Nhớ Nguồn

And now, part 2 of the Seoul experience, courtesy of our Korean tour guides. Taking a picture at one of the old palaces still in Seoul with a palace "guard." It's impossible to see, but the impressive beard that man is sporting is actually fake. Up close, you can see all the glue he had to use to keep it on. Pour soul... This is my obligatory "Asian pose" at the Cheonggye Stream. The 5-mile long river was an incredible place to escape the bustling streets just above, and I can only imagine how great it would be for dates. Apparently, the stream occasionally becomes a river when it rains a lot. There were escape ladders every few hundred feet. A "helpful" ajumma singled us out to explain to us the significance of the statue (you can't see it, but it's the large stone structure on the left) and the large stone dais that you can see in this photo. The statue is of Sejong the Great, the fourth king of the Joseon Dynasty, and the ...

Just last week, I had the pleasure of flying to South Korea to visit friends and family. It was a bit of a last minute trip (and it cost me like one), but I had a fantastic time! Here are my photos, thoughts, and observations of my one-week experience. To note, because there are a lot of pictures, I've decided to do this entry as two parts: the first part are shots from m camera, the second are shots from my Korean tour guide's. So apparently in Seoul, the way people go about buying housing is to come to one of these impressive looking model homes. They would then look at examples of the rooms and then buy them on the spot. The crazy thing, according to my Korean source, is that these rooms aren't even the final product! In essence, people have to buy their houses without knowing whether or not it will turn out the way they want it to! If you made a bad choice or had back luck, you'd literally have to live with it. I think this picture is indicative of South...