A good time to leave?

I am a little nervous.

Yesterday, North Korea tested a nuclear bomb that seems to be much larger than the one it initially tested in 2006. A few hours later, the country test-fired a handful of short-range missiles.

This is unnerving even under the best of circumstances, but, keep in mind that North Korea has...

• all sorts of weapons aimed at the big cities of the South (I have been living in the 2nd largest)
• in March, threatened to reduce the South to "ashes"
• recently closed the border between the two countries
  
• in January, tore up all agreements/treaties between North and South, including a non-agression pact
• never DID sign a peace treaty regarding the Korean war, so technically it's still going on...

I am leaving in two days, yet I shall return. Hmm. Hopefully things will de-escalate over the summer.

wanna see where I work?

I just found this. Someone has taken a ton of pictures of the area around Dongnae subway station, which is incredibly close to where I work. So for impressions of Dongnae, take a look! It's all so familiar; I wander these streets many times every week.

Have some photos (I still heart you)

Scenes from Hadong, etc






On Jeong's green hat, and the verdant hills...


Cherry blossoms and overturned kimchi pots.


The bum-cheek imprinted rock, which I had to sit on. On Jeong is photographing my derriere, apparently.

And we picked strawberries!


On the bus, with our bounty.


...and just for fun, some self-portait attempts amongst the cherry blossoms.

an English Village in my backyard!

Ever since I've lived here, on the opposite side of the intersection there has been much construction. The sign board proclaimed "Busan Global Village" and I'd wondered what that could possibly mean. Well as I was searching through job postings today, I found an ad; apparently this is an English Village! It looks fairly spectacular from the outside. I'll try to take some pictures today. Apparently this English Village is a joint venture between the Busan city government and Herald Media, which publishes an English newspaper here in Korea.

So, I live next to an English Village! I think that's kind of cool. I've always been intrigued by the concept, while at the same time vowing never to work in one after the stories I've heard. Still, seems neat. The kids come for a period of time to stay in a total immersion environment. There are rooms set up to look like hotel lobbies, airport check-in desks, movie theatres, even dining rooms in "traditional" American houses. And the teachers function a bit like actors, pretending to be the staff at the hotel for instance, while the kids have to use their English skills to get by in this "foreign" environment.

Of course with the increasing cost of sending children overseas, this sort of a program may be seen to have its benefits!

Springtime at last?

It was a balmy 17 degrees today. The next few days will be similarly beautiful. Sunshine-y and mild.

And filled with toxic dust.

Welcome to the Eastern Asian phenomenon known as "yellow dust"! It hits around March every year, I believe. Currently the concentration is high enough that there are warnings to limit outdoor activities to the bare essentials. I haven't actually seen the menace yet... somehow I was expecting a dust storm, with impaired visibility, but it seems all is fairly normal outside! Curious.

Oh, I went to Seoul recently. We visited Everland, in Suwon, and then I couchsurfed with Sherry in Seoul. We had actual brunch!!! I paid the equivalent of $19 for a plate of scrambled eggs, wheat toast, sauteed mushrooms and tomato, baked beans, coffee and orange juice. But it was totally worth it! You can't get this in Busan!


And the weekend before that, I believe, was Marina's birthday. On Jeong and I made cupcakes in lieu of proper birthday cake.


How do I look with pink hair?

This merits another post!

So, there's a contest being put on by Tourism Queensland for "The Best Job In The World". Essentially, the winner gets to live on a beautiful island for a year, and is paid a bunch of money ($150,000AUD per year, to be exact) to do so. In return, all he/she has to do is explore the island, blog, take pictures, and present these to the world.

MEET MITCH! He's from my university!!! By my calculations, he's in the top three, and you should vote for him because... well... look at this video. Seriously.



Yay Guelph! Look at the beautiful city centre... sometimes I quite miss it.

If you liked the video, take a minute and vote for him!

This is how it is.

I've obviously reached the point where life is so normal that I see no point in taking the time to post. This always happens; I apologize. I'll endeavour to do more posting.

However, here is a link to a blog which is not only far more interesting, pretty, and informative about life in Busan than mine... but it seems to be updated more often too :)

http://travelingfarstandingstill.wordpress.com/