So, as we get this up and running, please be patient as there is much tweaking to do whilst resurrecting a blog, especially one in which there are now two authors. While we may do an exhaustive retelling of how we got to Seoul later, to start with we will give some first impressions.
There are pavers everywhere. In any given parking lot that would logically have asphalt - they have pavers. Any given sidewalk is either concrete or more likely, pavers. This is A) prettier than asphalt, B) more uneven than asphalt. While I am immediately willing to concede that asphalt may not be cost effective over here - I seriously wonder. All that labor to lay the pavers when you could shlack it over with a cheap layer of asphalt? I don't know. I do recognize that maintenance and upkeep of pavers would be substantially cheaper, so maybe that's why. Sometimes I notice odd things. Maybe I should be more concerned with say, the fact I can't read their alphabet.
It can be difficult to find Korean food. Now, this is not really true, as there are all kinds of restaurants, markets, and mini-marts everywhere. However, in spitting distance of my building, including some in our building itself, we have: Dunkin' Donuts, Starbucks, Pizza Hut, and McDonalds. This does not include over a half dozen bakery/coffee houses that are apparently the rage, the KFC knock-offs (fried chicken is huge). This is just our building and the one next to it. Across the street, there are even more options. We have three pizza joints. The hard part with finding Korean food is that I can't tell one shop from the next unless they have windows or I go inside, because of the alphabet. Whereas Pizza Hut, McDies, and Starbucks all have hardwired psychological responses (I think revulsion is a response...) The good news is that we have found Quimbap...Cheungon..yah. It's name translates to Kimbap Heaven, and I've adopted it as my new regular eatery/hang out. They have their entire menu on a half-size sheet of paper (none of it in English), so my current M.O. is to come in, and mark something I didn't try yesterday. So far the result has been more positive than negative.
The internet connections are amazing here. I average between 1.7 - 2 MB/sec regularly, and have gotten upwards of 6--7 MB/sec on the faster end. For $10/month.
The subway is sweet...intuitive, well-signed, easy to access for foreigners, clean, safe, with large cars. I could rave on, but I won't.
Apparently, the only music that comes over en masse from America is hiphop, so that was depressing.
Some drinks are not well-labeled. Usually you would think it be easy to tell different drinks apart, and for the most part, this is true. However, there is the occasional bottle of something that looks like it could be say, peach juice, or vitamin water. It then turns out to be say, fermented rice wine, or acetone masquerading as a chinese liquor. On the plus side, I now have something to disinfect my first aid tools with.
More to come!
