren't going to be leaving a lot to the imagination if you try to wrap that around your waist.)

(This is a Korean shower.  The basin of the tub is perhaps 4 feet long and there are no shower curtains, so the water just sprays out and "drains," or more accurately evaporates, from the floor by the hole in the center of the room.  Everyone wears beach sandals to the bathroom here because the floors are always wet.)

I went to bed that night on the first real bed I'd seen in a week (I'd been sleeping on the floor at MandDFM and his roommate's place for five days before my flight), and woke up at 4:30 AM ready to take on the Asian Tiger of South Korea.  

Well, that was day one, keep tuned for more updates from The Korean Cop.  Tune in next time for a story about the Russian Mafia's presence in my neighbourhood.

DFM Opens Doors At The Edmonton Motorshow

Every year for the last four years MandDFM and I have gone to the Edmonton Motorshow to see the new cars.  While MandDFM prefers to consider the car as a whole when passing judgement, I concentrate on only one aspect of a car when deciding whether or not it is good:  

how well the doors feel to open and close.

The door handle is the first thing I touch to get into my car and the last thing I touch when I leave.  If I'm going to spend XX Thousands of dollars on a new car, I don't want to be annoyed every time I open the door.  To be certain, I'm also concerned with the experience of driving the car or being a passenger, but since it's hard to test the handling or braking dynamics of a parked car whose battery has been disconnected I'm left with the doors.

Without a doubt, the best doors at the Motorshow for at least the last three years have been found on those cars made by Hyundai (I did not extensively test the doors at the first Motorshow I attended).  But it's not just the door handles that Hyundai does well, the entire door is treated as a piece of art by Hyundai's designers, and it is that sort of attention to detail that makes Hyundai one of the leading automobile manufacturers in the World today.

Until today, the Hyundai Elantra has had the World's best door ergonomics.  While I still maintain that the Elantra is King, a contender to the crown has recently emerged - the Nissan Cube.  While opening and closing the doors on the Cube may not have the Crystal Pepsi-like perfection of the Elantra (yes, I was a fan of Crystal Pepsi), Nissan has finally answered my prayers and taken the engineering of car door handles into the 21st Century.

Rather than having an awkward-to-pull tab, as most vehicles do, the Nissan Cube employs a simple yet ingenious loop.  To open the door on a Cube simply slip two fingers into the perfectly positioned loop, curl and tug.  That's it.  No having your fingers slip off the negatively sloped handles of depressingly too many cars I tested, or having your knuckles smashed into the hard plastic ridge above the miniscule door handle (I'm looking at you Volvo).  Instead, the Cube passenger is treated to the door opening equivalent of a day at the spa.

Yes, the verdict is in, with it's gargantuan cabin/headspace and World-leading door handle design, the Nissan Cube was DFM's pick for Car of the Show this year at the 2009 Edmonton Motorshow.  Make sure you check out its door handles at a dealer near you.  Tell them DFM sent you.

(The remarkable door handles of the Nissan Cube.)

Egomaniacs Get Their Comeuppance

I love to climb, and I love to compete. I have not missed a single climbing competition at my local climbing gym in over three years. The competitions in which I compete have three categories: beginner, advanced, expert (expert is the top division). There are no qualification standards for each division, it's entirely based on the honour system. When I first started competing I placed myself in the advanced category. In my first contest I placed seventh place. I quickly improved to fifth place, and by my third contest I had achieved the podium with a third place finish. I eventually reached a high of second place before noticing a disturbing trend.

From midway through my second year on, the better I got the worse I ranked. It seemed as though there were a number of climbers who, although much better than the vast majority of the competitors in the advanced division, were not willing to compete against the climbers in the expert division for fear of losing (even though they were scoring higher than a number of the competitors in the expert division anyways). I continued to see more and more egomaniacs stacking the middle division until I became fed up and decided to do something about it.

I felt that it was ridiculous to have climbers in their twenties with three or four years of experience competing against eleven year old kids who were just trying to have some fun and maybe win a prize. I packed up my own ego and entered into the expert category. The results were predictable - I finished at the bottom of the division for a number of months. Recently, however, I received my retribution.

In the last competition I once again entered myself in the expert (top) category. And once again a number of egomaniacs entered themselves in the advanced category. While I have not necessarily improved to the point where I deserved to win the division, there were so few competitors (two in fact) that I ended up taking first prize. The irony is that the second and third place competitors in the advanced category both achieved higher scores than I did, but have to settle with a less gold-like colour for their medal. That's why the Bible says "A man's pride shall bring him low, but honour shall uphold the humble" (Proverbs 29:23).



(DFM mad! DFM climb!!!)

M and DFM's Excellent Adventure

For the past number of years I have been hanging out with my friend M so often that when we come into places people always yell, "hey, it's M and DFM!" Unfortunately, some people mishear this greeting as "hey, it's MandDFM!" This can cause problems when people think M's name is MandDFM. For example, there was one particular occasion when M walked into a room first and I followed a few seconds afterwards. The greeting we received from the well meaning host was, "hey, it's MandDFM... and DFM!"

Well M and DFM were at it again this weekend. Determined to "seize the day," we embarked on a wild safari of Biblical proportions. The temperatures were approaching "minus 5 billion degrees," but we had been working on our personal discipline and easily toughed it out. Even though we were both eaten dozens of times each by the ferocious beasts, M and I still managed to miraculously survive with the evidence of our daring escapade intact. For your amazement, I have included some of the more spectacular moments from the trip. [Caution: Do not read this before you go to bed. You will get nightmares.]



