Korea, taxis and TV's

On Saturday my wife and I took a taxi to go somewhere to try and fix my broken laptop. To no avail. But the trip was not uneventful. The driver had one of the TV's/hard drives that are increasingly common in taxis these days. During our ride the driver proceded to change the channel he was watching (whilst driving!) several times. At one stage he was flicking through the hard drive trying to find the music videos he wanted to see. We didn't crash - it was a Saturday afternoon, luckily not at night - but I was amazed at how this is legal.


I've posted about this before I think, but how can these things not distract the driver? I'm not a big fan of a lot of drivers here. Even if most are good behind the wheel there are a lot that take the mickey with the things they do, like using their phones while driving, people parking oin the pavement with no thought of pedestrians and those who stop to go to the corner store and leave their engines on. This is worse as surely it affects the drivers ability to drive safely. I know bad driving is a worldwide thing but I don't get this fad.

Lunar New Year in Tokyo

Over the past four years or so I've been lucky to have been to some great places such as Vancouver, Hong Kong, Thailand, Beijing, Seoul, London and Daegu. Only kidding, London's a dump. A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to spend four days in Tokyo.

The first thing you have to come to terms with is that in such a short space of time you can only, just, scratch the surface. Tokyo is huge and even if I lived there for a number of years I still don't think I could say I know the place. There is a lot to see and discover. Tokyo is also grand. Things operate very differently from both England and Korea.

February felt like a decent time to go to Japan. Not too cold and certainly not hot, however from my research April/May would seem to be the best time to visit due to the famous cherry blossoms. If I could make the trip again then I would wish to go during Spring.

There are two airports in Tokyo, Narita and Haneda. My wife and I were unable to get a flight from Daegu, Busan or Incheon that arrived at Haneda (Narita is new like Incheon but is further from the centre than Haneda) so we had to fly from Gimpo which is in Seoul. Haneda airport and Gimpo are similar but are limited which made me appreciate what a great airport Incheon really is and fully deserved of those international airport of the year awards.

We arrived in Japan at around 3pm and took a coach to Shinjuku where we were staying. The trip should have taken an hour but due to traffic and roadworks took nearly two and by the time of our arrival we were both fairly tired - we had to get up early to make our train from Daegu to Seoul. Our hotel was the Shinjuku Washington. The price was not so bad but the room was very small, but that's Japan where space is at a premium.

We figured we'd spend our first night relaxing in the Shinjuku area. At this point I must say that Tokyo really is full of neon signs. Living in Korea for four years has left me to a certain point immune to how they look to people who have never been to Asia. Tokyo is on a different scale to Korea though for neon, it's ubiquitous in the shopping and bar areas and is as striking in person as it is on TV and in images.

We spend a few minutes becoming familiarised with the area surrounding the hotel and then headed for the bars and restaurants. Surrounding the pachinko parlours and stores that seemed familiar to me were some bars that were pretty small, though I don't think they were the Golden Gai bars that I had read about, perhaps next time.

We went into our first bar and I had some fantastic Japanese beer. People who know me will know I detest Korean beer. It is pound for pound the worst in the world. For many years I'd liked Japanese beer but this time I got the chance to sample a great deal. Here is my ranking scale of Japanese beer brands based upon my findings. 1 Suntory, 2 Kirin, 3 Sapporo, 4 Asahi. I didn't try Orion, again, perhaps next time. Of course each company brews many beers, of which I got to try many but Suntory (which is known more for it's spirits) on tap was my favourite with Kirin running it close. If I ever ended up teaching English in Japan I'm pretty sure I'd end up an alcoholic, though a happy one at that!

After sampling some bar food we headed off to eat a more substantial meal. We tried to eat different food every time we ate and sampled many dishes during our four days, but we didn't even scratch the surface. There food is a lot more expensive than in Korea and in smaller portions but like Korea many people seem to eat lots of side dishes. Japanese food has similarities with Korean but the preparation seems to be more delicate and thoughtful - maybe that's an illusion glimpsed on a happy holiday. After drinking more beer we headed back to the hotel ready for a busy day to come.

The next day, Sunday, was Valentines day and we planned for a great day. First we headed to the Shibuya area and started off in what may or may not have been Yoyogi Park. After a while we ended up at the Meiji Shrine. This may have been the highlight of the trip. Certainly we greatly enjoyed ourselves. I must have taken two hundred pictures. Here we saw some nice scenery, interesting buildings and also three or four weddings taking place. The place was busy yet quiet and peaceful. This is definitely one of the places any visitor should go to in Tokyo.

One of the more famous areas seems to be Harajuku. This is an area famous for its shopping and fashion - Takeshita Street (that's a real street). As this was a Sunday we got to see some of the more 'different' fashion statements that come out of Japan, i.e. youngsters dressing up in clothes that nobody else would wear. We got there a little late and I think we missed the more bizarre elements. I could not stop myself from thinking some of these people were attention seeking losers, probably from rich families. Nevertheless, they are free to dress how they like.

