South Korea

Well, it's been another spell since I've last written.  Since that time, I've been to China twice and South Korea once.  Currently I am sitting in a hotel room in Qingdao, Shandong, China.  Nice place and it is a 10 minute walk from the airport.  I have been thinking about what to write about pertaining to my China experiences.  Thus far I've only been a tourist once in Hohhot, Inner Mongolia.  That was fun, but these recent trips have been all business.  My impressions of South Korea will make up this post.

I'll start with Korea, as I've spend a week there at the start of April.  Soeul-Incheon is a large and very busy city.  There are American-style highways that loop all over each other.  Luckily, I guess, a service tech gets to travel 90 minutes via taxi to get to our usual destination:  Yeongheung-do.  This place is a little fishing village about 15 - 20 miles southwest of the Incheon Airport.  Yup, west of Incheon and in the middle (well not quite, surrounded by) the Yellow Sea.  Absolutely nothing to do during the time off in this town.  The restaurants close to the hotel offer Chinese cuisine and some local fare: seafood.  The only good thing about this place is the fact that the owners of the hotel we stay at are a really friendly, English speaking, family of 5.  I've always received great service from them and it seems like I am a long, lost family member each time I arrive.  The momma-san (mom-in-charge) even gets up early to cook an American-style breakfast each day:  bacon, eggs, toast, fruit, and apple juice.  A great reprive from all of the still-moving squid tentacles that is the local speciality.

The Koreans take their power plant security very seriously.  There've been times in which I've had to take all of the crap out of my Pelican cases to prove that I'm not a sabotour from Pyongyang.  Heck, they even give random breathalyzers to the driver after lunch.  I'd hate to think what they'd do if we had a few bottles of Jinro (BTW:  Mmmmmmmmm!!). 

Korean Super Trooper Guards

I guess since the country is still officially at war, one could not really blame them for being too overly-cautious.  The tide in the area is quite amazing. The locals say that it goes up and down by nearly 33 feet a day. In the morning, there is wet seabed, but by the afternoon the sea returns. The locals take their garage-made fishing contraption out onto the seabed and pick up sealife off of the ocean floor before it dies and eventually kill it in a pot of boiling water. It actually does not taste too bad, even though some of it dies from my teeth as I bite down. The people are rather nice and willing to help whenever I need it. There is a kind of detached interest in seeing an American in their midst, only because of the remote location. In Incheon, there are quite a few Americans out and about.

"Just the tip," of an island in the frame.

The rest of the island at high tide.

Travelling to South Korea gets lonely quickly.  Again, there is not a whole heck of a lot to do and with the 15 hour time difference, it makes it hard to pick up the Skype and call home.  Even channel 1 & 2 gets boring after a fashion.  You'll have to go there to find out what I'm getting at.  Simon, former coworker, and I walked into "town," about two years ago.  That was a wasted trip.  All they have there is a police station, a couple of docks, and two fish markets.  Yippee.  At least there were a couple of Maseratti's at the dockyard.  Apparently, fishing is a rather lucrative business in those parts.  I have more pictures on my Facebook page if you're interested in seeing more.  This last trip to Korea was actually delayed by a half hour between Qingdao, China and Incheon, Korea.  Thanks to the North Koreans feeling frisky and launching a rocket over the Yellow Sea.  I guess with all of the travelling that I do there is bound to be some excitement, just as long as a repeat of Sept. 11, 2011 into Detroit doesn't happen again.

Yeongheung Power Station.  There are power lines heading North...

Next up: China.  Thank you for reading,

Kevin