Our journey actually started the day before, 2 274 miles away in the Gobi Desert. Since we had the time, M and I decided to split this hike into two days. Upon arriving at the West Pole, we were immediately eaten by the giant Guinea Pig King who had a number of kangaroos for servants.



After this rather inhospitable welcome the Guinea Pig King placed us in cages while the other inhabitants of the West Pole tried to feed us pop corn and bread crumbs, before eating us.



Our first visitor was the dreaded man-eating Snowy Owl. He turned his head all the way around twice before eating us in 2 bites.



Next came the fearsome man-eating White Wolf. This guy here not only ate M and I, but he ate our unborn children too. You can see the blood lust in its eyes.



This Takin was featured in Maurice Sendak's Where The Wild Things Are. He actually did not eat us though, because he was too busy using the hay to clean out the bones and raw meat from his last meal of four school children. Interestingly, this Takin has been said to be the inspiration for the Golden Fleece.



Similar to a snake, the man-eating Bactrian Camel cannot chew its human meal. Rather, it unhinges its lower jaw and swallows its prey whole. Interestingly enough, very few people know that this is how camels eat. Here, the humps you see are actually the outline of two unfortunate young women. They are slowly being digested alive by the digestive acids in the camel's stomach.

After M and I were turned into camel feces, we were flushed into an underground water world. But before we had a chance to drown, we were eaten twice each by the Ravenous Red Toad.



The Red Toad carried us to the other side of the world and spat us out on the gorgeous plains of the East Pole.



The first inhabitant we met was the menacing man-eating Buffalo. Wizened by our experiences at the West Pole, M and I pulled out a red cape and were able to have the Buffalo narrowly miss gorging us with its poisonous horns.



We again ran across some man-eating Wolves, but they had gone cannibal from not feeding on human flesh for too long. M and I took advantage of the distracted killing machines and moved on quietly.

Surrounded by so much danger, M and I decided it was time to learn how to defend ourselves. We observed the locals in their natural environment and were able to eventually agree upon the ultimate fighting weapon:



With our newly perfected martial skills, we easily chopped our way through the remaining threats until we found our ticket out of there.



We chased this murderous Mountain Goat up the rocky embankment and eventually trapped it at the top of the cliff. Defeated, the mountain goat was bound by ancient law to transfer us to any place we wished. We grabbed hold of its horns and were teleported back home. It was a good thing too, because we hadn't eaten in a while.

Cooking With DFM

I had spent all week preparing to make a meal of grilled Basa fish. I had my fish, my garnish, my sauces, etc. There were just two problems. 1) My most elaborate meal to date has been an omelet, and 2) It's winter and I didn't want to stand outside bar-be-cuing my fish when I wasn't even sure how best to grill it. Subsequently, more "rational" thinking prevailed and I decided to do what I normally do in situations of uncertainty: blindly jump into the deep end head first and rely on my time-tested powers of Optimism to get me through.

First I grabbed a frying pan. Next to boiling water, stirring things around in a frying pan is my most common method of preparing food to date. I chopped my Basa fillet into bite-sized pieces and threw the lot into the pan. It then occurred to me that while tasty, fish alone would not likely be considered a "complete" meal. So I chopped whatever I could find in my refrigerator - which happened to be some mushrooms, tomato, spinach and parsley. I added this salad to the frying pan to cook along with the fish. Now I had my vegetables and my meat, so I was halfway there. My next step was to cook up some potatoes. Although my experience with potatoes ends at peeling them in large quantities, I suspected that it may take longer to boil a potato than it would to complete the frying of my fish (especially since I'd have to take the bus to the grocer's first). Instead, I settled upon the next best thing: Tator Tots. I had luckily already pre-heated the oven and so I prepared a baking sheet and threw these in. Three down, one to go. The last choice was obvious. The cherry on top of this fish cake would be none other than God's favourite fruit (or at least mine), the apple.

It must be said that my timing was a bit off. My fish/veggie delight finished three minutes earlier than my Tots, and so the vegetables were a bit cold by the time I had the whole meal ready to go. Unsurprisingly to those who know me, I couldn't resist and started a bit early on my apple. All-in-all it wasn't a bad meal though. I'm sure the cooks/chefs among my reader base have a fancy name for what I've done, but as Hank Hill would say (and do), "I just fell back on natural instinct."

Here is the meal before it was masticated beyond recognition:



I fear the presentation may need a bit of work before I go on Iron Chef though (yes, that is a half-eaten apple).

The Coffee Shop Story: Adventures In Naivete

My friend, M, and I decide to step into a small, high-end, specialty coffee shop for some tea and pastries. While standing at the counter a homeless person asks me if I can "spare any change?" I do not, in fact, have any money to spare (my friend was buying my meal for me which makes the story even more funny), so I told said homeless person that I would give him half of my scone.

After ordering, M and I sit down at one of the tables on the fashionable, yet rather uncomfortable, chairs. The homeless person sits at an adjacent table by himself and calmly ponders one of life's many mysteries (at least I assume that's what he was doing). I begin to admire how charming the homeless person looks, when the owner comes over and tells the homeless person that he has to leave. I interrupt the owner and inform him that the homeless person is my guest, and that he is waiting for the half-a-scone that I promised him. The owner tells me that he will box it up, and sure enough he gives the homeless person half of the scone and sends him on his way. Meanwhile, M can barely contain himself from spraying London Fog out of his nose and all over the establishment. And that's why I would probably be the worst business man ever.

In retrospect, this story would probably have been funnier if you had been there.