Wednesday

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Well today was busy, very very very busy. I had an agenda when I came here of where I am going each day. Todays agenda had five places on them. I have a budy/tour guide with me who is the son of the family I am staying with. He is twenty eight and his name is Yoon Ji Jung. He speaks the most english and can roughly carry on a conversation. I gave him a copy of my agenda as well as a copy in Korean. He was totally in controll today navigating and choosing when to go to each destination. He also decided to make a four destination day into a nine destination day. Some of the locations I had on other days were moved to today. I set the pace stopping when I needed to and telling him when it was good to leave and such. He was very patient and very helpful throughout the entire day. Today, according to my agenda, we were supposed to go to Gyoenbokgung palace, Jogyesa, Dongminmun, and Seodaemun prison. We actually went to Deoksugung Palace, City Hall, Chung Kye Chun, Dongdeamun, Buk Chon Folk Village, Meongdong street, Nan Dae Mun Market, and Seoul Tower. This was a ton of walking and pictures. I estimated that I would take about 200-300 pictures. Well I ended up killing one of two batteries, filling up a memory card and taking 869 pictures!!! WOW. Well I wasnt planning on taking that many but I planned ahead. I have plenty of storage space and enough time to sort everything out. Now about my day, I loved it. I was extremely cold and misrable most of the morning. I had on three layers topping it off with a ski jacket. We walked alot of the day taking the subway for major distances. I love the culture, the people, and just the way of life. I was not treated as an outsider often and greeted positivly everywhere I went. Coffee is huge here, thus being the reason we had three cups today. I is a very defined culture that is just interesting to observe. There are common similarities but each individual seems to define themselves so way or another. By taking pictures I have to view each moment as a picture. Thinking how the "shot" would look. The great shots I take, and hope that they turn out well. The food here is awesome, I havent had anything I dont like yet. The food of the day is Sam Kye Tang, this was lunch, it is a Korean chicken broth soup ish. It was very good and served with kimchi and rice. I am now sitting in my room going through the hundreds of pictures backing them up on CD's. It is the New Years and I have no idea what I will be doing for it. Hope yours goes well and I will post again tommorrow.

Andrew
19.40

Tuesday, December 30

Well I have been in Seoul, South Korea for about three hours. I arrived safely after my eighteen hours of flight today and managed to wander around the Incheon airport successfully. I was picked up at the airport my the father of the household I am staying at. My name was spelled Andlu... its ok we still found each other. Then we had a one hour car ride going from the airport to their apartments. The traffic in Seoul is very crammed and very bad. When we got home I was introduced to the mother of the house and shown my room. My room, oh boy, well I don't have a bed. In Korea you sleep on the floor with a blanket apparently so my room is the coat closet, but I am not being mistreated my room looks like everyone elses... Nothing. There is limited if not any furniture in the house. All the sitting is done on the floor including meals. Tonight we had Korea beef (my favorite) with Kimchi, sticky rice, jjigae (a seaweed soup) and noodles ish. The meal was wonderful and none of the food was new to me. There are no plates, this took some getting used to. When you want something you simply reach to the bowl and grab it and put it in your mouth, totally unsanitary but I didn't say that. I have enjoying myself and the culture very much but struggling in the language department. The language is a big barrier and sometimes creates awkward pauses and moments. This is all new and as the week progresses hopefully so will our relationships amongst the family. Thank you for your care and interest I will be putting pictures up tomorrow.

Andrew
Tuesday, 20.15

Picture Website

While in Korea I will be blogging on this website. I have also set up a photo website where I will be dumping my pictures (providing I have the resources). I have a photobucket account and will be posting frequently the pictures I have taken. My usename account is andrewrigsby_photograhy, if you have a photobucket account you may access these pictures. If not you can still search for the titles of the albums. Each day I will save the albums with a specific title. I have tried to put my finalized agenda on my blog, but it was made in Excel and the columns arent lining up correctly. I leave Monday and am so excited and pumped about this trip. I will post again tomm. night hours before my departure.

Andrew Rigsby
12-28-2008

Welcome

Thanks to all of you for your support on my crazy trip to South Korea. I will be leaving December 29 at 7:30 in the morning from the Greenville-Spartanburg airport. I will be there for ten days. Each day (assuming I have internet) I will blog a journal of each day and hopefully be able to show you some pictures. If you are having any trouble with the blog or have any questions for me my email address is andrew_rigsby@yahoo.com. Thank you.

Andrew
December 8, 2008