New picture walk

Quite some time ago, when I first moved to South Korea, I put up a picture walk going from my house to the subway station. I like picture walks because it shows the little things that i see along my way... as if you were walking along with me.

Here's a new picture walk, from my house to bring Ryan a forgoten cell phone while he was writing at his favorite cafe.




Here's the front step to my house. Yes, house! I am so pleased to be out of apartements again. We rent a little one story 2 bedroom villa. Here you can see the tiny little garden I built here with random bricks from the neighborhood. I have osteospermum, columbine, pineapple sage, campanula, basil, one pink tulip, and some sprouting lettuce and spinach.


After turning to the right, (you can still see a little of my garden!), you are faced with a steep, crumbly hill. This slope has made nervous many koreans in high heels durring summer, and even myself have to hold onto the wall durring winter. It's really quite steep. It didn't help when a construction company dumped a big pile of sand at the top of it, and now the whole slope is made more slippery by sand everywhere.

You can still see the side of my house in this picture (on the left). Once reaching the top of the hill, you can look down and see the convenience store that is so close to us. This street is also quite run-down and steep, cars rarely drive here, all we get is the occasional motorcycle really (which you can see parked beside my house). I guess when you live on a mountain, steep hills is what you get.

Following the curve of the street you saw previously, you reach my bus stop! This bus takes me up the mountain when I don't feel like walking it. Busses here are really cheap. While there are no monthly bus passes, you load up a money card and it only costs 60 cents per trip.

This is the construction site along the way down the mountain. I have no idea what they're building but whatever it is has a basement, and is quite large. A small apartement building maybe? My area is highly residential, as many foreigners live around here.

Keeping on going down the street. Note the lack of sidewalks... but the cars are usually pretty careful as it is a residential neighborhood and lots of people walk around here. The PB is a Paris Bagette, a large chain here in korea with acceptable french bread.

Here's a small family run grocery store, and a hardward store beside it. The hardware store is closed since it's sunday.

And we've arrived at the cafe to find ryan!

Here's your cell phone, Ryan!

To-Do list on a cold rainy sunday

Saturday was a great day. I went out for lunch with an art meet-up group, and bounced ideas about running a casual jewelry workshop. It should be fun.... I will be taking a group of people to the bead area, where we will all go shopping. From there, we can go to a coffee shop and create very very basic style beading necklaces/bracelets. We're talking simple stuff. After seeing how this goes, maybe we can try something more complex? Metal punching, torching, etching, fabric working, collaborative work even... who knows? Maybe I can spark the jewelry bug in other artists. Or maybe we can work together on some assemblage tins? The sky is the limit really... or rather people's interests is the limit. I do have that problem where no one usually is interested in the things that excite me.... but maybe since i'm working with artists it might be different?? Who knows. Worth a try though!

Later Saturday night, I went out for a night on the town with Ryan, in my favorite neighborhood of Hongdae. After happily wandering around and soaking in the mood of the neighborhood, we failed to find the reggae show we were looking for. However, we did find Club Palm, which was had a live jazz group. Lots of jazz, tequilla, wine, and chilling was had. A good night.

But now it's sunday. A cold, rainy Sunday and i'm still sick with bronchitis. As a result, i should not be going inside. A jewelry day it is....

Totally ripping off Joel's livejournal style,.... here's my to-do list for today:

-sleep in
- drill metal tubes
-make sample chips for metal brushes, for knowledge of effect in future use
- aneal more sheet copper (too rainy for torching)
- solder bezels (see above reason)
- do ink transfer onto brass for cuff (ooops! forgot to reverse the text! but it didn't transfer legibly anyways)
- finish fabric cuff (just didn't get to it. not sure where to go next anyways)
- finish purple ribbon necklace
- organize ribbon and fabric shelf
- buy groceries
- slowly go insane from boredom and cabin fever and become depressed at the waste of a day off
- clean appartement
- do dishes
- kick ass at online scrabble


So, I got most of what i wanted done today. All except the torch work... but it was raining so i couldn't go do that outside. Instead of that, I did get lots of other jewelry stuff done. I call this a good day :).

