'n Radio kuier met Lena Park

Ek het vanaand vir Lena Park ontmoet. Sy is ’n Amerikaans-Koreaanse sangeres en liedjieskrywer wat veral gewild in die laat 90s en vroeë 2000s was, en het seker meer as tien albums vrygestel. Sy is huidiglik ’n omroeper by KBS World Radio en dit is waar ek haar ontmoet het. Sy het ’n program genaamd “One Fine Day”, elke weeksaand, en op Woensdagaande is daar ’n segment “Aliens in Seoul”. Die titel is ’n tong-in-die-kies verwysing na Sting se liedjie “Alien in New York”. Ek was genooi as gas vir die “Aliens in Seoul” segment vanaand om bietjie saam met Lena te gesels oor my lewe hier in Korea. Ons het gesels oor die redes hoekom ek Korea toe gekom het, en wat maak dat ek steeds hier woon en ander interesanthede. Byvoorbeeld, ek het onder andere genoem hoe bittersoet ironies dit vir my is om haar te ontmoet, omdat my blootstelling aan haar en haar musiek was via ’n eks van my wat ’n groot aanhanger was. ’n Liedjie wat ek aangeraai het om na te luister op die program was juis ’n song op Lena Park se laaste album Parallax, wat ek as ’n geskenk vir my eks gekoop het, toe ons nog saam was. Dit was ’n heerlike kuier, en Lena en die vervaardiger het genoem dat hulle eintlik weer met my op die lug sal wil gesels, omdat daar nog so baie was waarby ons nie uitgekom het nie. Alhoewel die krygskunste ’n groot rede is hoekom ek Korea toe gekom het, het ons skaars daaroor gepraat vanaand, met die gevolg dat dit moontlik ’n fokusonderwerp mag wees vir ’n toekomstige radiogesprek. Hoe ookal, dit was ’n lekker ervaring om weer op die radiogolwe te surf. Die program sal volgende Woensdag, 4 Oktober 2017, uitgesaai word en dan ook daarna aanlyn op die KBS World Radio webblad geluister kan word, en ek dink ook vanaf iTunes afgelaai kan word.

Some things I did in August

Wow, it is October already! I hope I can remember my August highlights.

In August I finished all but one test to get a Korean driver's license. The only thing I still need to do is do a public road driving test. All that is keeping me from doing that is that I don't have a car to practise driving on the right side of the road on. I only to do so for maybe two hours, just to get a feeling for it, since I'm already quite comfortable driving--it is just that I'm comfortable driving on the left side of the road. Sadly I do not have access to a car and since I don't have a license I cannot even rent a car.

A very fun outing in August was when I impulsively decided to go for a hike along the North Han River. I took the train not to far from my house to Daeseong-ri (about an hour away) and then walked along the river to Cheongpyeong. It was very scenic and beautiful. When I get a car I hope to take frequent trips to more rural, natural parts of Korea like this area, which are a little more difficult to get to via public transportation.

On my little excursion I also climbed up the underside of an express way bridge. It is something I've always wanted to do -- go explore the understand of an express way.

That evening I staid over in Chuncheon. The evening started out quite stressful as I accidentally left my mobile phone in a taxi. Luckily I was able to track the phone with Samsung's Find My Phone service by going to an Internet cafe and phoning the phone and connecting with the taxi driver. That evening I slept in a jjimjilbang (Korean sauna) which was not that nice as it is a bit noisy and the floor is rather uncomfortable to sleep on, especially after many hours of hiking. The hot tubs were quite relaxing though.

The following day, before returning back home I went to a restaurant called Peace of Mind Bakery & Book Cafe. What an interesting place. It is basically a museum of sorts, with some exquisite calligraphy, and other oddities.

For me the pair calligraphy inscribed on bamboo was the most unique of the vast collection.

Another trip I did in August was to Taean. Honestly, I don't like Korea's west coast. The beaches are usually muddy and the ocean is grey and ugly. However, I've been eyeing Taean on the map of Korea that I have on my wall for some time now. It is a large national part known for its pine forests. On a whim a friend and I decided to go and we ended up going to Manglipo Beach 만리포 해변. It was great. It is a beautiful beach -- not muddy, but sandy, with a great vacation atmosphere, but without being overly crowded as is the case for the many of the east coast beaches. Also, it is a mere three hours by bus from Seoul. I did some zip lining and just enjoyed the fun atmosphere.

By accident I discovered a sculpture park in Seoul. I went to a driving school to find out if I can rent a car there just for some driving practise, but they only have package deals requiring you to a thirteen hour course, including the written tests, etc. through them. So while I didn't make use of their service, I did enjoy the beautiful sculptures populating the premises. Apparently the property owner is a sculpture collector and just places them all around the property. I plan to go back there soon, once the fall foliage start to change colours. I'm sure it must be gorgeous then.

