Korea : Gyeongju

Sunday to Thursday (10 to 14 April 2011)

I reached Seoul last Sunday after a 1.5 hours flight from Kanazawa in Japan on Korean Air line. There were less than 100 passengers on board with the majority Korean nationals.

In Seoul, I stayed at a hotel located in Myeongdong. The surprising thing was there is a night market in this area and many other areas in Seoul. I thought Korea would be similar to Japan where there are no stalls selling stuff on the street. Another surprise was litter such as cigarette butts on the streeet. Maybe I have been conditioned to near pristine streets and roads in Japan. There were also a few beggars on the side walks. In these aspects, Korea or at least Seoul no different from any other city in Asia. Perhaps it may more accurate to say that Japan and its culture is unique and different from other countries in Asia (I have been to 13 countries in Asia).

I found Seoul to be an energetic and dynamic city. The Koreans talk and laugh loudly in contrast to reserved Japanese. Things are moving and happening in Korea and in contrast Japan has been declining for the last 2 decades after the economic bubble burst in the early 1990s.

The Koreans are still behind on some technologies but some of their companies are already out competing Japanese companies; Samsung Electronics with a revenue of USD 138 billion in 2010 is the largest electronics company in the world. As comparison, the two largest Japanese electronics companies, Sony's and Toshiba's had 2010 revenues of USD 88 billion and USD 70 billion respectively adding up to USD 158 billion.

Thursday : I am now in Gyeongju, a relatively small city of 300,000 compared to Seoul's 10 million. The main attraction here for me is the historical sites from Silla kingdown. I am staying at Nahbi guest house (Won 20,000 = USD 12 , Won 15,000 for domitory). I will be

I will be here until Monday which is leaves me too short a time to go anywhere else far from Seoul. I was initially planning to go to Soereksan national park but I will have to get there via Seoul. So on Monday I will go to Busan which only 1 hour from Gyeongjo, spend 3 days there and return to Seoul on Thursday.

Panda In Ueno

In Japan, you can hardly walk around without saying "Kawai" (it's cute"). The ultimate of all things Cute is now in Japan or specifically at Ueno Zoo in Tokyo. The previous Panda,Ling Ling died in 2008. When I was visited the zoo in December 2009, there was a sign saying there was no longer a giant Panda at the Zoo. Solely dissapointed, I consoled myself by looking at the many animals in the fine Zoo. Ueno is actually a quite small zoo, area-wise but with the ingenuity of space optimisation, the Japanese have managed to fit all them in the small space available to them.

On Monday, I went to Ueno park to see the cherry blossoms. I was also planning to go to the zoo as well but the crowd was too big. Picture below shows it all:

"Sorry I can't upload any photo to blogger, they seem to take forever"

In Ueno, Panda images are everywhere:

Tomorrow I am headed to Kanazawa, a small city in Western Honshu. I will be there until Sunday when I will be flying to Seoul.

PS : I am not sure why many tourists are scared of going to Japan. Other than the areas affected by the Tsunami, everthing else is almost normal in Japan. There are measures to conserve energy : fewer trains, turned off neon lighting and lifts not operational. There are no black outs in the area (Asukasa) that I am staying while in Tokyo.

Who is going to Japan soon?

Who is going to Japan soon? Me. For a holiday.

When I walked into the Japanese embassy at 3.00 pm this afternoon, I was astonished to see only two people applying for visas. One was a Malaysian Chinese man holding three passports. The second person was a guy filling up a form in Japanese. There were no runners from travel agencies carrying dozens of passports unlike in December 2009 when I had to wait 3 hours for my turn to hand over my documents, today it only took 5 minutes.

My flight will to Tokyo will be on Saturday, 2 April. I am expecting an near empty airplane.

I will spend one week in Japan in Tokyo and Kanazawa. I wanted to visit Kanazawa back in Dec. 2009 when I spent three weeks in Japan. The main attraction is the well preserved houses and other buildings from the old Edo period. However I could not find the time as I was traveling and spending time in five cities (Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara, Hiroshima and Osaka) and Kanazawa is not in the bullet train (Shinkansen) routes.

From Kanazawa, I will fly directly to the second leg of my trip to Seoul . I plan to spend about 16 days in South Korea.

I have bought some essentials for my trip :

1. Face mask ; 1 pair in case the level of radiation increases in Tokyo or Kanazawa.
   
   
2. Six AAA batteries for the blackouts
   
   
3. Two small LED flash lights
   
   
4. Two packs of Panadol each with 8 tablets

A few more things that I plan to buy and bring along:

1. Rubber gloves
   
   
2. Possibly ; 2 x 1.5L bottle of water
   
   
3. A whistle.
   

2011 Update

My first post for 2011. It's been ages (4 months) since I wrote a post. A few things since Penang BR, (2010):

Running.
I am still running but it is getting harder to be motivated. On a typical weekday, I run about 4 km on the treadmill at the gym. I am getting fatter for sure which makes it harder to run. I plan to run some races this year but have to wait until I get in enough shape.

Running Mom has retired from running. I have no plans to stop running.

Work
Usual, 8.00an to 5.00 pm but usually its up to 5.30 when I quit to head to the gym. From 1 April, flexi hours will start but it won't change my schedule due to the traffic jam problem. Why does almost everyone drive to and from KL?

Traveling
It seems I never stop traveling. I am going to the Ukraine (work related) this evening. I am going the same town ; Sumy that I went in February. It is a dreary small town in Ukraine. The worst thing is it takes 3 hours to get there by road from the nearest airport in Kharkov.

Holiday
I had to cancel my planned holiday to Korea in December 2010. I went to Dubai instead for work. But I have booked my flights to Japan and Korea in April. Although a major earthquake and tsunami hit North East Japan yesterday, I will still continue with the trip.

That's it for now. The taxi is coming in 2o minutes time.