DMZ Trip

This was one of the trips I have been most excited for since I have been here.  We booked an all inclusive tour that provided everything from transportation to meals.  The only downside of the tour was how early we have to wake up.  The first place we went to was the 3rd tunnel.  This was one of the tunnels that the North Koreans attempted to make to have a surprise attack on Seoul.  The South Koreans discovered the tunnel when it was about to reach the Southern border of the DMZ.

I am sorry that I couldn't get a better photo.  They didn't allow pictures at the tunnel or inside the tunnel.  They cart us down inside the tunnel and that tunnel is small.  They say it is 2 meters by 2 meters, but I swear that thing was much smaller.  The biggest attraction was that there is a sign that lets you know you are officially in the DMZ.  I had to crouch walk 200 meters to get there but it was worth it.  After the tunnel, we headed off to Dora Observatory.  This is right along the DMZ and allows you to look over into North Korea and see one of the cities they have.  The have binoculars you can rent to see over into the city and you can actually see North Koreans living their lives.  

After the observatory, we headed out to Dorasan Station which is the only station the had a rail line into North Korea.  

After the station, we headed out to Imjingak Park.  It was built around the hope that unification would be possible someday.  And the South Koreans built a bridge they deemed Freedom Bridge into the DMZ that they hoped would one day allow both sides to freely cross over.  

Buddha's Birthday Adventures

This Monday we had a school holiday for Buddha's birthday (a coincidence that it match up with Memorial Day).  Some of my friends and I decided to head out to Bukchon village.  This is the technically historical district in Seoul.  We started off by running into one of the most prestigious high schools in all of Seoul and decided to give ourselves a little tour.

I only got a picture of the main building.  The campus is centered around a gymnasium which is connected to an outdoor soccer stadium.  There are 4 or 5 buildings that stretch around the stadium and then this building sits in front of all of it looking over everything else.  It is pretty amazing considering it is just a high school. After seeing the school,  we went and explored the rest of the village.  

We ended up walking into the most famous street of the village. 

This street shows up in a lot of tv shows and movies and is quite the tourist attraction.  

Afterward, we headed out to Namsan Tower.  This tower is known for the locks that people put on top of the tower.  To get up to the tower, you either have to pay for a cable car or walk the 1000 steps up.  As good college students, we decided to be cheap and just walk.  I am not going to lie.  It sucked, but the views were unbelievable.  

The way the locks work is you buy the lock and put your groups' names on it and lock it to other locks already on the tower.  Then you throw away the key forever. 

They only had heart ones so no judgement.  Better than the pink one right?

Celebration Week

Last week was a big week for Korea University.  It was IPSELINTI week which all I really know about it is that it is one big week of celebrating.  Monday was like a huge convention where a lot of outside companies came in an set up booths.  They handed out a lot of free stuff.  There were also some game booths and food tents set up.  On Tuesday, all of the international exchange students ran a fair where every country represented had a table to show off their country's culture and food.  It was fun I guess.  I did not participate in setting up the USA table because of the person they assigned as the leader, and the table was pretty disappointing.  On Wednesday, the big part of the day was the universities' League of Legend (video game) tournament finals.  I have no idea how to play this game, so I had no idea what was going on.  However, the event was pretty hyped, so it was fun nonetheless.

 The best part of the night was the concert afterwards.  EXID is one of the most popular girl Korean pop groups.  They only performed a couple of songs, but they did perform two of their most popular songs: "Ah Yeah" and "Up & Down".
Ah Yeah         Up & Down
I posted links to the songs if you want to hear them.

Thursday was another concert, but I ended up not going because of some homework I had to get down.

On the other hand, Friday was a big day because of the big IPSELINTI concert.  It lasted from 1pm-10pm.  The first part of the concert is the first half of the school celebration songs.  Each song comes with its own dance that all of the students learn as freshman.  The whole concept is kind of hard to understand.  It's like your school has 20 school songs and each one has a dance and you do them at every major school event.  

After the celebration songs, a couple of student bands performed for an hour or so before we did the second half of the celebration songs.  

After this round of songs, the concert part of the evening really began.  There were 3 big headline artists performing.  The first was Orange Caramel.  They are a relatively popular girl pop group, but their most famous member is most known for her acting career than her singing.  They were good nonetheless.  Catallena

My Copycat

I've posted some of their most famous songs too.

The next person to perform was Baek Ji Young.  She is very famous in Korea.  Her career is very rare because she has been a solo pop artist for over 15 years.  Solo artists by themselves do hardly exist in the Korean pop industry, so for her to have a career like hers for so long is pretty amazing.  

Hate

This is her most famous song.  

The finale of the concert was the most exciting performer of all.  This final performer was Psy.  He is known for his world renown song "Gangham Style".  His part of the concert was awesome, and I cannot believe I got the chance to see him in concert at all.  The rest of the artist this week would have been enough but getting to see him was unbelievable.  

