Time for an update again! Right now the midterm exams are coming up, and a couple of papers have to be finished soon. Unfortunately, I do have a little bit less free time than in the previous weeks, but I guess studying abroad also includes... studying. Anyway, I still visited some nice places since my last post, so I added new pictures this time as well. I still call the photo-folders Seoul (1st, 2nd, 3rd) since that makes uploading easier, but actually not all photo's are taken in Seoul (just like last time actually; when I included Incheon and Suwon in the Seoul folder as well).

Within Seoul I went to the Olympic park. It was a very beautiful park, and much bigger than I expected. There was also a big fountain that was supposed to be 'dancing' on music. I did not really notice that to be honest, but it still looked really nice. With a small group I also went to Bukchon some time ago. After visiting this neighbourhood, we went to eat Jokbal at a restaurant. Even though you could perfectly see it were pig's feet, it still tasted nice. After this, we walked along the Cheonggye-stream (which has some fountains and a waterfall) during the evening.

Together with many people from the buddy program we also visited South-Korea's largest amusement park just south of Seoul (Everland). Especially the T-express rollercoaster was really nice; it had the worlds' steepest downward slope (at least for a wooden rollercoaster). It (almost) felt like falling completely vertically down!

Last saturday, I went to the DMZ, which is some kind of buffer-zone between North and South-Korea. Since you cannot go there on your own, we booked a tour that took us to different spots around the border. Even though there were plenty of soldiers around, it did not feel that dangerous at all. I think this might be due to the fact that there are many tourists visiting this area, that are just taking pictures (at least whenever allowed) like everywhere else. Of course you had to sign a form that stated that if there might be incidents that they cannot be held responsible. We were also told not to have any (non)-verbal contact with any of the soldiers, and next to this we were warned not to step on landmines (I wonder who would step on a landmine when they would see one?). During the tour we visited one of the tunnels reaching from the North all the way into South-Korea, and also a modern train-station that connects the North with the South. It was used for food-support to the North I believe, but after an incident some years ago, the transport between the 2 countries has been stopped again. Nevertheless, when (and if) Korea will reunite again, transport between the 2 countries can immediately start. We also went to a platform from which you could look into North-Korea.

In the evening we visited a fireworks show. It looked like all of Seoul (and the surrounding areas) where planning to go there. Stations got closed down, and there were big crowds everywhere. Fortunately, after a long time we managed to find a place (on a mountain) from which you could see the fireworks, as well as the skyline of the city. It was quite far away from the fireworks, but there were still a lot of people there as well.

Jeroen van Bommel

Ps: I will also try to upload some old videos this time