How was everyone else's weekends?

Dale's Picture Walk to the subway station (with Ryan)

So, i was talking earlier with my friend Tasha, and she said she wanted to see 'landscape pictures'. Well, i haven't been in Seoul long, and it is surely a varied area as a result of it's gigantic size, but the landscape of my neighborhood of Gwanak-gu seems to be buildings, buildings and more buildings. High rises everywhere. Single story buildings don't exist here in my area. So, i thought I'd do you better than show you one or two landscape pictures... i thought I'd show you where it is that i live here, and my personal 'landscape' of a daily basis. Ryan and i were on our way to do some errands, which involved a walk past the subway station. A walk to the subway station is seeming like a pretty standard thing to me. Here... walk with me through the pictures as we go to the subway station from my place.




First thing you do is walk down the stairs (or take the elevator) to first floor. once you step into the hall, this is what you see. Note the Korean restaurant here on the first floor. I have not eaten here yet, but the soup looks interesting. I am intrigued by the idea of 'eating out' without even setting foot outside. It reminds me of living in rez haha.

By the way, that silhouette in the first picture is Ryan.






This is where you are right after stepping outside the doors. In my building, there is also a dry cleaner place, a travel agency and.... a 7-11. The tables are all from the 7-11.



A quick picture of the dry cleaners.



Ryan, successful from his mission of buying a coke from the 7-11.



This is the first turn you take. It is directly opposite the 7-11 (the 7-11 was right behind me).



After walking down the narrow side street for about 2 minutes, you come onto the turn onto the major street. This is that turn. At the corner here there is a 'Red Mango'. This is a totally delicious frozen yogurt place. If you ask for your yogurt 'to go', they tape pieces of ice to your take out container to keep your frozen yogurt cold. I love the sour yogurty taste here. It's no german gelato, but i like it better than canadian ice cream.

When i first went to red mango, ryan had gone off to starbucks as he didn't want any. Once doing a lap around the building to find the stairs to the second floor (the first floor is something else... i think a cell phone store?) I got to the door it. It was a sliding door. The kind that usually have sensors and slide open as you come in. I tried waving all around to trigger the sensor, i even tried pushing on the door itself to make it slide. There was delicious frozen yogurt on the other side and all i could do was stare... the door WOULD NOT OPEN! Koreans passed me on the stairs and were laughing at me. They said something to me in Korean and then went on. Finally i found the little 'push' button beside it. I was no longer the crazy foreigner banging on the glass, trying to get into the store.



Directly opposite the red mango is another convienience store. Here is Ryan with the 'wacky' convenience store cartoons.



A typical Gwanak-gu 'landscape'. This is the view down the major road after turning the corner at the Red Mango.



Along the major street here, there are many cars, a bus stop, many stores and along the side there are street vendors selling food. It snowed just a very little bit today (melted as soon as it hit the ground, didn't show at all) and so there were tents over the vendors. They sell a variety of fried foods. I haven't tried any of their food yet. I do know Ryan's friend got sick after eating this, but i figure anything is worth trying once.... There is one in a different area that sells roasted nuts ( i think?). I think i will start with that one and work my way up.




Here's where Ryan likes to go to get his frapp fix. I am not that crazy about Starbucks, but i was intrigued when i went in with him and saw that they sell cupcakes in the Starbucks here. However, upon eating the cranberry cupcake, i discovered that the 'whipped cream' is made with soy milk. Oh well. This place makes Ryan happy :).



This place makes Dale happy!!!! I have already fallen madly, deeply in love with Paris Baguette here. I love their breads, i love their friendly people that work there, i love their little salads, i look forward to trying the juice from their juice bar.... i really love everything about the place. For breakfast today, i had a almond sticky bun i picked up from there.... delicious! I will have to take a picture sometime of the cakes they make there... i swear i will be picking one up as soon as an occasion arises to buy a cake where there will be 5 or 6 people together. The cakes are so beautiful! They also sell individual slices. Ryan and i loved the mocha cake, and i usually don't even like chocolate! This was divine.