Of course, there is no better way to end a "summerish" evening than with fireworks.  

Lotus Lantern Festival

On Saturday, some friends and I headed out to the Lotus Lantern Festival.  This parade is to celebrate Buddha's birthday and is the largest parade in all of Korea.  I have copied a description of all the festivities involved with the parade.

The Lotus Lantern Festival is held every year on April 8th (lunar calendar) in honor of Buddha's Birth. The festival is preceded by hanging of lotus-shaped lanterns across Seoul for several weeks, and officially kicks off with lighting of the Jangeumdang, a large lantern that symbolizes Buddhism and Buddha's Birthday, at the Seoul Plaza. The celebration continues with a wide array of Buddhist programs and activities, before ending with an impressive lantern parade in the heart of Seoul.

The festival was a lot of fun, and it was pretty unbelievable how many lanterns there were and how excited people are for this event.  I did not know when I left for the parade, but this parade is one of the most famous in the world.  I was completely surprised by the amount of tourists that came out to see the event (especially the western ones).  

FC Seoul

This Saturday we headed out to the second biggest sporting event in Seoul, a FC Seoul soccer game.  FC Seoul is the most historic team in the country with the most wins and best players.  Unfortunately, the game we went to was against a very bad team and over a holiday weekend, so the stadium was not very full.

Our seats were only 14,000 won ($13) and were very good seats for the price.  The game ended 1-1 with a very exciting first half.  The second half was extremely boring but it was fun to get out and experience a soccer game in another country.  

Post-Midterm Relaxation

Sorry again for not having any posts up the last few weeks.  I was very busy studying for midterms which are a very big deal here.  In the US, I had never really had a true midterm before, and I have never really had a final or test worth more than 20% of my final grade.  All of my midterms were worth at least 35% of my final grade, so I have never felt the pressure on an exam like I did this past week.  I think I did pretty well on all of them (I already got one score back which was a 92 so yay!).
The first thing I did after getting done with finals was head out to Insadong to go hit some baseball in the batting cages as a stress release.  After this, we went to eat one of the most famous mandu (dumplings) in Seoul.

The rest of the day was spent on relaxing, so we did not really do anything until Saturday.  On Saturday, we all decided to go with some Korean buddies of ours and go see the Cherry blossoms that just started to bloom in Seoul.  

A funny thing that happened during our time at the cherry blossoms was one of my roommates, Lei, decided to take my hat, and he called himself a true Chinese gangster (he's Chinese).  

After a long day looking at the flowers. we decided to relax and cool down at the movie theater to see Avengers: Age of Ultron which had just been released.  This movie was extremely packed because a good part of the movie was filmed in Seoul.  It was really cool to get to see some of the buildings and areas I have explored show up on the big screen.  

To end the night, we decided to do one of the most Korean things we could do..... a face mask.  These are all the rage in Korea.  Most Koreans actually do 5-6 of these masks a week to keep their complexion.  

It was kind of hard to use with my facial hair, but my face felt great after nonetheless.  

Oppa Gangham Style

Today, I was the one that planned the activities for the day.  So, today we spent the day in Gangham-gu (yes that Gangham).  We started the day off in the COEX mall which is the biggest mall in Seoul.

This mall is huge.  Its has 4 atrium and plazas, so many stores, a cinema, and an aquarium (in a mall).  The reason we were here was the aquarium.  We started out by wandering up one side of the mall on our way to the aquarium and maybe finding a place to eat lunch.  We ended up in the food court, and it was pretty interesting how it worked.  The food court has about 10 restaurants, and the food court is closed off and the only entrances have these huge touch screens. 

 You order and pay at the touch screen.  

After paying, you get a ticket that has your order on it.  

Then, you get a text alert saying your meal is ready, go turn in your ticket, and you have your food.  

After lunch, we headed off to the aquarium.  

It was a pretty standard aquarium, but they did have the largest individual tank in the world or Asia.  Sorry, I didn't get any pictures of it. I was not thinking about it.  Next, we walked back past the other side of the mall before going to the Hyundai Department Store.  

This is a 9 story tall department store full of everything and anything you can think of.  This place was absolutely unbelievable.  

After this, we went to Samsung headquarters and played around in their "Samsung d'light" which is a place they have that lets you mess around with all of the stuff they are making and developing there.  

The coolest thing they had there was a prototype virtual reality headset to try on.  

The program I did was a city tour of some of the world's most famous cities, and it was pretty realistic for the most part.  Exciting to see where they take this in the future.  I did buy something at the store they had because I could help myself.  

It only cost me 5,000 won ($4.60).  

It is actually a 8 GB flash drive.  I though this thing was pretty cool.