Later we spent some time in Omotesandō primarily window shopping. Here we got to see some very expensive things but I managed to pick up some fairly inexpensive souvenirs. It was at this point that my feet started to ache from all the walking I had done. Later we headed back to Shinjuku and went for a nice meal to celebrate the day.

On the Monday the weather took a turn for the worst. It rained almost all the entire day which limited us for the things we could do. To try and make the best out of a bad situation we headed to Odaiba, a large man-made island. Here we spent most of our time window shopping again is some nice, yet uneventful malls. This was perhaps the low point for me.

As day turned to night-time and the rain started to lessen we headed to Shibuya again. It was here that we saw for ourselves the famous crossing area where four cross-walks merge and hundreds of people cross the road simultaneously. It was still raining though so most of my pictures we disappointing but the feeling is one of "wow". This is definitely a place of Tokyo that I want to see again. It's very impressive at night I wonder how it is by day. We found another bar and ate and drank and enjoyed being where we were.

The next day we were very limited because of our flight departure time. We stayed in Shinjuku but headed to a different area where we again relaxed and went shopping. When our time was over we headed off to the airport. In truth I didn't want to head back and it took me a few days to readjust to like back in Daegu and being back at work. Tokyo is a great place but like I said we could only scratch the surface. The see a lot more of the touristy places I'd say you need about seven days or maybe more.

There are many differences between Japan and Korea, too many to mention here. Being my third time I had been there the differences continued to stand out though not as dramatic as before. I will mention some without trying to put down Korea too much. Japan/Tokyo is without a doubt cleaner. There is more grass, more parks and places to enjoy some nature. Traffic seemed to be more patient and respectful of pedestrians. Everything in Japan is FAR more expensive and the sooner you accept that the sooner you can move onto enjoying the place. Architecture, what little I've seen is more interesting. There is a lot of choice, compared to life in Daegu, Korea. There I could buy, look at or do a lot of things I can't here. Life there is different that's for sure. Perhaps Tokyo cannot be compared to the rest of Japan, it being a mega-city of sorts. I intend to go back. There is so much more to do.

A room in Korea: ESL teacher homelife

For most ESL teachers here in Korea their housing is much smaller than where they come from. You usually live alone so there is no need for extra rooms. Life is more spartan than 'we' are used to, but you adapt and get more used to the conditions and the limitations. In my current housing I have one basic room where I live. For better or for worse that is what many teachers have.

I don't consider my home here to be good but as it's just me that lives here I am now used to it. If I had to live here for the rest of my life I would probably go mad in my little 'Korean padded cell' though. Of course I have a bathroom and a kitchen too, but they are pretty small. A few months ago I took this video to show what my apartment looked like. My room has changed a little since then but not a lot. From what I know, some Korean homes are a little similar, just on a larger scale due to there being more than one person living there. If you come to Korea to work, don't expect to live in a palace of a penthouse suite.

Phoning it in. Cultural differences you cannot ignore

Whenever someone asks me what the differences between the UK and Korea/Asia are I try to take some time to think about it. I mention the food, the respect for older people, the education system, the bright neon lights and the poor beer. I usually tell them that there are so many cultural differences but we also have many things in common. After all, are we so different? Then I see things like this, exhibit A.



It hits me straight between the eyes and says Korea is very different from the UK and everywhere else. For good or for bad, for better or for worse. The above is a commercial for a mobile phone starring five pop stars who are the hottest thing in Korea right now. At some later point I may post about how celebrities all across the fame scale attach themselves to whatever product they can for money but for now I will just leave this - some Koreans like to make money and will do whatever they are told to do to a) put coin in their back pocket and b) stay in the public eye and conscience for as long as possible.

Onto exhibit B. Another commercial but for a different phone. Boy do Koreans love phones - possibly more than there children. If you think Koreans rest on their laurels think again. Those boys working so hard to sell those phones came up with something else more preposterous and have four new faces (a new girl group here) with them. I do not know what came first, the commercial or the phone. I'm lying, it must be the phone and the 'song' is a real song not a thirty second snippet. So essentially they wrote a song to promote a phone. Split the cash for this one nine ways and whatever they got can't be much especially when their agents take their piece of the pie.



The quality is poor for the above clip so just to reinforce the point click here to see what one of the singers is prepared to wear as long as you slip money into his pockets. I struggle to think of an amount of number someone would have to pay me to wear that. When questioning my students, adoring fans of the singers, they just say it's "Big Bang's style". God bless the girls in my classes who swim against the tide and say they don't like or understand the fashion of these Justin Timberlake wannabe's.

Korea's history is long and proud. 5,000 years of hard work, tradition and culture, pride and achievement, war and bloodshed has culminated in this! It's a free country these days here and people are allowed to make money, but when you do a commercial as this surely you have no artistic credibility left. There is nothing wrong at all with the clips, the people in it, or the culture/fashion etc etc. But right now it's a slice of Korea, like it or not and it's very different to Western culture.