And now we have arrived at the subway! Here is the view from the top of the stairs.




Here is the view in the direction towards the school where i work. In order to get to the school, i go down into the subway station, and go out on the other side, which is on the other side of the street. This street is so busy you cannot cross it except for underneath.



Here is a picture of the spot where those previous two pictures were taken from... the subway stairs. Down the escalator we go...



And here we are, inside the subway station.




Once in the station, we are directly under the street. We can exit through one of 8 exits without actually going into the subway area. This is the method for crossing this street. The first time i went out on my own, i was going out to a store to buy more clothes hangers that we had seen. I had a brief moment of worry that i was leaving through the wrong exit... and then i saw the sign. The name says it all hahahahhahaha. Ryan and i do get a giggle out of this one.




Wow this was a long post. Final thing i go is a picture of my new little friend. In the previous post Bianca said i needed a plant. I agreed and already had my eyes open for a plant store. In our travels today on the other side of the subway station, we came across a plant store! This little sweetie was only 3$... i couldn't resist. After years of living in a basement i finally have enough light in my place to keep a plant! If he lives, i will build up a collection :). I give him a month before the collection starts.

Pictures of my place!

So, i have Internet here at my place now! We still don't have a wireless router, or anything but the bed to sit on, so we do our computing sitting on the middle of the floor. I am currently using my housecoat as a cushion, and have the laptop propped up on the suitcase in front of me. Table and chairs will come as soon as we find a secondhand furniture store here in Seoul. Preferably one close to home?

Well i thought I'd post some pictures of Ryan and I in our new place! Here they are:

We found this table at a nearby furniture store for only 40$. I was so pleased at the price and it's simplicity. It even has a pull out keyboard tray for more surface area. This pictures shows what is so far my 'studio' (hahahhahaahhahahha).



This door shows where we come in to our apartment. You can also see the fridge, the large cupboards, and (much to Ryan's delight) a large bookshelf. I grabbed one shelf for myself, and i am sure he is working towards filling the rest of them.



Here is our bathroom. Note the nice tiling on the floor and walls. It looks new. All the floor s look new here. As well, you can kinda see in the mirror, there is a really nice wood roof in there too. What there is not is a 'shower area'. Note the drain on the floor. Oh well, it is a really nice bathroom none the less, with a 'natural rain' falling style faucet thing (that isn't in the picture it's higher up.



While out looking for sheets that day (and we found them!) i walked by a market stall that sold fruit. Oranges are EVERYWHERE here. I am 90% sure that they are in season or something. Every fruit seller has them by the bucketload. However, this seller had bags of kumquats for sale. I love kumquats, but back at home they were REALLY expensive. The bag i picked up would have been about 15 or so dollars. However, here, there was a very friendly fruit seller, who had a great display for 2$! How could i resist? Sarah Evans, wherever you are, i bought these kumquats thinking of you. (For those who do not know what a kumquat is, they are a delicious mini citrous fruit. They are kind of like a christmas orange with their peel. However, the peel is sweet, and the flesh inside is VERY sour. You eat a kumquat by popping the whole thing in your mouth, peel and all. Watch out for seeds :).



This picture shows my kitchen. Note the tiny fridge and the complete lack of any counter space. However, also not the washing machine! The sink is very large, which is nice. The horse head came over to be part of the fun.





This picture was taken standing beside the fridge. You can see my art area, the door to the bedroom, the desk, and the 'studio area'. You can also see an opening beside the bedroom, which deepens to the bathroom and is also where the kitchen table will go.

Here is the bedroom. And Ryan! And the horse head! The really nice, king sized bed came with the place.



Here's where i'm storing all my art supplies. This desk also came with the place. Once we have a chair, it will also be our laptop computing desk.





Beads! I couldn't resist showing the awesome little containers i got for them at a nearby shop today.



More art stuff... I created little papers for storing all my various ribbons, in the cd rack.




Well, today, the plan is to go to Namdaemun to do some shopping around, and then to hang out with Ryan's friend Mike. Wish me luck finding a cheap drill!