One evening I decided that I'm going to make a custard. I made it from scratch, without a recipe using coconut milk, and delicately scented with cinnamon, cardamom, and jasmine flowers.It was quite tasty but not as thick as I had hoped for.

Speaking of desserts, a nice place selling mango bingsu opened up close to my Taekwon-Do gym. It is probably the best mango dessert I've had in Korea so far. Sadly, since Korea is not a tropical country, it doesn't really have a tradition of mango desserts as one would find in for instance Hong Kong or Thailand. Nevertheless, the mango bingsu at Roys is very good.

And, here is a picture of me from the Taekwon-Do gym...

Oh, and I went to the Han River one Sabbath afternoon with some friends for a picknick, which was nice.

Well, sadly that's about all of the highlights I can remember.Hopefully I'll get to writing about the things I did in September before October has passed as well.

Some things I did in July

July has been a strange month. Although I have been on holiday, I haven't done half as much interesting things as I usually do during my working-months. I guess part of the reason is that I'm burning the candle at both ends so often, that when vacation time comes I just want to stay at home and relax.

I've done many of the normal things, such as regular martial arts training and teaching though. Some international visitors came to our martial arts gym (Russia, Netherlands, and America), so I tailored my teaching a bit to their needs. I also taught a private class on Taekwon-Do philosophy, which was quite interesting. Apart from my own normal training, I also attended two Tai Chi Chuan lessons--one Chen Style Tai Chi Chuan session, and one workshop on Sun Style Tai Chi Chuan.

My second cousin from Australia visited Japan and Korea. We had the opportunity to meet one afternoon, had Thai food and went to the National Museum of Korea. It was nice meeting a relative for the first time, and in Korea of all places. 

I went on a short trip to with a Korean friend to his family's hometown Daecheon, and spent one day exploring the neighboring historic city Buyeo, which is the site of the capital Sabi of the Baekje Kingdom. Of the Three Kingdoms of Korea, most people are familiar with Goguryeo, since it was the largest, and Shilla because of its rich cultural heritage. However, Baekje was culturally actual one of the most influential little kingdoms in East Asia. The palace in Buyeo is probably the biggest I have seen in all of Korea, and the on site temple pagoda is the tallest I've seen in Korea so far. I enjoyed spending some time with my friend's family -- mostly farmers. It reminded me to a bit of my own past, having grown up on a farm.

One highlight for July was visiting the Weta Workshop Fantasy Exhibition currently displaying in Seoul. Weta Workshop is known for its special effects work in such notable fantasy films such as The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings. There were some truly brilliant statues, including some characters from The Hobbit, as well as other fantasy and sci-fi characters and even a collection of mythological busts. I think I want to visit it again one more time before the exhibit comes to an end in the middle of August. Below is a random selection.

Last week, on the last day of July, I went to do my driving learner's test in Korea. It was a little tricky as although I could do the test in English, the textbook was in Korean, so I couldn't properly study for it. My score was around 85%, which is well above passing, but I was still slightly disappointed. I plan to go do play in some driving simulators which they have at many of Seoul's driving test centers, just to get used to driving on the right side of the road, and then hopefully before the end of August I want to try getting my Korean driver's license.

One reason I may have been less active in July was because I came down with a really bad cold. My fan broke, it July is terribly hot, so I used my air conditioner for a few hours one evening -- I usually don't. Well, the next day I had a terribly sore throat and other cold symptoms. It took me a couple of days to recover. At least it resulted in two good things. The first was that I dismantled my air conditioner and cleaned it out properly. I'm thinking that it was not merely the cold air that made me sick, but also dust and mold in the air conditioning unit. At least it is clean now, so that if I do feel the need to use it again, it will at least not be that much of a health hazard. The other thing I did was to go and by myself a new little fan. I'm very much in love with it.

And of course I did some Seoul exploring -- one nice discovery was the gorgeous view of downtown Seoul from the observation deck at the Seoul Mayor's old office.

My personal life has been quite -- how shall I put it? -- surreal. Strange drama with an ex and family members has made the past month one of the weirdest inter-relational experiences of my life. Relationship dynamics have shifted dramatically, so much so that I think my future visits to South Africa will be most unusual. What I found quite interesting is how modern technology has brought issues from multiple thousands of kilometers right into the palm of my hand here in Korea, via my mobile phone. We live in a world where time and space are increasingly less important...a family member's actions on one part of the world can affect you almost directly continents away. Indeed, fascinating.

Also, I made some new friends, enjoyed good food, and did other fun things.