Monday, August 29, 2005

Trip to Seoul

A few weeks back I took a trip up to Seoul. This was so I could attend a week long seminar as part of my master's studies. A couple of professors came over from England and offered a series of presentations on the theme of 'Current Issues in Applied Linguistics'.

I went up to Seoul the weekend before the seminar so I could hang with Tanya and do fun stuff. And so we did.

Saturday afternoon we went over to the Hongdae area, which is a very funky university district with lots of clubs, restaurants, bars and shopping. On this little street we found some good clothing shops and some seriously groovy little bars on the upper levels.

Later in the evening we saw this Chinese restaurant. I really liked the lanterns. It reminded me of the Japanese anime movie 'Spirited Away'.

We also went to this really neat bar which was basically an unfinished basement with concrete walls, but what was unusual were the floors. Several areas were covered in sand, and in the centre of the room was this shallow pool with candles and lights set in and over it. It's difficult to get a sense of it in this picture, but if you notice in the background you can see a couple of people standing up.

Here's a picture of Jordan and Tanya, and man who's about to try and sell us some lovely straw hats. The funny thing is Jordan was just visiting Seoul from Montreal, and had met us because he was a friend of a friend of Mark and Tanya's. Amusingly enough I recognized him from seeing him around town in Montreal and it turns out he's very good friends with my friend Paul. Small world huh.
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I'm not sure which night exactly, but at one point this giant mama flew into Tanya and Mark's apartment. In this photo it's resting on some stacked canvases and is about 10 cm long. These we do not have in Ontario or Quebec. These mighty insects are cicadas. Cicadas are in fact incredibly noisy. During the hot summer days large numbers of these bugs create an incessant deafening drone. This one seemed a little upset at being trapped in the apartment. Mark hastily caught it and released it outside.


Sunday, August 28, 2005

Onomatopoeia

What do dogs say? "Woof-woof". But in Korea they say "mung-mung". Before I came to Korea it never occured to me that animals would have different sounds throughout the world. But they do, and this site sent to me by Andrée has very cleverly collected different examples of animal and other sounds from around the world. The layout is very well done and most of the recordings are of kids and so is very cute to boot. What I find interesting is that some animals have pretty much the same sound throughout the world, like the snake, but some like the dog or frog are often strikingly different.

Follow the link below:

Onomatopoeia

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

The sound of an era --- MOOG

Electronic music and auditory explorers alike would be nowhere were it not for the pioneering work of Robert Moog and the wacky sound boxes he invented. Moog's creations have inspired legions of musicians, not least among them modern artists such as Stereolab, Air, Radiohead, Brian Eno, Frank Zappa, The Cure and Fat Boy Slim. Cheers Robert.

Electronic Music Pioneer Robert Moog Dead at 71

Sunday, August 21, 2005

Pretty cool photo, no?

For their honeymoon, Ian and Margaret took a lengthy cross-Canada road/camping trip. Well, at least from Ottawa to Victoria and back. They recently returned and Ian's showed me a few of their photos. This one I liked so much it's now the wallpaper on my desktop. This is what a mine looks like everyone. In this case, it's McIntyre mine. As part of their journey, Ian and Marg visited the town where Ian and I grew up. It's a (semi) northern town in Ontario by the name of Timmins (if any of you every mention Shania Twain to my face you're in big trouble). It's not that I have some sentimental attachment to mines as being an inextricable part of my childhood: when I saw this photo the sheer geometry of this structure set against a sparse natural background really impressed me. Props due to the photographer of course!



[Back in Time Some More] Thursday, June 9

Thursday was officially Ladies Day. We started off getting very fancy pedicures and manicures at a place downtown. Here's us looking happy living the high life:



After that, Margaret and I met with Julia who led us through a fun-filled afternoon shopping for cosmetics. Neither Margaret nor I are make-up wearers, but we wanted to wear some for the wedding. Julia and her expertise was there to guide us.

Later a large group of us met for a festive dinner at the Mexi Cali Roses on Rideau Street. Many of us were appreciative of the pina colada special:



After dinner several of us proceeded to The Bar (Dominion Tavern) in the market. We sat in the pleasant patio area out back, and later on may have engaged in a bout of drunken dancing at Zaphod Beeblebrox's next door.




Tuesday, August 16, 2005

[Back in Time] Wednesday, June 8

Woke up early so I could pick up my dress over on St. Denis, and also managed to squeeze in some last minute Montreal shopping before heading to the train station to catch a train to Ottawa at 3:00pm. At some point along the way I snapped this shot at Berri-UQAM subway station.



Mum picked me up and we drove out to her house. Along the way we had a look at Ian and Margaret's new house, and stopped in at the grocery store and liquor store. That evening I revelled in strange salads using ingredients you can't find in Korea. First up was a fennel, bell pepper salad with ginger-soy dressing, followed by and artichoke heart, bell pepper and feta concoction dressed with lemony italian dressing. These accompanied delicious BBQd burgers and cold beer - yum!!

I also got to meet the new doggy - tiny little Ariane.


Monday, August 15, 2005

The Miracle

Before Busan, I lived in the town of Ulsan for a year. This is a pretty interesting article featuring Ulsan and discussing the 'Miracle' which has occured in Korea over the past 50 years. The Miracle refers to the incredibly rapid modernization/ industrialization which has taken place in Korea as well as other parts of Asia. An interesting read. Check out the photo gallery too.

The Miracle Workers

Chicken-licious!

Looking for a place to eat recently, John and I decided to try a place that had chickens spit-roasting over a wood fire out front. What a delightful dining experinece we were in for! We got a whole, roasted chicken which was deliciously moist (what's worse than dry chicken) and stuffed with seasoned rice with bits of potato. Fantastic. Even better is that the price on the menu said 11 000 won, but we were told it was on special for 8 000 or about $9.00 CAD.

Very amusing to me was while we were eating, there was a fellow sitting by himself a few tables over. He too had ordered a whole chicken and with the aid of two forks and a beer, managed to eat the entire thing. I was quite impressed!

Here's John looking satisfied and the remains of the chicken we devoured.


JD's BDay

Coworker John recently celebrated his birthday. A few of us went down to Gwangali beach to check out a Chinese restaurant and while we were waiting for Colin we saw this place - a barn-shaped, neon-fringed bar beckoning in the night sky.



Inside was the complete opposite of a dive. It was a small place, maybe 5 tables, with blue lighting and tons of beautiful plants and fresh cut flowers. Our ashtray even had flower petals in it! Here's Chris in the blueish glow.


Signs Signs Everywhere...

Just a couple of amusing writings found around Busan. This one is down in Nampodong near the port.

This one is around my house, on the outside of the university wall, also very near to a middle school.